I do kinda think that Fuyuki was also assuming Eri is straight; from her point of view Eri rejected a girl she was actually close to but then shortly afterward she got her first boyfriend and proceeded to say yes to most guys that asked her out, including Kyou. She may not believe that Eri was homophobic, but she has zero reason to think she's anything but straight.
Kono Koi wo Hoshi ni wa Negawanai - Vol. 5 Ch. 22
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Yeah - I went back and re-read the chapter again because I was certain I'd misunderstood/misremembered what had happened (and I was right in that, natch).
And I also think Eri is straight, hence why I am interested to see what she does in the next chapter, in terms of what she's willing/prepared to do if she intends to try and keep Fuyuki innher life like I suspect is her overall aim.
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You're correct about the first kiss, but the main issue remains unchanged. Even that kiss from Eri followed a significant buildup centered on how her two friends were concealing things and acting on her throughout the manga, leaving her constantly scrambling. At that point, because she'd been kept in the dark, she ended up stumbling into things while trying to wrap her head around these sudden changes and keep Fuyuki close to her. Then Fuyuki, understanding what happened, added on to the issue with her sudden second kiss days later.
That's part of the "bumping into things in the dark" analogy I made in my earlier comment. Eri stumbles into a mess because information is kept from her to serve others' interests, but the core problems of the manga would be solved if her friends were honest with her--and as this chapter showed, they know this. So even when Fuyuki is upset with Eri, it feels a bit hollow considering she's essentially blaming her friend for a situation her friend did not really cause. Eri can not be blamed for what she does not know, and certainly can't be blamed by the person who is the reason for her not knowing.
Having said that, Fuyuki isn't a villain either. She's great. Her actions are understandable given her circumstances, but Eri is now caught in a double bind, and it's happening suddenly. That was the point of my list of events around her that you commented on. Regardless of the order, that's a lot of stuff happening. Beyond that, she's been nothing but a good friend. I focused on explaining and defending her because, as you said, she gets this super weird treatment in the comments, so I didn't see a need to protect Fuyuki (even though the manga has been very clear about which two people are most at "fault" for this mess).
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Damn uhm... I guess it's because he technically didn't successfully do anything, and in this conversation, he downgraded himself and his feelings so much and kinda swore to himself never to touch Eri again, that's why I can forgive him but not thinking highly of him
But then again... Fuyuki also did force a kiss on Eri.... the 2 scenes between Kyou and Fuyuki kinda similar, they tried to do the same thing, kissing out of rage
I also dont think Fuyuki would see someone as a brother if he assaulted Eri, but like as in, FOR REAL assault, Eri rejected him quick, and he also backed to his sanity quick right after
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The angst, the drama is just so well done. If the author can land the ending, this manga will be counted among the top yuri works of all time for me.
Eri is not a horrible monster, but she's not blameless either. She was too possessive of Fuyuki, to the point of getting jealous despite not dating her. It's like she wanted to keep her cake and eat it too. You can't have it both ways.
Hopefully, she won't try to tie Fuyuki down anymore. If Eri can not date Fuyuki, which is fine, she must be clear about it and let Fuyuki go. It would break Fuyuki's heart but it will be for the better in the long run.
Hopefully, she won't try to tie Fuyuki down anymore. If Eri can not date Fuyuki, which is fine, she must be clear about it and let Fuyuki go. It would break Fuyuki's heart but it will be for the better in the long run.
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Yep, Itou and Kisaki's mom, of course /s
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Yeah we gotta get those two
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I really think it depends on how much Eri wants to keep Fuyuki in her life.
If that's her core aim, I could see her trying to force romantic feelings, in the hope that she could "fake it 'til she made it", in order to try and hold onto Fuyuki.
That carries the potential of either actually working out and them having a happy relationship where Eri grows to develop genuine romantic love over time, or she cannot make it work, which risks a double-dose of heartbreak for the both of them and would likely irreparably destroy any chance of them being in one another's lives at that point.
That, or she could try and not be so jealously possessive of Fuyuki, with the understanding that Fuyuki will have romantic partners in the future, and that Eri necessarily cannot be her #1 for forever. If she can stomach that, I could see Fuyuki being able to maybe let her feelings go and maintain a friendship (she's basically done that this whole time already, just in an unhealthy way, and doing so now in a healthy fashion means keeping her best friend). But again, if Eri discovers she can't not be Fuyuki's most important person, the same heartbreak/split happens, just without the attempted romantic relationship.
