Character sheet of Adachi and Shimamura.
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Hougetsu Shimamura
Voiced by: Miku Itō (Japanese), Amanda Lee (English)
One of the main characters. A high school first-year student who tends to skip classes, which is how she met Adachi. She has better social skills than Adachi, but secretly thinks that socializing is troublesome.
- Adaptation Dye-Job: Her eyes are purple in the anime, rather than brown like in the Light Novel.
- Affectionate Nickname: Tarumi calls her "Shima-chan" since they were small.
- Birds of a Feather: The main reason she and Adachi bonded over so quickly. Both of them, for their own reasons, have trouble socializing and frequently try to be alone because of that.
- Blunt "Yes": She gives one after challenging Adachi's mother to an endurance contest in the sauna, with the latter being obligated to be a better mother if she loses.Mrs. Adachi: Is this some kind of new petty teenage rebellion?
Shimamura: Yeah, that's basically it. - Can't Hold His Liquor: According to Adachi in the Flash Forward section of Volume 10, apparently she and Shimamura shared drinks to celebrate being legally able to. Adachi could handle it while Shimamura could not, and Adachi would rather not see that side to Shimamura again.
- Closet Key: She was this for Adachi, who didn't realize she was into girls until her Awkwardly Gay Dream with her.
- Cloudcuckoolander: While she is not as bad as Nagafuji, Shimamura can be a bit... weird at times. She comments in her narration in the novels that when she was smaller a teacher wrote in a report card that she was an absent-minded child, and admits this is accurate. The chapters of the novels narrated from her point of view show that her mind can easily wander into weird directions, which can be either relevant philosophical pondering, or just random stuff. She casually compliments Adachi's Lap Pillow, has no problem with or doesn't seem to pick up on any of the more suggestive things she and Adachi say or do to each other, and comes to agree with Nagafuji that a boomerang is a fun gift note .
- Cool Big Sis: She is very nice to her younger sister often playing video games with her. This has made her sister somewhat clingy.
- Dismotivation: The crux of Shimamura's character arc. She doesn't feel motivated about anything, be it school or even interpersonal relationships. While she doesn't dislike other people, she claims that socializing is troublesome and makes no effort to get closer to people or push them away. She just "goes with the flow" and lets her relationships continue or end without much concern. Her Character Development starts when she realizes, thanks to her relationship with Adachi and her awkward reencounter with Tarumi, that there are people from whom she doesn't want to get separated, and actually begins putting some effort when interacting with them.
- Embarrassing Last Name: Dislikes her last name, since it reminds everyone of a fashion storenote , and wishes she was a Shimazaki.
- The Gadfly: Becomes fond of teasing Adachi by reminding her of her more embarrassing moments. Interestingly enough, her mother is an even bigger example, which Shimamura finds to be incredibly childish for an adult woman.
- Gold Digger: Averted. In Volume 08, Adachi offers to pay to cover Shimamura's expenses for a vacation which Shimamura refuses on the grounds that she doesn't want to be a gold digger. She would prefer to do things as equals.
- LGBT Awakening: While she was willing to begin dating Adachi in Volume 06, she doesn't truly come to accept her own feelings for Adachi until Volume 08.
- Lazy Bum: At least at the start of the series, she hardly did anything besides going to school, sometimes skipping class, and then going home to lazy around in her room. She gets better with time.
- Love Confession: She tells Adachi out right she loves her during their second Christmas together in Volume 09.
- Love Epiphany: She has one in Volume 08. Curiously, it happened after she and Adachi started dating. This is because Shimamura's initial reaction to Adachi's Love Confession was to calmly consider whether she would like to date her. While the answer was "yes", she felt a little inadequate when comparing her rational and composed behavior to Adachi's very emotional reactions. After a classmate talks to her about how the two of them are very "lovey-dovey" in her eyes, Shimamura realizes she truly loves Adachi, even if Shimamura's way of showing it is different from Adachi's. Cemented even further when they briefly get lost later and Shimamura realizes she doesn't want to be separated from Adachi forever.
- Oblivious to Love: Completely misses very obvious hints that Adachi and Tarumi want to be more than just friends with her. Partially justified by her personality: she deliberately avoids interpreting her friends' behavior in a way that could "complicate" their relationship.
- Official Couple: She starts dating Adachi at the end of Volume 06.
- Only Friend: Adachi claims that Shimamura is her only friend. In Volume 08 after they had been together for ten years and living together, Shimamura indicates that Adachi has expanded her social circle.
