So Mika is a TYPICAL HIGH SCHOOL GIRL, doing typical high school stuff, yada yada yada, She gets in fights with her obviously going to be a villain "friend" in the cliche POISONOUS FRIEND vein. Yeah yeah, typical shojo, normal enough. So she sees HOT STUD and he scares her and attacks some guy but then she talks on a phone and she's like "OH HE'S NOT AS SCARY I'LL GIVE HIM MY PHONE NUMBER". And they go on a date. You know. Also known as his penis. Okay. Where it's revealed he was lying about leaving his girlfriend and essentially just had an affair with her.

Okay. Warning. Red Alert. By this point you should already hit the "Douchebag" alert and get out of there. BUT NOT MIKA. AT THE WEE RELATIONSHIP PERIOD OF LIKE WHAT 1-3 days. She has decided she is madly in love with him, and since he broke up with his ex finally. That's all hunky dory. Hiro is obviously the best guy ever. (sarcasm hand raised) I can already tell he's totally trustworthy and will sweep me off my feet!

What is it with shojo heroines having so little self worth in these stories? Okay, reword that. Mika is the most pathetic, codependent, idiotic, and obviously masochistic shojo heroine I think I've ever seen.(And she has such competition like Hatsumi from Hot Gimmick!) Actually, there's only about one character I actually liked in this series. Everyone generally seemed to have the idiot ball so far up their rear ends they wouldn't know what actually care and empathy was if you cured their parents of life-threatening illnesses and then dedicated your entire lottery earnings to ending world hunger. Hiro comes off as a controlling, emotionally abusive sociopath for the most part, and cancer aside, this is even -BEFORE- the cancer things.
Observe the various romantic things Hiro does!
- Refuses to call the police on the rapists, in favor of punching one. Leaving his CRAZED EX TO GO COMPLETELY UNPUNISHED. Responsible? I think so!
-Emotionally abuses Mika for the HORRIBLE CRIME OF HAVING A FRIENDLY NON-ROMANTIC MOMENT with a perfectly nice and friendly guy. (After all she is property.) Then insists it's her fault until she believes it.
-Tries to break up with Mika and blames her for SOMEONE KISSING HER IN HER SLEEP.
Sound romantic? Sound like a dream guy you'd fall in love with? I feel like my knees are getting weak. And this is before he has I AM DYING as an excuse (As if it was one).

So then his ex (WHO BY ALL RIGHTS SHOULD BE IN PRISON, If Hiro was a reasonable, caring individual. ) shows up and causes Mika to miscarry their love baby. Which makes them sad ): Because the melodrama has to happen in every chapter in this story. And thinks are okay and then Hiro turns into a MASSIVE DOUCHEBAG. With such things like HUFFING PAINT. and MAKING OUT WITH OTHER CHICKS. And when Mika gets mad he's just like "WHAT DID I DO". Yeah.
Romantic.
So then he essentially makes use of her codependant to get head and to make her hurt herself and essentially rape her, and then changes his mind. And Mika is sad and of course self blames because she is totally at fault, and at this point she's just sort of bringing it upon herself by being a complete idiot who sounds horribly too much like a domestic abuse victim.

So she goes around being a complete psycho obsessed with him, with her obviously unhealthy (Like her every other relationship) friendship with an obviously also psycho and crazy girl who is supposedly her best friend, who always turns on her at every opportunity. Because isn't that just what all our friends are like?

If Mika was a compelling heroine, with a spine, a brain, and the self worth of a piece of dust, and not a whiny, passive codependant hollow shell of an actual character maybe this would be the part where she would go "You know all my friends are horrible to me. Hiro was horrible to me. Maybe I should rethink my social circle." But sadly, this is not one of those stories. What really gets me is that

So logically she MOVES ON AND FORGETS HIM RIGHT. No she just whines forever and does self destructive things and MOURNS HIRO FOREVER. Because obviously Hiro was such a catch, where will she find a guy who blames her for everything, dominates her, and refuses to actually protect her from his insane and dangerous ex?
She'll never feel that much romance again! What really got me is when she was upset Hiro's sister had the nerve to tell her to "Think about his feelings!" For motivations that were never explained. Aren't you just being so selfish Mika! Wanting answers for that person who manipulated you, emotionally abused you, and told you he'd take you back for sexual favors, before going LOLJK GET OUT OF MY BED.

You're so very, very selfish. You horrible girl.

