The Unfading Lie and the 20-Watt Bulb

Chapter 4: A Beacon Against the Wind

The mid-1960s: the heights of Japan's rapid economic miracle. Fluorescent tubes and neon signs flood the streets, forcing society to look only toward a bright, forward-looking future. Amidst this dazzling progress, Shizue’s husband (Grandpa) clashes with her over the dim twenty-watt bulb. "The postwar era is over. Turn off this shameful light," he begs. But one rainy night, he returns home heavily intoxicated, sobbing on the tatami mats: "I lied today for the company. I am a coward, no different from the police who crushed that boy." Under the quiet, amber glow of the twenty-watt bulb, Shizue embraces his weakness, offering a sanctuary of forgiveness for a raw, weary soul. A deeply moving chapter illustrating the clumsy promise made by a husband and wife in the shadows of national prosperity, and how the bulb became their shared pride.

"Grandma. Did Grandpa... really never get angry?"

Modern day, 2026.

Kazuya asked quietly, keeping his eyes on the dark screen of his face-down smartphone.

The twenty-watt bulb on the ceiling was still radiating heat, casting a faint shadow over their tatami mats.

"Oh, he got angry."

Shizue narrowed her eyes nostalgically, letting out a small laugh.

"We fought so many times. Your grandpa was a truly honest, stubborn man, after all."

Shizue slowly drank her tea, turning her voice back once more toward the turbulent Shōwa era.

The mid-Shōwa 30s. Japan was in the midst of a rapid economic growth period often called a miracle.

Fluorescent lights flooded the streets, and when night fell, colorful neon signs forcefully chased away the darkness. People proclaimed that "the postwar era is over," buying new refrigerators and televisions, running forward with their eyes fixed solely on the future.

Shizue's husband—Kazuya's grandfather—was also one of the many salarymen working desperately to feed his family in that whirlwind of excitement.

"Shizue. Please, just turn that light off."

One night, returning home from work, her husband looked up at the dim twenty-watt bulb in the living room and spoke with a exhausted voice.

"The war is over. Everyone is looking forward, living in a new era. Keeping this dim light burning all the time, clinging to an incident from twenty years ago, looks shameful. The neighbors are starting to look at us strangely again."

Shizue stood in the kitchen, staring at her husband's back.

"I can't turn it off, dear."

Shizue's voice was quiet, but there was an unyielding core deep within it.

"My father died in front of that police station, protesting for the truth. Detective Makabe was locked in a hospital, treated as a madman for speaking the truth. Teru-chan, who did nothing wrong, is still crushed in a cold prison by the weight of the lie he was forced to say: 'I did it.' No matter how dazzlingly the world is decorated with light, I cannot forget that darkness."

"The boy's trial is already over! The death sentence was passed, and there is nothing we ordinary people can do anymore!"

Her husband raised his voice, striking the tatami mats with his fist.

"I know that boy is pitiful! I understand your father's resentment! But we have to live in the present. Do you have any idea how hard it is to live normally, without causing trouble, in the company and in society?!"

"I do."

Shizue walked over to her husband and sat quietly in front of him.

"Because I understand, I cannot turn it off. If we close our eyes and turn off this light, thinking 'it's already over' or 'everyone has forgotten'... How are we any different from the cold police who crushed that boy, or the townspeople who stayed silent in fear? For our own small happiness, we would be murdering my father's death and that boy's life all over again."

Her husband lost his words, only lowering his face in frustration. Between the two of them, only a heavy silence and the fragile amber light of the twenty-watt bulb remained.

A few years later, on a rainy night.

Her husband returned home late, heavily intoxicated. Throwing off his muddy shoes at the entrance, he staggered into the living room and collapsed spread-eagled on the tatami mats.

When Shizue rushed over in worry, tears were streaming endlessly from her husband's eyes.

"...I lied today, Shizue."

Covering his eyes with his arm, her husband spoke in a raspy voice.

"At the company, I discovered our boss's corruption. I found out he was demanding kickbacks from a client. But... when I tried to bring justice and blow the whistle, my colleagues stopped me. They said, 'You have a family, don't you? Do you know what happens if you go against the company? Just close your eyes and stay quiet.'"

Shizue gasped, staring at her husband's trembling shoulders.

"I was... terrified. I didn't have the courage to die in front of a police station like your father. I didn't have the resolve to lose everything and be treated as a madman like Detective Makabe. So I... forced a smile in front of my boss, pretending I noticed nothing. I said 'white' was 'black,' and bowed my head."

Her husband clawed at the tatami mats, weeping like a child.