- Poor Communication Kills:
- In Volume 04, after she's dragged into hanging out with three other girls in their class, she and Adachi stop interacting due to the latter's shyness and Shimamura makes no effort to try and speak with her, even when she finds the company of the others girls boring and unfulfilling. Even worse, she realizes that Adachi may be waiting up in their old hangout in the gym, but never ends up going there. It's revealed in the next episode that this left Adachi feeling lonely and depressed, and she only got the guts to approach Shimamura herself after a chance encounter with a fortune teller.
- In Volume 05, Adachi goes on a depressed breakdown rant regarding her feelings which ends with Shimamura simply saying 'annoying' and hanging up which leaves Adachi even more depressed along with thinking that her friendship with Shimamura is on thin ice at best. In Volume 06, it is indicated that Shimamura barely understood a word of Adachi's rant, and she regrets not asking Adachi to repeat and explain herself.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The Blue Oni to Adachi’s red. Unlike the easily flustered Adachi, Shimamura is level-headed, and always ponders things in a calm and rational way. This is also the reason she keeps people at arm's length: she finds relationships to be troublesome, mostly because she understands, on a purely logical basis, that most friendships that start when you are a child or teenage don't last. She self-deprecatingly wonders if she is a cold-hearted person.
- The Tease: She loves to tease Adachi throughout the series, especially after they begin dating. In Volume 08, she tells Adachi she accidentally wore her underwear.
- The Unfavorite: Played for laughs. Shimamura’s mother tends to favor anyone who isn’t her, including Adachi. When Shimamura’s mother made lunches for her and Adachi, she wrote ‘delinquent’ on Shimamura’s lunch while she wrote Adachi’s name on her lunch.
Sakura Adachi
Voiced by: Akari Kitou (Japanese), Megan Shipman (English)
The other main character of the series. Like Shimamura, she is a high school first-year student who often skips classes. She is timid and has trouble socializing with others, but she opens up to Shimamura. Her feelings for her end up changing as they interact more. She works part-time at a Chinese restaurant.
- Anguished Declaration of Love: Adachi makes one out loud at the end of Volume 05, but no one else is there to hear it.
- Bathtub Bonding: Adachi has done this with both Shimamura siblings. She has one with the younger Shimamura sister in Volume 05 when she tries to get along with her. She has one with Hougetsu in Volume 06 when she shows off her new bikini.
- Birds of a Feather: When she and Shimamura meet when they skip class to hang out in the gym, the both of them bond quickly due to their respective anti-social personalities and labelling as "delinquents".
- Later, she finds herself identifying with Shimamura's sister, who also has trouble with strangers and gets jealous when somebody takes Shimamura's attention away. Thus, when Shimamura suggests that Adachi should try to find some friends besides her, the first person she reaches out to is her sister.
- Brilliant, but Lazy: It is subtly hinted at. Shimamura acknowledges that despite how she attempts to take school more seriously, Adachi gets grades either equal or better than hers. It is more or less acknowledged that if Adachi applied herself more, she would do far better.
- Character Filibuster: In Volume 05, she goes off on a pages-long rant while talking to Shimamura over the phone, having spotted the latter with her old friend Tarumi at a festival and become jealous.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: She gets jealous of Shimamura spending time with other girls very easily. After the events of Volume 05 she realizes this behavior is no good and starts making an effort to not let her jealousy guide her actions anymore. Through her negative feelings are still obvious for Shimamura.
- Closet Gay: She spends the second half of Volume 01 unable to admit she has fallen in love with Shimamura in spite of her Awkwardly Gay Dream. While she acknowledges she wishes to spend time with Shimamura and be special to her, she refuses to believe she is in love with her until the end of Volume 05. After they become a couple, Adachi is the more openly affectionate of the two.
- Complexity Addiction: Played for Laughs. Because of her shyness, Adachi can't just ask Shimamura to exchange chocolates with her in Valentine's Day. She has to invite her to eat in the shopping, reject going to any place that doesn't have a special event for the holiday (which involves making an excuse in the spot) and after finding one that does, "casually" bring it up to Shimamura so the conversation "naturally" arrives at the chocolate exchange. Shimamura figures it out in a flash, and is shocked she went through so much trouble.
- Covert Pervert: When thinking about Shimamura, she sometime finds her mind wandering to places like her thighs and her breasts.
- Desperately Craves Affection: Shimamura guesses that because Adachi's home life is so cold, she longs for someone to treat her with kindness and warmth, which is why she has latched so strongly to her Only Friend. She is mostly correct, but has misread what kind of affection Adachi wants from her.
