The Light You Kindled for Me

This is an English translation of 君が灯してくれた光, my first novel, originally written in Japanese.

Chapter 1: The Unfillable Void

“Hey, Doctor. Doesn’t today’s light feel sort of like ‘freshly squeezed lemon’?”
The voice sliced through the stagnant afternoon air of the lobby—quietly, yet like a razor-sharp blade. No, perhaps it was more like a wedge of primary color suddenly thrust into my world, which had lost all its hues.
I was nervously fiddling with the cold stethoscope in my lab coat pocket, trying, as always, to dissolve my own outline into this colorless space. Miyazaki Yu, neurologist. My mind was occupied only by a routinized sense of duty and an unfillable void in my soul—a cold space where only the echoes of a light that must have once been there reverberated meaninglessly. And the heavy residue of memory, the memory of having forever lost the light that was my grandfather, whom I had once touched with these hands. This void craved something. Light. Meaning. But I didn’t know how to find it.
As if drawn by a magnet, my gaze turned toward the source of the voice. A wheelchair by the window. A petite woman. Short hair, shoulder-length. Only a pale apricot-colored stole stood out, like a single, vivid drop of paint on the faded canvas of the world. She was gazing intently at the cityscape spread beyond the large glass window—a view that should have been overly familiar to me—as if seeing the world’s light for the very first time, or perhaps as if trying to sear this final light into her memory. Seeing the taut serenity and the almost fragile concentration dwelling in her profile, I forgot to breathe and stopped in my tracks.
Before I could utter a word, she turned to face me,ふわっと (fuwatto)—softly, ethereally—as if particles of light themselves had taken form. And then, she offered a smile—a smile that saw right through my emotional armor, the walls of self-defense I had spent years building, as if they didn’t exist. It was a clear, untroubled smile, yet it held an abyss so deep you felt you could be drawn into it.
“The color of the sky… it’s sparkling, bursting. Like life itself. Can’t you see it, Doctor? Can’t you hear this song of light?”
To say I was caught off guard would be an understatement. It was as if she had effortlessly pushed open the door to my stubbornly sealed soul and spoken directly to it. To hear such words in a hospital lobby, from a patient I’d never met, one who likely carried a heavy illness… My thoughts froze, time seemed to dissolve. Transfixed by the vortex of shimmering light deep within her eyes, I stood motionless. Perhaps the world hadn’t lost its color; perhaps it was merely my own eyes that had grown clouded.
Her name was Hina (雛). At that moment, I had no way of knowing. No way of knowing that her words, her smile, her very existence would become the single, irresistible light piercing the frozen void of my heart. I couldn’t even imagine that she would illuminate my monochrome life so dazzlingly, so warmly, and at times, with such unbearable poignancy. That this encounter was the beginning of the fateful melody that would awaken my lost soul.
Why did I become a doctor? Looking back now, I think it was an escape. An escape from the colossal shadow of Parkinson’s disease that consumed my beloved grandfather. And from the memory of my childhood self, standing helplessly before it.
My grandfather was my sun. He took my hand and led me into a world overflowing with light. The time spent in his studio. The smell of oil paints. His broad back as we stood side-by-side facing canvases. “Yu, don’t just look, feel. Feel the soul’s contour at the border between light and shadow. That’s where the truth lies.” Those words were deeply etched into my heart, supposedly part of my very blood, even if I hadn’t truly understood their meaning back then.
The illness mercilessly stole that brilliance away. I could only watch, holding my breath, as my grandfather’s body lost its vitality, like a living statue. The trembling fingertips, the awkward movements, the fading expressions and words. And finally, even the strength to hold the paintbrush he loved so dearly. Days when it felt as though the sun had fallen from my world, never to rise again.
After my grandfather passed away, the radiant memories were brutally overwritten by the final image of his face, distorted by suffering. The light was lost. Joyful recollections slipped away like sand, leaving nothing in my hands.
As if fleeing, I sealed away my oil painting supplies deep in a closet and immersed myself in the objective, emotionless world of medicine. I wanted to believe that knowledge was power, salvation. That if I honed my skills, perhaps one day I could save someone. Someone like the person my helpless younger self couldn’t save. This near-obsessive desire distracted me from my guilt over the past and the cold “hole”—the void of a soul that had lost its light—gaping in my chest.
That’s why I chose neurology. Facing people suffering from the same disease as my grandfather felt like it might be the atonement I could never fulfill. The ward I was assigned to was a place dominated by a fog-like silence and resignation. A quiet space, cut off from the outside world, where only rhythmic machine beeps and subdued footsteps echoed. Here, perhaps, I could resonate with my inner void and exist unnoticed. That’s what I thought.
But that premonition was shattered—vividly and decisively—by Hina. Her very existence was an alien, intense light piercing the stagnant air.
“Doctor?”
When I came back to myself, she was tilting her head slightly, looking at me with an expression that seemed both curious and all-understanding.
“Ah, no…” I scrambled for words. “…It’s beautiful, the, um, light. …Like lemon.”
Even to my own ears, the reply sounded clumsy. But she didn’t seem offended. With a soft fufu laugh, like a flower blooming, she smiled gently. For an instant, that smile was so radiant it made me forget the shadow of illness.
“Right? It’s almost a waste to overlook it. Like life itself is burning brightly. …Doctor, you should try looking up at the sky sometimes too, and listen to the song of light. Maybe that hard place, deep in your heart, might loosen up just a little.”
Her words sent small but distinct ripples across the edge of the tightly closed void deep within my heart. They carried a premonition—one that faintly awakened the forgotten memory of the light I saw with my grandfather, and something I myself had been craving from the depths of my soul: the lost radiance of the spirit. This meeting wasn’t coincidence. My soul had been drawn to her light. Such an unscientific, yet irresistible conviction began to sprout within me.

