22 replies to this topic

[jonuiuc]

This is gutwrenching.

[Purple Library Guy]

I feel sorry for the childhood friend girl.  Well, either way, but assuming Miyazono dies.  There she'll be picking up the pieces, and how is she supposed to top that?  If Miyazono lived she could have competed for him and lost, or competed for him and somehow eventually won, and that would be that.  But now Miyazono's ghost will be in the background forever saying "He loved me more than you; you only have him by default and his heart is still with me."  Even if someday he loves her for real, it'll be hard for her to feel that.

[Comadrin]

One has to feel sorry for the childhood friend, as dense and used to running away from her feelings as she is.  I thought, however, that it was one of the best and most realistic stories I've come across in a very long time about two girls loving the same boy (remember that they are in the last year of middle school).   Kousei undoubtedly loves Tsubaki, but he's in love with Kaori.  Kaori definitely had an inside track, as her free spirit and playing style personifies, in many ways, what he loves most about music.  She also speaks the same musical language he does and lives in the same world; something he doesn't share with his two childhood friends (I know how much that means, as I only had three friends in my 20 years in the military that were interested in the same things I am).  As they grow older together, he may fall in love with Tsubaki, as she has a lot of growing up to do.  I've known many people who have had an intense first love and lost that person, who have gone on to have another fulfilling love, while never forgetting their first love.  If that happens for Tsubaki, it will be because she grows out of her inferiority complex.  Is unrequited love sad?  Hell, yes, but any real love enriches the life of the one who loves.

 

Side note:  I really lost it emotionally when Kaori's last words were quoting Marcie from Peanuts.