Amnesia is a fun--if problematic--plot device. It is also fascinating. What makes us us? Genetics? Nurture? The past? Our choices? And how can any of those things make us us if we don't remember them?In the Punch Up series by Shiuko Kano, 19-year-old Ohti Kouta falls and knocks his head at the construction site where he works. When he wakes in the hospital, he believes he is fifteen and has forgotten anything that happened to him beyond that age. He no longer remembers his job, his co-workers, his somewhat dysfunctional first lover Yuya and his current lover Maki Motoharu. He only remembers his sibling Kiyoto, with whom he has a strained relationship. He chooses to move back in with his current lover, a decision I refer to here.
This is a relief since so many amnesia plots are simply excuses for protagonists to behave completely unlike themselves--then deal with the fall-out when their memory returns.
Kouta doesn't move to a new country, start dating his aunt, and become a lawyer. He stays with the secondary protagonist, Maki and eventually returns to work. He is still mostly himself--except all the ways he is not.
Before the fall, Kouta and Maki were in a tense place in their relationship since Yuya had returned to complicate Kouta's life. Despite being in love with Maki, Kouta was holding onto baggage from that first relationship. He withdrew which pushed the sensitive (no matter how bombastic) Maki to also withdraw. In the middle of this stressful situation, Kouta experienced his fall and subsequent amnesia.
So who is Kouta now? And will he be the same person when his memories return?
Maki comes to realize that 15-year-old Kouta was intensely vulnerable, hunting for "any sign of affection, no matter how small." Kouta's basic personality is there but it is buried under a "desperation to be loved."
Maki loves Kouta's fundamental personality but he misses the Kouta of experience. Maki fell in love with the young man who "gained so much in the last four years"--not the kid who "has no idea of his own worth."
So why not wait for Kouta to "grow up" again? Because this second time around, Kouta may turn into someone that Maki doesn't recognize. After all, he won't have the same experiences (see Cyteen where Ariane II's "uncles" attempt to raise her, a clone, to be the same genius as Ariana I--she has the genetics; however, trying to replicate her life experiences, to push her in exactly the same direction, is practically impossible). Kouta also struggles with who he is/who he might become. Interestingly enough, Kouta is upset by any attempts to "help" him recover--everybody wants that guy back, that nineteen-year-old guy. He resists his returning memories and even perceives that "other person" as a rival. Can't I just be who I am right now?
Kouta is hammering away at his identity. When he ponders what it means to be happy, he realizes that happiness is not simply sitting around feeling special. Happiness "gives you stuff you gotta protect." So does that mean protecting his memories? Resisting them? Remaining the self he is right here right now?
Maki assures him, "You won't disappear, and I won't let you regret anything." In the end, the nineteen-year-old and fifteen-year-old are reintegrated, only this time Kouta understands his past better.So is understanding what makes us us? Or memories? Or experiences? Or all of it?
Fascinating questions!