- Even Girls Want Her: Based on the perspective of one of Adachi's former classmates from middle school, implied to be Pancho, Adachi had both male and female admirers, but they didn't approach her due to her perceived coldness.
- Face of a Thug: Shimamura describes Adachi as having "a classic case of 'resting bitch face'" despite being so laid-back and mellow.
- Friendless Background: As shown by a flashback in Volume 04, Adachi never even tried to make friends before meeting Shimamura. She is aware of her lack of social skills but lacks the will to try and change it.
- Gayngst: Not a very overt example (mostly because she worries about many other things), but Adachi suffers from this. While her Closet Gay phase only lasts for half of Volume 1, the scenes where she is planning to get close to Shimamura in the following volumes sometimes have her worry that Shimamura may hate her if she confesses. During their Christmas date, she looks around and sadly notices that all the other couples in the mall are heterosexual ones.
- Hair Color Dissonance: She has black hair, but colored illustrations of the novel, manga and the anime portray it as dark blue.
- I Need to Go Iron My Dog: After asking Shimamura about her sign, she deflects Shimamura's question about why she's interested by saying that she needs to get ready for her next question. Shimamura finds Adachi's reaction odd, but doesn't ask about it.
- LGBT Awakening: The chapters narrated from Adachi's point-of-view in Volume 01 are mostly about her discovering and accepting her own feelings for Shimamura.
- Love Confession: She gives two of those in Volume 06. The first time, she faints immediately after finishing the sentence and gets the impression Shimamura didn't hear her. She did, but was pretending she didn't to give herself time to decide what to do. The second one is loud and clear for both, so neither can run away from it. It leads to them becoming girlfriends.
- Love Epiphany: Adachi has one at the end of Volume 05 when she realizes why she has such strong feelings of jealously when she sees Shimamura spending time with others.
- Misunderstood Loner with a Heart of Gold: In middle school, people viewed Adachi as cold. One of her former classmates could see there was more to her, and she didn't seem to do certain things intentionally. When she bumps into Tarumi and notices she dropped something, she makes sure to it back to her.
- No Social Skills: There are several factors getting in the way of Adachi's attempts to socialize: she is timid, frequently overthinks her plans to get closer to Shimamura, and has a strong fear of messing up and being rejected by her. The result is a blushing mess.
- In Volume 01, Adachi acknowledges in her own narration that she comes across as 'aloof and bitchy'. However, if the Flash Forward of Volume 08 is to be believed, Adachi seems to overcome this issue to an extent.
- Official Couple: With Shimamura after she gives a positive response to Adachi's Love Confession.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: After falling in love with Shimamura, Adachi becomes the Red Oni to her Blue Oni. While Adachi easily gets flustered when spending time with her crush and has a tendency to overthink things and get very worried, Shimamura is level-headed, and always ponders things in a calm and rational way. The negative side of this is that Adachi is overly emotional and can either be too shy or too much of a Clingy Jealous Girl.
- Reluctant Fanservice Girl: For her job in a Chinese restaurant, Adachi wears a Chinese dress that shows off part of her legs, and her boss makes her wear it because she is young enough to pull it off. In Volume 02, she wears one when she spends time with Shimamura during Christmas because Shimamura complimented her. In Volume 06, Adachi poses in a bikini selfie when Shimamura requests it, and she later shows off her bikini after Shimamura returns from her grandparents. In Volume 09, she buys a Chinese dress that she wears on her second Christmas date with Shimamura because she knows Shimamura would like it.
- Running Gag: Adachi gets into a number of fanservice moments throughout the series whether it be for her job or doing something Shimamura.
- Shrinking Violet: Behind her "resting bitch face" as Shimamura puts it, Adachi is really just a shy and socially awkward girl who has trouble interacting with others, with her considering Shimamura being her first and arguably Only Friend. This also contributes to her awkwardness about her feelings for her, with her lacking the confidence to confess or do anything overly affectionate.
- When Shimamura seemingly makes some new friends in their second-year class, she's too shy to go talk to her and defaults to waiting in their usual hangout spot in the gym, fearing that Shimamura may have just forgot about her. It's only after getting encouraged by a shady yet helpful fortune teller that she works up the guts to approach her herself.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Upon meeting Adachi's mother, Shimamura notes that she looks like an older version of her daughter.
Akira Hino
Voiced by: Manami Numakura (Japanese), Sarah Anne Williams (English)
One of Shimamura's few friends at school. She is the youngest daughter of a wealthy family with four older brothers. She and Nagafuji have been best friends since childhood. She is not used to the decent atmosphere at her home, often staying at Nagafuji's house.
