Fast-faced, wholesome story as one would expect from Kusama-sensei. The domesticity and beauty of an old yaoi set-up, the lightness and airy of the concept, the comical art style of a grumpy divorcé and a gay shopkeeper slowly falling in love with each other. Not much conflict—just friendship, companionship, talking, and love. It’s everything I want. I can’t praise this enough. I’m so thankful for this breath of fresh air!
The other day I realized that, apart from the ebooks published by SuBLIme, I only owned one manga by Kusama Sakae. This has now changed - apart from this lovely, lovely manga I also own the Japanese version of Lost Letters. And there are more to come because she is just that good.
This book has several things I love - younger seme, older uke, two megane characters, warmth and humour. And Kusama Sakae's incomparable art. I have fallen so hard for her style recently.
The Chinese version was published by 尚禾 in 2010, which has then close down. I read the scanned version online. A mellow and sweet story about a bi-sexual uke rediscovering himself after being dumped by his wife and meeting the younger seme. By the way, both main characters wear glasses, one of the moe point that Kusama Sakae sensei wrote about in the last page.
The uke 篠田昌昭 (mid to late 30s?) has been recently divorced from his wife and moved into a new apartment in an area he’s not familiar with, living a bare minimum life from the packed boxes.
The seme 朝倉智紀 (mid to late 20s?) runs a tobacco/antique shop deep in the alley by a tea house, left behind by his grandpa. He’s been hanging around a lot of older folks to keep himself busy after his grandpa passed away.
The uke’s poor condition is like a stray dog in the subway, hence the name of the manga. He tried taking off his glasses while walking at night (to blur his vision) and bumped into the seme.
The seme welcomes the uke to come by anytime for a cup of coffee and hang around the old shop, as well as check out the many antique drawers for storing a stack of paper - manuscript accidentally left behind with the wife, some story he’s been writing secretly.
The uke wasn’t good with maintaining a relationship and cherishing important things, hence he grew apart from the wife. The seme takes good care of the old stuff in the shop/home, especially an expensive tea cup left behind by his grandpa which has been repaired after it broke.
The uke found peace and calmness by spending time with the seme, as if all the negatives and worries in the world would disappear. The seme’s pretty face reminds uke of a boy he liked back in school and kind of went out with. As he get closer with the seme his hidden side slowly awakens…
Some readers would have thought the couple was supposed to be reversed because the seme has a heart like an otome, likes to say kawaii and would easily cry. I think they are perfectly cute together with their complimentary personalities.
There are many small details that made this story a good read. The uke feels that he’s a middle aged man who can only cook for the seme, so when he make bento boxes he’d put the best parts (middle) into the seme’s box and leave all the scraps (ends) for himself.
Shinoda, broken from divorce and loneliness, stumbles into the antique shop of Askura, who treasures broken things, and Shinoda slowly comes to life under the gentle sweetness of Askura's interest and attention, even though he has never identified as being a gay man. This manga has a beautiful use of realism with hesitant and circling conversations, lots of details about how they live and the slow way in which these two people come to love each other.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.