Chapter 2: Mismatched Time, Melody of Resonating Souls

My time with Hina began to accumulate in a small common room at the east end of the ward, a place where the afternoon light lingered the longest. Furnished with two old leather sofas facing each other, it was insulated from the daily bustle, imbued with a serenity that made it feel as if time flowed differently there. The presence of other patients and hurried staff felt distant, and it had somehow become our tacitly agreed-upon “designated spot.”
She was always there. Not in a way that suggested she was merely waiting idly, but rather that she was quietly, yet profoundly, living her own time in that space. Sometimes, she would follow the shapes of the clouds drifting outside the window, catching her breath at the sky’s ever-shifting colors. Watching her profile, I felt liberated from my own daily grind, as if reminded anew of the world’s beauty. At other times, she would slowly turn the pages of a paperback, lost in its world. When I appeared, she might passionately discuss the feelings of a character as if they were her own experiences, or exclaim in admiration at the author’s skillful metaphors. Lately, she had been absorbed in cross-stitching, weaving intricate patterns. Her slender, yet unerring fingertips brought forth tiny universes of colorful thread on the fabric. That absorbed profile somehow overlapped with the image of my grandfather in his studio—an image I had once revered and then averted my eyes from—faintly tightening my chest while simultaneously filling it with warmth.
“Doctor, you’ve got those deep valleys between your brows again. Were you thinking about the end of the world?”
The day after we first spoke, as I entered the common room with coffee in hand, Hina stopped her embroidery and said this with a mischievous smile. It wasn’t a calculated, pleasant smile; it possessed an unexpected brightness that slipped past emotional walls.
“No, just a bit tired from last night’s shift…” I hesitated. She let out a soft fufu breath.
“You’re honest. But, you know, I don’t dislike people who are that honest, even if they’re clumsy. Instead of trying to sugarcoat things, they make an effort to look you in the eye when they speak. Your eyes, Doctor, they don’t lie. Though they do have the color of… a slightly lost child.”
Her last words startled me. She seemed to see not just my superficial demeanor, but also the sediment of emotion deep within me, things I couldn’t fully face myself. From then on, we naturally began to talk more. Not just the expected doctor-patient conversations about symptoms and treatment plans. We shared thoughts on books that moved us, memories of childhood games, disliked foods and the silly reasons why, places we secretly dreamed of visiting someday. Talking with her felt like the frozen parts of my heart were gradually thawing.
Strangely, in her presence, I sometimes found myself blurting out things I usually kept pushed deep down—cynicism about the world, frustration with the limits of the medical system, or resignation about my own inadequacy. Perhaps it was due to the atmosphere she carried, like a deep lake—one that didn’t judge or evaluate, but simply accepted quietly, seeking the true meaning beneath. She seemed able to scoop up the true feelings hidden even from myself within the fragments of my words.
“Oh my, Doctor, you can be quite sharp-tongued, can’t you? But the root of that anger is probably kindness, I think. Like frustration with a reality you can’t change. Something inside you just can’t give up, even when you know it’s hopeless.”
She’d say this, covering her mouth slightly as she laughed quietly. Her reaction strangely soothed my frayed nerves, and at the same time, I felt a mix of surprise and a kind of relief, as if she had accurately pinpointed my own inner workings. She seemed to absorb the thorns of my words and wrap them in humor and deep empathy.
Hina wasn’t just a bright and cheerful woman. At times, her words contained startlingly deep insight and a quiet resolve, almost a philosophical acceptance of life and death, that seemed far beyond her years.
One night, during a fierce rainstorm, I was on duty. Around midnight, the nurse call buzzed, and I rushed to Hina’s room. She was sitting up in the darkness, her shoulders trembling slightly. The sound of rain lashing against the window seemed to amplify her anxiety, like drums heralding the world’s end. Her eyes held a depth of fear I’d never imagined seeing in her.
“Doctor… I’m scared. It feels like if I fall asleep, I’ll sink down into deep, dark water… like I’ll dissolve and disappear into a bottomless darkness… My sense of self will melt away, and I’ll become just a ‘symptom’… My consciousness, everything… I’m afraid it will all just vanish…”
It was likely nocturnal delirium associated with Parkinson’s, or perhaps latent fear about the disease’s progression. While making clinical judgments, I felt an even stronger desire to be present with her fear, simply as a human being. I spoke, trying to remain calm, yet infusing my tone with as much gentleness as possible.
“It’s okay, Hina-san. It’s alright. Let’s try taking some slow, deep breaths together. In… and out… That’s good. I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll stay right beside you until you feel calm.”
Gently rubbing her back with a steady rhythm, I guided her breathing. I could feel the tension slowly, gradually draining from her rigid shoulders through my palm. In the silence, punctuated only by the rain, we simply shared the most fundamental rhythm of life: breath. Her tremors passed through my hand, making me acutely feel the fragility of life, and simultaneously, its irreplaceable preciousness.
“…Thank you, Doctor. Your voice… it’s somehow… very calming. …Even the rain, which sounded so terrifying just moments ago, now sounds like… a distant lullaby. …I’m really glad you were on duty tonight.”
As the trembling subsided and she regained her composure, Hina suddenly looked up at me with serious eyes. They were clear as a rain-washed night sky, yet held a strong will.
“Doctor… when you feel unbearably pained, when your heart feels like it’s about to break, how do you get back up? What do you lean on?”
It was a question I myself hadn’t found a clear answer to for years. I thought for a moment, wanting desperately to respond to her sincere query, and found myself speaking with a frankness that surprised even me.
“…Sometimes, I imagine incredibly long stretches of time. The 3.8 billion years since life began on Earth. Our ancestors overcame unimaginable environmental changes, extinction events, time and time again. Viruses, ice ages, even giant meteor impacts. Yet, they stubbornly survived, passing down the slender but resilient baton called genes. We stand at the very forefront of that miraculous relay. When I think about it like that, my own worries seem like cosmic dust. And then I feel like maybe I should try to carry this inherited ‘life’ forward, just a little bit more, just a tiny bit further. That’s how I manage.”
I spoke with uncharacteristic fervor, using gestures. Hina watched me quietly, as if tracing the shape of my soul. When I finished, she took a deep breath and then spoke, her voice now devoid of the earlier fear—firm, yet tinged with a certain poignancy.
“The forefront of evolution, huh… That’s a grand, powerful story. It must be a big narrative that supports you, Doctor. But for me… it might be a story that’s a little too distant. Because I don’t even know if I can pass that baton on to anyone. …Besides, doesn’t it feel a little… lonely? Like we’re just beings who receive the baton and pass it to the next person. Maybe that grand story of yours is actually a slightly convenient way to look away from your own… that ‘hole’ you have.”
Her words were quiet, but they struck deep into my chest.
“Even if this body doesn’t move as I wish, I don’t want to just fulfill a role decided by someone else. I want to choose something with my own will, as the ‘me’ I am right now. Feel this world, think, laugh, cry… even if it’s just for a fleeting moment’s sparkle. The joy, the sorrow, even the pain I feel in these trembling fingertips—I want to savor it all as ‘mine.’ I think struggling desperately like that is proof that I’m ‘alive.’ Because this is the one and only, irreplaceable ‘now’ that I’ve been given. …Doctor, is this way of thinking strange?”
I was speechless. Her words had quietly but accurately pierced through the way I leaned on the grand narrative of “evolution” to avert my eyes from my own powerlessness and the “hole.” Yes, Hina, you always try to stand on your own two feet, no matter the situation. That desperation is what makes you shine so strongly, so beautifully. Within the inescapable reality of illness, she was trying to grasp the meaning of “life” far more profoundly, more desperately than I was. And her question shook the very foundations of my own way of living.
“…It’s not strange at all. Not in the least. In fact… you are much, much stronger than me,” was all I could manage to say.
She rarely spoke much about her illness, sometimes seeming to view it as an objective event separate from herself. But in unguarded moments, emotions she couldn’t suppress would seep through the cracks in her mask of composure.
One day, after a check-up, when I asked the routine question, “Anything changed?” she hesitated for a moment, then said in a small but distinct voice:
“Yu… Doctor, when you’re here, my heart feels a little lighter. Like getting a single patch of sunlight in a cold room. …Oh, I’m sorry, suddenly using your first name like that… it’s too familiar, isn’t it…”
“No, it’s fine. Call me whichever is easier for you. When I talk with you, Hina-san, I feel like… yes, I feel like I can breathe too,” I replied, voicing something I felt deep down, though I tried to sound calm. She blushed slightly, looking pleased, and then continued, a little more boldly.
“Then… Yu-san. …Yes, it has a nice sound. Maybe because it has the character for ‘gentle’ (優) in it. It sounds warm somehow. Will you call me by my name too? …Hina. I’d like to hear it in your voice.”
“…Hina.”
“…Yes.”
In that brief exchange, I felt something more than words pass between us. This time, Hina noticed the heat rising in my face. Her own cheeks were tinged with a faint cherry blossom pink. In that moment, the air between us clearly changed color. Something beyond the roles of doctor and patient—something more personal, delicate, and undeniably compelling—was quietly, yet surely, beginning to bloom.
Hina’s smile wasn’t mere optimism or cheerfulness. It held the quiet strength and deep empathy for others’ pain that only someone who knows profound sadness and helplessness can possess. That light was slowly seeping into the void in my heart, frozen since my grandfather’s death. I felt something tightly shut within me being gently, yet surely, loosened by its warmth.
My “hole” was still there, but perhaps it was no longer a cold emptiness, but transforming into a space capable of receiving and resonating with the light that was Hina. I felt a light like the gentle, certain warmth of a spring sunbeam beginning to illuminate its edges. It was a complex light, mixed with confusion, pain, and a faint glimmer of hope.

