Ikumi Chiba is a popular, cheerful university student who returns to his family home from Tokyo for the summer. There, he encounters Harukiyo Yamabushi, an edgy-looking gardener with piercings who is working temporarily in his yard. Despite Ikumi’s friendly and outgoing nature, Harukiyo is cold and avoidant, leading the confident Ikumi to believe he has simply met someone who dislikes him. However, the truth is the opposite: Harukiyo is deeply shy and admits he gets nervous and flustered around people he finds overwhelmingly cool, like Ikumi.

As Ikumi becomes intrigued by the quiet gardener, a tentative friendship begins to develop. The story follows the push-and-pull of their mismatched personalities as they navigate mutual attraction. A pivotal moment occurs when Ikumi sees Harukiyo smiling with his shirt off after getting caught in the rain, triggering a sudden awareness of his own romantic feelings. By the end of the summer, their relationship comes to a head, and they confess their feelings for one another, embarking on a new, long-distance romance as Ikumi returns to Tokyo.

The narrative is split into two distinct emotional arcs. The first half focuses on the comedic and heart-fluttering tension of the "getting together" phase, where both characters are too flustered to communicate their feelings properly. The second half shifts to the challenges of their early relationship, specifically how a "shining star" and a "prickly hedgehog" navigate their first long-distance relationship and the stark differences in their personalities when they are finally reunited.