Unlike girls who knew they smoked, drank, permed their hair, got into fights, stayed out all night... yet still considered themselves "good" girls, Utaha Kasumigaoka had never thought of herself as particularly kind-hearted—scheming by nature, gloomy in personality; that was her objective assessment of herself. People called her an unattainable flower on a high peak, but put another way, she was simply difficult to get along with and hard to befriend...
That was right. Despite her mature appearance and exceptionally bold way of doing things, Utaha Kasumigaoka was actually quite insecure in her self-evaluation. As for why, it came down to the same old saying: in this country where fitting in mattered above all else, the more outstanding someone was, the more likely they were to be excluded from the group...
In this country, a cute appearance was not necessarily a weapon for acting adorable; it could also be the root cause of misfortune. For example: Yukino Yukinoshita, who had had more than forty pairs of indoor shoes stolen.
By the same logic, during childhood—emphasis on childhood, childhood!—Utaha Kasumigaoka, whose looks were evenly matched with Yukinoshita fla... ahem, Yukino, had gone through certain experiences as well...
Fortunately, neither Yukino Yukinoshita nor Utaha Kasumigaoka had been defeated by childish ostracism and bullying. Though their methods of dealing with it differed, they had something in common:
Yukino Yukinoshita responded with icy indifference, cold as a snow woman;
Utaha Kasumigaoka climbed to lofty heights, too high to be reached...
But whether it was responding with indifference or placing oneself beyond reach, both methods had one drawback—that was, they made it difficult to make friends!
Yukino Yukinoshita, who looked aloof and cold like a snow woman, longed to make friends, longed to celebrate her birthday with others, longed...
Likewise, Utaha Kasumigaoka, who appeared