hey tumblr sorry I forgot you coming back with a new fixation on kyosato *happy*

So. Firstly to be honest i saw the spoilers of the last chapter out there and was scared of the outcome, how it was handled and all that. I saw multiple disappointed, angry or frustrated opinions, and i thought that was it. Until i read the actual chapter.

Wdym they met in a sushiya called はなれ??? And were having a conversation about neither of them like an actual SUSHI the most in a SUSHI shop????? And to the "do you even like sushi?" question Satomi just answers "i do". By that confirming "yes, i meant what I said". And right after that we learn Kyoji likes えび天ぷら, so they both just admitted having unusual tastes in... Sushi. I remind you we never consider a talk about food as an actual talk about, you know, FOOD in wym's manga.

And over that, Satomi, who laughed for the first time as we see. The line about him wants to be on equal terms oh my god. My baby has grown so much. So that's not about "moving on with their lives" or "everything will pass", it's about both of them share the feeling to make a step up on a new level and spoke about it, may be not so openly, but enough to understand they are on the same page. So the last panel seemed to me not as a "heartbreaking goodbye" or anything, but as just another day you live and don't know yet, where life goes next. And what a beautiful move to make Satomi say the ファミレス行こ line to show he's taken the initiative now and actually ready for the 対等 (equality) he's talking about.

AKA: Coming from a person with Borderline Personality Disorder that developed majorly between the ages of 13-16, Satomi is an extremely relatable character, and this is an essay explaining why.

My partner and I got into Karaoke Iko! in particular a while back. I think when the first episode of the anime adaptation dropped, we rushed to read the manga and then binged most of Famiresu right then and there. Then "I like Kyouji, and Kyouji is alive" dropped, and we were basically inconsolable. The recent announcement of an additional scene with Kyouji turning himself in sent us into a familiar spiral.

That spiral being, we're writing fanfiction again, and there's no coming back from that. Screw being published BL authors, let's go write some Karaoke yaoi!

...With that unnecessary preamble aside, after a rewatch of the anime, I started thinking more about Satomi until I couldn't stop thinking about him. Truthfully, I doubt this post can address everything I have in my brain about him simply because I won't feel satisfied until I'm able to write his POV properly.

Satomi is such an interesting take on the understated tsundere character to the point he exhibits actual traits of the "quiet" type of borderline personality disorder, and Wayama-sensei writes this with brilliant ease. I'm constantly blown away by her subtle characterization of both Satomi and Kyouji, as well as how she writes characters in her other works. I do not think this BPD "coding" was intentional, nor do I want to call it "coding" for that reason, but...

It definitely, definitely fits, and makes for an extremely satisfying, if a bit more depressing, sort of reading on both Famiresu and KaraIko. I don't plan to finish this in a single post, as it requires a total reread of Famiresu for sourcing, but I would like to begin this thesis with the most Obvious Example that I cannot and will not ever get over.

The watch.