|Episode Eight|

Takao has some serious dumb luck. First there was the thing with the lunch money, then Saeki agreed to go on a date with him, and after asking her to go out with him he manages to keep her from seeing the gym clothes he was wearing underneath his regular clothes. He may be an idiot, but luck is definitely on his side, even now.

So what happened in the aftermath of the previous night’s ballet of destruction? Something inside him changed, or rather snapped I should say. It was as if all of his pent-up guilt and rage were unleashed in that one moment. It’s so disorienting then that after such an adrenaline rush, the first half of the episode is just the two of them walking home. No spoken dialogue, no inner monologues; it’s just the two of them holding hands in silence as they walk through the empty streets at night. It’s a long scene that is meant to imitate the daze that they must feel after all that excitement, though it goes on for a little too long.

To think though, that Takao would be walking through town in the middle of the night while holding hands with Nakamura. Any other situation would have referred to them as a couple. But we all know that this isn’t the case. At least, not yet I assume. Their relationship has now reached the point where it seems that they understand each other a little more. The destruction of the classroom wasn’t just an emotional release; it allowed them connect in their mutual frustration with the world.

I said Takao has dumb luck, because he ends up getting away with the classroom destruction without his classmates or teachers knowing that he did it. He ended up painting over his name when he was running around with the paintbrushes. It’s like an angel (not Saeki) is watching over him each step of the way. Still, it doesn’t help ease his guilty conscience at all. Guess he’s just added on to his sins yet again.

The big stinger comes at the end when Saeki finds Nakamura and Takao behind the school and figures out that it was the two of them who did it. It probably wasn’t the brightest idea to paint the cover of your favorite book onto the floor of your crime scene, was it Takao? Putting two and two together, she even figures out that he was the culprit that stole her gym clothes. Talk about everything crashing down all at once.

Now that the cat’s out of the bag, the stakes have now raised. Nakamura and Saeki are now the only two people in the world that know what Takao did. One is blackmailing him about it, and one is dating him. With the secret finally revealed, Nakamura won’t have much reason to blackmail him now apart from ruining his reputation in the school, while this revelation will surely damage Takao’s relationship with Saeki. I don’t remember high school drama to be this tense.