Highlights
As Volume 7 of We Were There begins, Take is invited by a friend to go with him to meet with a girl he met at the gokon they attended, the two of them being too shy to go one on one. He reluctantly agrees, and finds that the girl in question has brought her own friend, Chisa, who was also at the gokon, so that he and she are by necessity paired. Take observes that his friend and the other girl seem to have no trouble in talking, and he comes to learn that this has actually been a set-up by Chisa to meet him, as she is actually the shy one who wanted to get to know him and to spend time with him. She asks him for a month in which they would date, so that he may get to know her, and he finds himself considering the offer as a way of getting over Nana and moving on. When Take tells Yano about her proposition, his friend doesn't think much of it, and tells him so, while Take tells Yano he should spend more time learning how not to make his girlfriend cry, and the two come to blows, which Nana interrupts, and they lie to her about having been fighting. Nana decides she doesn't want to wait til she and Yano are adults, she wants them to be together now, to begin their eternal love. The occasion seems made to order when her parents go to Sapporo for a wedding and will be gone for the weekend. Nana tells Yano, and she plans for a perfect weekend with him – they'll go out to a movie, she'll cook spaghetti carbonara for dinner (she's been practicing) and they can stare out at the starry sky and talk all night in her bed. Of course she is well aware that more can happen, when two seventeen year olds are in bed together, but Yano for once is not as concerned with that aspect of their relationship as he was before, he simply wants to hold and kiss her until morning (although just in case he does purchase condoms from a place not close to his house, but is spotted anyway). However, the best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry, and before Yano can meet with Nana, he receives a phone call from Yuri Tamamoto that her mother is gravely ill and has been taken to the hospital in an ambulance and he reluctantly goes to her, not wishing that anyone should be alone at such a time, trusting that Nana will understand the situation. Realizing later that he is late, he calls Nana and apprises her of the situation. Naturally, she is not happy and demands he join her immediately, but he says he cannot, to go home. She refuses and they are at an impasse. She continues to stubbornly wait for him in the cold, while he waits with Yamamoto until the doctor pronounces her mother out of the woods, at which time he leaves her (but not before she confesses that she has always loved him), and heads off to be with Nana. But in the meantime, Take has arrived and talks her into leaving with him. Yano arrives too late, and ends up walking home in the cold himself, taking ill, collapsing in school the next day and being sent home. Nana goes to see him when she finds out about his illness, but she arrives just in time to see Yamamoto leaving (at Yano's request), and jumps to conclusions. (By now she knows that they had sex two years before). Things are at a low point already when Yano's mom drops a major bombshell on him, even as he and Nana attempt to put their damaged relationship back together again. Despite their best efforts, they seem to be working at odds with one another, and the future is looking rather bleak for the two lovers.
Overall
Some people would say that Nana and Yano are too young to feel real love for one another, but it isn't a matter of age, rather of experience and maturity, for age is but a number, and that works with the young as well as the old. Yano has had a lot to deal with in his life, not just with the death of his girlfriend while with another boy, but also having been born to an unwed mother and not ever knowing his father. It is truth that comes between he and Nana. They both insist upon it, but truth means different things to different people. Yano has a hard time in being honest about Nana-san. At one point when Nana tells him to simply say aloud what he would say to her if she were alive and standing before him, he blurts out that he wishes she were alive and here with him. But is it that he misses her that much, or that her betrayal has hurt him so much? Is her death the ultimate betrayal, and does it add fuel to his fear that everyone he loves will leave him? At the same time, Nana has become obsessed with Nana-san, with knowing more about Yano's feelings for her, with knowing more about the girl herself. Neither one seems able to let go of the past in order to move into the future. Until they do, their relationship is doomed. I have no doubt that they truly love one another, but love is not always enough. The artwork of We Were There is well done, and the manga-ka has drawn some visually stunning images in her portrayal of Nana and Yano. The drama and intensity of the relationship is so heartrending that it will leave you breathless at times, and I found myself aching for them, feeling their agony and their heartbreak. We Were There was the recipient of the Shogakukan Manga Award for shōjo in 2005, and was adapted into a twenty-six episode television anime series in 2006. I can't help but hope that their love will survive despite everything, and that they will ultimately end up together. Only time will tell. Until then, we must wait for the next volume to be released.
ComicsOnline gives We Were There 5 out of 5 eternal vows.