Chapter 3: Fading Light, Intersecting Feelings

As the season mercilessly erased the remnants of summer and the deepening autumn tinged the color of the sky, changes—impossible to ignore, yet hard to accept—began to appear in Hina’s body, spreading quietly and steadily like a stain on water.
The speed at which she formed words slowed, just slightly, but undeniably. The sharpness of her thoughts remained, but a frustrating delay occurred before they reached her lips. Her slender fingertips, contrary to her own will, increasingly trembled faintly, like the captured fluttering of a butterfly’s wings. When drinking liquids, the hand holding the cup would shake, and the movement of bringing the glass rim to her lips became slightly awkward. She tried to hide this from everyone, performing each action deliberately slowly, almost like a dance, but that excessive carefulness only tightened the observer’s chest. Still, in front of me, she deliberately straightened her posture and never let her soft smile falter. Thinking of the impatience or the quiet despair over her shrinking world of freedom likely hidden behind that smile, my own heart, struggling to maintain professional composure, ached with a dull pain.
“Lately, small bumps in the hallway look like Mount Kilimanjaro to me,” she said one afternoon in the common room, trying to sound casual as usual. But her voice had a dry undertone it lacked before. “My legs, you see, they don’t quite listen to me anymore. My mind feels like it’s racing with the wind, but my body feels like it’s trapped in a heavy diving suit. …Well, let’s just call it part of my personality.”
Her voice held a complex shadow, somewhere between self-mockery and resignation. Unlike her earlier humor, which was like bursting particles of light, these words sounded like the strained jesting of someone who knows pain, and they struck my ears with poignancy.
“If I happen to fall… let’s see… you could call me ‘a former angel on the verge of breaking off final negotiations with gravity,’ and I’d appreciate it if you’d gently offer a hand, Yu-san.”
Wanting to dispel the abyss-like anxiety lurking beneath her joking words, I explored every possibility as a neurologist to make her remaining time as long and as peaceful as possible. I scoured the latest papers on Parkinson’s disease, contacted specialists both domestically and internationally anonymously, and exchanged opinions on treatment options. The last, and only, hope for dramatic improvement I clung to was Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS). This surgical procedure, involving implanting electrodes in specific brain areas to send weak electrical stimuli, held the potential to alleviate motor symptoms. If she were eligible, it could significantly improve Hina’s Quality of Life (QOL). Reduced tremors and rigidity might allow her to once again enjoy the walks she loved and the intricate embroidery that required delicate finger movements. Beyond objective medical judgment, this reflected my own, almost undeniably personal, desperate wish to see her smile in that light she described as “like lemon,” to see her stand firmly on the earth again with her own feet, for even one day longer. Because I had realized just how much I myself was saved by the light of her presence.
However, the results of the detailed pre-operative examinations delivered data cruel enough to shatter our small but desperate hope. Hina’s cardiopulmonary function, particularly her respiratory reserve capacity, was lower than expected. Additionally, the instability of her autonomic nervous system due to the disease’s progression was significant, with blood pressure fluctuations too substantial to ignore. The risks associated with the complex neurosurgery—lasting at least eight hours, potentially longer—far outweighed the expected benefits. The risk of anesthesia and postoperative complications, especially pneumonia, was simply too high. This was the cold, unalterable conclusion reached in conferences with multiple specialists, leaving no room for my personal feelings. We reconsidered adjustments to other drug therapies and enhanced rehabilitation, but the harsh reality was that maintaining her current state or slightly slowing the progression was the realistic best-case scenario—a far cry from the “recovery” she might have dreamed of.
How could I tell her this? Words failed me. I replayed the conversation countless times in the heavy silence. As a doctor, I had a duty to explain the objective facts and prognosis calmly and clearly. But the thought of what those words would steal from her eyes made my throat burn. Seated in the cold chair of the examination room, showing her the test data, I tried to maintain a voice that was as gentle as possible, yet unambiguous. Offering optimistic interpretations would be nothing but a cruel betrayal in this situation. I explained, one point at a time, choosing my words carefully, as if treading on thin ice, that she was not eligible for surgery, the medical reasons why, and the future course of treatment. As I spoke, I worried constantly whether my own voice was betraying me with an unconscious tremor.
She listened silently, her gaze fixed on the street trees outside the window, which were beginning to blaze with red. Her profile remained impassive, like a Noh mask, but I felt I heard the faint sound of something shattering deep within her eyes. I could see her fists, clenched tightly in her lap, white to the knuckles and trembling slightly. When I finished explaining everything, a long, suffocating silence filled the room. The ticking second hand of the wall clock—tick, tock—sounded unnaturally loud. Eventually, she slowly turned to face me. For an instant, her eyes wavered with deep despair, revealing a glimpse of bottomless darkness, but then, like the calm after a storm, she spoke in a voice that was deliberately composed, yet fragile as glass.
“…I see. …Numbers are honest, aren’t they. …Doctor, you really went to great lengths for me, didn’t you. …From the bottom of my heart, thank you.”
They were words of gratitude, but their tone was too quiet, a complex weave of resignation, a hint of irony, and genuine appreciation for me, and it pierced my chest sharply. Then, she let out a long breath and continued in a small, almost whispering voice, as if talking to herself.
“…Maybe, somewhere in my heart, I was hoping for a miracle. Just a little. Maybe I was dreaming a sweet dream. That I could walk that beach again… walk in that ‘freshly squeezed lemon’ light, on my own two feet… Fufu, how silly. But… one should be allowed to dream, right? Until the very end.”
Her eyes, as she smiled self-mockingly yet somewhat defiantly, seemed to glisten for a moment. How powerless, how trite I must have appeared, reflected in that thin film of tears. I couldn’t say anything. I knew, painfully well, that any words of comfort would ring hollow in the face of this cruel reality. The limits of medicine and the guilt of being unable to hold onto her last hope settled heavily on my shoulders like lead.
“…Doctor, I’m sorry. Could you leave me alone for just a little while? …It seems I need some time to come to terms with this stubborn heart of mine. It’s okay. I’m surprisingly quick at bouncing back in times like these… I should be. …Really.”
