Izumi Sano

Izumi Sano (佐野 泉) is one of the main characters in the manga series Hana-Kimi (shorthand for Hanazakari no Kimitachi e (花ざかりの君たちへ)) by Hisaya Nakajo. He is considered to be the leading male character of the series, central to the plot of the story.

Character
Izumi is a member of the high-jump team in Osaka High. Widely considered to be a star in the high school sporting scene, he even has a fan all the way in the US: Mizuki Ashiya. Mizuki then decided to make a controversial decision: She transferred herself to Osaka High just to get near to Izumi. There was a big problem, for Osaka High is an all-boys school.

As fate would have it, Izumi was the first person Mizuki bumped into on her first day in Osaka. To complicate matters, the pair turned out to be classmates and roommates. Mizuki herself was elated at this turn of events, although she worried that Izumi, her idol, would find out about her true gender.

While Mizuki was playing soccer with Shuichi Nakatsu, she was accidentally knocked unconscious by Shuichi. When Izumi took the initiative to cradle the girl to the school doctor, he accidentally felt her chest as he was carrying her to the nurse's office (This was only revealed towards the end of the series, although the reader is aware that Izumi knew Mizuki's true identity). After the incident, the high-jumper took it upon himself to look after Mizuki, and help hide her identity. Meanwhile, Mizuki remains unaware that her secret's already known to Izumi.

On top of keeping Mizuki's identity a secret, Izumi has to suppress his own feelings for the girl. To make matters worse, Nakatsu too fell in love with Mizuki, and later challenged Sano, asking if he has feelings for Mizuki. Sano successfully evaded the question, without revealing that Mizuki's really a girl.

While attending Sekime and Rei's wedding in Japan, he proposes to Mizuki and she accepts it.

Family
Izumi hails from Hokkaidō. His family consists of his father, stepmother and younger brother Shin. His family troubles and how they were resolved formed a major plot development in the second half of the series.

Relationship With Father

Back when Izumi was still in junior high, on one icy winter night, his father and mother were driving home from a party. His father, alcohol induced, lost control on the icy road and crashed the car. His father was hurt, but his mother died. This caused his father to go into depression believing that he himself was the cause of the accident. His father channeled his anger at himself to Izumi by pressuring and forcing him to jump higher and higher. For that reason, Izumi despised his father and refused to see or talk to him, going as far as to enroll into Osaka Gakuen on a scholarship, refusing his father's money.

When his father went to Osaka for the high jump pre-competition as a coach for Shin's school, Izumi had to finally confront his issues with his father. With Mizuki's encouragement and help, he finally realized his father was sorry and they made up with each other.

Relationship With Shin

Back before Izumi and Shin's mother died, they were extremely close brothers. When he left Hokkaidō for Osaka to go to school, he never visited or called, leaving Shin with a feeling of abandonment. However, we see that Shin still loves his brother very much; Shin stills calls Izumi "Nii-san" or big brother and we see that later Shin continues with high jumping because he looks up to his brother.

The relationship with each other is still rocky as we can see when the second year students of Osaka go on a school trip to Hokkaidō. Izumi saw Shin purposely picking fights with anyone and refusing his help.

Afterwards, when Shin goes to Osaka for the high jump pre-competition, they finally get a chance to talk it out and get their relationship back to the way it was before.

Trivia

 * During the cross-dressing event at Osaka High's cultural festival, he crossdressed as Yang Guifei (known to the Japanese as Youkihi). Photographs of him as Youkihi were sold at 2000 yen a piece. Later, during the school trip to Hokkaidō, Mizuki claimed that this photo was his last one in a while.

사노 이즈미 Izumi Sano