Episode 2 Events:

- Shinobu Maehara moves into the Hinata apartments

This episode is focused on a very shy girl named Shinobu Maehara, who we saw near the bridge in the previous episode. Her parents have recently divorced and she is getting ready to move away with her mother. Being very depressed, she takes a walk to the bridge to get out of the house for awhile. Soon after she notices Keitaro sitting at the bench on the opposite side as he's glancing over to her. This is the same event as in Episode 1 where Keitaro ends up leaving his sketch book behind. The town elders inform her that the young man who dropped that lives over at the Hinata Apartments. Although they direct her to where the apartments are, instead she goes the other way and heads home instead.

The next day at school, Shinobu arrives at school. As we see, Shinobu is very shy around her classmates. However, she does talk to one of the girls who is having makeup done on her face, obviously part of a prank by classmates, who seems very friendly to her. Later, as she's talking to her teacher about her moving away, Su who goes to the same school as Shinobu tears through the hallway on one of her mechanical inventions. They glance at each other as Su continues riding down the hallway on her machine.

As Shinobu is walking home from school, we notice that she's walking in the direction opposite to arrows on streets (the theme of this episode of course). She ends up at the Hinata Inn as Su is begging Kitsune to play with her since Motoko is gone on her retreat. Su spots Shinobu down below and jumps down off the roof to greet her. Naru returns and stops Su from scaring her. All of them figure that Shinobu is here to hang out with Su or is here for another reason. Shinobu hands them Keitaro's sketchbook and look at his drawing as Keitaro is coming up the steps. Su jokes with Keitaro about his drawing as Shinobu in embarrassment upon remembering him grabs the sketchbook and runs off. Keitaro sort of chews them out for looking at his sketchbook which was none of their business. Shinobu's mom finds out that she was at the Hinata Apartments and scolds Shinobu, telling her to stay away from that place.

Back at the Hinata, everyone gets ready to enjoy Su's dinner that she cooked, although it turned out to be on the extreme side of spicy. Therefore, they decide to go to the restaurant that Shinobu's parents own. Naru tells Keitaro that he'd better apologize for making her cry. Arriving at the restaurant, they find out that it's closed and they spot Shinobu upstairs who still seems a little upset. At the tea house, Haruka explains the situation about Shinobu and her parents to everyone. Keitaro feels sorry for her and decides to do something for her.

As Shinobu is walking around town again, this time getting away from her parents fighting, Keitaro finds her and invites her over to the Hinata for a special party they have planned just for her. Making it back to the Hinata, Keitaro gets blasted by a kitchen accident. Looks like the dinner is ruined, until Shinobu comes up with an idea and ends up saving dinner. Everyone compliments her on her cooking skills, including Keitaro while also giving certain "other" people crap about how their cooking sucks. With Naru standing right next to him, that immediately earns him a punch right back through the kitchen door.

As everyone is enjoying Shinobu's cooking, Keitaro notices how sad Shinobu is, as though she doesn't want to leave. As they begin to clean up, Keitaro trips over Su, knocking over Shinobu with his hand ending up on her skirt. In shock, Keitaro gets off of her but ends up getting kicked into the wall by Naru anyways. Naru yells at him, while Shinobu is very surprised at how tough he must be if he can take hits like that (surprising that after taking abuse like that he comes out unscathed). Su demonstrates with some additional flying kicks to head and keeps messing with him. Haruka enters and says that Shinobu's parents have come to pick her up. Keitaro asks Shinobu what she wants to do. She grabs his arm, obviously not wanting to leave.

Naru wonders why Keitaro is getting involved in this. He tells her that Shinobu should have a say in the matter,. It's her life and she should at least have a say in what she wants. They decide to stall her parents so she has some time to think. As Keitaro runs off with Shinobu to the roof, Naru seems to show a hint of jealousy for Keitaro concern over Shinobu. On the roof, Shinobu and Keitaro talk for awhile. Shinobu proceeds to ask Keitaro about Tokyo U. Keitaro finds some cookies that she dropped and eats some of them and promptly compliments her. Seeing how much lack of self-esteem Shinobu has for herself, he manages to cheer her up and in a way flatter her at the same time. This is probably how Shinobu begins to develop a crush on Keitaro.

Meanwhile, Naru, Kitsune, and Su continue to stall Shinobu's parents until they manage to find Keitaro and Shinobu on the roof. Shinobu finally speaks out and says she wants to stay and live at the Hinata. Her parents object to this. Haruka responds that the decision is Keitaro's and therefore he is responsible for her. Shinobu assures her parents that she's in the good hands of a Tokyo U student. Naru knows of course that he's lying and Keitaro plays it off.

The next day, Shinobu makes friends with the girl that she talked to in class yesterday. As the girls are in the hot spring, Naru is flipping through Keitaro's sketchbook until she comes to a page with a picture of Keitaro which Shinobu had sketched. At the bridge, Shinobu looks to the sky to see arrow signs pointing everywhere as her inner self guides her towards the Hinata Inn. Shinobu laughs and finally smiles as she makes her way to her new home and her newfound friends.

End of Episode 2

 

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