The last words were clearly forced bravery. Her voice was thin and faltering, yet her concern for me was painfully evident. “…Alright. If anything happens, don’t hesitate to press the nurse call button. …I’ll come right away,” I managed to say, and left the room. As the door closed behind me, I thought I heard a stifled, short, yet sharp sob from the other side. No, it wasn’t my imagination; I definitely heard it. I stood frozen there, leaning my back against the cold door. My powerlessness stabbed my chest again like a cold blade. Even doing one’s best as a doctor, there are realities that cannot be changed. That obvious fact had never felt so heavy, so personal a pain before. It was just like with my grandfather. No, perhaps this was a deeper, more personal helplessness. Because I myself had craved her light so desperately.
The next day, when I visited her room with heavy steps, Hina was sitting up in bed, looking at the autumn leaves outside the window, tinged even deeper red than yesterday. Her expression seemed different from the day before, imbued with a quiet determination, as if she had found some resolution. Or perhaps she had peered into the abyss of despair and, from that edge, desperately acquired the strength to appear so. Her profile looked painfully solitary and noble.
“Oh, Yu-san. Sorry about yesterday, losing my composure like that. It was childish of me,” she said, noticing me. She smiled gently, though with a fleeting shadow of fragility. “But I’m alright now. I’ve decided.”
“Decided?”
“Yes. If surgery isn’t possible, that’s an unchangeable fact. As certain as the sky being blue. So, instead of melting time away with lament, I’m going to do what I can do, right now. With this body, and this limited time, do everything I possibly can. Right? Even if you fall, falling forward might still change the scenery. Even if the path ahead is darkness, if it’s darkness I chose myself, maybe I can see stars there too.”
Her words easily surpassed my shallow expectations. My small-mindedness, imagining she would either sink into grief or adopt a defiant attitude, was quietly but decisively shattered. Her grace, her spirit that sought humor even from despair—I was once again rendered speechless.
“Hey, Yu-san,” she looked at me with earnest eyes. There was no trace of yesterday’s tears; they were clear as the post-rain sky, yet held the light of a strong will. “If… even if I’m no longer here, please promise me you’ll keep looking forward, and smile sometimes. Can you promise? Your smile, Yu-san, the slightly troubled but incredibly kind one… I like it. I don’t want to see it clouded over. Because that smile, for me, was also a small light of hope.”
The impact was like a strong hand squeezing my heart directly. I couldn’t speak. A simple nod was all I could manage. She had accepted her own fate and was now concerned about my future, my way of being. Her unimaginable strength and kindness simply overwhelmed me.
“…You know, sometimes I get scared in the middle of the night. Like yesterday. It feels like I’m slowly sinking, all alone, to the bottom of a deep sea. Can’t breathe, it’s endlessly dark… And the me who’s always laughing casually, pretending the illness is no big deal… feels like not the real me… Maybe the real me is much more of a coward, scared, a crybaby… That’s what I think.”
She paused, taking a deep breath. The soft afternoon light filtering through the window traced her silhouette in pale gold. Then, as if pulling a faint thread of light from the deep sea, she continued quietly, but with unwavering resolve.
“But still… even so, I want to leave something warm, a small light, in someone’s heart. Even if it’s just self-satisfaction. Just a tiny light is fine. A small proof that I was here… if I could gently place that in a corner of someone’s memory. Like the light of a distant, nameless star twinkling in the night sky, something that could illuminate someone’s dark path, even just a little… If I could become that kind of presence, maybe I could find some meaning in my life too. Just as you, Yu-san, found light within me.”
Her words violently, yet silently, shook the unresolved feelings about my grandfather, my doubts as a doctor, and the questions about my own existence that had settled deep within my heart. She was facing her limits and despair head-on, yet still trying to light the way for others. It sounded completely different from resignation or self-sacrifice; it was a more active, desperate affirmation of life, almost like a prayer. Faced with her nobility, and the unimaginable loneliness and fear that must lie beneath it, I was simply struck with awe.
After the option of surgery disappeared, Hina, far from sinking into depression, began surprisingly quietly, yet steadily, to do what she called “what I can do now.” Getting permission from the head nurse, she spent more time in the common room and started actively talking to other long-term patients and newly admitted, anxious ones. It wasn’t meddling or pity; it was a quiet, warm companionship offered with an equal gaze. She didn’t recount her own experiences but listened intently to others, empathized deeply, and sometimes, with trembling fingers, made small embroidered charms for someone. Her figure seemed painfully brave, yet it also looked like a desperate, solitary battle—her way of confronting her own anxiety and fear head-on, seeking meaning in connections with others. She was trying to hand out small lights from within her own deep darkness, as if sharing them. For me, her presence became the most precious and demanding example of how I should live, both as a doctor and as a human being.
One calm, clear autumn afternoon, in our usual corner of the common room, Hina was sunk deep into the sofa, her eyes closed, her expression serene. Her profile seemed slightly thinner than before, but it held a wondrous tranquility and transparency. Thinking she was asleep, I started to quietly move away when she whispered.
“…I’m awake, Yu-san.” She must have sensed my presence. “I was just having a pleasant daydream. A dream of walking with you, Yu-san, along a wide, wide seashore.”
“The sky was endlessly blue, the sea breeze caressed my cheeks… and I was walking properly, with my own feet, stepping firmly onto the white sand, one step at a time. Beside me, Yu-san, you were smiling with that gentle face of yours. …It was so real, so warm.”
The poignant yet beautiful scene floated before my eyes, leaving me speechless. I could feel, with painful clarity, how much she longed for that sight, and the heart that cherished the dream even knowing it couldn’t come true.
“You know, Yu-san,” she slowly opened her eyes and looked up at me. Her eyes were clear as the autumn sky, endlessly deep and calm. “I’m truly, truly glad I met you. That you were my doctor. It was really for the best. …Thank you.”
The moment I heard those utterly pure, unadorned, direct words, the walls of professional composure and rational emotional control I had painstakingly built crumbled with a loud crash. An uncontrollable emotion surged up my throat like a mass of hot lava, impossible to stop.
“Hina… san…”
The voice I managed to squeeze out trembled, surprising even myself.
“I’m sure… even after I’m gone… you’ll be alright, Yu-san. You are someone who can become a light, supporting and guiding many people with those warm hands. I’m certain of it. So please, live fully. Don’t let your light go out.”
It was her final prayer, akin to a heavy yet warm wish entrusted to me. Her words were like transparent, infinitely gentle crystals of light, condensing the immense pain and despair likely hidden behind her smile, her indomitable will to overcome it, her deep trust in me, and her own unwavering courage. I felt strongly, fiercely, that I must never extinguish this light. That I myself must embody the meaning of “living” that she had demonstrated with her entire being.

