#Abe and Mihashi subtextually implicitly undeniably a romance while Tajima and Hanai still lurk in the grey area

[daisyachain]

The question of when Hanai and Tajima will get together. I’ve seen it put that Hanai is a fairly normal well-mannered person and Tajime is open as a book, so there’s no earthly reason to engage in Abe and Mihashi’s struggle for proximity. I’ve also seen it said that their friendship is too much based on their inferiority complexes and that to meet on even terms they’d have to reboot their friendship and built it independent from the game.

I’d raise the third option of: Hanai’s sensible and Tajima’s empathetic. No way is Hanai going to go out with Tajima without a long term plan. It’s too important a friendship to squander on a few failed dates and it’s also too weird of a friendship to transition without some serious thought to what it’s going to look like being exposed to Tajima 7 days a week forever. No way would he ask him out or accept a date before second-year uni at the earliest. Now, Hanai is restrained in his signals and Tajima often reads him like a book despite that. Just as Hanai wouldn’t date him without serious commitment in mind, I wager that Tajima picks up on the we’ll-cross-that-bridge vibes and maintains a friendly level of flirt. He wouldn’t be too keen on being rejected.