Christmas Eve
🧵
iori chats with yuka, deciding whether to reconcile with ichitaka. izumi tracks him to his classroom. in the stairwell, as she talks with ichitaka, her ex-boyfriend physically drags her away. ichitaka steps out and runs into iori. izumi and her ex argue loudly nearby.
with iori fanning the flames, the two guys nearly come to blows.
"kick his butt, ichitaka!" — iori's instigation is really cute.
"kick his butt, ichitaka!" — iori's instigation is really cute.
iori's grades probably aren't great, but she's very intelligent -- it's just that theater and performance consume most of her time and energy. her life plan has always been to pursue acting, so it's completely natural that she doesn't prioritize academics.
that evening ichitaka goes home to study. iori, still at school, helps izumi call him (iori is genuinely chaotic, helping her rival like this lol). the underclassmen are pulling all-nighters at school preparing for the cultural festival, and izumi asks ichitaka to come help.
he arrives at 7:45. walks into the classroom and catches izumi mid-change. walks out the classroom door and runs into her ex-boyfriend. the melodrama never stops.
playful iori
continuing that same night. things escalate. it's a full-on confrontation, the "boyfriend" beating the "other man." iori watches the entire spectacle from outside the door. the classmates immediately crowd outside to spectate.
the ex-boyfriend claims he's always treasured izumi. it's quite possible he never actually slept with her precisely because she was "special" her -- and that's why he sought out other women. and that's why izumi wanted to break up.
ichitaka sucks tho, siding with the boyfriend who's physically manhandling izumi and still controlling even when they're not together.
iori is still watching from outside the door. when the scene becomes a total disaster, ichitaka declares there's nothing between him and izumi, says he already has someone he likes, and advises izumi and her ex to get back together.
could iori's expression be read as shock? perhaps she interprets "someone i like" as meaning ichitaka is still in love with itsuki. the shadow itsuki left on iori's psyche is deep enough that she'd default to this reading.
in the live-action version, iori looks at ichitaka's face and gives a satisfied smile during the physical confrontation. there's something telling about that : she's watching a man get hurt on her behalf and finding it affirming.
they leave at 8:35 pm. six and a half hours later, at 3:00 am, izumi shows up at ichitaka's house in the pouring rain. fujimigaoka to nishi-eifuku is 2.6 kilometers, about a half-hour walk. walking through a downpour at 3 am for a boy who just told you he likes someone else.
izumi still has feelings for ichitaka, which is why she came over to his place. the pattern repeats: women in this story pour enormous emotional energy into a man who can never fully reciprocate because he's always split between multiple objects of desire.
ichitaka ultimately rejects izumi again. as compensation, he vaguely promises to make it up to her some other way. izumi proposes a christmas date and invites him to the cultural festival the next day. ichitaka's reply to both invitations: "yeah… if i come."
completely noncommittal. he doesn't go to the cultural festival btw. this is ichitaka's consistent pattern: making women invest emotionally while keeping all his options open. he treats romantic attention as something he's entitled to receive without corresponding obligation.
one week before christmas, december '98. teratani, iori, and morisaki arrange to invite ichitaka to spend christmas together. izumi refuses to let go of their promise and sets a meeting time of 7:00 pm.
people constantly project deeply subjective fantasies onto others, even people they know well, and these fantasies distort their behavior and damage their own interests.
ichitaka doesn't see iori as she actually is, he sees the version of her that exists in his head. but nowhere in the series does any character actively recognize this pattern, guard against it, or try to correct for it.
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