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| Ugh, a love triangle... |
Drama, relationship conflicts and more drama. With her mother, Kou and his co-worker showing up in this episode, things are starting to get tough for Ohana. All this is caused by her love for Kissui Inn. How unfortunate is that? Anyways, the relationships between the characters are getting even more complicated with Ohana, Kou, megane-san, Tohru and Minko all in the mix. With the direction that this series seems to be going in after watching this episode, I am sure that there will be plenty more drama ahead which, for me, is extremely relieving.
With the release of the new edition of the onsen ranking magazine, Ohana and co. prepare themselves for the result. In the end, Minko is the one who gets to look at the results first since Ohana and Nako aren't able to due to nervousness. As Minko searches for the rankings page, Ohana comments on how she won't know what to do if the results are bad. At that moment, Minko tells her to start thinking because the results are indeed bad. At first glance, Minko's comment didn't seem valid as Ohana sees a 5/5 rating for Kissui Inn. Unfortunately, Nako points out that the ratings are not out of 5 but out of 10. So instead of a perfect 5/5, Kissui Inn actually got a mediocre 5/10. Back in the staff room at the inn, Tomoe and Tohru start complaining about the rating. However, their whining comes to a halt when the landlady demands that all the staff go back to work immediately. Knowing Ohana's "never give up" attitude, it isn't surprising that, instead of getting back to work, she decides to call the publisher of the magazine so that she can speak to the author of the article. Unfortunately, she isn't able to get what she wants as the person on the other end gets fed up with her begging. Meanwhile, at Fukuya Inn, a meeting was being held concerning the low scores that every inn in the Yunosagi area had received. The cause of this: a new, massive hotel complete with luxury services that even the other inn owners can't resist. The landlady of Kissui and Fukuya then begin to argue about quality vs quantity before the person in charge of the meeting tells them to calm down. Outside the meeting room, Ohana attempts to eavesdrop. She is soon busted by Yuina who happened to be walking by. After getting Ohana to help her with cleaning somethings for the upcoming festival, Yuina tells her that she may want to try staying at the new hotel for one night after it's completed. This comment didn't sit well with Ohana as she gives Yuina a annoyed look while threatening to call her a hobiron if she actually did that. However, Ohana's annoyance quickly turns into depression and then determination as she decides to bonboru (a new made-up word which probably means "work") like crazy, leaving Yuina to comment on how interesting Ohana is. That night, after failing to get the landlady's approval to go and talk to the reviewer about Kissui Inn's score, Ohana is tells herself that she will never accept that score.
The next day, after the staff found a note explaining how Ohana has left the inn temporarily to find and fight the author of the article in hopes of increasing the rating for Kissui Inn, the phones start ringing like mad in the staff room. Unlike in Episode 9 where the phone calls were all about reservations, these phone calls were all about cancellations. Meanwhile, while on the train to the city, Ohana reminds herself that she will keep bonboruing (is that even a word?) so that Kissui Inn will be given a score that they deserve. She even decides not to answer a phone call from Nako. Once she finally reaches the magazine publishing office, Ohana begins to verbally tear apart one of the workers there, demanding to know why they published an article that they didn't even write. After she scares him into giving her the person who wrote the article, Ohana is shocked to see her mother's name written on the paper that he shows her. Upon seeing her own daughter again, Ohana's mother rushes up to Ohana and gives her a big hug, acting like deserting her own child is nothing special. As the two begin dining at a restaurant, Ohana's mother tells Ohana that she came back alone because the relationship with the man she ran away with didn't work out. Once her mother had finished talking, Ohana begins her interrogation about Kissui Inn's score. It turns out that, because of some corruption within the company, Kissui Inn was to receive a low score. At this, Ohana snaps at her mother and demands to know why she wrote this article even though she never stayed at Kissui Inn before. After calming down a bit, Ohana starts remembering all the times in the past when she had to suffer due to her mother's selfish decision making. She continues by saying that, because she knew her mother is always busy with work, she forced herself not to complain about the cancellations to various events like parent-teacher night, the zoo and the pool. However, after finding out that this "job" is actually this horrible, Ohana begins regretting the fact that she didn't complain about the cancellations. Although what she says is valid, Ohana is forgets the most important thing about this horrible job her mother has: it's what helped to raise her. After her mother tells her that, Ohana decides to take another approach. She suggests to her mother to go to Kissui Inn so that she will be able to see how good an inn it actually is. Even when her mother rejects her suggestion, Ohana voices her determination, saying that she won't give up until the article praising Kissui Inn is written, and storms out of the restaurant, leaving her mother speechless - that is until she asks a waiter that's passing by for another glass of wine.
