NANA – 18

Summary:
Hachi remembers that at the time, it had been three years after Trapnest’s debut and their singles and albums had sold millions. Reira was a powerful singer who stood out from the others and Ren was writing the band’s songs. On that day, during that concert, Hachi spent the entire time staring at Ren, trying to get him to notice Nana. Sometimes it seemed like Ren was looking over at them, but he quickly turned his eyes away. Hachi wonders if Ren is unreachable even after they finally came here. At the end of the show, the band members leave the stage while the audience cries for an encore. Backstage, Naoki thinks that they need to play more than two songs for the encore, but Takumi and their manager are against it. In the dressing room, Takumi tries to talk to Ren about screwing up on the second song, but Ren runs out of the room. In the audience, Nana thinks that Ren probably didn’t see her with all the lights on him. She doesn’t really know what it’s like because she’s never been on a stage that big. Hachi thinks that Nana can do it and that Blast will surpass Trapnest.
At that time, Yasu is walking home when he gets a call from a panicked Ren who had indeed noticed Nana’s presence. Yasu of course had known and had wanted it to be a surprise for Ren. He decides to send Ren Hachi’s cell phone number so that Ren can contact Nana. Ren still isn’t sure about seeing Nana after all this time, so Yasu says that if Ren doesn’t want to meet Nana, then he himself take Nana instead. During the two songs of the encore, Ren didn’t look over at Nana and Hachi at all. The two girls return home and have dinner with Hachi’s family, including Hachi’s father. When Hachi comes out of the bath later, she notices that Nana is reading out of the pamphlet from the concert. Nana then goes into the bath, and Hachi checks her cell phone. She sees a message from Yasu saying that Ren might call, so immediately bursts into the bathroom to tell Nana. Hachi panics because she had forgotten to turn her cell phone back on until just now and she’s afraid that Ren might have already called.
Nana has Hachi call up Yasu, and he reminds Hachi that she can check her call logs to see if she missed anything. But of course there are no call logs because Hachi hadn’t kept the phone on Yasu thinks Ren will probably call because of how he provoked Ren. Nana takes over the phone and tells Yasu that she doesn’t want his help; she’s got nothing to say to Ren. Yasu tells her about how Ren called after noticing that Nana was in the concert hall. He says that if she’s got nothing to say to Ren, then she should say that to him personally. Yasu knows about the two keys Nana has – one to Ren’s old apartment and one to the lock around Ren’s neck. If she doesn’t need them anymore than she can throw them away and it’ll all be over. He reminds her that Ren is tied down by the traces of the woman he can’t hold again. After a long pause, Nana finally says that she understands and asks for Ren’s number because she’s not the kind that will wait around for him to call.
At this time, Ren is laying on his hotel bed thinking about how Yasu threatened to take Nana. Reira comes knocking on his door asking him to come play cards. Ren declines, but he does tell Reira that her voice sounds withered. Reira smiled at him and said that they have to do their best with 16 concerts to go. Soon after this, Ren’s cell phone starts ringing. He’s shocked when the person on the other end is Nana and she announces that she has things to say to him. He tells her his hotel and room and so she rushes over with the two keys in her hand. Nana gets as far as Ren’s floor before getting stopped by a staff member. Fortunately, Ren comes out to get her and pulls her into his room. Nana thinks that maybe she shouldn’t have come, but Ren hugs her. At first Nana wants him to let her go because she doesn’t want to start over with him. However, when Ren says that he’s wanted to see her, Nana can’t help but start crying. She still thinks that she shouldn’t have come, but now she hugs Ren back.
Back in Tokyo, Yasu, Shin, and Nobu are discussing how Yasu expertly got Nana and Ren back together. The three of them are playing mahjong, but Shin wants to play with four people next time. Yasu remembers how they used to play with Ren, so Nobu suggests that they call Ren next time. Both Shin and Nobu want to meet Ren, though Nobu especially because he feels left out since Yasu is the only one seeing Ren these days. Yasu thinks that Ren isn’t able to face Nobu because Ren considers himself a traitor. Nobu decides to send Ren a mail invitation for a mahjong tournament anyway. Shin then asks Yasu about what he provoked Ren with earlier, but Yasu refuses to reveal it. Thinking in retrospect, Hachi remembers that at that time, she didn’t want to fall in love ever again. But on that night, while praying for Nana’s happiness, Hachi had thought that even with all the wounds and the pain, she wants to see that dream again – the dream where she can love someone from the bottom of her heart.

I was sooo excited about this episode, and rightfully so. Not only did we get to hear from Takumi and Naoki, but we also got to hear Reira!! And voicing her is of course the very talented Hirano Aya, which made those parts doubly good. Heck, I’d even say that it was completely worth watching this episode just to hear her. Reira’s voice a bit whiny (in a good way), similar to how Hirano Aya voices Haruhi. Reira may just become my favorite character in the anime version (I don’t have one for the manga). On top of that, they finally used a different Trapnest/OLIVIA song for the latter half of the concert scene. I didn’t recognize it as something from the ED single or from the soundtrack, and it wasn’t listed in the credits, so perhaps it’ll be on a future release.
I noticed that they went and corrected something from the manga for this episode. Originally, Yasu had told Hachi to look in her call history on her cell phone to see if Ren called. She had checked and not found anything. But in the Junko’s Room part (i.e. the omake) of Volume 5, they noted that it wasn’t possible to log call history if the cell phone was turned off. In other words, it was a small error. And here they seem to have made that change for the anime version.
The “Nana’s Room” part at the end of the episode today featured Paku Romi, KAORI, and Hirano Aya advertising the first NANA DVD. And for whatever reason, both Paku Romi and Hirano Aya said “pyon” at the end of their sentences (it was very cute).