I don't really understand the last few pages. What does Yura (?) mean on page 41 when she tells Koma that "she's not her problem" and "she's being looked down on". Why is she calling her a coward when the train doors are closing ?
Koma and Yura are childhood friends, but Yura didn't get into the same high school as Koma, and is bullied by her new classmates, with no one to stand up for her. The bullying gets worse and worse, to the point where Yura stutters more and more and can no longer attend school. Yura sends increasingly frantic signals to Koma that she needs urgent help throughout the year, but Koma is too comfortable with her own legitimately good high school life to intervene. Instead of helping her friend with her problems, she just wants them to go away on their own, while simultaneously bottling up her feelings for Yura. In the end, Yura basically says, come with me or I will drown myself, and Koma is still unable to bring herself to reach out to her, because even acknowledging that her friend is suicidal would demolish any illusion of a proper high school life she wants so badly. The seawater IMO represents Koma's feeling of helplessness, rather than outright depression.
It's quite a common story, unfortunately. For example, a lot of folks don't accept that climate change is real and think that if they believe in the good old ways hard enough, all the excess CO2 will just go away on its own. I believe that climate change comparison was very much intended by the author, or they wouldn't chosen to highlight that particular end of the world scenario in the opening scene.
last edited at Mar 24, 2024 5:28PM