This is a love story about a man and woman who don’t have a romantic relationship. It’s a record of their accumulated dates, from their first encounter through marriage and possibly breakup, for the sake of a loveless contract marriage.
Yoriko Yabushita (Anne) is 29 and works for the government bureaucracy. She has a PhD in math and science from the best university in Japan. Her life is proceeding in accordance with the life plan she formed for herself. Her next assignment is to get married and have a baby. But her projected time limit is getting close. As for marriage, Yoriko plans on finding someone and if he likes her, she assumes they’ll be able to make a deal. Forget the romance, just aim for marriage!
Takumi Taniguchi (Hiroki Hasegawa) is a 35-year-old, self-styled “man of pleasure”. He doesn’t work but leeches off of his mother and spends his days indulging in literature, the arts, music, and amusements. Takumi is a cheerful, friendly intellectual who is always neat and tidy. At a glance, Takumi seems like a fine young man, but just jobless. He lives with his elderly mother and when she passes away from an illness, the reality that he can no longer continue his current lifestyle stares him right in the face. Then inspiration strikes. Takumi thinks if he can just marry a working woman and live off of her in place of his mother!