With her battle plan set, Ohana settles down in a fast food restaurant and starts creating some signs and posters. While doing that, she notices a young couple laughing happily at another table, causing her to realize that she hasn't told Kou that she is in the city now. After a moment of hesitation, she decides to send a text to him, asking him where he is now. A while later, Ohana finishes what she was doing and heads over to the sidewalk that can be seen from the publishing company's window. It turns out that she wasn't kidding about the "never giving up" thing as she just sits there with various signs and posters targeting her mother. The workers at the publishing company notice Ohana a short while later and start questioning her mother about what to do. In the end, Ohana's mother decides to leave Ohana alone because she knows her own daughter will not give up that easily. Back outside, Ohana receives a reply from Kou who tells her that he is at work now. After replying to his text, Ohana realizes how long it has been since she was last in the city. Kou's reply came quicker this time and he tells her that he is working at a bookstore nearby. With it only being one block away, Ohana decides to take a break from her protesting and visit Kou. If you've watched earlier episodes, you would know that something bad is going to happen. Once she reaches the bookstore, Ohana wanders around a bit until she sees Kou and his female co-worker talking. While eavesdropping on them, she accidentally drops all her things, blowing her cover. Even when she tried to cover her face with one of the signs, it fell apart, revealing her identity. After making an excuse for why she is here, she is shocked to see Kou's co-worker holding onto his sleeve. Thinking that they are already in a relationship, Ohana quickly hurries out of the bookstore and heads back to her protest zone. As rain starts to come down, Ohana's mother, who has just finished work, goes over to her daughter and, after mocking her, leaves her with a bag of snacks. While fighting back tears, Ohana is determined not to accept anything from the enemy. Suddenly, she hears Kou's voice and after looking up, she sees him standing across the street, out of breath. After the two sit down at a local restaurant for drinks, their conversation slowly starts. During a break of silence, Ohana starts thinking about everything she wanted to ask Kou while looking at him until he turns around, causing her to turn red with embarrassment. To escape from that, she goes to get a refill of her drink. While she gets her refill, Ohana can't help but feel confused with why she came to Tokyo in the first place. However, once she gets back to the table, the mood is lightened by Kou who bursts out laughing after seeing her drink. Unfortunately, this atmosphere doesn't last long as the conversation quickly focuses on Kou's co-worker. It turns out that she had confessed to him but he had rejected her. Even after the rejection, she told Kou that she would wait, officially forming the love triangle. At that moment, Ohana blurts out something extremely hypocritical, telling Kou that it's not right to not give an answer when, after all this time, she hasn't given him an answer. With the guilt beginning to creep up on her, Ohana decides to leave, offering to pay for their drinks before she does. However, because Kou is also thinking of paying, their hands touch when they both grab the receipt, surprising the two of them. The first to recover from this surprise is Kou who ends up paying for the drinks. With the rain pouring outside, Kou tells Ohana to wait while he gets her an umbrella but she tells him she can buy one herself before running off, leaving him behind. Personally, I found that Ohana's attitude towards Kou in this scene was particularly rude, especially since this is the first time she actually had a face to face talk with him since she left for the country. While walking down the street in the rain alone, Ohana causes herself to be vulnerable to pedophiles which is exactly what happened as two older guys who passed by in a car offered her a ride. While running away from them, her soaked bag of posters and signs rips, causing everything inside it to fall victim to the rain. After seeing all her hard work go to waste, Ohana reaches her breaking point. All she could do now is run; run until she can't run anymore while thinking about everything that has happened since she came back to Tokyo. As she is running, Ohana hears a familiar voice and, after hitting her nose on a streetlight, she turns around and sees Minko and Tohru, with concerned looks on their faces. At this, she jumps towards Minko and starts sobbing uncontrollably. While looking back at today, she realizes that it had been the most dramatic day of her whole life. As for the next episode preview, I'm not sure what to think about it. On one hand, it seems like it's going to be something romance related as "date" is mentioned. However, the title of "See You" seems to lean more towards drama. Nonetheless, with the story starts moving along at a quicker pace, I'm really looking forward to the next episode.
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