Chapter 4: Entrusted Light, and the Vow for Rebirth

Hina disappeared from our daily lives just as the winter wind began to rattle the branches of the naked street trees—like light snow falling silently, accumulating, and then quietly melting away in the sunlight.
Her final moments were remarkably peaceful, the head nurse told me later. No grimace of pain, just a quiet gaze towards the dull, leaden sky outside the window before she drew her last breath. As if, at the end of a long journey, she had finally reached a place of rest. Hearing the report, I could only nod. I knew that if I spoke, the emotions I held back would break through like a dam.
I heard the news sitting on a cold chair in the on-call room. For an instant, time froze, and all sound vanished from the world. Foolishly, I wondered if it wasn’t some mistake. No, somewhere in my heart, I must have been prepared for this day to come, yet the reality struck me with a suddenness and weight that was difficult to bear. The sensation of the ground crumbling beneath my feet. The hole gaping in my chest seemed to expand infinitely, accompanied by a cold wind. Tears didn’t come. The sheer sense of loss seemed to have paralyzed the very function of emotion. Only my heart beat erratically, painfully hard, like a broken clock.
I stood motionless before the door of her room after it had been cleaned and all her belongings removed. The empty space was filled only with the cold, hard fact of her absence, a dense silence. Mixed with the scent of disinfectant, the echoes of our last conversation, her mischievous laugh, and the citrus fragrance she favored seemed to drift like ghosts before vanishing. Only the afternoon light, streaming through the window, drew an overly bright, empty rectangle on the sterile linoleum floor. Her warmth was no longer there.
Her soft voice, her sharp questions that unexpectedly hit the mark, the warm resonance of my name spoken by her—none of it existed here anymore. The sofa where she did her cross-stitching, the window where she gazed at the sky, had reverted to being mere parts of the scenery. Yet, precisely because she was lost, the contours of what she left behind emerged more sharply, accompanied by pain. It was warmth, questions, and above all, the definite light that had pierced my frozen heart. But now, even that light seemed obscured, overshadowed by deep sorrow, on the verge of being lost. My “hole” was even deeper, darker than before I met her.
Several days passed. I was like an empty shell. I performed my daily duties as if borrowing someone else’s body, emotions detached. People around me might have noticed something was wrong, but no one said anything. Food had no taste, sleep was shallow, fragmented, filled with nightmares. The more I tried to maintain professional composure, the more the tsunami of personal loss surged, overwhelming me. Powerlessness. Once again, I couldn’t save someone precious. Just like with my grandfather. No, this parting devastated me even more deeply. She wasn’t just a patient to me. Perhaps she had been the very light I had lost. And now, I had lost that light forever.
At the end of a day shift, exhausted and heading back to the doctors’ office, the head nurse stopped me, slightly hesitant. “Dr. Miyazaki, this… Hina-san asked me to give this to you.” She gently handed me an envelope, as if handling something fragile. A thick, pure white envelope. No sender’s name was written, but its texture, its weight, spoke volumes about who it was from. My heart leaped painfully, my fingertips trembled. I couldn’t breathe.
Back in my own room, I closed the door, desperately holding back the emotions threatening to overflow. Leaning against the wall, I slid down to the floor. I held the envelope to my chest, unable to open it for a long time. Her final words were inside. Reading them felt like it would truly bring everything to an end. Yet, at the same time, I longed to hear her voice. With trembling fingers, I finally broke the seal. Inside was apricot-colored stationery, her favorite. A single sheet, carefully folded. The moment I opened it, the faint scent of the citrus hand cream she loved violently knocked on the door of my memory, stinging the tear ducts I had held in check. Holding my breath, I unfolded the paper. There, lined up, were the ink characters of her handwriting—slightly slanted upwards, yet clearly written with great effort.
To Yu-san,
Writing a letter like this feels a little embarrassing.
I probably couldn’t have said this to your face, even at the end,
so please forgive my selfishness.
Instead of a proper farewell, I really wanted to convey
all the “thank yous” I have.
The time I spent with you is my treasure.
The view from the hospital window, which I thought was gray,
strangely looked vibrant when I talked with you, Yu-san.
Not just your kindness as a doctor, but your occasional clumsiness,
and your sincerity in trying to face your own pain—I was saved by them countless times.
The day I found the “freshly squeezed lemon light,”
I won’t forget the way your eyes widened slightly in surprise.
The pain of the illness, the helpless anxiety about the future.
When I felt like sinking into that kind of darkness,
your presence, Yu-san, was my anchor.
It was a short time, but being able to laugh beside you,
being able to touch upon your worries just a little,
the thought that my words might have reached your heart, even slightly.
That alone makes me feel my time alive had meaning.
So, please.
Don’t stay trapped in sadness for long, for my sake.
I want you to live, Yu-san.
Not just survive, but live in the way you believe in,
sincerely facing the pain before you.
Do you remember the story you once told me about the “baton of evolution”?
You, Yu-san, are someone who can pass that baton
to the next person with warmer hands than anyone.
When you feel crushed by difficult cases or unreasonable realities,
please, just for a moment, remember our time together.
Remember that there was a small patient who tried not to give up searching for the light.
And that this patient is cheering for your future from the bottom of her heart.
If you happen to look up at the sky,
whatever the weather, I’d be happy if you thought it was filled
with my “thank you” and “I’m cheering for you.”
May the kindness you showed me
brightly illuminate the path ahead of you.
With much gratitude.
To the doctor who gave me my first and last special light.
Hina
P.S. Doctor, please paint again. I wanted to see the light you paint.
The moment I read the last sentence, the postscript, something shattered within me. The door to the past I had sealed shut—she was gently, yet resolutely, trying to open it at the very end. It felt as if her breath, her soul, resided in each stroke of ink. With trembling fingers, I read it again and again. Tears overflowed uncontrollably, creating numerous stains on the stationery. They weren’t just tears of sorrow. The sheer warmth, the strength of the words she left behind, and her unwavering trust in me squeezed my chest. She, facing her own death, had worried about my future, trying to entrust me with light. As if she had seen right through the past I had sealed away.
Sobbing aloud, I solidified a single resolve within the darkness. It wasn’t something as simple as overcoming grief. This pain, this sense of loss, would likely never disappear. But I would live embracing this pain, holding the light she left me. This “hole” of mine was not nothingness. It was a space to receive her light, resonate with it, and then, ignite my own.
She hadn’t given me light. She had found the light that must have always been inside me, but which I had lost sight of, and kindled it anew. And she had shown me, through her way of living, how that light should be used. Painting. It was what I had inherited from my grandfather and then fled from. Yet, she, at the very end, had wished for me to face it again.
I carefully tucked this letter, this fragment of her soul, into the deepest part of my chest. It might ache like a scar, but at the same time, it would serve as a never-fading guidepost. To keep the light she entrusted to me burning, in my own way, for someone else. And to take up the paintbrush again. That was the silent, final promise exchanged between her and me, and the beginning of the path I now had to walk. The light entering the empty room no longer symbolized emptiness, but seemed like the hopeful light of a new dawn she had illuminated. A complex, yet certain light where pain and warmth coexisted. I stood up and turned my gaze towards the depths of the closet. There, I knew, lay the dust-covered box of oil painting supplies.

