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Main (EP.4-1～EP.4-31)
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<Yamaha-chan’s Safety Measures>
- Cover the door peephole with a mask so that people can’t peek inside your room.
- Put masking tape over the mail slot on the door to prevent anyone from taking photos through it.
When people figure out what times you’re not at home, it can lead to things like religious solicitors coming around, or even burglars breaking in.
Living alone can be risky for anyone—regardless of gender—so please stay alert and take precautions!
[Q&A: ‘What’s that female friend’s name?’]
How did you like EP.5?
This time, the story was about Suzuki-kun and Kawasaki-kun, back before they had even started job hunting—before entering society as working adults.
Unlike their present selves as professionals, Kawasaki-kun was actually a bit more mature back then.
Back when I was posting EP.5 little by little, I received a huge number of comments on the social network GRAVITY asking,
“What’s the female friend’s name?”
So this time, I decided to create a special Q&A corner to answer that question.
To get straight to the point—
She doesn’t have a name.
The reason is that EP.5 is a story told from Suzuki-san’s memory.
For Suzuki-san, those people were never that important.
That’s why, when the present-day Suzuki looks back on his memories, their names simply don’t come to mind anymore.
After all, from Suzuki-san’s perspective as a third-year working adult now, those events took place six or seven years ago. Humans are wired to let go of things that don’t matter—people we no longer meet, or details that aren’t important gradually fade away. So, memories of people who weren’t significant to him have naturally grown faint.
What he does remember are fragments: what kind of face they had, how they dressed, where they met, and the conversations they had at the time.
And that is why EP.5 turned out the way it did.
Since I’ve set up this special corner, I’ll take my time explaining it this time.
People naturally forget things as time goes on.
From EP.5-4 through EP.5-10, the backgrounds are often left blank or blurred in white. This is because, for the present-day Suzuki-san, these are old memories that have already begun to fade. Everything apart from Itsuki-san has grown vague.
The reason there’s no scene where Suzuki calls out the name of Itsuki’s ex-boyfriend is not because he was a minor character, but because Suzuki’s time hanging out with him as a friend was so brief. As a result, in Suzuki’s memory today, that presence has already faded away.
And Suzuki and Kawasaki putting on the attitude of “Whatever. Doesn’t bother me at all. She’s not even mine to begin with, so I don’t care.” really shows how immature they were too—and that’s exactly what makes it good.
However, in EP.5-11 through EP.5-13, the backgrounds are drawn clearly.
That’s because it was a moment when Suzuki-san finally got to be alone with Itsuki-san—and he truly enjoyed it.
Even now, after all this time, he still remembers it vividly—that’s how happy he was back then…
But, well, starting from EP.5-14, things suddenly take a turn and it’s no longer about that.
Also, in EP.5, there was another memorable girl who appeared alongside Itsuki-san, wasn’t there?
It’s the girl who confessed her feelings to Suzuki-san.
As for this girl, during my GRAVITY streams I often received comments like “What’s her name?” and “When will her name be revealed?” Thank you so much for all the interest 🙇♀️
Unfortunately… she doesn’t have a name.
She’s been nameless up until now, and she’ll continue to stay nameless forever.
Her confession was certainly an impactful moment for Suzuki-san, so he still remembers the conversation itself quite well.
But beyond that, there weren’t really any standout events involving her. For present-day Suzuki, she’s so unimportant that he can’t even recall her name anymore.
By this point, some of you might be thinking Suzuki-san just seems like a forgetful person—but this is actually completely normal.
As I mentioned at the beginning, for present-day Suzuki-San in his third year as a working adult, these events happened six or seven years ago. It’s only natural that people we’ve grown distant from, and details that weren’t important, would fade or disappear.
I mean, that’s about the same amount of time it takes for a child who just started elementary school to become a junior high student! Honestly, Suzuki-san actually remembers a lot more from back then than most people would 🤣 Normally, you’d expect to remember far less, lol.
EP.5 takes place six to seven years ago. In terms of the timeline, EP.5-4 through EP.5-8 are set during Suzuki and the others’ first year of university, while everything from EP.5-9 onward happens in their second year.
In other words, ever since her first year, Itsuki-san had already been studying abroad, taking part in internships, and acting with a clear plan. She was someone who put real effort into shaping her future.
The reason I often dressed Itsuki-san in outfits that showed off her toned stomach was to visually convey the idea that “this is someone who knows how to put in the effort.”
After all, keeping a good figure is the result of daily discipline and hard work… Truly impressive.
And as for the future of hardworking Itsuki-san—well, it’s just as shown back in EP.4.
I truly wish her happiness 🙏
If you go back to EP.4-1, you’ll see where Itsuki-san is in the present.
Now that she’s a working adult, Itsuki-san has changed quite a bit from her university days—her hair is darker, she’s got a bit of a perm, and overall she looks more mature.
Her smartphone has changed too.
She’s no longer an iPhone user—she’s switched to Google Pixel.
And of course, the man she’s dating has changed as well.
