First Love (2022 TV series)

Yae Noguchi is a single mother working as the only female taxi driver in her company, Keisei Transportation. This catches the attention of her co-worker Outaro, who made several attempts to ask her out on a date, but is unsuccessful. Her teenage son Tsuzuru is an aspiring musician who lives with his father, as the two are divorced and only visits Yae once a week.

Harumichi Namiki is a security guard of the Northern Lights Building, who has a troubling relationship with his fiancée, Tsunemi. While hanging out with his sister Yu (who is deaf), and her daughter Airi, Yu notices that Harumichi's passcode for his smartphone is "1209", implying to mean December 9th - Yae's birthday, to which Harumuchi denies as he and Yae have not seen each other in years. Later as he rides a taxi, he sees Yae driving by, but she does not notice him.

Harumichi uses a two-way radio to intercept signals from various taxi drivers, hoping one of them is Yae's, and constantly listens on a daily basis. One night he finally receives Yae's signal. Taking Tsuzuru's advice, Yae accepts Outaro's invitation to a date, unaware that Harumichi came by at Keisei Transportation to see her. The date doesn't turn out well. Outaro asks why Yae took the job as a taxi driver and comments that she may have been influenced by something and mentions the movie Titanic, which Yae quickly denies having seen the film herself. Harumichi comes home to Tsunemi, who is watching the movie, which springs up memories of him and Yae when the film came out in Japan.

Tsuzuru visits Uta at the bar where she works and presents his music to her peers, which they enjoy. A frantic Tsuzuru later seeks Harumichi for advice, the latter commenting the former is showing signs of 'first love'. When Harumichi then asks how Yae is doing, Tsuzuru explains his relationship with his parents. Yae picks up Uta and drives her to the airport where she plans to audition for a dance company in Tel Aviv, Israel. Later, when Yae texts her son that she's at the public laundromat, Harumichi rushes there to find her sleeping on a bench. Yae wakes up and the two return to her apartment where he repairs her broken washing machine. They then have dinner where Yae asks Harumichi his favorite food, though the original context of the question has since been lost.

Yae and Harumichi make constant contact with each other and she invites him to a restaurant that serves Napolitan, which he accepts. Later, Harumichi jogs at a local park where he sees a poster of Mars being the closest it has been to be observable from Earth. Yae is also at the park, about to see Mars from the observatory, when she and Harumichi bump into one another. After looking at Mars and gazing in the night sky, Yae turns down Harumichi's offer for a taxi ride and walks to a nearby vending machine. Harumichi follows her and buys her a drink when Tsunemi arrives.

Tsunemi arrives and Harumichi introduces her to Yae, after the which the latter hurriedly leaves. The next day, Tsunemi sets up a date where she and Harumichi visit her parents, forcing Harumichi to cancel his pre-planned date with Yae. Uta returns from Israel and gives a performance at an event where Tsuzuru comes to watch. The two then share a drink together and Tsuzuru opens up on how he wishes his father could appreciate his music, but instead pushes him to pursue a medical career. Uta gives him words of encouragement. Later as Tsuzuru talks more about his musical aspirations, Uta suddenly goes to hang out with another man, causing Tsuzuru to tearfully run away. Uta posts photos of her with the other man on her Instagram, which further upsets Tsuzuru. Yae takes in a man who asks her to drive to the Northern Lights Building and upon arrival, hurriedly enters the building, leaving his smartphone behind. Yae follows and as she climbs the stairs, the man runs down attempting to escape with stolen documents and shoves her away. Harumichi catches her and breaks her fall, but is unconscious, while the thief is caught by authorities. Yu and Airi visit Harumichi at the hospital where they meet Yae. Yae instinctively communicates with Yu in sign language much to her own amazement.

Harumichi returns to work and uses his condition to slack off while ordering his co-worker around. The latter then asks about Yae and why Harumichi didn't tell her the truth of their relationship, to which Harumichi shuts it down. Yae volunteers to be Harumichi's personal driver until he fully recovers, and drives him to Tsunemi's home. Harumichi asks for a flashlight and magnet, which Yae provides, and recalls the time Yae carried them back in high school when they went out on a picnic before changing their plan to see Yae's father instead, who frequently flies abroad. This inspires Yae to secretly tell Harumichi her dream of being a flight attendant. After their meeting, Yae reveals her father left her and her mother for another woman and had a child.

On Yae's last day of being Harumichi's personal driver, he invites her to the top of Mount Tengu where they ask each other about their high school lives. Yae confesses she doesn't remember much but feels she lost something important in her life. The two then share a kiss.

Yae is lost in thought after sharing a kiss with Harumichi. Tsunemi rushes her wedding plans with Harumichi as she suspects of losing him to Yae. After her shift ended late evening, Harumichi picks up Yae at Keisei Transportation and they talk and walk outside together until dawn. Tsuzuru remains upset over losing Uta and deletes all of his music works.

Outaro makes one final attempt to ask Yae out, which she declines. Yae provides him words of encouragement, and in return, he advises her of expressing her true feelings. Tsuzuru visits Harumichi and, deducing what has happened between him and Uta, converses with him on their love lives. Harumichi then breaks up with Tsunemi. Yae asks Harumichi out on a date and he accepts, but when the day comes, Harumichi calls her saying he is leaving Japan to be a commercial pilot overseas. Yae confesses her feelings to him and the two end their conversation. While packing his belongings, Harumichi gives Tsuzuru a CD player as a parting gift. While visiting Yae, she and Tsuzuru listen to the CD player containing Hikaru Utada's "First Love" - the song Yae and Harumichi listened to in high school when they shared their first kiss. Yae cries as she finally remembers Harumichi. The fifth sense of hearing seems to be the trigger for this remembrance.

In 1997, Yae leaves by train for Kitami for a practice high school entrance exam and passes. While looking at her novel at home, she notices a train ticket bookmarked between the pages. Yae traces back the ticket to Appaushi station and waits for the person who gave her the ticket to thank him. When no one came, she writes "thank you" on the chalkboard before returning home.

With her memories restored, in 2019 Yae returns to Hokkaido to dig up a time capsule from 2001 that she and Harumichi buried with the plan to excavate in 2011. Yae looks at all the items that remind her of Harumichi, among them the bookmarked train ticket, and a letter encased in a cigarette packet. In the packet Yae discovers an updated letter that Harumichi inserted in the meantime. While studying, Tsuzuru could not get his mind off Uta, which inspires him to compose a new musical piece. When Yae returns to work, she finds Uta playing Mahjong among the other taxi drivers. Later, Uta tells Yae she is going back to Tel Aviv to be part of a world tour with the dance company. After Tsuzuru completes the musical piece, he and Yae drive to the airport during which Yae hands over Uta's gift to Tsuzuru - a pair of shades. Tsuzuru makes it to the airport and confesses his feelings to Uta and giving her his latest composition. Uta cries and gives him a kiss, then informs him she broke off with the other man after he cheated on her.