Chapter 5: Painting the Soul – The Darkness of Loss and the Flame of Rebirth

Months passed after Hina vanished from my world, like a patch of winter sunlight suddenly overshadowed. Even as the season moved beyond the freezing winter and the faint signs of life awaiting spring could be felt beneath the soil, my heart remained sunk deep at the bottom of loss, in a cold, colorless shadow. Daily tasks were performed dispassionately, like a precise but soulless machine, emotions completely detached. Donning the white coat, pressing the cold stethoscope to skin, writing sterile characters in charts. Only the repetition of these routine actions barely kept me tethered to the real world, maintaining the outline of sanity. But it was far from the feeling of being “alive”—merely an empty existence, waiting for time to pass meaninglessly. The cold void that once occupied my heart had, through the definitive loss of Hina’s light, become deeper, vaster, transforming into a bottomless darkness that threatened to swallow even the warmth and radiance she should have left behind. “Live fully, okay?” Her final words now felt like heavy chains tangled around my ankles, emphasizing the fact that I wasn’t truly “living.”
Then one day, walking down the corridor in a daze of post-shift fatigue and exhaustion, the afternoon light pouring through the window of that common room suddenly caught my eye. It illuminated the fine dust particles dancing in the air, making them sparkle like tiny golden creatures. A powerful sense of déjà vu. Hina’s voice from that day replayed in my ears with the clarity of thunder across time: “Hey, Doctor. Doesn’t today’s light feel sort of like ‘freshly squeezed lemon’?” In that instant, my world had indeed regained color, something had started moving. And the image of her absorbed in her cross-stitching on the sofa surfaced vividly in my mind. Colorful threads, guided by her sometimes faintly trembling fingertips, weaving a small yet certain universe onto the fabric. Her profile, suffused with a concentration akin to prayer. It overlapped—suddenly, yet with irresistible force—with the memory of my grandfather in his studio, a memory I had once gazed upon with admiration and then persistently avoided. Yes, Hina too, within her limited time and freedom, had desperately tried to ‘leave something behind’. Just as my grandfather sought to etch the soul into landscapes, perhaps she had imbued each thread with proof of her own life, with prayers for others. The light she tried to kindle, the light I had certainly received. I could not let it dissolve into the darkness of my own listless sorrow and be lost forever.
That realization felt less like gentle hope and more like a burning urgency, an irrepressible impulse pushing my whole body forward, though I didn’t know where it was heading. This couldn’t continue. If things stayed like this, the memory of the unique light Hina, that rare being, radiated would fade within my own lazy grief and truly vanish. Her proof of life, the warmth and the piercing pain I received, all of it—I had to grasp it with these hands, hold onto it. Words weren’t enough. No medical record could capture even a fragment of her soul. Through my own senses, with my own hands, I had to capture a piece of her soul, the “feel” of that light, before it was completely lost. Shedding the armor of medical objectivity, with my own soul.
Driven by impulse, almost unconsciously, I dragged out the oil painting box I had sealed away deep in the closet of my family home, buried in the depths of memory. Covered in thick dust, it symbolized the glorious days with my grandfather, his despair as illness eroded him and extinguished his light, and my own powerlessness and guilt, which I had continuously averted my eyes from. Unfastening the rusty clasps and opening the heavy lid, the mixed scent of dried oil paints and evaporated turpentine—the air of the time-stopped studio—rushed back, flooding me with forgotten sensations. My grandfather’s back as he faced the canvas, the dancing colors on the palette, the dust motes floating in the light from the window, and those words: “Yu, don’t just look, feel. Feel the soul’s contour at the border between light and shadow. That’s where the truth lies.” Back then, I hadn’t even tried to understand their true meaning. But now, resonating with Hina’s memory, those words pressed upon me with terrifying weight and urgent significance.
I set up the easel, placed a blank white canvas upon it. It felt like an infinitely vast emptiness, or perhaps it was silently testing my resolve. I squeezed paint from tubes onto the palette. Cadmium Yellow, Cerulean Blue, Burnt Sienna… But when I picked up a worn brush, my fingers felt heavy as lead, trembling slightly. What should I paint? Where to begin? Hina in my memory was too dazzling, too complex, and at the same time, painfully fragile. Her sudden, all-seeing smile? The quiet intimacy of our time in the common room? Or the heart-wrenching promise in our final words? Trying to capture any fragment felt like merely one facet of her multifaceted existence, falling far short of what I desperately wanted to grasp—the complex interplay of light and shadow her very being emitted, the “presence of her soul.”
The harder I tried to paint, the more her image shimmered like a heat haze, receding elusively. Though she shone so vividly in memory, the moment I tried to transfer that light to the canvas, it became a mundane, faded imitation, or mere maudlin sentimentality. No, that’s not what I want to paint. Not some shallow sentiment or idealized memory. Her unwavering strength, her sudden fragility, the inescapable shadow of illness, the smile she radiated even while carrying pain, and deep within it, the “freshly squeezed lemon light” that pierced my soul—I wanted to capture all of it, contradictions intact. The complex, sometimes rending, yet undeniably true “feel” her existence imprinted upon me. It was the vibration of the soul itself, transcending surface appearances of form and color.
I painted, then painted over, impulsively scraped away layers of paint with a palette knife, and painted again. Trying to capture her smile, my grandfather’s agonized expression would superimpose itself, freezing my brush. It wasn’t creation so much as an endless struggle in a labyrinth with no exit—a battle between my own inner darkness and Hina’s blindingly bright memory. The canvas became a mirror, coldly reflecting my confusion, despair, and lack of talent. Squeezing time between grueling hospital shifts, sacrificing sleep, I shut myself in the studio (or rather, the corner of my cramped room, permeated by the smell of chemicals and medical books). The more I painted, the more her absence solidified as absolute reality, the sense of loss repeatedly cutting my heart like a sharp blade. “Do I even have the right to paint you like this? Isn’t it arrogant blasphemy to pretend I understand your pain?” An inner voice relentlessly accused me. Anxiety and exhaustion reached their peak; I was utterly drained, mentally and physically. I could never paint like my grandfather. I cursed my mediocrity. Half-baked as a doctor, not even an imitator as a painter. What on earth was I? The void, far from being filled, seemed only to widen.
One pre-dawn morning, as physical and mental fatigue reached its limit and my consciousness wavered before the easel, I felt a warm, familiar presence nearby, in that ambiguous state between dream and reality. Startled, I looked up. Sitting on the old sofa in the corner of the room was Hina, looking at me with a slightly troubled, yet mischievous and gentle smile. The studio seemed filled with the clean citrus scent she loved, a scent that couldn’t possibly be real.
“Honestly, Yu-san. Furrowing your brow like that again. Like you’re carrying the weight of the world’s end all by yourself.”
Her voice was surprisingly clear, resonating directly in the softest part of my heart. It might have been a hallucination created by my own mind. My own inner voice, crying out for salvation, might have taken her form. Still, her presence felt overwhelmingly real. I caught my breath.
(…Because you’re gone, Hina. Almost all the color has vanished from my world. I try to paint you, but I just can’t capture your true light, that lemon-like brilliance…!) I pleaded silently, screaming inside my mind.
“Fufu, you exaggerate, Yu-san. But you know,” she (or the voice from the depths of my own soul) continued quietly, “what I loved wasn’t the tormented artist trying to paint a perfect picture. It was the face of that kind doctor, listening closely to a patient’s unspoken pain, trying clumsily but desperately to stay by their side.”
She seemed to rise gently, come close, and softly place her hand over my trembling one. It should have been an illusion, yet I felt a distinct warmth.
“You don’t have to paint me beautifully, you know. Because I wasn’t such a beautiful, perfect person myself. I was weak, scared, cried a lot, almost gave in to the illness many times… But still, because you were there, Yu-san, I was able to find that light even in the darkness. The light I desperately tried to grasp, and the light you found within me. I want you to paint that, with your colors, with your soul. Not the form or appearance, but that ‘feeling’ you felt deep in your heart. You remember, don’t you? The sparkling, bursting, almost painful ‘feel’ of that ‘freshly squeezed lemon light’ you sensed. If you could kindle that onto the canvas, I’d be happy. Because you know, that light isn’t just mine. It’s something that can surely gently illuminate the hearts of others you’ll meet from now on too. …You can do it, Yu-san. Don’t overthink it. There’s light inside you too, that you haven’t noticed yet. Paint that. Paint the place where my light and your light overlap. Because you, Yu-san, just like me, are someone who has always been searching for light.”
And just like that, my consciousness snapped back. Outside the window, the sky was beginning to whiten; birdsong could be heard. The apparition was gone, the citrus scent faded. But her words (or my own inner voice) felt like they had quietly, yet decisively, released the heavy chains that bound my heart. Yes, I wasn’t trying to paint a perfect portrait. Nor was I trying to imitate my grandfather’s superior technique. Through my own heart, resonating with my soul, I wanted to express the “feel” of her soul, the undeniable proof that she lived, and the unforgettable glimmer of “light” she had kindled within me—that raw “feel.” It wasn’t about simple dichotomies like beauty or sadness; it was more complex, embracing contradictions, yet still striving to shine—the very “presence of life” that her existence radiated. My grandfather’s words, “Feel,” struck me now like lightning. It wasn’t about objectively analyzing and reproducing the subject, but using one’s own soul as a catalyst, grasping what resonates and emerges there. Truth appears in the moment the boundary between subject and self dissolves.
From then on, my brush, as if exorcised, regained a little freedom. I abandoned the pursuit of technical skill or realistic accuracy. Instead, I immersed myself in the task of entrusting the unspoken emotional fluctuations I felt during that intense time with her, the resonance of words that struck my heart, the light and shadow dwelling behind her fleeting expressions, their unavoidable contradictions and coexistence—simply channeling them into color and form. The brilliance of lemon yellow, the deep indigo of the sea bottom, the pale pink signifying vulnerability, and the warm brown within the shadows encompassing them all. Perhaps my experience as a doctor, having touched the inner depths of countless human beings, was unconsciously guiding my brush. It was both a memorial to Hina and a painful, prayer-like act of thawing my own frozen soul, moving towards rebirth. On the canvas, I conversed again with Hina’s soul, understood the meaning of my grandfather’s words with my body, and continued, without fear, the journey of searching for the light dormant within myself. Not fearing failure, simply layering colors as my soul felt, scraping them away, layering again. It was also a process of reclaiming intuition and sensation—another truth long forgotten by the doctor who relied absolutely on logic and objectivity. From beneath the thickly layered paint, pushing back the darkness, little by little, definite colors and a trembling light began to emerge.
Weeks later, as the soft light of dawn filled the studio, I finally put down my brush. Before me stood the canvas. The finished painting might be immature, rough, by objective artistic standards. Far from academic realism. The facial contours were deliberately ambiguous, the colors bold like waves of emotion, perhaps sometimes striking dissonant chords. But Hina, as only I knew her, the “feel of her soul” as I sensed it, was undeniably breathing there. Embracing deep shadow, yet still striving to shine—no, shining because of it—the trajectory of her soul. Deep within her eyes, that “freshly squeezed lemon light” resided—quietly, yet powerfully. It wasn’t merely a bright light. It was a complex, profound light that penetrated and refracted through sadness and pain, yet still—or perhaps precisely because of it—struck the viewer’s heart. Light accentuated by shadow, warmth grasped because darkness is known. An irrepressible life force seemed to overflow from the entire canvas like quiet music, along with warmth. It didn’t negate sadness; rather, it was a serene yet burning affirmation of life, the kind only emitted by those who know sorrow and despair deeply. It wasn’t a “perfect painting.” But for me, it was the truest painting possible. I could believe that I had truly captured the echo of her soul, the feel of the light she kindled, with my own hands. And in that moment, a faint but certain light of hope for my own regeneration was lit.
I hung the painting on the wall of my room where I would always see it, not for anyone else to view. It became a place for wordless dialogue between Hina and me, and the first, most crucial lamp guiding me as I started to walk forward again, allowing me to remain myself. Dawn might still be far off. The pain of loss would likely never disappear. Yet, whenever I looked at this painting, I would hear her voice, and my own inner voice. “Live fully, okay?” The words no longer felt like a heavy burden binding me, but resonated as warm encouragement welling up quietly from within. With this certain warmth and light found in deep darkness held close to my heart, I felt ready to walk my own path again, on my own feet. As a doctor, and as a human being. It was my turn now, to light the way for someone else, in my own way, with the light Hina left me. Not towards the back of the closet, but towards the future.

