It’s another hard-core slice of life episode on Koori Zokusei this week.  This show certainly stays true to itself – cute, chill, and a little cheeky.  One of the things I find charming about it is how it captures the way folks this age – new workers in their early or mid 20’s – are basically still kids.  They work instead of go to high school, they have overtime instead of homework, but they’re still mostly baffled by relationships.  They like to hang out, play games, have sleepovers – it’s all so familiar, except alcohol is another instrument added to the soundtrack.

As ever, the couples in this show are the last to know they’re couples.  Fuyutsuki is using the cat blanket Himuro gave her in the office (yeah, like she didn’t want to make damn sure he saw that), but he’s still agonizing over whether to give her the earrings he bought her for Christmas – as a birthday present.  A winter rainstorm has rolled in, shutting down the trains, and the two trios end up spending the night together – the girls at a station business hotel, the boys at Katori-kun’s bachelor pad.

Much of the ever-present kawaii factor here comes from Komori-san being afraid of thunder (are foxes afraid of thunder?  That seems odd…).  This reminds Fuyutsuki of when Nyamero was a kitten and likewise scared of kaminari, and she pledges to “run right over” if Komori is every frightened of thunder in the future.  This prompts the “don’t you already have a boyfriend?” conversation, with Fuyutsuki implausibly denying that Himuro is said boyfriend even as they continually text each other.  “Never been in love” indeed…

When Fuyutsuki’s birthday rolls in, Himuro is horrified when she tells Komori she has plans.  But they’re just to take her parents out to dinner to thank them for giving birth to her – seriously, could she be more of a good girl?  Himuro keeps getting pre-empted every time he works up the nerve to try and give her the earrings, until finally he manages to ask her if he can walk her to the restaurant.  On the Western Terrace at Shinjuku Station (which this show seems very fond of) he has a meltdown and creates an ice storm in one of the most beautiful scenes of the series, before finally listening to his inner snowmen (I love that they converse) and forking over the gift.

It’s not like there was any doubt to begin with, but I don’t know how much more official you want than this.  Mind you I’m thoroughly convinced that “live with me” from the epilogue was said to a cat or something (not least because every one of those cliffhangers has been a misdirection) – there’s still plenty of time left in the awkward fumbling stage (they may stay in it even after marriage).  But jewelery is a pretty unambiguous present for a guy in Himuro’s position to give to a girl in Fuyutsuki’s position.