This story basically has Kiku taking on some of the characteristics of a Hikikomori without directly referring to the phenomena or using terms associated with the life style/condition.
If he were human they'd have words with him. His anti-social behavior was sometimes ridiculous but he wasn't human. They saw no harm in letting the personification of their nation lock himself up for days. Because so many of the nations youth did the same. He showed up for meetings, was polite and proper they didn't need him to come out of isolation again, he already was. He met every requirement so they chose to ignore the problem. But she didn't.
She walks around in house slippers on his hard wood floors, trying to find his door. Gently she touches the slider and pushes.
He's at his computer and doesn't look up at her.
"Herr Honda?"
His ear twitches and he turns, he looks pale and he has a small smile. Around the computer is empty food containers and books. Some trash as well, perhaps drawing pages. The room is dark and his futon is out and unmade. Along the walls are books, figurines of animals and along the other wall is the anime and manga collection, a different kind of figurine is set here.
"Inju-chan" He slowly gets up from the seat and approaches her, at first he has a dreamy look on his face but he wakes up as he walks closer to her. When he realizes it's all real, and that she's there, he blushes.
He apologizes and asks her to leave. She does.
But she comes back the next day at the same time.
"Herr Honda?"
He's quicker to respond today. His trash is taken out.
It ends the same.
This goes on for the next few days, each day his room is a little cleaner and his reactions more normal.
Until one day she pushes open the door and he's not there.
"Inju-chan this way please." She follows him into another room.
They sit at the chabudai and they share tea. They can over look his garden from here.
She comes back the next day and the next, for over a month this happens. They have a pattern and his completion begins to return to his healthy vigor. He still uses his computer but her return each day brings him something to look forward to. They talk about a large range of things, but they don't talk about why she comes or the way he's slowly socializing more. She doesn't know it but he's started to call people instead of e-mail them.
He's outside sweeping one day and she has brought macaroons.
He invited her to come earlier.
They sit together at the chabudai and she stitches at an embroidery and he reads a book.
He teachers how to cook things from his country. She soon cooks them dinner each night she comes.
Work and responsibility breaks up these rhythms but they soon fall back into them.
It's a festival. He's nervous but excited to go. He ties her obi and places the flower clip in her hair.
It's the first time they hold hands.
And so it goes.
She will show up and they share time around the table. She's embroidered him a kerchief and he made her a painting. They hold hands more often, in winter they make snow rabbits. On Christmas they kiss.
He finds one day that his computer screen is covered in dust.
And so things go.
Inju-chan, for what I have on it, would be a cutsie, affectionate nickname. "Ribbon" and the use of Chan indicates: cute, youthful/young girl.