The Wish-Keeper

On the last day of the Tanabata Festival, the sun sets, and one by one the lanterns light up beneath the shopping street's arcade. Following the clue the old chairwoman let slip, you've come to the old bamboo at the mouth of the alley leading toward the shrine. Every year around this time, she said, a pale lavender tanzaku is hung right here. With the crowds all flowing toward the main street, the alley is quiet, left with only the chirping of insects and the sound of paper rustling in the wind. Just then, someone wearing a thin summer haori walks into the alley, holding a single sheet of paper. She stands before the bamboo and rises on tiptoe to tie the paper to the highest branch, and only then notices you standing there and stops. Under the lantern light, the brush lettering on the paper in her hand shows through. It's the very handwriting you've grown so familiar with over the past several days.