So she gets the "Genuine nice guy" involved eventually. And come on, if you've read shojo you know this character. The smart, funny, nice, sweet, caring character, that the main girl will pull around on a string and manipulate until ZOMG TRUE LOVE comes back and he's kicked on his rear to be in the friendzone and since this is a shojo probably angst about how he'll never love again/kill himself.

Guess what happens here?

I don't even really need to go on so I'll sum it up. Mika never forgets about the douchenozzle. Runs off with Hiro the Sociopathic Cancer Patient because he "DID IT SO SHE'D NOT CARE WHEN HE DIIIED". Which totally justifies taking advantage of her codependancy, breaking her when she might be suicidal, and using her for sexual favors. (I saw someone on a forum saying this was a "Mature Decision".) And I'm sorry. Having cancer isn't an excuse for being an absolute douchebag, you know. The one he already was pre-cancer anyways.

I read this for the trainwreck it was. And It surprised me with just how much of a trainwreck it turned out to be.

It was unrealistic, melodramatic trash. With wonderful messages like. "Talking to other men is being an unfaithful terrible girlfriend, even if it's not romantically. And you deserve to feel bad about it and he deserves to leave/get kicked out of school." "Being kissed in your sleep is your fault." "Your boyfriend practically owns you" "Don't call the police on rapists, they were just being paid to do it!" and "You can be as horrible as you want in life, just hope you get a life threatening disease and anything you did before is totally justified and reasonable."

oh one more. "Your friends can turn on you for unwanted contact/being kissed in your sleep and any other minor infraction, and you should always take them back for it."

and "Sex in a school library is the most romantic thing ever"

in the movie after he sleeps with mika he actually says his ex girlfriends name in his sleep

she doesn't get raped in the drama, hiro saves her in time. plus he was actually thinking of killing his ex because of the whole thing. you can just tell how much he loves her. plus u see how much she loves him

mika doesn't cause harm to herself in the drama and though sad stuff does happen hiro is always their for her and loves her very much, so much he went to her house every day begging mika's parents to accept him. he even changed his appearance to make them accept him better. the whole thing about hiro betraying mika after discovering he has cancer does happen, but her friend was half a sleep and they did not run off together plus she was kissed by her friends boyfriend too right after. sure hiro was harsh to her afterwords but he just didn't want her to suffer anymore. (i do not agree with what he did though, but his reasons were not wrong or not thought out) he really loved her and in the drama he did brake and was going to patch things up with her and tell her the truth because he loved her and missed her so much, but she was with another guy (only for tutoring) hiro misunderstood i think, but he saw how happy she was with that guy and new that no matter how much he loved her and wanted to steal her away for himself. he was going to die and leave her in pain and this guy there was making her smile and could be with her a lot longer then he could. It was hard on him too. anyway they do meet up again and the ending is really sad yet touching (just so you know if your being bad and reading the spoiler without watching the drama.) I thought it was really sweet that all the photos were of her and the little wedding they had and even though he was at the end of his life he still saw her. they spent the last second of his life with each other even though she wasn't even in the same room as him. I also think he saved her in the end even after he was gone. watch it if you haven't and you'll understand.

AND THEN IT GOES HAYWIRE. So okay, she's miscarried and self harmed once and somewhere along the line he works out he's got cancer? Perhaps it could excuse the going back to drugs, but it certainly does not excuse the coercion of Mika to perform sexual acts and burn herself with a cigarette under the ruse of going back together with her and then deciding not to. And bearing in mind he knows his girlfriend has just gone through all this suffering and has previously self harmed so clearly isn't in a strong state - I do not see how it could be 'love' or a need to 'protect her' that drove him to severe the relationship but leaving lingering threads and run off with one of her close friends (well, okay so the friend was kind of there to steal her boyfriend) and just leave her with no explanation. I don't know about you but I think breaking the relationship off in amicable terms would have been fairer. And then the whole being with Yuu and not forgetting about this horrible ex of hers. So okay the manga left it at hinting Hiro is dying but to be honest it seemed Hiro was pretty much a backup character from early on in the story and it seems preposterous that Mika would then break up with Yuu to stick to Hiro after all this pain as I believe the drama or movie portrays it (reading forums). Sure if it was just on amicable terms it's understandable but who would want to get back with that kind of nightmare?

Would have been an absolute perfect love story if Hiro would have recoverd from cancer ( Not everyone dies of cancer their are tens of thousands who beat it live with it ans survive for years to come) After he recovered he returned to woe the love of his life Mika and they had a little girl together. Or even if he went into remission, they got back together had a kid then it sificed again and he died. Atleast i wouldn't feel so much regret and loss. it just missing something.