Shoya Ishida

Shoya Ishida is one of the main characters in The Shape of Voice.

Childhood
In the days of his childhood, Shoya was an indifferent child. He viewed everyone close to him as a way to stave off his unending boredom. Shoya was raised by his mother. However, his mother owned and operated a hair styling salon as their means of income, and that business enterprise took up just about all of her time. The result was that Shoya and his older sister, for most of their childhood, was left to themselves almost all of the time, to do whatever they wanted to do. Therefore, he would turn to others for 'entertainment'; really anything that he would see them do, or anything that he could get them to do, so that they would be a source of interest and amusement to him. Later in elementary school, Shoya had worked his way up to being a class clown and a notorious bully. With little or no guidance or discipline over his course or direction of his life, there never was any reason, at least to him, to do anything more than run his gang, engage in weird or dangerous stunts, pursue being a social outlaw, and have fun in the process. This outlook served him well, until a thorn was stuck in his side, that sharp pain being the new transfer student in the person of Shoko Nishimiya. Shoya took no note of her the day that she was introduced to the class, but her presence became an increasingly troublesome irritant to him. She was everything that he was not, self-confident despite her disability, emotionally stable, self-motivated to accomplish all that she put her mind to do, eager to learn at school, and having a real purpose in life.

Young Shoya
Shoya at this age presents himself as an unkempt and messy child. He is of average height and weight for a teen boy, although he is the tallest of his three member boy's gang. He has a square, somewhat flat face with a pointed chin. Shoya has narrowed, beady eyes of a dark green color, with thick eyebrows. His short hair is jet black, always looking dirty and uncombed, that forms into many tiny spikes all over his head. With a pale skin tone that looks unwashed, it gives him an appearance of a somewhat darker skin tone all over. Shoya wears anything that he wants to, mostly clothes that make him look sloppy. Many times his clothing would be wet, from jumping into the rivers on the way home from school. On the day that Shoko was introduced into the classroom, he was wearing a maroon with black stripes long sleeved shirt, with a black short sleeved t-shirt over it. He had on a well worn pair of beige cargo shorts, and dirty gray school shoes.

Personality
At this point in his life, Shoya is on the verge of becoming a delinquent. He seems to be content to wander through life with the only direction being seeking thrills and recklessness that will somehow negate the boredom in his life. Shoya has seemingly 'cool' traits that two other boys his age think that overwhelmingly makes him a role model. Shoya and his gang are not mixed up in hardcore troubles like drugs or weapons, but they are prone to stupid antics, like jumping off of bridges into the water below. All three boys attend school, but Shoya is not interested in any academic activities. He would rather play video games at home than ever think of studying for school. When Shoko is introduced to public school, Shoya only ignores her, he being more interested in playing with a mechanical pencil that morning. But because Shoya is so self-centered, he eventually sees Shoko as an irritant, rather than an opportunity to help her become accumulated to her new school. Shoya is not above playing pranks in school, both to his friends, and later, to Shoko. He can be mean-spirited, an example is when he throws sand in the face of Shoko when she was on the playground.

Finally, a couple of somewhat good personality traits of Shoya, as rare as they are. He is loyal to his family and friends. Out of school and in public he is presumably obedient to his single mom, and the local civil authorities, though his shenanigans are often done undercover and with impunity. He depends more on his quick wits, than in carrying a weapon.

Older Shoya
In the five intervening years, not much has changed in Shoya's appearance, other than he is taller and somewhat thinner. He is of average height and weight for an teenage boy, although he looks somewhat lanky. He has a square, somewhat flat face, slightly hollowed cheeks, and is showing a pointed chin. Shoya has narrowed, beady eyes of a dark green color, with thick eyebrows. This gives him a mournful, tragic facial appearance. His straight short hair is jet black, always looking wind tossed and uncombed, that forms into many tiny spikes all over his head.

No matter what Shoya wears, his clothes always look too big for his body. Most often he is seen wearing the male school uniform, consisting of a dress shirt that is not buttoned up at the neck, a loose black tie that is becoming undone, baggy brown pants, and a brown jacket that looks wrinkled and well worn. His school uniform is also the outfit that he was wearing on the day that he was going to commit suicide. When not in school, then any other time Shoya dresses sloppy casual, such as in a shirt and work pants, or a shirt and worn-out cargo shorts. The only time he gives any attention to what he is going to be wearing seems to be the times that he is going on a date with Shoko, or will be with her for any period of time. At least then he will look clean, properly dressed, and somewhat presentable.

