Chapter Text
The café was warm, golden light spilling over polished wooden tables, the faint scent of roasted beans and vanilla syrup clinging to the air. Outside, the evening sky dimmed into soft indigo, the city humming gently beyond the glass windows.
Across from each other sat Haruto and Junghwan.
Haruto’s hands were wrapped around his cup, though the drink had long gone cold. He looked calm—too calm. The kind of calm that made Junghwan uneasy.
“I have a favor to ask you,” Haruto said quietly.
Junghwan blinked. “That already sounds suspicious.”
Haruto gave a faint smile, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “You see… I was born with a weak heart. So I’ve been getting regular checkups and everything.”
“But recently,” Haruto continued, his gaze dropping to the surface of his untouched coffee, “it suddenly got a lot worse.”
The air between them shifted.
“So… I thought… just in case… I thought I should ask you ahead of time.”
Junghwan straightened. “If you’re about to say something ridiculous, don’t.”
Haruto inhaled shakily. “I promised to make Jeongwoo happy day after day.”
At the mention of Jeongwoo, Junghwan’s chest tightened.
“But I don’t know how much time I have left,” Haruto said softly. “I could collapse at any moment.”
“You are going to be fine,” Junghwan shot back immediately. His voice was firm, almost angry. “Nothing is going to happen.”
Haruto’s lips curved into something fragile.
“If I die… if I die… erase me from Jeongwoo’s journal.”
For a moment, Junghwan couldn’t breathe.
All thoughts vanished from his mind. He simply stared at Haruto, as if he’d just spoken a foreign language.
“Wh–what are you talking about? What is going on?”
Junghwan looked fearfully into Haruto’s eyes. They were clear. Calm. Detached—like he had already stepped one foot out of this world.
“This is important,” Haruto said.
“I don’t want to do that. You should do it yourself.”
“You’re right. I should. I’m sorry to ask something like this from you.” Haruto’s fingers tightened slightly around his cup. “But I want you to listen.”
“I don’t want to,” Junghwan said, almost childishly. A rueful smile tugged at his lips. “I hardly had any interactions with Jeongwoo before he lost his memory. So… if I die, as long as I’m not in his journal, we can make it like it never happened.”
The words felt wrong in his mouth. Cruel. Impossible.
“I think it might be possible,” Junghwan whispered. “But are you okay with that?”
What kind of person would willingly vanish from the one they loved?
Haruto looked at him with a sad smile.
“I think I’ll be okay with it. We could say we broke up, but he might look for me. And if he discovered I’d died… it wouldn’t be good for him mentally.” His voice wavered for the first time. “That’s why I think it’s probably best to erase me altogether. Even if it takes some work. Make it like we never even dated.”
Junghwan couldn’t look at him anymore.
The café suddenly felt suffocating.
The following night, Haruto died suddenly from heart failure.
It didn’t feel real.
Junghwan learned of his death the same night.
He had wanted to know how Haruto’s hospital tests had gone, so he called him. The call rang. And rang. And rang.
No answer.
Haruto once mentioned that he didn’t check his phone very often, so Junghwan sighed and hung up, convincing himself it was nothing.
About half an hour later, his phone lit up.
Haruto.
Relief flooded him instantly.
He picked up. “Hey, phones are for carrying around, so how about carrying yours? Anyway, how did your tests go?”
There was a pause.
“Oh… the tests didn’t turn up any abnormalities,” said a voice that wasn’t Haruto’s.
It was older. Deeper. Tired.
Junghwan frowned. “Um… where is Haruto?”
The voice on the other end trembled.
“Haruto… I mean—my son… passed away suddenly from complications with his heart.”
Silence.
Junghwan laughed softly at first. Because it had to be a joke. It had to be.
A person who had been sitting across from him just yesterday. Close enough to touch. Close enough to argue with.
How could someone die so suddenly?
“I’m sorry,” the man continued. “We’ll be holding the funeral tomorrow.”
Junghwan couldn’t respond.
The line went dead.
And just like that, Haruto was gone.
Gone from the world.
And now Junghwan understood.
Erase me from Jeongwoo’s journal.
Make it like we never even dated.
Junghwan stared at his reflection in the dark screen of his phone, his chest aching with something too big to name.
How was he supposed to erase someone who still felt so painfully alive?
The next morning, the sky was pale and colorless — like the world had forgotten how to be bright.
Junghwan stood outside Jeongwoo’s house for a long time before ringing the doorbell.
His hand hovered in the air.
Erase me from Jeongwoo’s journal.
The words echoed like a curse.
He couldn’t do it.
Haruto was written there. In ink. In memories. In love.
And sooner or later, Jeongwoo would notice the silence.
The door opened.
Jeongwoo looked smaller somehow. Softer. Fragile in a way Junghwan hadn’t seen before.
They sat across from each other in Jeongwoo’s room. The journal lay open on the desk between them, pages filled with neat handwriting — fragments of a love story carefully documented because memory could not be trusted.
Junghwan’s throat felt tight.
“Haruto…” he began, forcing the name past his lips. “Haruto… passed away last night.”
The room went still.
Jeongwoo’s fingers trembled slightly over the page.
“Haruto… Haruto is my boyfriend, right?”
Junghwan couldn’t answer immediately. He looked down at the floor, at the faint cracks in the wood, anywhere but at Jeongwoo’s face.
Jeongwoo continued, his voice growing quieter.
“I can’t believe it. I—I’ve only read the summary in my journal so far, but I was so looking forward to seeing him today.” His hand tightened on the page. “He seems to be a very important person in my life…”
A small, broken sound filled the room.
Junghwan froze.
When he looked up, Jeongwoo was crying.
Not silently.
Not gently.
His face was twisted with grief, tears spilling freely down his cheeks as if they had been waiting for permission to fall.