Chapter 6: The Place Where Hope Continues to Burn

Nearly ten years have passed since then. Or rather, the ninth spring has arrived in this town where the sound of the tide can be heard. Like the ebb and flow of waves, sometimes gently, sometimes fiercely, but surely, time flowed, quietly transforming me as a person.
I now spend my days as the master of a small clinic in this town, a place permeated by the faint scent of salt carried on the sea breeze and the smell of old wood. The me who once rushed down the sterile corridors of a large hospital as a neurologist now begins the day by opening the creaking wooden window frames to the morning light, breathing deep the soft sea air and the fragrance of seasonal flowers planted in the garden. In the consultation room, the warmth of long-used wood, the subtle scent of the tide, and the unspoken questions and encouragement silently emanating from the painting on the wall overpower the smell of disinfectant. The slow tempo set by the pendulum of the old wall clock still breathes here, not yet lost.
By the time the afternoon sun draws golden geometric patterns on the old wooden floor of the consultation room, a rugged fisherman with a sunburnt face might boom, “Doc, messed up my back again in yesterday’s storm… pathetic, ain’t it? But look here, look at this big catch!” filling the air with the smell of nets and his boisterous voice. As evening approaches, children with bouncing backpacks might proudly (or tearfully) present scraped knees like badges of honor. An old woman troubled by a lingering cough, a young housewife unable to sleep at night due to a vague, indefinable anxiety, a solitary man who barely speaks, just coming silently to pick up his medicine. There are fewer dramatic diagnoses or treatments than in a city hospital. But each day involves quietly touching fragments of individual lives, the small joys and deep sorrows behind them, the unspoken, adrift anxieties. There’s no adrenaline rush, but it’s a life that confronts more deeply the weight of each individual life and the quiet, yet overwhelming miracle of its continuation day by day. Sometimes, I feel acutely aware of my own powerlessness, leading to sleepless nights. That helplessness from long ago sometimes washes over my heart unexpectedly like a cold wave. But I no longer think of running away. I have a reason to put down roots here, to keep the light burning.
On the wall of the consultation room, precisely in my line of sight as I face my patients, hangs a single painting. The portrait of Hina that I once painted in the depths of loss, as if wringing out my entire soul. In my heart, I call this painting the “Portrait of Hope.” The depth of the oil paints has slightly increased over the years, and the “freshly squeezed lemon light” I struggled to capture in her eyes, catching the sunlight from the window, seems to flicker—sometimes quietly introspective, sometimes powerfully hopeful—as if still speaking to me, and to those who visit, even now. Technically, it probably has many immature aspects. The confusion and pain I felt while painting it are also vividly etched there. But beneath the layers of paint, what I received from her, the unbearable pain of loss, the desperate prayer for recovery from it, and all the hope she entrusted to me, are certainly breathing. This painting is my compass, my anchor, and above all, the site of an endless dialogue with her soul, and with my own.
“Doctor, this painting… it’s really strange, isn’t it? Every time I come here, I find myself drawn to look at it. It feels somehow… like my heart is quietly cleansed, but at the same time, something deep inside tightens… My grandmother, too, when she sits in front of this painting, she starts talking, little by little, about the hardest times in her past, but she always ends up saying, tearfully, ‘Still, I’m glad I lived.'”
One day, a woman who had long dealt with unexplained fatigue, carrying an air of floating detachment from reality, murmured these words softly at the end of her consultation. She always seemed to be gazing somewhere distant, her eyes holding an elusive anxiety, but today, I felt a gentle light, seemingly radiating from within, flicker deep in her eyes.
I looked up from the chart, met her eyes directly, and slowly searched for words. Consciously trying, as Hina had done for me, not to deliver a diagnosis, but simply to be present, to listen quietly to the unspoken words emitted by her soul.
“Yes, for me too… it’s a special piece, like a guidepost, and a guardian spirit. I painted it when I was still young, much clumsier than now, and utterly crushed by a sense of helpless powerlessness. Right after losing a precious, irreplaceable light.”
After a short pause, I continued.
“I believe everyone carries within their heart both a bright light they might not even be aware of, and an equally deep shadow. Even people who seem incredibly cheerful might be shouldering deep sorrow or pain unknown to others, crying alone in the middle of the night. The woman in this painting, I’m sure she was like that too. She knew deep suffering, pain, and injustice in her short life. But she… she refused, until the very end, to be swallowed by that shadow. Even while looking down, she never gave up on lifting her face. I think she was trying to find, beyond where she lifted her gaze, a tiny, yet diamond-hard and certain light. It wasn’t comfort given by someone else, perhaps, but a light she desperately grasped from within herself, like a lotus flower blooming from the mud.”
I glanced out the window at the gentle sparkle of the calm sea, then turned back to her.
“You don’t need to rush. Slowly is fine. At your own pace. If there are moments when you can lift your face even just a tiny bit, that’s more than enough. If I can help you find that small light, there’s no greater joy for me as a doctor. Hope, perhaps, isn’t a word that only refers to great success or a brilliant future. Just managing to get through today safely, catching your breath at the beauty of the afternoon light through the window, feeling your heart warmed by someone’s clumsy kindness, feeling ‘Ah, I’m alive right now,’ even if there’s pain in your chest… I believe hope is surely hidden within the accumulation of these small, yet irreplaceable moments scattered throughout daily life. Just like the ‘soul’s contour’ my grandfather found at the border of light and shadow, it breathes right beside our everyday lives. Just as the woman in this painting taught me firsthand, in the midst of my own darkness.”
What Hina taught me. That perfect diagnoses or dramatic cures aren’t the entirety of medicine. That quietly staying beside someone, listening to their suffering that cannot be captured by diagnostic labels, their unspoken lonely anxieties, and patiently continuing to believe in the light within them, no matter how faint it seems—that this plain, patient work sometimes holds a power to heal the soul more deeply than any cutting-edge drug. She not only lit a definitive light in the “void” I carried but also showed me, through her very way of living, the path I should walk as a doctor and as a human being. I still hesitate, I still make mistakes. I still get frustrated by my own limits. But I try not to lose sight of the direction she pointed me towards, the direction her light shines. Her voice continues to echo quietly within me, like the sound of the tide.
After the woman left the consultation room, her stiffness slightly eased, her eyes holding the quiet radiance of someone who had found something precious, I gazed up at the painting on the wall for a while. Hina, what would you say if you saw me now? Would you tease me with that mischievous smile, “Yu-san, making that difficult face again. Loosen up, go look at the sea!”? Or would you smile quietly with that deep gaze, “Yes, you’re properly staying beside them. Keep it up. But take care of yourself too”? No, you would probably just be there, without saying anything, gently, warmly pushing my back, and the backs of the people I face, through this painting. Your light, as long as I keep kindling it, is here now, and will be from now on.
On another day, a small boy, after his check-up, shyly fidgeted on his way out and offered me a piece of origami. “Doctor, this is for you. A sparkly star! I made it! It’s yellow, so you’ll feel energetic!” I looked. It was a slightly crooked paper star, clearly folded with great effort, but it glittered, reflecting the light. Its innocent purity and clumsy but direct kindness struck something deep in my chest unexpectedly. Yes, light isn’t only found in special places or extraordinary events. It exists, certainly and countlessly, in ordinary daily life, in these small, warm exchanges of heart. What I need to do is not overlook it, but gently scoop it up in my palm, cherish it, and connect it to the next person. Just as I received it from Hina that day.
In the nine years since Hina passed, I lost my way many times, stood still. There were nights I was crushed by my own powerlessness as a doctor, wanting to throw everything away. But each time, the ink stains of her letter shining quietly deep in my chest and the “Portrait of Hope” hanging on the wall pulled me back to the present, to the place I should stand. The light she left hasn’t faded into a mere memory of the past. Within me, it has changed form, changed warmth, become my own flesh and blood, and even now, in this moment, it keeps me alive, keeps me moving. In the fingertips that touch someone’s pain, in the silence of deeply listening to a patient’s story, and in the gentle yet certain atmosphere of hope that fills this old, small clinic.
Today, too, I open the door to the consultation room.
My eyes meet Hina’s in the painting on the wall.
“I’m living fully. I’m keeping the light you kindled burning here, in my own way,” I tell her in my heart.
The sorrow of the past won’t disappear. Occasionally, it will strike my heart with sharp pain. But it’s no longer a heavy chain binding me to the past. It’s my own core, a warm and unwavering guidepost for connecting the light I saw with her to the future, to the person before me. Believing that knowing pain allows for deeper empathy. And because I know that countless “lights like freshly squeezed lemon” are hidden right here in this ordinary daily life.
This is the place where I live. The place where I continue to kindle hope.
Together with the warm light you left me. Here, I will continue to draw the contour of my own soul, day by day.