Personality

Given that Shoya's childhood and early teenage personality was such that they were very self-centered and uncaring regarding anything outside their immediate wants and needs, something akin to an earthquake or tsunami emotional or social event would seemingly be the only thing that would shake him out of his hardshell existence. And something like that did in fact happen to him with regard to his bullying of Shoko Nishimiya. His obnoxious personality traits that he had built up over his younger years came tumbling down when he was changed from a uncaring bully, to that of a target for other bullies to assault and insult. Shoya's reaction to this was at first one of isolation, that is, isolating and insulating himself from any and all influences on his personalty and life. He would in a sense, place a cartoon 'X' on the faces of people, so as not to interact with them. This situation went on during the intervening years from when he was 12, to when he became 17. He was in a crucible of loneliness, with now one else to blame for that situation but himself. One outstanding crystal trait that Shoya did come to have in his personality was that he had the capacity to become introspective, in a sense falling back to default mode, before he could begin to address his new, changed life's circumstances that he had created for himself, and had found himself in.

Shoko Nishimiya
Surprisingly, Shoya's dislike and opposition to Shoko was countered by her displaying kindness and offers of friendship. For every cruel deed done to her, she would 'turn the other cheek'. Even when on the day Shoya drew blood as he ripped a hearing aid from Shoko's ear, she did not retaliate, but continued her 'conquering the evil with the good'. Finally, one day a line was crossed. Shoya physically attacked Shoko such that a fight ensued. Shortly thereafter, Shoko was transferred out of the public school and into a private school for the deaf. Shoya would not see her again until several years later.

Family
Nothing is ever mentioned about Shoya's father. Very little is related about that fact that Shoya had an older sister. The older sister had lived at home with him and mom, but later is shown to be living at home, pregnant, but with a daughter and an unemployed husband called 'Pedro'. All that is shown with any detail is that Shoya was raised by a single mom, who, unfortunately, spent a lot of her time taking care of her home business of hairdressing. Thus, Shoya was left to himself for most of his childhood, to do pretty much whatever he pleased. Shoya seemed to view his mom as a necessary but inconvenient person that he was stuck with until be would became an adult, although mom seemed to be somewhat of a 'free thinker and free spirit' herself.

Tomohiro Nagatsuka
While Shoya had been friendless and alone for quite some time now, years in fact, quite by accident he comes across his first real friend, Tomohiro Nagatsuka. Shoya notices an altercation between Nagatsuka and another boy who is bullying Nagatsuka to let him have his bicycle. Shoya intervenes, offering the bully his own bicycle, which is promptly stolen. Later, Nagatsuka finds Shoya's bike abandoned in a rice field, and returns it to him. It turns out that Nagatsuka himself is friendless and lonely. So when Shoya came to his aid, that played out as almost instant friendship and loyalty, at least as far as Nagatsuka is concerned. And Shoya did not mind a friend, being hardcore lonely himself. And so the cartoon 'X' that is on everyone's face, all placed there by Shoya, comes off of Nagatsuka.

Yuzuru Nishimiya
Years after Shoya had spent considerable time harassing and bullying Shoko, he finds her at a special, private school for the hearing impaired. As he attempts to contact Shoko in person in a classroom, he is prevented from doing so by a scruffy, rancorous, ill-tempered 'boy' at the door to the classroom. This 'boy' refuses to let Shoya inside, telling him that Shoko is not in class, although he can see Shoko sitting at her desk. The 'boy' introduces themselves as "Shoko's boyfriend", thereby giving Shoya the impression that Shoko already has a boyfriend. Later, it comes as quite a shock to Shoya to learn that the mean-spirited 'boy' is not actually her boyfriend, and furthermore, not actually a boy, but Shoko's younger sister called Yuzuru.

Naoka Ueno
Shoya had been good friends with Naoka since they were children. But when they both began to enter into adolescence, feelings began to change and evolve. By the time that Shoya turned twelve, he seemed to be content with the friendship he had with his gang of boys, and thus he treated Naoka as 'one of the boys'. However, as time passed, that role became unsatisfying, and did not sit with Naoka very well, as she began to yearn for more from her relationship with Shoya. Shoya, not interested in girls at this age, was oblivious to Naoka's feelings and her need of love and attention.