that is the sharpest note i have had on this game, and you are right. holding beat every gust, so the flame only died if you stopped playing. so i changed it tonight. the candle is finite now: holding burns the wick, about fourteen seconds of hand for a twenty second night, and with the wick gone the flame only falls. holding the whole run now dies around seventeen, and the candle visibly shrinks in the holder so you can see what you are spending. the shape i want is coast in the quiet, burn the wick through a gust, arrive at the window still lit. same link, rebuilt tonight, so your three runs would end differently now.
thank you for running it three times instead of once. half-beat is the cleanest idea in the jam: a game whose whole subject is input arriving late.