Epilogue: Immortal Light, Soul’s Portrait

March 15, 2027 – Japan Arts & Culture Dispatch (Breaking News)
“Soul’s Portrait, Light Illuminating the Era’s Darkness” — Shocking Work by Unknown Doctor-Painter Wins Top Prize at Prestigious Art Exhibition
Today, at the announcement for the 75th Japan Contemporary Art Award (Sponsored by the Agency for Cultural Affairs, The Japan Art Academy), one of the nation’s most prestigious public exhibitions, an extremely unusual feat was achieved: the Grand Prize in the Oil Painting category was awarded to “Portrait of Hope — Hina,” a work by Mr. Miyazaki Yu, an unknown doctor practicing community medicine in a seaside town. A Grand Prize winner who is not a professional artist is nearly unprecedented, sending quiet yet profound shockwaves and great emotion through the art world. The work will be specially exhibited at The National Art Center, Tokyo, starting tomorrow.
The painting is said to depict a young woman who, while battling a severe illness at a young age, never lost the light of hope that illuminated others until the very end. However, its expression transcends mere realism or sentimental reminiscence. Imbued with deep introspection and universal life brilliance, it possesses a rare power that seems to speak directly to the deepest parts of the viewer’s soul, earning unanimous top marks from the jury committee.
The Jury President, world-renowned painter Arisugawa Sōtatsu, stated emotionally and fervently in his commentary: “This painting effortlessly transcends the existing evaluation criteria of technique and style that we are familiar with. What is depicted is certainly the figure of a young woman. However, the light dwelling deep within her clear eyes, behind her quiet, somewhat ephemeral smile, is the very crystallization of ‘hope’ found by the subject herself from the abyss of despair. It poignantly reflects the fundamental strength, fragility, and immeasurable dignity inherent in human beings. A serene yet burning hymn to life—the kind only emitted by those who have known deep sorrow and unbearable pain and accepted them head-on—flows directly into our hearts from every brushstroke, every drop of color. This is not merely a beautiful portrait. This is a cry of the soul, a prayer. This depicts pure ‘humanity,’ beyond technique or school. It is an urgent message to all of us living in this modern era shadowed by loss and anxiety, and to the future. It is a powerful ode to the human soul, which never loses its radiance even amidst hardship. Discovering this unknown yet terrifyingly sincere talent has been, I must say, the greatest joy and privilege of my long career as a juror.”
The model was Hina-san (then in her 20s), diagnosed with juvenile Parkinson’s disease, whom the artist treated during his residency. Mr. Miyazaki states that his encounter with her, and their too-early parting, fundamentally changed his perspective on life, his values, and his way of being a doctor. He says he took up the paintbrush again after sealing it away for a long time, driven solely by the desire to express, through his own soul, the memory, the “feel,” of the utterly selfless, warm, yet unwavering “light” she continued to kindle for those around her, including himself as her physician, even amidst the harsh, inescapable reality of progressive illness. It was both a memorial to her and his lifelong vow to pass on the incredibly heavy, yet warm, baton he received from her to the future.
Upon receiving news of the award, Mr. Miyazaki, expressing surprise and bewilderment in his comments from the seaside clinic, spoke quietly yet deliberately:
“I sincerely believe this honor should not be given to me personally, but is an award for the living proof of the model, Hina-san, the soul of this painting—for the light she herself emitted. In her tragically short, limited time, she demonstrated with her entire being how strongly, nobly, and with deep compassion for others, a person can live beautifully. The light she kindled in my deep darkness—that unforgettable ‘freshly squeezed lemon light’ she found herself amidst despair—it never went out. It still burns quietly, yet surely, within me, and within this clumsy painting. If this painting can become a small, small lamp helping even one person currently facing hardship or deep sorrow to lift their face just a little and look forward, that would be her wish, and there would be no greater joy for me. Hina-san, can you hear me? The color of the sky you looked up at, the words you spun, the warmth you desperately protected and left behind—they never disappeared. On the contrary, your light has now left my hands and is beginning to quietly illuminate the hearts of so many strangers like this. Thank you, Hina-san. Because of you, I remembered how to ‘feel’ again. And I found meaning in living. Thank you, to you who became my—and now, many people’s—first and last special light. With heartfelt gratitude.”
Mr. Miyazaki’s sincere, unadorned words deeply moved those present, spreading quiet ripples of profound emotion throughout the announcement venue. The irreplaceable light of the soul, received by one doctor from one patient, has now gained universal form through art, poised to become a beacon of hope illuminating the hearts of many across time.