Things start off a little rough with Koito and it gets even worse for her. The confession from her senpai last time still weighs on her mind, but the duties of being a campaign manager are even worse. She has a lot of demanding duties to do. Also, the news of Koito being the campaign manager hurts the feelings of Sayaka-senpai. But Koito’s conflicts get even worse when she gets a surprise kiss from Nanami and it twists her thoughts into mush.
I’m afraid we might step into love triangle territory. If I hadn’t gotten the visuals from the OP, I would have thought that Sayaka being dejected was simply because she’s been Nanami’s friend for such a long time and has always been by her side. Her hurt from Nanami appointing Koito as campaign manager is completely understandable. Your best friend only met this girl a few days ago, and she chooses this girl over you? That is kind of shitty, and it was pretty shitty that Nanami didn’t talk to her about it first. If I were in Sayaka’s shoes, I’d be pretty pissed off too. It’s like all that trust you built up went out the window for some random girl. But in the end, Nanami assures their trust and friendship is deep and real so Sayaka gives in and happily helps out Koito with the speech she has to make. But like I said, I think there might be a love triangle with Sayaka and it’s the OP that hinted that. Right now I can’t tell how Sayaka really feels about Nanami since we don’t know her well, but the part in the OP where Nanami walks away from her outstretched arm, and because this is anime, there just might be a love triangle to spice things up. Who knows, or maybe she’ll just be the best friend that feels left out which is another very real scenario.
Koito has her own issues that seem to just pile on and on. She asks Nanami about the other day and reassures Nanami that she probably didn’t mean it in a weird way. Weird, as in, romantic because lol they’re both girls, there’s just no way right? Also, she’s not the type of person to fall in love. But that makes Nanami stop in her tracks, turn around and kiss Koito. That particular scene was nicely directed as their kiss was covered by the train with time totally stopping in that moment, focusing on them. The colors were nice as well.
But this just makes things really awkward for Koito the whole episode. The next day, Nanami makes sure to tell Koito that that wasn’t the reason why she chose her as manager, though I’m guessing that was a small reason. The main reason was using Koito, a first year, to round up interest among the rest of the first years to have interest in her and vote for her. They agree to continue on, but Koito has conflicting feelings. She didn’t hate the kiss, actually. But it’s actually much worse in that she didn’t feel a single thing after the kiss either. No sparkles, no bubbles, no floaty feeling, nothing. She ends up holding Nanami’s hand and notices her blushing and it brings back to what Koito thought made her and Nanami similar, which is that the right person hasn’t come around to make her heart flutter. But this time, Koito is that person but Koito doesn’t feel the same. Thinking they were the same, now she thinks they’re different and is selfishly disappointed in herself for having selfish expectations of Nanami. She feels really down and lonely. I really like that the story is going in this direction. I would have thought that Koito would have started realizing her feelings for Nanami after that kiss, but instead it’s the opposite and I really like that. It feels a lot more realistic this way.
The cafe scene in the end was another intimate moment where Nanami outright says she won’t ask Koito to go out with her, but that she’ll still love her anyway. Koito finds it unfair but still says she doesn’t mind. Maybe it’s just me, but maybe I would have liked the scene better if Koito had actually said what she wanted to say, which was telling Nanami that she can’t fall in love with her. It probably would have made the scene a lot more powerful, but that would also make Nanami understand that the love is very much unrequited right now. But, it was fine.
Koito seems to be having a lot of issues coming to terms with everything that has happened so far. They’re both girls, it’s a little weird, and she just didn’t feel anything and it depresses her. I wonder what’s going to happen to Koito to really change her mind in all this?
“Your best friend only met this girl a few days ago, and she chooses this girl over you? That is kind of shitty, and it was pretty shitty that Nanami didn’t talk to her about it first.”
This happens when you develop special feeling towards someone you just met. This has nothing to do with people around you. Fearing what others feel about your actions would ultimately result to missed opportunities and regret. I can totally understand why Nanami choose to not tell her friend.