"I am a coward, Shizue. I can't blame those police officers who crushed the boy's alibi at all. Because when it came to protecting my own skin, I also chose to step on someone else's life."

Shizue quietly drew closer to her husband, placing her hands gently on his shaking back.

In the deep amber shadow of the twenty-watt bulb falling across the tatami mats. Shizue began to speak with a voice that was quiet, yet steady, just like her father had once pulled her out of the mud.

"What the police did back in Shōwa 25... that wasn't mere 'self-preservation.'"

"They used the colossal power of the state—which is supposed to protect its people—to completely crush the life of innocent Teru-chan, and they snatched away the life of Detective Makabe, branding him a 'madman' for trying to uphold justice."

"That was 'murder,' a complete uprooting of human dignity for the sake of cold organizational pride. There is nothing in this world more malicious than that."

"But your closing your eyes at the workplace..."

"It wasn't to steal someone else's life, nor to trample on others to elevate yourself. You simply swallowed the muddy water to feed me, to protect this tiny wooden house, and to make sure we could survive tomorrow."

"That is not the act of a coward."

"It is simply the figure of a weak, raw human being, desperately clinging to whatever they could so as not to be blown away in a sinister, colossal storm. Who could possibly blame you for that?"

"And you know, dear..."

"The ones whose hearts are truly rotted away live their lives laughing under the dazzling lights, trampling on the lives of others, completely forgetting that they are living a lie."

"But you... you are hurting over your own weakness, shedding tears, and showing your regret right here in front of me."

"You are suffering right now because you still know 'white' is 'white.'"

"You must never allow your clean heart to be grouped together and stained by the filthy lies of those police officers."

Her husband buried his face in Shizue's chest, continuing to weep silently for a long time. And when he finally wiped his tears and looked up, he gazed at the twenty-watt bare bulb hanging from the ceiling.

"...It's warm, this light."

He whispered.

"Outside, there are only dazzling fluorescent lights and neon, and you can't survive without lying. But this dim amber light... it feels like it quietly forgives me, even after I've lied and become hollow inside. Because you kept your eyes open and didn't extinguish this light here, I feel like I was able to stop myself from completely rotting away today."

After that night, her husband never once said "turn off the light" again. Instead, if dust gathered on the light shade, he would clean it himself. And when the bulb was about to burn out, he would happily buy a new twenty-watt bulb.

He became the greatest supporter of Shizue's silent resistance.

Many years passed. The bubble economy rose and collapsed, great disasters struck Japan, and the era shifted violently from Shōwa to Heisei, and then to Reiwa.

And in the spring of 2019. Lying on a hospital bed, sensing his own end, her husband gripped Shizue’s hand with his thin strength.

"Shizue... Even after I am gone, never extinguish that bulb."

His voice was hoarse, but his eyes held the same unyielding light Shizue's father had once shown.

"Because you stood your ground there, watching the truth, I feel like my life was able to be lived a little straighter, a little more humanely. ...That twenty-watt light is our pride. It is the flame of your father's soul, of Detective Makabe's, and of yours."

Those were the final words he left to Shizue.

"Your grandpa said those words, making my father's legacy his own words, before he passed away."

Modern day, 2026. Shizue looked up at the bulb, smiling gently.

"So you see, Kazuya. This twenty-watt light doesn't belong only to my father and me. It is also the light of your grandpa's clumsy, hard-fought life."

Kazuya remained silent, letting his grandmother's words sink deep, deep into the core of his chest.

The cold screen of his smartphone lay quiet and dark on the tatami mats. In this suffocating modern age, where someone is ruthlessly torn apart in the sea of the internet, and everyone conforms to the atmosphere.

(Grandpa was saved by Grandma's light, over and over again.)

Kazuya felt his hands growing slightly warm. It was a warmth of circulating blood, something he could never feel in the frictionless world of merely sliding his fingers across the smooth glass of a smartphone.

Kazuya slowly looked up, wrapping his hands around his grandmother’s once more.

"Grandma. That promise Grandpa made... let me protect it with you this time. I won't let the blue light of the internet cloud my eyes."

The twenty-watt bare bulb. Its fragile amber light, carrying the clumsy love and pride of a husband and wife who survived the turbulent Shōwa and Heisei eras, quietly and truly warmly illuminated the profile of their grandson living in the present.

(Chapter 4 - End)

Have you, or has someone close to you, ever had to smile and swallow muddy water just to "keep the peace" and survive in an organization or society? In those moments of self-reproach, did you have a "warm beacon" that quietly embraced your weakness and prevented your soul from completely rotting away?

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