If you look closely at the background, it doesn’t really look like a woman’s room. That was intentional—it’s meant to show that she moved into her boyfriend’s place, started living together, and eventually tied the knot.
She fell in love with someone Suzuki doesn’t even know, in a world completely apart from him, built a life there, and found happiness.
As for how she ended up with him, well, maybe Suzuki will only hear about it secondhand through a friend.
Tough luck, Suzuki 😉
▼Backstory
From here on, it’s the backstory of that girl who confessed to Suzuki.
After she was alone with Suzuki-san, she kept holding onto her phone the whole time—did you notice that? There’s actually a reason for it.
The truth is—she was recording the whole time.
In most of the panels, her phone’s camera is continuously pointed at Suzuki-san.
Her fingers sometimes overlap the lens,
and sometimes the camera angle doesn’t even catch Suzuki-san’s face,
Because of her nerves, there are even times when the camera is pointed straight ahead—nowhere near Suzuki-san.
But still, she keeps holding her phone tightly and continues recording him.
Did you notice?
This girl isn’t filming with the intention of posting it online or anything like that.
She’s recording because she wants to keep it for herself—like a good-luck charm she can always hold on to.
It’s definitely painful for her! But she’s the kind of dreamy, complicated girl who wants to look back at the footage later and make those memories shine again.
All she really wanted was to remember the moment she had a real conversation with Suzuki-san—the moment she confessed that she liked him.
Even after that confession, she probably had days when she hoped their relationship might move forward, moments when her heart raced with excitement. But unfortunately, none of it ever reached Suzuki-san, and he doesn’t even remember it now.
Hopefully, someday in the future, she’ll look back and think, “Ah, there really was a time like that,” and quietly find the strength to delete that video.
For the record,
Suzuki-san has noticed the camera.
Because he thought, “Could it be…?”
he asked, “You okay? Want me to hold your bag?”
He asked that with the hope that, if she moved her bag even a little, he might catch a quick glimpse of her phone screen.
The reason Suzuki-san immediately calls Kawasaki-kun is because the girl refused his offer to carry her bag, so he couldn’t check her phone screen. In other words, Kawasaki-kun was his backup plan.
When he asks, “Aren’t your legs tired?” and leans in a little closer, it looks like a kind gesture—but in reality, he’s just trying to sneak a peek at her phone screen. Unfortunately for him, she tilted it face down, so he couldn’t see anything.
After the call with Kawasaki-kun ends, the scene shifts into a flow where the girl blushes and says, “There’s something I want to tell you,” making it seem like a love confession might be coming.
But then Suzuki anxiously asks, “What on earth did I do wrong?”
This doesn’t mean he suddenly turned into a clueless character—it’s because he’s still distracted by the girl’s phone.
At this point, Suzuki still doesn’t know why she’s filming him—or even if she actually is filming him at all. That uncertainty is what drives his behavior.
The reason Suzuki-san treats the girl so politely and gentlemanly in EP.5-29 through EP.5-36 is exactly because of this.
In the end, the day comes to a close with Suzuki-san still unable to confirm whether the girl was actually recording him—and without ever confronting her about it.
As for the phone, Suzuki brushes it off by telling himself something like, “Maybe she was just nervous and wanted to hold something in her hands, so she kept gripping her phone,” adding a convenient excuse after the fact and deciding it was nothing to worry about.
He never goes as far as pressing her with, “Were you filming me?” After all, he had already hurt her by turning down her confession, and besides, Itsuki-san was there too.
And so, this girl—who boldly confessed her feelings while secretly recording—was never found out. In the end, she became nothing more than “one of the girls who confessed to Suzuki,” and because she’s already fading from his memory, she has no name.
▼At the End of EP.5
From EP.4 to EP.5, I’m truly happy that we could all witness Suzuki-san’s growth over time together.
The feeling you get when you see news that Itsuki-san has found happiness with someone you don’t know.
The feeling of quietly watching the group chat as the conversation flows by.
The feeling of putting on your earphones to listen to the news or music on the way to work—because you don’t want to carry that mood into the office.
The feeling of forgetting it once work actually begins.
The feeling of suddenly remembering it again when you finish a task.
The feeling of being alone on the train ride home, recalling the past.
The feeling when you open the gift box from Yamaha-chan.
The feeling of realizing that everyone’s lives have entered new stages.
Suzuki-san still has many hardships ahead, but I hope he continues to overcome them and mature even more.
Originally, EP.5 was meant to be an episode about Yamaha-chan. But at the time, I was uncertain—wondering if I could really continue my work as a manga artist. I thought, “This might even be the last thing I draw.” And when I asked myself what I absolutely wanted to leave behind, Suzuki’s past came to mind. It was the most fitting choice in terms of the main story’s timeline and length, so I changed plans and drew this episode instead.
In the end, I was able to explore Suzuki-san in greater depth, and now I truly feel glad that I did.
To everyone who read EP.5 piece by piece as I was posting it back then, and to all of you reading it now—thank you so much. Thanks to your support, I’ve somehow been able to keep this story going.
I hope you’ll continue to watch over Yamaha-chan and the others together with me.
