Mm... my birthdays are usually kind of a mixed bag.

[Sometimes they're good. Last year was nice, just a comfortable gathering of friends. And sometimes they're a reminder of everything he's born to be and born to lose, like the political events back home where he's more of a holiday than a person to celebrate. This one's worse, even if he knows he'll see Ignis again. (Even if Ignis will never see him again.) The moments they have here are borrowed, extra gifts when a decade-long separation awaits them back home. He's lucky to have had them with him for so long. He knows, he knows that, but...]

I think this year, I'd rather forget. Got enough bad memories to carry around with me.

[Not just his own, either. And she knows about that already.]