- Beta Couple: With Nagafuij. The story frequently takes breaks from following the titular character around to focus on their own budding romance.
- Childhood Friend Romance: She and Nagafuji have known each other since kindergarten, and pretty much every scene where the two are alone together is overflowing with Ship Tease.
- Day in the Limelight: A large chunk of Volume 09 is focused on Hino, her family, as well as her relationship with Nagafuji.
- Height Angst: Isn't fond of her short stature, mostly because Nagafuji sometimes uses their difference in height to tease her.
- Massive Numbered Siblings: She has four older brothers. This ties into the issues she has with her family. Her parents along with her older siblings are the ones who take care of all the family business, meaning she has no role in her house besides greeting guests. In one episode, she acknowledges one of the reasons she spends so much time at Nagafuji’s place was because it felt more comfortable.
- Practically Different Generations: Akira's older brothers are much older than her, to the point at which she believes the eldest is old enough to be her father.
- The Runaway: In Volume 09, Hino considered running away, but that ends up not.
- Strong Family Resemblance: In Volume 09, Hino comes to the realization that she bears a strong resemblance to both her mother and father rather than only one way or another.
- The Unfavorite: Hino more or less seems to think that she might not be necessary to her family compared to her other siblings which partly motivates her to consider running away.
Taeko Nagafuji
Voiced by: Reina Ueda (Japanese), Monica Rial (English)
Hino's best friend since kindergarten who frequently hangs out with her and Shimamura. A very tall high school girl with big breasts and glasses. She is a little careless and weird and is always teased by Hino.
- Affectionate Nickname: Hino also used to call her "Tae-chan", to the point her mother thought that Tae was actually Nagafuji's first name instead of Taeko.
- Beta Couple: She and Hino are the second main couple of the series, getting the highest amount of romantic development after the titular characters.
- Book Dumb: Inverted. In spite of the lack of common sense she displays in her daily life, she gets good grades at school. Shimamura wonders how she does it.
- Childhood Friend Romance: With Hino. While they are not an Official Couple, they have been so close to each other for so long their relationship already has many romantic undertones. Unlike Hino, Nagafuji doesn't seem to find that weird.
- Cloudcuckoolander: There is just something odd about her. Besides her self-confessed terrible memory, she seems to be seriously lacking in common sense. Many of her words and actions are pretty much non-sequiturs, such as trying to lift Hino out of nowhere just because she thought she could. In addition, her idea for helping a friend pick a gift for her little sister is to go to the mall and point to everything that could be a gift until she finds something her friend likes. She directly compares it to a brainstorming session. Then there is the fascination with boomerangs that is revealed during this "session"...
- D-Cup Distress: Nagafuji doesn't like being such a buxom, claiming the only thing her breasts do is attract unwanted attention from guys.
- Day in the Limelight: Part of Volume 09 is focused on Nagafuji's past as well as her relationship with Hino.
- Genius Ditz: Despite her ditzy nature and apparent lack of common sense, Nagafuji does extremely well in her exams according to Shimamura.
- Hair Color Dissonance: Her hair is supposed to be black, but the anime stylizes it as purple.
- Pervert Revenge Mode: Rare same sex variant. Whenever Hino pokes fun at or gropes her boobs, she's quick to respond with a Dope Slap.
- Sarcasm-Blind: Much to Hino's annoyance, Nagafuji rarely understands the sarcasm of her friend.
- Smart People Wear Glasses: Pointedly averted. Shimamura notes that she has the stereotypical "female nerd" appearance, in part because of her glasses, but she is a Cloudcuckoolander that does not seem to be very smart.
- Smarter Than You Look: Despite her ditzy look and nature, Nagafuji apparently gets the best grades out of Hino, Adachi, and Shimamura.
Yashiro Chikama
Voiced by: Iori Saeki (Japanese), Sarah Wiedenheft (English)
Click here to see her without her suit
A self-proclaimed alien from the future who came to search for her brethren from space. Initially showed up in a full-body spacesuit, but discarded it later. She looks like an elementary school girl, but claims to be around 670 years old. She usually wanders around the town, but after taking a liking to Shimamura and her younger sister she starts visiting their house often to play.
- Affectionate Nickname: She calls Shimamura's little sister "Shou" ("little one" in the subs) and is called "Yachi" by her in return.
- Beta Couple: Gets paired with Shimamura's little sister. Though considering Hino and Nagafuji were there first, they are more of a Gamma Couple.
