Leo lived a quiet kind of life.
Not the peaceful kind. The restless kind.
He was twenty-two. Freelancing here and there—illustration jobs, inking for other people's manga drafts, commissions that paid just enough to keep his little apartment in Suginami. But his own work? His own pages?
Blank.
He told people he was "between stories." That he was still finding his voice. But the truth was simpler, and heavier.
He was stuck.
He spent most days in his room, half-dressed, hunched over a desk he barely touched. The walls were filled with prints of artists he admired—Hayashida, Asano, Nakamura. All of them told stories that mattered. Leo couldn't even start one.
Then came the morning it rained.
He had woken up late, his apartment felt colder than usual, and his internet was down. He wandered into the streets of Tokyo without a plan, hood up, sketchbook in his bag even though he hadn't used it in weeks.
Somewhere near Yoyogi Park, he ducked into a café just to dry off. It was quiet. Warm. The smell of toast and cinnamon wrapped around him like a scarf.
He sat in the corner, ordered a coffee out of habit, and opened his sketchbook just to feel like he was doing something.
That's when she walked in.
She wasn't dramatic. Wasn't even particularly loud or colorful. She just… fit. Into the light. Into the space. Into something inside him he didn't realize had been empty.
She ordered green tea. Took out a book. Sat by the window. Didn't look at anyone. Didn't need to.
There was something about her stillness that made the air settle.
He watched her turn a page and thought:
I want to draw her.
Not because she was beautiful—though she was.
Not because she was mysterious—though she felt like a secret.
But because in that moment, she made the world make sense.
The sketchbook stayed blank.
But the next morning, he came back.
And the next.
And the one after that.
He didn't know her name. Didn't even know if she noticed him. But she always came at 8:07 a.m., sat in the same seat, drank half her tea, and left before nine.
He started calling her Sun-chan.
Because she came with the light.
Because her presence reminded him what hope felt like—quiet, soft, and almost too gentle to hold.
- Written by H1M