Aku no Hana

The narrative follows Takao Kasuga, a middle school bookworm whose favorite book is Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal, as it begins in a little hamlet in the Gunma Prefecture. He impulsively steals Nanako Saeki's gym gear one day after school because he admires her. But when Sawa Nakamura sees him, she uses blackmail to force Kasuga into signing a "contract." Kasuga succeeds to win Saeki over and become her boyfriend at the same time. Kasuga notices that his guilt over his theft grows heavier as he spends more time with both girls. By damaging his classroom with Nakamura, he makes an effort to confess, but Saeki won't end their relationship. He flees from home and tries to ride a bike past the mountain next to the town with Nakamura after his mother discovers that he was the vandal. As the two are taking a break, Saeki follows them and tries to get Kasuga to return. He isolates both girls because he can't decide between them, and the cops come to get them. After breaking up with Saeki a month later, Kasuga decides to support Nakamura. To express his affection to her, he composes a song. Kasuga follows her as she flees from him and reads from her diary about how disappointed she was that she couldn't make it to "the other side." In order to gain Nakamura's favor, he steals the underwear of every female in his class save Saeki and uses it to adorn a temporary hiding place. They want to attach the panties to a piece of plywood to display at the approaching festival at the beginning of the summer break. Saeki learns of the scheme and entices Kasuga to the hiding place in an effort to woo him and convince him to stay in their community. She rapes him after he chooses Nakamura over her, but Kasuga fights back, prompting her to set the hideout on fire. Later, after Saeki reports the fire she started to the police, her best friend Ai Kinoshita informs their school about Kasuga's actions. His parents choose to relocate for the holiday because the school does not contact the police. Nakamura breaks into Kasuga's home the day before the festival, attacks his father, and the two flee. They adopt disguises and ascend a float at the event while brandishing a knife. Before they can use a lighter, Nakamura throws Kasuga over the float, where she is tackled by her father. They curse their town and cover themselves in kerosene. A few years later, Kasuga is a high school student in Saitama's miya-ku and still has trouble forgetting Nakamura. In a used book store, Kasuga spots his classmate Aya Tokiwa reading Les Fleurs du mal. She starts giving him books, which rekindles his passion of reading. Kasuga learns that she is writing a novel and is moved to tears when he reads the draft because he can relate to the main character. When Kasuga and Saeki get together for lunch, she charges him with using Tokiwa as a stand-in for Nakamura. Tokiwa accepts Kasuga's invitation to go out with her after he pays a visit to her at work and promises to save her. When Kasuga returns to his hometown to care for his ailing grandfather, he runs across Kinoshita, who regrets being abandoned by Saeki and shares with Kasuga the whereabouts of Nakamura. After finishing her book, Tokiwa hears Kasuga talk about his history and his desire to see Nakamura once more. They ride the train to Tokawa Station in Chshi, Chiba, where they locate her diner. Her mother tells them not to speak to Nakamura because she is "calm now," but Tokiwa is adamant about doing so. Kasuga questions her during their conversation on a nearby beach, but he does not receive adequate replies. As the three wrestle, Kasuga tells Nakamura that he is relieved that she did not vanish. Later, Tokiwa, who is writing a new book, is still seeing Kasuga while she is a freshman at college. Kasuga dreams of the evil flower withering away when he and Tokiwa drift off to sleep, the scar on his hand no longer visible. In his dream, he sees what the characters from the series will become. He marries Tokiwa and they have a kid together, Saeki starts her own family and gets back together with Kinoshita, and Nakamura finds happiness and finally relocates to the city. Nakamura looks up at her own withering flower of evil as the dream comes to an end. Kasuga begins writing in his blank book as soon as he wakes up, perhaps about the happenings in the manga. The last chapter presents Nakamura's account of her initial encounter with Kasuga. She perceives the world as monochromatic and distorted through her eyes, expressing her dislike of normalcy. She recognizes Kasuga's looks when she witnesses him stealing the gym suit. Later, Nakamura detects a return to the mundane existence she despises. Kasuga shows up on his bike before she can, completely defining her environment in terms of both detail and a rich scarlet hue.