- Bizarre Alien Biology: Her body gets weirder and weirder the more the series goes on. From the start, both Shimamura and her little sister note that Yashiro is unusually light and her skin is always cold to the touch. While squeezing her cheeks, Shimamura notices that they also seem to be softer than normal. Volume 8 really ramps up the weirdess, when Yashiro sneaks inside Shimamura's bag during her school trip. Beyond the little fact that there shouldn't be enough space inside for her to enter, Shimamura didn't feel any extra weight and she wasn't caught when the bag was scanned. She also claims that she won't make any mess while eating inside the bag because she curls her body around the food before eating. In the same volume, she tells Shou that her eyes are just decoration to help her blend in among earthlings. When Shou asks how Yashiro sees then, she just taps the center of her head.
- Expy: She has a lot of similarities to Yashiro Hoshimiya from Ground Control to Psychoelectric Girl.
- Hammerspace: She is seemingly able to take anything out of her pockets, including fully intact food like pieces of cake.
- Puppy Love: Pretty much becomes the second Beta Couple of the series with Shimamura's little sister. Although she may not be as young as she looks.
- Nice Girl: Although she can be a bit weird at times, she's really nice with Shimamura and her sister.
- Saying Sound Effects Out Loud: Tends to do this a lot, such as imitating an astronaut's breathing or removing her helmet.
- The Thing That Would Not Leave: In later volumes, Yashiro becomes a permanent addition to the Shimamura house, eating there with everyone else and doing pretty much everything a resident would do except sleeping there. Hougetsu is bothered by this, but her family accepted Yashiro very easily.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: The fishermen don't seem to be that taken aback by the sight of a small girl in a full-body spacesuit.
- Similarly, Shimamura and her mother don't seem at all really surprised when they spot Yashiro literally flying around Shimamura's little sister. Only the former even comments on it and does so in a rather laid back, unshocked manner.
- Vader Breath: When she's in her spacesuit, her breathing is unusually loud and labored. She loses this trait when she abandons her spacesuit, though
Tarumi
Voiced by: Ai Kayano (Japanese), Alexis Tipton (English)
A girl who was Shimamura's best friend in elementary school, but became distant when she went to a different junior high school. After meeting Shimamura again by chance she hopes to restart their friendship.
- Affectionate Nickname: Shimamura used to call her "Taru-chan". She is somewhat reluctant to use this childish nickname again in the present, but ends up doing it anyway.
- Childhood Friend Romance: One-sided. She clearly hopes that her relationship with Shimamura will evolve into this, but she isn't so lucky.
- Genki Girl: Not really part of her personality, but she intentionally invokes this trope during her second date with Shimamura in an attempt to make things more fun to her.
- Loving a Shadow: Seems to be the case. Like with Nagafuji and Hino, she was Childhood Friends with Shimamura and wants it to evolve into a Childhood Friend Romance. Unlike Nagafuji and Hino however, she and Shimamura parted ways after grade school and only reunited when both entered high school, meaning she wasn't able to adapt to the progressive changes Shimamura made over the years and her feelings for her are still painted by how she remembers her from their childhood. This leads to their first hang out in years, where Shimamura gets her help buying chocolates for Adachi, being largely uneventful and awkward, with the two of them hardly speaking. Not that this deters her.
Shimamura's Sister
Voiced by: Takako Tanaka (Japanese), Michelle Marie (English)
Shimamura's shy little sister, who strikes up a friendship with Yashiro.
- Affectionate Nickname: Yashiro calls her "Shou" ("little one" in the subs), perharps to differentiate her from her sister, who she calls by their surname.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: Implied platonic variant. While she's stated to be a Shrinking Violet, she comes off as very cautious towards Adachi and, one time while staying at her house, she barges in and drags Shimamura with her to have a bath, which the latter notes she never asks for, and gives Adachi a pouty look before leaving.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: According to Hougetsu, her sister seems to have warmed up to Adachi by the time of Volume 05.
- No Name Given: Her first name isn't revealed to the reader. Making matters worse, her sister comments in Volume 09 that the nickname she received from Yashiro, "Shou", isn’t even close to her real name.
- Puppy Love: Gets some Ship Tease with Yashiro.
- Shrinking Violet: Stated to be shy around guests and strangers.
Pancho, De Los and Sancho
Three of Shimamura's classmates in her second year, whom she occasionally ends up interacting with despite her lack of interest in them.
- The Bus Came Back: After mostly fading away after their introduction, they return as part of Adachi and Shimamura's group on the Class Trip.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Shimamura doesn't bother to remember their names, so she refers to them by their nicknames. It's noted that two of their names are similar, hence the Pancho and Sancho nicknames.
- Those Two Guys: They're never seen far from each other.
