realistic fiction

Spring is in the air, but doubts about the future bloom along with the flowers for Sawako and her friends. A bright spot in this season of worry is White Day, where the boys return gifts for the ones they received on Valentine's Day.

Kazehaya discusses his strict father with Sawako, deepening their relationship just in time for Valentine's Day, when Sawako plans to give Kazehaya chocolate for the first time.

A new year brings promise, with the budding relationships of Ayane and Kento, and Chizu and Ryu, and fear, with Sawako worried about choosing a career path.

After the Christmas party, Kazehaya finally kisses Sawako! But a kiss is not enough, and Sawako asks permission from her parents to stay out late with Kazehaya.

Sadako, feeling like her boyfriend Kazehaya is being distant, decides to take a drastic step in order to finally reach him.

While their friends' romantic relationships deepen, Sawako feels Kazehaya pulling away, and hopes that throwing a big Christmas party will bring the troubled couple back together.

Seventh-grader Ben, always an outsider, is led into a deep friendship with Halley, who is being treated for cancer, by the special dog he and his adoptive mother take in.

Twelve-year-old Tia lives in a white slum in New Orleans with her mother, and her whole world revolves around singing in the gospel choir with her best friend, Keisha, but when practice is interrupted by a shooting outside the church, and a baby is killed, Tia finds that she cannot sing, and she is forced to confront her feelings about her incarcerated father who killed a girl in a failed robbery years before.