The realization that Mairimashita! Iruma-kun’s second season ends next week (it actually would have been today if not for the one-week hiatus) hits like a punch to the stomach.  Hopefully it returns for a third season, but even with NHK shows that’s no sure thing – two seasons is common, more than two much less so.  That said the manga is more popular than ever, so there’s at least some hope.  I think I bond more emotionally with this series than most, just because it’s so endearing on every level and makes me feel happier than any anime in a long time.

With Clara (and her lovably bonkers family) getting the spotlight last week, Ameri gets her literal moment in the sun this week.  With her the family is much smaller – just Henri – and the crazy much more condensed and neurotic.  Henri is the classic (single?) dad obsessed with his daughter no longer belonging to him, though interestingly the idea of Iruma seems to bother him more than the fact that he’s human.  He was at the Valac household only to deliver the news that – ever responsible and forthright – he’d gotten the lad a restraining order against the demon press.  As far as his daughter’s plans, Henri had no idea.

Are Clara and Ameri really “competitors”?  Well, they’re certainly both close to Iruma-kun.  And they’re certainly opposites in almost every way.  I have absolutely no doubt that Iruma and Clara love each other dearly, and we’ve seen robust evidence that she’s not immune to fundamental chemistry.  But does Iruma love her any differently than he loves Azz?  Superficially then, things appear to be much more romantically inclined between Ameri and Iruma.  And for her part there can be absolutely no doubt whatsoever.  But I’m not so sure.

That this ep is adorable is undeniable.  Though one interesting side effect is that, as much as I love the Valacs, it kind of makes me curious to see Iruma and Clara spend a day like this alone together.  From the exchange of text messages on both these two are in full form – Ameri is a neurotic mess, overplanning everything and obsessing over every small detail to the point where she’s drawn up a graphic novel version of the date based on “First Love Memories“.  And Iruma is his feckless self, knocking her senseless with every innocent burst of cuteness.

There’s an elephant in the room here though, and Ameri is well aware of it.  Setting aside the question of how Iruma sees her (and he’s played his cards very close to the vest there) watching the two of them together calls out just how great a material and symbolic gap there is between them.  Iruma looks like a little boy next to her – and well, he is still a little boy, really – and part of the appeal for her is how innocent and childlike he is.  Ameri loves Iruma for sure, romantically too, but she loves an ideal.  Iruma is 14, and while I don’t recall if we’ve been told I assume Ameri is about 17 in human terms.  That’s a gap as huge as the height difference that makes it impossible for Ameri to hold Iruma’s hand on cue.

Yes, Iruma is “far away” from Ameri – both physically and otherwise – and she’s smart enough to understand that this is a problem.  And indeed their date at the aquari-park doesn’t go according to her manga, largely because she’s got no real experience at this sort of thing.  Iruma is far too much the little gentleman to offer a word of complaint, and he does have fun – but he sees that she’s doing so only intermittently and tries to cheer her up.  And that just makes Ameri “Kyuu!” all the more over him.

The big finish here is the princess carry, and I kind of figured it would be Ameri doing the carrying.  But thanks to a cut from the scuffle with the fortune-telling alligator-thingie Mako-chan Iruma does get to turn the tables, even if he has to rely on a little magic to make it happen.  I don’t know just where we stand with these two, but Mairimashita! Iruma-kun isn’t really a romance series to begin with so that’s not a bad place to be.  It’s enough just to watch the two of them be adorable together, just as it is to watch Iruma interact with the Valacs and even Azz-Azz.  It’s hard to overstate just how much I’ll miss that.

Su…ki…ma