Yurine has a new kohai in the gardening club and she isn’t sure how she feels about it. Haine is a bubbly and somewhat awkward middle schooler who looks at Yurine with sparkles in her eyes and her attention leaves Yurine feeling exhausted quickly. But it’s what she says to Yurine that has the greatest effect on her senpai; “You can do anything, but you don’t like any of it? You aren’t proud of any of it? Isn’t that kind of sad? Having an empty life like that, doesn’t it worry you?”
To get this out of the way, I was not fond of the new “couple” who are featured on this volume’s cover: Haine (Yurine’s new kohai) and Aika (who is in the high school division). The two of them are actually an aunt and niece, separated by only five years, who grew up together almost like sisters and who are going through a little bit of a bumpy patch in their relationship as Haine begins to grow up. Their relationship isn’t portrayed as a romantic one, it’s more like a very close familial bond, but Aika does say “My soulmate just happened to be a family member” and I can’t ever recall seeing the term “soulmate” used in English for a non-romantic partner.
Their stories were also just a bit dull. Aika’s story feels rather flat and Haine is only in middle school so of course her emotional quandaries are going to be a bit simpler than the ones the slightly older characters are dealing with (Haine’s problems consist mostly of an internal struggle of trying to find the balance between being independent and pushing Aika too far away). I was glad that the volume spends more time focused on Yurine but this volume is mostly re-treading familiar ground with her as well, albeit with a clearer resolution.
Haine’s idolization of Yurine triggers a bit of an internal crisis in Yurine as she once again confronts the fact that while she’s talented in many areas, from academics to sports, she’s not really “interested” in anything and that it makes her feel very empty inside and touchy about it. Ayaka is actually surprisingly gentle to Yurine during these moments — I think that she feels this is an area of common ground between them, and she encourages Yurine to give her life a fresh, critical look and see if anything she does, such as the various other clubs she “volunteers” with, actually sparks joy within her after all.
When I first started reading Kiss and White Lily For My Dearest Girl I thought that the tempestuous and tsundere Ayaka would be the series’ main focus but as of late the series has been giving Yurine more time in the spotlight. Yurine’s struggle to fill the “emptiness” in her life actually reminds a little bit of some of the essays on USian “gifted and talented” students that I’ve read recently; these students, who are placed in advanced classes starting in elementary or middle school, often end up feeling lost and unfocused once they reach young adulthood and they either phase out of the advanced classes or graduate from school entirely. Without academics, or another rigorous “competition” to fill their lives with, these students sometimes find themselves searching for a purpose long after their peers have already found one and that’s what Yurine is going through this volume, and I suspect this started long before the series began. No wonder Yurine is delighted to find a “rival” in Ayaka, that’s at least one area of her life which isn’t “empty” and, with Ayaka beginning to put the moves on Yurine, her life is looking less and less empty to me.
While this volume was a bit of a duller one, and I was disappointed that Ai wasn’t in this volume at all despite being on the volume’s spine, I still fully plan on being back here in a few months time for volume 8!