I feel like Eri's main goal is Fuyuki remaining with her in some capacity. Starting in middle school, she became so dependent on Fuyuki that their roles sort of flipped from childhood, which I'm sure contributed to Eri becoming possessive and jealous of her, and seeming to be selfish in always depending on her in a manner that seemed hurtful to Fuyuki (because Eri was never made aware of Fuyuki's feelings toward her, and Fuyuki just...went along with it all because it meant she stayed close to Eri, and that was "good enough" for the moment). Whatever their complicated circumstances and Fuyuki's refusal to say anything for so long, they both cherish one another, and Eri just as much as Fuyuki, if in a different context.
So I do think it would be odd if anything but Eri trying to repair their friendship happened in The Talk. The question for me becomes what Eri will be willing to do in order to make that happen, and whether Fuyuki can stomach that eventual decision (willing to try and date Eri, or willing to let her feelings go and be friends again, or if those are both untenable in light of everything that's happened).
I think the problem is that a lot of this would've happened even if Fuyuki was in a "real" relationship. Like, everything around Eri's birthday was Fuyuki and Kyou being weird and dishonest, but the final straw for Eri that eventually leads to the kiss is seeing Fuyuki and Kisaki kissing during a private moment. It wasn't just about her being misled and confused, she had a possessive streak that she never had to confront. And it's worth mentioning that the series kicks off with Eri trying to keep her relationship with Kyou a secret from Fuyuki, so I can't really see her as someone who's just trying to navigate her friends' dishonesty.
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Eri is absolutely not a blameless victim in all of this, but I think what the others here are saying is that she was nowhere near so "bad / villainous" to warrant the proportional amount of relative vitriol that has been pointed at her in the posts under each chapter here, compared to the other two / other characters of the story.
None of them are the "bad guy" of this story. But I suspect that, because Fuyuki is our lens into the story, some readers ascribe more sympathy to her and--valid or otherwise--her issues with Eri thus get colored in that framework of "oh she's making our lens character sad therefore she's in the wrong".
Especially if they stop there and don't consider the lens character's actions in the context of the story - additionally so if you think of Fuyuki-as-narrator as not wanting to paint herself in a bad light and having been the one in the wrong (at least until she explicitly admits her faults in this most recent chapter).
I don't know if that's precisely what happened, but I've seen it occur in fandoms/communities following a single media before, so it makes sense that it might be the case in this instance as well.
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Yes, that's exactly it. I was going to reply, but you said what I would have said in different words.
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I don't know if she's straight. I just don't think she's had to think about any of this before, but her two friends' actions have forced a lot of quick decisions that she's regretted. She's very young and inexperienced, so even if she considered herself straight, this whole situation could easily have revealed some things to her.
It wouldn't be outlandish for her to recognize her attachment to Fuyuki as being more than platonic. I also wouldn't blame her for being unsure. This is all happening very quickly. Unlike Fuyuki, Eri hasn't had years of considering her sexuality like that, so her not having clean answers wouldn't be a cop-out. From Fuyuki's perspective, I'm not sure she'll want to wait, though. We'll see.
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That's very true. This has been a weird Yuri manga where the "two FL characters" aren't actually together (and one seems to have only ever dated guys), so trying to play the "oh is she even gay" game is a fool's errand, now I think about it.
That and definitive, absolute statements are silly and I should be more careful about making them (irony aside here and now).
I know you saw my other comment about what might go down in The Talk so I won't repeat it all here, but I do admit that I worry over the fact that whatever Eri's orientation is might ultimately not end up mattering because there's a chance the things they want from the other are too different to be compatible.
I wanna hope, and I'm comforted by the fact that whatever happens it's likely to be a lovingly told story that's worth the potential heartache, but.
If that's what Eri is most concerned about, then she didn't learn anything. The most important thing Kizaki told Eri is that she wants Fuyuki to be happy:
https://mangadex.org/chapter/e24fb62a-9325-412e-9576-97af15e54705/18
Well, that should be the freaking point. If Eri can make Fuyuki happy, because she realized she loves her romantically, then by all means, she should go out with Fuyuki. If she can't, because she doesn't love her romantically, then she should let Fuyuki go. Either option is fine. What is not okay is to try keep Fuyuki as a friend. That should be out of the question, imo. Because that won't make Fuyuki happy; that would only hurt her more. That should be clear to Eri at this point because now she knows how Fuyuki feels about her. Being in the dark about Fuyuki's feelings is not a valid excuse anymore.
