Backstory
At first, Koko was raised in Germany for most of her childhood, alongside her parents and extended family. She'd watch a few aunts and uncles move away, her grandparents pass away, but her immediate family was always around to support her. She was an only child, yet given more attention than intended when her health once began to fail her. At one point, she was diagnosed with Guillain-Barré Syndrome after experiencing a respiratory illness.
Her time with GBS lasted months, something she recovered from with no complications afterwards, but the experience itself was an uncomfortable one that she since refuses to forget. Koko remembers being away from school, from the familiar comfort of her family, sometimes waking up in the ICU as doctors spoke of things she didn't understand. After being so ill, she was made to repeat a year of school due to the time missed, still had many follow ups with doctors to monitor herself, and ultimately a childhood she didn't deem as normal as others. When visits lessened and she was on pace to normalcy, she appeared much better, yet an underlying fear of growing ill remained.
During her early adulthood, Koko's family supported her wishes to do something in the medical field, to go to college in New York and stay at a dorm. Personally they weren't worried given her streak of no longer getting sick, and her attentiveness to being healthy. When she attended university, she met new friends there that mostly let her forget her past worries, and focus on the present and future more than before.
First she met Chicory, a similarly youthful looking girl in her classes, but Chicory really was just a younger prodigy. Koko was simply known for being energetic and shorter than others, and when Chicory introduced her to her brother's friend, Asim, Koko certainly felt a big gap between them at first. Asim was an aspiring doctor, a kind hearted person with noble goals, but with time Koko could see that he didn't actually put as much passion into his major than he did with his hobbies. She certainly had a crush on him first, but when he noticed she could see through his hesitations, he felt more respect towards her pushing him to do what he really wants. Somewhere along the way, he got his medical degree but pursued schooling in cosmetology after, becoming a barber, and, Koko's partner.
Koko never quite told her friends about her difficulties as a kid, now assuming she wouldn't run into such things if her life up to now has been going too well; she's married Asim and become a coroner, while Asim is enjoying his time as a hairdresser. She enjoys the purpose her work gives her, able to handle it well, and enjoys the time she spends unwinding with her loved ones. She was never one to really think much of jewelry, even her wedding ring, but when Asim gave her a pomegranate themed pendant, she appreciated it greatly.
Pomegranates themselves signify marriage for one, perhaps the meaning Asim stuck with, yet they can also refer to fertility and prosperity. For someone who briefly became paralyzed during her early years, with a fear of not becoming better, she's become so much better than she could have imagined, prospering. She doesn't notice it herself, but as a caring and amusing person, she brings out the best of others likewise.