[February 15][Original/Historical] For Hope

[shirasakura.livejournal.com]

Title: For Hope
Day/Theme: February 15: candles for the dead
Series: Original/Historical
Character/Pairing: Original
Rating: G

It's the same every year.

The year is never the same, not ever. People are born; people die; sometimes people start wars and sometimes end them. There are different people in the world this year than were here the year before. There will be different people next year who weren't here this year. (There will be people who changed so much since last year that they are new people. There will be people next year who will have changed so much as to not even be recognisable from the year before.)

But there is always one constant, if there are no others.

Each year she lights lanterns on Hiroshima's tōrō nagashi. One for her mother, one for her father, two for her sisters, one for her brother. Another for the many others who died from the flash of light, immediately or lingering for days, weeks, years, until death took them, too.

She always lights a lantern for the living. That they will not die the way her family, friends, fellow citizens died. That it will not happen again. That no one will have to suffer because of something like this ever again.

She lights a lantern for hope.