As a fan of Ai Yazawa’s Paradise Kiss, I couldn’t help but pick up its prequel, Neighborhood Story. I’ve enjoyed reading about Mikako Koda and her feelings for her childhood friend, Tsutomu Yamaguchi. I’m glad it won the award for Best New Edition of a Classic Manga at the 2024 American Manga Awards. Neighborhood Story is a work where you really see what Yazawa was all about before NANA.
There’s one particular side story in the volume 3 omnibus that I really enjoyed because it went into how hard it is to be accepted when you’re bit too cool for the crowd and why trying to fit in isn’t always the best idea.
Before the current story, Mikako attended a junior high school where she repeatedly violated the dress code. Her dreams of being a full-on fashion designer were in full swing during her 2nd year. She catches the attention of the class president, Sanae Seto. Seto admires Mikako, but lives a life where she just follows the crowd. She hesitates to speak up as needed and responds to people in ways that suit them.
Seto has a dream of being a shojo novelist and writes in her spare time. However, she’s afraid of showing off her work in fear that she’ll be made fun of. This is in contrast to Mikako, who shows off her style of fashion with full confidence much to the distress of the school faculty. Mikako gets bullied for her rebellious behavior while Seto doesn’t.
Seto doesn’t understand how Mikako doesn’t seem to mentally break from all the bullying and someone tells her.
“She’s already found the most important thing in the world to her, and her conviction in it is unshakeable.”
Bullying is still a major problem in schools today and adults continue to fail children on how to face it. So what if there really isn’t any help? What can kids do? One can do what Mikako does and that’s to live your life. Don’t bully back and don’t retaliate. Practice confidence and stay connected to people who genuinely care about you. Mikako does all of these things. When Mikako gets bullied after coming back from a suspension, Seto tries to stand up for her. Seto’s classmates try to tell her that it’s none of her business to stand up for Mikako. Mikako responds with conviction by pouring water from a vase onto one of her bullies for picking on Seto (I did say don’t retaliate, but only if you’re the main target. You do have to stand up for your friends instead of being a bystander).
However, those solutions aren’t enough. After Seto comes over to Mikako’s house and sees how lively she is compared to at school, the two stopped connecting during their third year. It turns out Mikako wasn’t going to school at the start because her behavior really disturbed the school culture. Mikako felt that she was too restricted in how she wanted to express herself in school.
Seto realized that it’s not easy to care about what people think about you or be free for that matter. She admits that she was jealous of Mikako because compared to her, her life seemed dull. Seto also says something when going through a life change that made her move away to another school,
“Still, I had a new mold to fill. So I changed my color and shape to fit in perfectly there. That’s how most of us live our lives. It makes things easier.”
To be fair, sometimes, this is necessary. But being just a singular color is limiting. You’re surviving, but not exactly thriving. And the connections you make by trying to fit into a cog aren’t necessarily the best. Do they value the same things you do? That may not be true. When there’s an overwhelming majority that’s you’re totally not align with and only enjoying being a part of it due to the benefits you get, you start to have some cognitive dissonance when you run into someone who makes you question what you’re doing.
Seto finally realizes this after Mikako sends her off with a parting gift in the form of cute eyeglasses and a letter thanking her for being a friend during a tumultuous time in junior high. Mikako expresses her desire to get through junior high despite the bullying because of Seto. Seto then decides to chase her dream of being a shojo novelist. At the end of the chapter, a now award-winning future novelist Seto (who’s in high school) decides to write about her experiences with Mikako as her potential debut novel.
When you’re all by yourself and not feeling connected to what’s really important to you, you can fall into black or white thinking. You’re falling into a one-color scheme. I sometimes see this happening with youth who struggle to deal with uncertainty in their lives. That’s why it’s important to show them the varieties of people they can meet and experiences they can find that can change their perspective for the better. School is important, but it is black and white as hell and its lessons don’t apply to what actually matters in real life. Seto was a victim of this until Mikako entered the picture.
Seto says a very profound thing in the end as she begins to write her story.
“As my fingers struck the keys, the emotions that poured from my heart were so colorful.”
I feel that this side story chapter in Neighborhood Story was also about embracing the diversity of emotions and how important they are to make us connected to those we value in our lives. This applies to both Seto and Mikako. After all, there’s a reason why life is more than just black and white. It’s colorful, good and bad. Dreams and communities that are truly welcoming are full of color. Embrace the rainbow because colors are the smiles of nature.