Young love is one of the hardest things to deal with – and one of the things our parents least prepare us for.
What They Say:
Yuki continues to gather stickers for his plate. However, his points have stagnated since the boys stopped rotating “sticker duty.” While Yuki has kept in touch with Kayo, who also collects stickers, when he learns she plans to quit working in the cafeteria, their conversations run dry.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
You & Me continues it slow but steady progress with this set of characters, though the previous episode wasn’t all that interesting since it focused on a new character a lot and largely sidelined the main cast. With this episode, the focus shifts back to Yuki for the majority of it and calls back to an earlier story in the series with Kayo, the young woman who works in the cafeteria. It also ties back to that same story that dealt with the stickers that Yuki collected in which she started to give him some of them for his collection. His interest in her was obvious back then, even in his own closed way, but it’s taking some interesting turns here.
While he’s doing what he can to get a little closer to her in a very roundabout way, he discovers from her that she’s not going to be there much longer, having gotten a job at a hair salon where she can do what she really wants to do. She’s kind of offhanded about it, saying he needs to start finding a new place to get additional stickers, but there’s a strange mixture of sadness and tiredness about it as the two talk. Kayo even gets pretty tense about it at one point and snaps at him, which shuts him down pretty quickly unfortunately. He’s plenty used to dealing with his friends, but this feels different to him and the small but cutting remarks just hit him very personally.
Because of this, when the days go on before she leaves, Yuki ends up cutting his time there with her in a big way, enough so that she notices and questions him on it since he hasn’t gotten his food there. With the others checking in before that with Kayo to understand it and this, it’s made clear just how much this is getting to Yuki in his very restrained way. You know that this kind of treatment has to get dealt with in some way, but it’s how it’s done as the two reconcile just a little while understanding there is a problem here. Yuki does try to man up here in a good way, but you can tell there’s difficulty with it as he tries to encourage someone he likes to leave where he can see her. Though it may be for the best in the long run, since it gives them a touch more space and a way that he can now try to see her.
In Summary:
You & Me is the kind of series that definitely takes a certain kind of mood to be in to watch, to let the small moments be what they are and enjoy the characters and their situations. It’s not a show with big, radical changes but rather the slice of life piece that works like slice of life should; realistic situations, measured responses and a longing to be more than one is. The story focusing on Yuki and Kayo is really well done here as you can completely understand where Yuki is coming from and how much it’s getting to him, having known his personality for as long as we have now, but also getting to see a sliver of Kayo as well and what potential may really be there. The show continues to leave a small but welcome impact on me with every episode.
Grade: B
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