Right now, Eri is well aware that trying to keep Fuyuki as a friend would only benefit Eri herself, and if that's all she wants, what was the point of talking to Kizaki at all? What was the point of trying to learn more about Fuyuki? She should be able to look beyond her own needs now, or at least I want to believe so. We'll see.
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I'm mostly basing my thoughts on Eri's resolve toward Fuyuki upon her last words with Kisaki in the previous chapter. About how, if Fuyuki still thinks about her, Eri doesn't want to give up on her.
Yes, she does seem to have internalized what Kisaki said about "I just want Fuyuki to be happy" - but that's also Kisaki's explicit wish, reflecting what Fuyuki said about her before. I absolutely think Eri feels the same in general, but she also has a history of attachment and depth of bond to Fuyuki that Kisaki doesn't, and it goes both ways in a much bigger way that Fuyuki and Kisaki's relationship did.
That, and Eri is possessive of Fuyuki. Always has been, and I have to think she would not want to let Fuyuki go without trying everything else first - even if that potentially hurt her best friend in the end. If that takes the form of forcing romantic feelings that she might not currently have in the hopes they naturally develop, or if that takes the form of learning to be okay with "not always being Fuyuki's #1" and just being good friends but keeping her in Eri's life, then I think both of those are viable options, assuming Fuyuki is okay with them.
They both run the risk of backfiring, of course, over time. But Eri just letting Fuyuki go, has the greater potential of hurting them both in the here and now.
And it's not just Eri's decision to make, and Fuyuki will be a part of the dialogue in the Planetarium. I think she'd also grasp at any opportunity to keep Eri in her life, however messed up their relationship is now - she found common ground and was able to rebuild a bit with Kyou, and Eri is arguably more important, at least in certain ways, to her.
So it depends on if she can let go over her feelings for Eri and be "just friends" like it's always been, or if she trusts that Eri could develop romantic feelings (if they're not already starting) and thus would try a relationship with her. Do I think that being "just friends" would be hurtful? Likely. But I think that's something that she has to decide for herself at that point, and whatever Eri thinks or thinks she knows right now isn't as relevant in how she chooses to go about this conversation.
But walking away from each other strikes me as a worst-case option that would only happen if this conversation goes very south, because it doesn't fit either motivation for their characters up to this point, unless they realize the only option is choosing certain pain now to avoid potential pain later, or something.
Reminder that the series starts with Kyou going to a wedding, not his own. If it's not Eri/Fuyuki, I'm not sure what it could be.
As for Eri, I'm guessing she's homoromantic and kind of non-repulsed asexual. She's gone out with a lot of guys but has she shown strong physical desire for anyone, ever? (Besides clinging to Fuyuki.) Legit question, I don't have the whole series in my memory.
In which case Fuyuki is the best person for Eri; whether Eri would be good enough for Fuyuki's desires is another matter.
Fuyuki does think about Eri, in a romantic way. I doubt Eri is fool enough to forget about that little detail. Specially if she indeed doesn't want to give up on her.
Regardless of their history together, Fuyuki stopped running away and confessed her feelings. That's the context here. It's in that context that Kizaki said she wants Fuyuki to be happy. And it's in that context that Eri must provide an answer. Trying to keep the old status quo instead of properly responding to Fuyuki's confession would be a huge disrespect to Fuyuki's feelings. Fuyuki mustered her courage and confessed, even though she was really afraid. She still is. But she stopped running way and confessed. The least Eri can do is to give a proper answer. It's either yes or no. No middle ground. The friendship thing is the old status quo. It's the past. It's what caused all this trouble. It's Eri trying to have her cake and eat it too. It's time to make a real choice.
That would be fine for the old Eri who didn't know anything. But Eri should have changed. After learning how she unwittingly hurt Fuyuki all this time. After learning more about Fuyuki from Kizaki. She should have changed. If she didn't, I would call that a bad ending. It would mean she's really selfish, and I personally want to think she's not like that.
We'll have to agree to disagree on this. I simply don't think Fuyuki would accept going back to the old status quo. If Eri offered dating Fuyuki to test the waters, without being totally sure about her feelings, Fuyuki might accept that. But "just friends" is out of the question imo. I don't think Fuyuki would accept that at all. Besides, it would negate the whole story. It would mean no one learned anything. And I don't think this is that kind of story.
I could see a world where Fuyuki stays just friends with Eri. Maybe not in a "I'll drop everything for you and pick out your underwear for date nights" way, but a firm rejection might make her realize it's not the end of the world and she can move on. Whether Eri would be ok with that is a different story, but I think her talk with Kisaki has made her think critically about her existing relationship with Fuyuki.
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