In the second volume of Hazuki Takeoka and Fly’s Chasing After Aoi Koshiba manga, a couple of the characters come to terms with the feelings they have for others.
This volume contains chapters seven through to sixteen.
Front cover of the second volume of Chasing After Aoi Koshiba, featuring Sahoko Narita
Sahoko Narita is enjoying the perks of finally being one of the popular girls in high school. One summer day, however, she encounters the athletic and tomboyish Aoi Koshiba and her world is thrown into disarray. Their growing friendship is tested when Aoi Koshiba confides in Sahoko about an upcoming date with a fellow classmate, Shoji Miwa. Sahoko, unable to hide her surprise, must come to grips with her own feelings for Aoi before it’s too late…
The first thing that I think is worth mentioning about this second volume of Chasing After Aoi Koshiba is that Sahoko felt a little less grating to me than she was in the first volume. That desire to be one of the “popular girls” still rears its head from time to time, but not as much as previously.
Once again, most of this volume takes place in the high school part of the time line. We get some particular focus on one of Sahoko’s friends, Anna, at the start. In case it wasn’t made blatantly clear in the previous volume, this one pretty much goes out of its way to confirm her feelings towards Sahoko.
Feelings that Sahoko does not notice at all; only Aoi Koshiba occupies her thoughts.
Anna comes to terms with something about herself, and then a certain event has Sahoko reaching a very similar epiphany.
Said event is Aoi going on a date with some guy. I don’t know why she went on that date, as it is made plainly clear she has zero interest in him. It’s also been established that Aoi has no qualms about how others perceive her, so she’s not trying to fit in or anything.
Ultimately, it just feels like a contrived method for Sahoko to realise that what she feels towards Aoi may be a bit more than just friendship. Probably could’ve been a smoother way of doing that, as the whole date thing comes out of literally nowhere. Also, Aoi definitely seems to be happier spending time with Sahoko…
Which doesn’t seem to be something that can be said of the Aoi from the university part of the timeline that this manga covers. It’s only briefly we get to check in on that, but one thing remains consistent: Sahoko pining for Aoi.
There are a couple of observations I have about this particular volume – first of all, it gets compared to Bloom into You on its back cover. That might be an overly ambitious comparison, is all I’m gonna say.
Secondly, the page numbers. The manga is printed correctly and preserves its right-to-left reading direction, but the page numbers are in reverse order. Seems kind of odd; you’d think Kodansha Comics wouldn’t let errors like that go to print. At least it doesn’t affect the story in any way – at least, I didn’t even notice the page numbers whilst I was reading.
I guess a fairly decent volume. Not sure why some events even happened the way they did in the first place, but high school Sahoko is getting a little more bearable. I’m also very curious about what the state of things is between Sahoko and Aoi in university. I’m hoping we get more focus on the university part of the timeline, but I’m sure there’s still plenty of high school drama waiting.
Rory Muses 