Mikako is a little bit short, ending up around five feet even, or 152cm. Her blonde hair, usually tied back in either pigtails tied with black and white bows, or a ponytail tied with both, has just enough droop in the front to frame her bright smile and her bright green eyes. Also, that hair is long, falling comfortably to the small of her back even when tied up. She takes impeccable care of it; or at least she tries to, sometimes she's busy enough that it's not viable and it ends up frizzy and out of pocket. But most of the time it's smooth and shiny (and smells nice, too). It had better be; she wakes up an hour early every morning to make sure, after all. She keeps a comb, a hairbrush, and a small bottle of hair product in her bookbag at all times.

She has a typical enough build for a high schooler at the moment; however, her mom is a pretty curvaceous person, and she's starting to develop in that direction as well. It's all a bit embarrassing for her, really. Consequently, when she gets changed for gym classes she does her best to do so a little bit out of the way, and get it done with as fast as possible. Her skin is at least tanned enough not to be pallid, by and large because she just ends up being outside a lot by happenstance; bikes to and from school every day, walks to the supermarket to buy stuff for dinner, spends time in the nearby park with her siblings...

When she's not wearing her uniform, she tends to wear comfy, but feminine, clothing. Jeans, sweats, floofy oversize sweaters, sundresses, midi skirts, when it's really hot out she'll rock a sports bra and shorts, and so on and so forth. If she can, she gets them in shades of blue, green, and white. They're her favorite colors, and she thinks they go the best with her hair and her eyes.

A special mention, though, has to go out to the thing that she can most often be seen wearing outside of school. Brought back by her mom from London, the Malibu blue newsboy cap is something that she treasures deeply. She's pinned a white and a pink star on the brim, and basically any time she can wear her hat, she does. It makes her feel closer to her parents, and on those infrequent nights where she lies in bed, staring at the ceiling and missing mom and dad, she clutches it to her chest and it chases away the cold.

She carries herself with something almost like a bounce, a cheerful spring to her step that doesn't quite intercede on the strange aura of maturity that she bears. Of course, she's not always happy, as discussed, and when she's not feeling super jazzed that bounce morphs into a much more typical stride, usually with purpose, because if something is bothering her then she's probably trying to do something about it.

It was difficult for Isshiki Akiko, née Tanaka, to leave her career as an airline pilot alongside her husband to raise their child. But leave it she did, because that child--a girl that they named Mikako--was as important to her as the whole world. She was a kind, helpful child from the very beginning. Even when she was a toddler clinging to Akiko's skirts, she was still babbling that she wanted to help her in the kitchen, because 'mommy is always so busy!" Akiko thought it was the CUTEST thing. Whenever Jun came home, he would lavish attention on her too. This went on until she was five, at which point her mom told her: "Mi-chan, you're going to be an older sister!"

And everything changed when Kaede was born.

With six years between them, the jealousy that kind of takes over kids when siblings are born was absent in Mikako. Indeed, she went the opposite direction, and became incredibly fond of her kid sister. Of course, she couldn't do much; she was still only six, after all, just starting elementary school. But after a few years, when she started growing more capable--and when Rin came along--she finally got her wish to help her mom around the house. While her mother was busy with feeding and taking care of an infant, she threw her whole ten-year-old self into cooking, doing laundry, cleaning, organizing, making every bed in the house...and the list went on. At first she didn't figure out how to balance things and isolated herself from her friends; but a few months of it was all it took for her to figure it out.

She was popular in elementary school. She liked everyone (with maybe a few exceptions), and everyone seemed to like her too. Her favorite people were Ei-kun, and the girl he'd introduced her to, Suzu-chan. She spent more time with Suzuka, really; she even started to get a little jealous of Eikichi, because Suzuka seemed to like spending time with him more than she did spending time with Mikako. So she tried to spend time with her ten times as hard. The four, then five, then six-year old Kaede adored her. She thought she was SO cool, and Mikako firmly agreed. She had three siblings that she adored. She was well-liked at school, and had some very good friends. Everything seemed to be coming up Mikako! It was about this time that she started being...a little too helpful. It got her coming home from school late sometimes, because she'd spend her time helping someone after school. Her mother was worried about it, but she seemed, happy, so she figured it was fine.

...And then Suzuka announced that she was moving away.

It deeply upset the then-thirteen year old Mikako; right before middle school, one of her best friends went poof into thin air. Ei-kun changed himself too, turned...weird. She still liked him, but without Suzu-chan tying them together they didn't really spend time together anymore, and eventually drifted apart. Still, her life was good. Hiro was starting to grow up a little bit, Rin was stringing together sentences a little bit better, and Kaede--her favorite, but don't tell anyone!--started to really come into her own personality!

...Which was really similar to Ei-kun's new one, which was...a lot to deal with at home.

And then came the biggest bomb to be dropped on her. When she was fifteen years old, in her last year of middle school, her mom informed her: she was going back to working full-time with dad. She was in charge of the house now. They trusted her to take care of the house and her siblings, to make sure they were happy, clean, and fed. It was up to her now.

It was a TECTONIC shift for her. Instead of taking an assistant role, she was now the caretaker-in-chief. A year later was when she truly came into her own as the substitute mom, just as she was going into her first year of high school. Her grades dipped at first; her first semester, she got slapped with nothing but Cs. But as she figured the balance out, her honor-student grades returned, her siblings were happy, and everyone at school seemed to like her. And Suzu-chan was back!

It's been two years now since she took on the household, and she's thriving, but she's also starting to...burn herself out just a little bit. She's still popular at school, people really like her, but she's taking on more work that she's really able to keep up with. Secretary of student council; a constant member of broadcasting club (and kendo club, oddly enough), a tutor for students who are struggling, and always willing to help clubs that are short somehow--all that alongside her working in her household--she's not sleeping as much as she should, and she's starting to get a little bit tired.

But her friend's back, she has friends all over, her siblings love her, she gets good grades, she's athletic...so of course she doesn't complain. What more could she want?