#seowaka

Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun is insane. It’s a gag manga built on misunderstandings, mostly accomplished by the fact that the entire cast has two brain cells put together. The main joke of the manga is how everyone is always acting like they’re in a romantic relationship—without any of the romance. In the beginning, the joke was facilitated by the fact that Nozaki is always trying to simulate being in a romantic situation for research purposes for the shoujo manga that he writes, but then other characters got involved and they’re even more ridiculous than he is.

Horikashi

Omg, where do I begin?

Kashima constantly talks about how to get Hori to dote on her. For some reason, despite the advice of Sakura, Mikoshiba, and a drunk Hori himself, she can’t bring herself to go to club regularly. Hori should just go back to telling Kashima he likes her/giving her head pats/just kiss her already to properly motivate her.

Kashima has a rivalry with Nozaki since Hori said that Nozaki was his favorite kouhai, so Kashima gets angry when Hori gives Nozaki snacks or when she thinks Nozaki is going to text Hori before her. She also stole all of the head pats that Hori was going to give to Nozaki even though they were play acting.

Nevertheless, they do spend a lot of time together in club, and club members hilariously either get or misinterpret their dynamic. Like, they understand that Kashima wanted to show off her legs to get Hori’s attention since she might have been jealous of Hori liking a pair of legs in a picture (actually her legs).

On the other hand, when Hori freaking HUGGED Kashima to comfort her after she got upset, the drama club members just interpret this as ad-libbing.

They hang out together outside of club too, to the point that when they couldn’t even go HALF A DAY without talking without a) Kashima complaining about how painful it was and b) Hori going into shock. As a follow-up, Hori started meeting Kashima at the train station in the morning.

When Kashima went on a school trip, she texted Hori constantly.

When trying to make conversation with Mikoshiba before Mikoshiba knew Hori was the backgrounds guy, Mikoshiba thought the backgrounds buy was a Kashima stalker (once he knew that the backgrounds guy was Hori, he felt relieved)

Whenever anyone gets praised around Hori, he has to check to make sure that that person isn’t better than Kashima. He also realizes that Kashima is his ideal girl as well as guy.

When Kashima invades Hori’s personal space, he either responds by gazing at her beautiful face or noticing that her eyes are red.

Kashima, to the extent that she listens to anybody, listens to Hori. One notable example is when she passed the basketball to him when he said to EVEN THOUGH HE WAS ON THE OPPOSITE TEAM.

Hori went around telling Kashima (but also other people) that he liked/loved her for a while.

Hori actually likes listening to Kashima’s horrible singing, even though he knows it’s objectively bad. He even records it specifically so he can fall asleep to it at night. WTF?

Seowaka

These guys . . . these guys are almost as bad.

Technically, the reason Waka goes out with Seo so much is to spare his kouhais the pain of spending time with Seo, but that does translate into them going out a lot. At one point the basketball club tries to get Seo a boyfriend so she’ll be . . . less Seo-like, and in the end they just rely on Waka.

Waka got pretty upset when he thought that Seo had a boyfriend though (turned out to be Kashima).

Seo realized that she likes bullying Waka specifically.

Whenever Waka is NOT allowed to interact with Seo, such as when she accidentally had a card turned to not being bothered, he gets morose.

He also got morose when Seo didn’t text him while on the school trip.

He got morose when Seo didn’t hang to hang out with him right after she got back from the school trip.

It’s pretty established that he says he loves Lorelei (whom he doesn’t know is Seo), but even once he does know, he gives her all these gifts, like food and earrings.

But . . . the food is not a big deal considering Seo is always making Waka go out to buy her food anyway.

The whole interaction between Waka and Seo now that he knows she’s Lorelei is a little weird, since he’s said so many times that he loves Lorelai—but it seems more like the love for an idol instead of actual romantic love. The main change is that Waka now accepts Seo’s orders more willingly.

Waka told Seo that he liked her for some reason (to freak her out?) and it worked, but then he had to tell her it was a joke to make up with her since they had arranged to see a movie together. He sometimes still says it because he likes how freaked out she gets about it.

NozaChiyo (Sakuzaki)

Well, can’t leave out the title character. This is the only couple where one of them actually acknowledges their feelings as romantic. Lately they’ve been getting some air-time, with Nozaki actually reciprocating but in denial.

Even though Sakura’s confession doesn’t go anywhere romantic, she does become Nozaki’s mangaka assistant, which entails spending lots of time at his apartment. This is turned into a joke later on when Nozaki’s classmates invite her along to visit his place since everyone knows she has a massive crush on him and she has to pretend she’s never been there.

Even early on, Nozaki said that he’d be shocked if Sakura abandoned him (though the fact that Hori is more irreplaceable as a manga assistant is a frequent source of jealousy for Sakura).

Nozaki feeds Sakura a lot. It’s not like he doesn’t feed his other assistants, but he especially feeds Sakura, even outside of his apartment. Nozaki even realizes this, to the point that he tells Kashima that’s how they got close (prompting Kashima to feed Hori the notorious brandy cake)

Nozaki even made Sakura oven mitts for her cooking project (where she was baking cookies for him).

Nozaki (and Seo) got jealous when Sakura hugged the Wakamatsu doll Nozaki made for Seo (so he made a Sakura doll for her).

Nozaki really wanted to hold Sakura’s hand after she got “lost.” Of course Nozaki asked Kashima for advice about this and she told him it was a motherly feeling. I’m not sure if this actually counts since it’s actually romantic as opposed to non-romantic. I guess as long as there’s plausible deniability it counts.

Main vectors of romance-adjacent behavior

Spending stupid amounts of time together (but they could just be club buddies/coworkers).

Jealousy—I was going to say that Horikashi was an exception, but Kashima is jealous of Nozaki. Hori is annoyed at fangirls if they prevent Kashima from going to club.

Touch (this is mostly Horikashi, but Seo has started rubbing Waka’s head, but let us not forget that Sakura once sat in Nozaki’s lap—prompting Seo to do the same with Waka. Hori has given Kashima a lap-pillow a couple of times, once for Mikoshiba’s sake, and once during the king game)

Knowing a huge amount about the other person (Sakura is an acknowledged stalker, but Hori and Kashima come close)

Feeding (Nozaki, Kashima, and Waka)

Obedience (Kashima listens to Hori, Waka listens to Seo—Sakura and Nozaki actually have a mutually respectful relationship)

Telling them that they like them (Hori demotes this behavior by just telling everyone he likes them, Sakura’s confessions always go awry, and Waka as a joke)

Tolerating the other person’s terrible behavior (Waka obviously (poor kid has Stockholm Syndrome), Hori for Kashima’s singing (he kind of puts up with her other terrible behavior, but also smacks her for it), Sakura putting up with Nozaki’s eccentricities)

Other special treatment (Hori praising Kashima, Kashima hovering around Hori, Seo bullying Waka, Waka idolizing Lorelai but also thinking about Seo (as a troublemaker) a lot, Sakura for almost anything regarding Nozaki, Nozaki mothering Sakura)

Important: Please do not vote if you don't know the characters.