Aya Nishikura

Aya Nishikura is Kota Sagano's only high school friend from the time when he was a delinquent. She used to have feelings for him, but they went unnoticed by both parties.

Aya was introduced to the series as someone Kota had completely forgotten about, until Kako Motoya managed to reawaken some of his suppressed, positive memories from his high school days.

Appearance
In high school Aya is shown to have almost shoulder-length black hair, with her bangs swept to her left side. As an adult she still keeps her bangs swept to the same side, however, her hair is much shorter.

In high school she was to wear the same uniform as everyone else, with seemingly no alterations. The uniform consisted of a white dress shirt, a dark coloured skirt and matching jacket, a tie, a pair of knee high socks and loafers.

Personality
Aya is shown to be a very nice woman, who somewhat resembles Kako in her personality; she is honest, bullheaded and kind. However, unlike Kako, she is more reserved, and not quite as widely expressive.

Aya is shown to be a person who does not stand for unfairness or lies and false rumours, as shown by when she refused to have Kota apologize to her and her mother for having involved her in a street fight- something that Aya had actually gotten involved in on her own accord to help Kota. She also stood up for Kota when more nasty rumours started to spread about him after the death of his father.

Background
Aya went to the same high school as Kota. There she often got to hear rumours about him being a horrible person despite his father, Lt. Junta Sagano, being a police officer. It seemed like most of the town were familiar with the Saganos, as Junta was interwieved on television and often featured in news paper articles, while Kota was constantly getting himself in trouble.

Aya, too, showed initial disdain toward Kota because of the rumours she had heard, but changed her disposition after getting to know him. She noticed that he was not a bad guy deep down, and that he really idolised his father deep down, even though he did not want to show it to others. The two became friends and remained relatively close until the death of Junta, after which Kota isolated himself from the rest of the world, and Aya found it awkward to talk to him. She did, however, pass on a few words of encouragement to him, thinking that he could not hear him, before he left his home town.

After this, he once returned, and happened upon Aya. The two shared a nice conversation, not knowing that they would not see each other in years. It was not until she was an adult that Aya noticed that she used to have feelings for Kota when they were still in high school.

Nothing is known of Aya's childhood beyond her high school days.

Relationships
Aya was Kota's closest friend in high school.

Aya also met Kaoru Sagano when Kota and Kako came to visit her during their summer vacation. As only acquaintances, the two are understandably not close, however, Kaoru was at least initially not very taken by Aya. This is because she assumed Kota was cheating on Kako with Aya, and Kaoru, like Kota, is somewhat protective of Kako. That being said, Kaoru still listens to Aya's side of the story, at least to hear what Kota was like while she was out of town. She also notices very quickly that Aya's retelling of their shared times in high school make it sound like she had a crush on Kota, which Aya admits to.

It can be assumed that Aya's relationship with her family is good.

Quotes
TBA

Trivia

 * Nishikura is Aya's maiden name. What her marrital surname is was never revealed.
 * According to her character page, she has gotten noticably more beautiful as an adult.
 * Because of this, her old male school mates (whom she has never talked to during their high school days) often comment on her looks at school reunions. Deep down, these comments enrage her.