How Wanda-san Dances (
Summary[]
Kaboku Kotani enters Ichirin High, contemplating which club to join. While considering if he should return the Dance Club poster to its place, he sees Hikari Wanda picking it up, thinking deeply, folding the poster and leaving with it. Her unusual expressions left an impression on him.
One day in the hallways, he catches Hikari dancing in front of a reflection on the window and was mesmerized by her charm. Unbeknownst to both of them, Hoto recorded a video of her. He then shows it to Kaboku and Seiya, and sends it onto the group chat later on. Kaboku, who has gotten to know Hikari a lot more through their joint Japanese classes and has been inspired by her (as she was also a person of few words) decides to confront his friend about his inappropriate actions. He then proceeds to run off, only to find himself where he first saw Hikari dancing. He tells her he wants to join the Dance Club and she encourages him.
Plot Details[]
Kaboku Kotani (Kabo) joins Ichirin High and is at the Ichirin High Club Fair, an event where students are given a chance to showcase their clubs' charm to recruit freshmen. When Ichirin's Dance Club takes the stage, Kaboku awkwardly gazes down to his phone immediately and busies himself with his friend's group chat conversations to avoid watching the performance. While his friends were enthusiastically talking about Dance Club's girls, Kaboku remained silent, eventually telling them that he's not watching the performance. Unfortunately, Kaboku found it hard to watch people dancing due to an old memory of a bad experience back in middle school.
During English class, a student is reading an paragraph out loud, which Kaboku's friends make fun of due to his pronunciation. Immediately after that, Kaboku is called up to continue reading the next paragraph. He stands up and stutters.
When class is over, his friends once again make fun of the student with bad English pronunciation, trying to include him in it this time. It is revealed that Kaboku dislikes attention and tries to avoid standing out, only desiring to be "normal". He fears that being different, whether in a good or a bad way, will only do him harm. As Kaboku and his friends pass by a table with stacks of different club posters lined up on top, Hoto picks up a poster for the basketball club, unintentionally knocking over a poster from the Dance Club's stack. Kaboku wonders to himself if he should pick it up, but when he turns around, he sees a silver haired girl picking it up and making weird faces while staring at the poster.
Back in the classroom, Kaboku's friends approaches him when they sees him looking at the Dance Club's poster, asking him if he is intending to ditch Basketball Club for Dance. Kaboku lies, saying he only grabbed the poster to check out cute girls in the club members' picture in the back.
Kaboku saw Wanda dancing
While walking through the hall way, Kaboku catches a glimpse of the girl he saw from before dancing in front of the huge window glasses and is mesmerized by her cute charm and her dancing. Both were unaware that her dancing was recorded by one of Kaboku's friends, Hoto.
Later, Hoto shows Seiya and Kaboku the video he recorded, boasting how he was able to take a peek under her skirt. Kaboku wants to tell them that that is not appropriate, however, he stammers with his words.
During combined Japanese class between class 3 and 4, Kaboku sits next to the silvered hair girl and they check each other's answers. On her quiz test, he notices her name - Hikari Wanda from class 3 and exclaiming how gorgeous her writing is. When he glances down to her thighs, he is reminded of Hoto's recording and feels extreme guilt for taking a quick look at it. Kaboku starts a conversation with Hikari, asking if she likes dancing. Instead of answering right away, she asks how he knows and he answers that his friend saw her. In the midst of asking another question, Kaboku stammer with his words yet again and profusely tries to explain himself, only to end up stutter even more, saying the way he talks has nothing to do with him being nervous or not. Hikari is surprised but, she smiles at him and assures him that she doesn't mind. She calls his name, wanting to tell him something but she's cut off by the teacher.
During gym test, Kaboku notices Hikari's expression when she realizes her grip strength is a lot weaker than she thought. Later, Kaboku asks about her physical strength as he helps Hikari putting away the P.E equipments into the gym storage room and she reveals that she used to do karate. Kaboku wonders if dancing takes a lot of strength and Hikari is curious if he is interested in dancing. He shares with her that he used to dance during gym class in middle school but when they watched the video the teacher took, he was shocked at how out of sync he was, he felt like the everyone watching the recording was laughing at his dancing that he can no longer watch anyone dance without feeling embarrassed. Hikari sympathizes with him, she agrees that it takes courage to dance in front of an audience.
While playing basketball with his friends and in possession of the ball, Kaboku thinks of passing the ball to someone else due to the fact that he feels uncomfortable having other people's eyes on him. Later, his friends were talking to the girls that were present during their game when Kaboku walks in. Hoto calls out to him and introduces him to the girls. He stutters and it leads to an awkward silence. Hoto quickly covers for Kaboku, stating that that is just how he usually talks. Kaboku stays silent and quickly stays on the sideline.
Wanda leaving an impression on Kabo
The next time Kaboku sits next to Hikari, he is taken aback by her compliment on his basketball skill. She says he seems good at passing and assisting while also able to see everyone's position. Kaboku admits that he only started basketball because his friends said he should and his good skill is only due to him wanting to get along with them. He does like basketball but sometimes he just freezes. Wanda opens up with him, telling him that even though she wants to join the Dance Club, she haven't danced with anyone before and as answer to Kaboku's question "why?", she simply says, it is because she likes dancing, because she doesn't need to talk while dancing, and because she doesn't think she is good with words either. That answer left a strong impression on Kaboku, even till he is already home, reads books about his condition - stutter, and watches Scatman John's Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop) music video. However, Hoto sent the recording of Hikaru into the group chat.
The next morning, Kaboku's friends show their dissatisfaction due to him not responding to their messages and Kaboku suddenly asks why Hoto sent the video of Hikari. He replies saying it was because he was ignored, wishing Kaboku was there with him, since girls love talking to him. Kaboku snapped at Hoto, demanding him to delete that video. He further says that judging others when they all live in a small town where these things don't matter at all, is dumb. Hoto was surprised how Kaboku didn't stutter but that immediately triggered his speech impediment. Hoto exclaims how Kaboku is suddenly acting weird and Kaboku calmly responds that judging and laughing at other people hurts him because he too, has something he is conscious of - his stutter - and he would rather be weird but being able to do what he wants than to be "normal" and then he runs off, leaving his friends behind. Seiya taps Hoto on his should and agrees that he should delete the video.
Wanda saying dancing makes her feel free
Kaboku runs straight to where he first saw Hikari, just in time to see her dance again. She notices his presence once she stopped, and Kaboku immediately tells her that he wants to join the Dance Club even though he don't know much and start doing the Running Man. Hikari goes quiet for a while, then she gives him some advices on his form. Kaboku shyly tells her that he expected her to laugh at him because he is just a beginner and his dancing might look dumb, but he still wants to give dancing another chance. Hikari encourages him that people grow the most when they do something they really want to do. She also adds that she found another reason for why she dances - it feels freeing. Kaboku is captivated, saying that she makes interesting faces sometimes.
Characters In Order of Appearance[]
- Kaboku Kotani
- Hoto
- Seiya
- Hikaru Wanda
Chapter Notes[]
Dance Moves[]
- Running Man
Featured Songs[]
| Song Title | Artist(s) |
|---|---|
| Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop) | Scatman John |