Well, Giraffe Guy’s younger siblings — blood-related or not — seem to love him, and that’s always a good sign. Personality-wise, however, he’s still kind of a blank slate. But this is the episode where we finally start to learn more about him and understand what makes him tick. He won’t just be the tall, nice guy in Koyuki’s small friend circle. He’ll finally have real depth. Having said that, I am already bracing myself for the angst: “I have to stop the noise, or it consumes me.” Yeah, that’s a little dramatic. Sure, I get it. He lost his mom at a young age. That would mess anyone up. But is there a single character on this show who doesn’t have major baggage?

Right off the bat, the opening hits us with bits and pieces of the relationship drama surrounding Koyuki and that Igarashi kid (dunno if we’ve been given his first name). Miki thinks she might be at fault for the whole mess, but eh… one, there was no real need for Koyuki to take Miki’s words so seriously. Two, it happened in middle school. Just move on. Put it aside, stop thinking about it, and move on with the rest of your life. It literally doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. By the time you’re in college, you probably won’t even remember any of this stuff. I know adults sound dismissive when they say this sort of thing to kids, but ugh… some things deserve to be dismissed. Trying to parse a middle school breakup from years ago is one of those things.

We pick up where we left off last week, so Miki confronts Minato directly and asks him what he thinks of Koyuki. At first, he says he pities Koyuki, which is partly true. Miki proceeds to call him “sanctimonious,” so he quickly course corrects and says he’s interested in Koyuki for some other reason. It’s totally not love, though! Hmm. Well, I do agree that the pity thing doesn’t explain the whole story. After all, Koyuki is happy with Miki and Giraffe Guy, so she isn’t alone all the time. If Minato merely pitied her, then he could probably find sadder, more pathetic targets lurking around the school. So why does he insist on knowing whether or not Koyuki is dating Giraffe Guy? Why does he want to personally worm his way in when Koyuki already has friends? Not only that, she has been relatively indifferent to Minato’s attempts to close the distance between them. It’s not love, he says. But he’s being real fishy.

Miki met Minato when she was down in the dumps and having trouble making friends, so a pattern is emerging. Basically, she should be wise to his antics. For whatever reason, he likes to chat up all the lonely people. Maybe Yota is right in that he pities them. But what happens afterward? Does Minato stay in touch with his “patients?” Or does he drop them once he can’t look like a savior to them? The latter would explain why Miki looks so bothered about Minato’s clumsy attempts to befriend Koyuki. I just wish she would say something to her friend.

Is this story going to feature a love triangle, square, or any polygon for that matter? Who knows? But Minato already seems to be jumping to conclusions. Why is he so fixated on Koyuki anyway? And why so soon? Hell, he just recently got dumped, so he’s had a girlfriend this whole time. You can of course befriend the opposite sex regardless of your relationship status, but his jealousy over Koyuki and Giraffe Boy would suggest something more. So what’s his deal?