“I don’t know why I’m crying,” Jeongwoo choked out. “It’s strange, isn’t it? I don’t think I have any memories of him. It’s so weird. I can’t stop crying. Even though I’ve only seen his face in pictures. The only things I know about our relationship are from my journal.” His voice cracked. “But here I am sobbing. It’s so strange.”
“Jeongwoo…”
“It’s not strange,” Junghwan said quickly, even though his own vision was blurring. “Although I don’t know how the two of you thought about your relationship…”
He took a deep breath, pressing a hand to his chest as if he could physically push the pain back inside.
“You two were made for each other,” he whispered. “It had nothing to do with whether you could remember or how many years you were together.”
His voice trembled.
“Because the two of you truly loved each other.”
He couldn’t continue.
The words dissolved into tears.
They cried together in that quiet room.
After a while, Jeongwoo wiped his face and looked at Junghwan with red, swollen eyes.
“Tell me about him,” he said softly.
And Junghwan did.
He talked about Haruto’s soft laugh. The way he would tilt his head when he was teasing. How he always made sure Jeongwoo wore a jacket when it was cold. How they would sit at their favorite café for hours, arguing over nothing, hands brushing across the table like it was the most natural thing in the world.
He told him about the promises.
About how much Haruto cared.
About how careful he was with Jeongwoo’s heart — even while his own was failing.
The more Junghwan spoke, the heavier the air became.
Every detail made Haruto feel alive again.
And that made his absence unbearable.
The funeral hall was quiet, filled with white flowers and the low murmur of restrained grief.
Junghwan stood beside Jeongwoo, close enough that their sleeves brushed.
Haruto’s portrait rested at the front of the room — smiling softly, as if he hadn’t left at all.
Haruto’s father approached them slowly.
“Thank you for coming,” he said, his voice steady but tired. “I’m certain the deceased… I mean, Haruto… is happy you are here.”
Junghwan bowed.
Beside him, Jeongwoo didn’t move.
Junghwan glanced down — and noticed small drops darkening the floor near Jeongwoo’s feet.
Tears.
They fell silently now, one after another.
Jeongwoo stared at Haruto’s picture like he was trying to memorize a face he had never truly known.
Junghwan swallowed hard.
Haruto had wanted to disappear.
To be erased.
But standing there, watching Jeongwoo cry for a love he couldn’t remember, Junghwan realized something.
Some loves don’t live in memory.
They live in the heart.
And even death couldn’t erase that.
The next day, the sky felt heavier.
Junghwan stood outside Jeongwoo’s house again, a dull ache settled deep in his chest.
He told himself he was just checking in.
Just making sure Jeongwoo was okay.
But when Junghwan slipped quietly into Jeongwoo’s room, he knew immediately that “okay” was the furthest thing from the truth.
Jeongwoo looked haggard — pale, eyes swollen, lips dry like he hadn’t slept. He looked like a ghost wandering through his own life.
It seemed he had written about Haruto’s death in his journal last night.
And this morning, he had read it.
Junghwan could tell.
The grief on Jeongwoo’s face wasn’t new. It was reopened.
The day before, Junghwan had made a decision he wasn’t proud of.
He hadn’t stopped Jeongwoo from writing about what happened.
He wanted to see.
He wanted to know how Jeongwoo would react when he learned — in his own handwriting — that his boyfriend was dead.
The answer was standing in front of him now.
Devastated.
Without telling Jeongwoo, Junghwan spoke quietly with his parents in the kitchen. They already knew about Haruto — had known even before his death — and they were deeply grateful to him. Grateful for how he had loved their son. Heartbroken that he was gone.
They all understood the cruel logic of what had to be done.
Jeongwoo’s parents decided to buy him a new phone.
After they purchased it, Junghwan kept it with him.
Because in Jeongwoo’s current phone, Haruto was everywhere.
In photos.
In videos.
In late-night messages.
In casual conversations that mentioned him without thought.
Even in Junghwan’s own text exchanges with Jeongwoo.
Haruto existed in pixels and data.
And to erase him from Jeongwoo’s life, they had to erase those too.
They agreed on a story: the old phone had broken. The data transfer had failed. They would recreate the digital journal and notes — carefully edited — on the new device. As for the messaging app, they would say something went wrong.
It sounded simple when spoken aloud.
It felt monstrous in practice.
Early the next morning, Junghwan arrived while Jeongwoo was at the hospital for a checkup.
The house was quiet.
Too quiet.
Junghwan stepped into Jeongwoo’s room and inhaled slowly, steadying himself.
He opened the desk drawer.
Inside were the notebooks. Volume after volume of carefully recorded memories.
He gathered them gently, almost reverently, and placed them into his bag.
Each one felt heavier than paper should.
He set Jeongwoo’s laptop on the desk and turned it on. His fingers trembled slightly as he transferred the altered digital journal and notes he had prepared.
Starting today, Jeongwoo would read this version.
A version without Haruto.
A version where that love never existed.
He would learn about himself through edited memories. He would add new entries to a life that had been quietly rewritten.
Junghwan’s chest tightened.
On the side table, Jeongwoo’s old phone was plugged into its charger.
Junghwan picked it up.
Haruto’s name was still there in the call logs.
Still pinned in messages.
Still smiling in the gallery.
For a moment, Junghwan couldn’t move.
If that happens, I’ll leave the rest in your hands.
He remembered Haruto saying it lightly. Almost joking.
Junghwan swallowed hard and took out the new phone. He intentionally messed up the data transfer, making it look like a failed attempt. Then he registered Jeongwoo on a new messaging account.
Now, there would be no past conversations.
No late-night confessions.
No soft “I miss you.”
No proof that Haruto had ever been there.
Junghwan stared at the blank message history.
“Haruto,” he whispered under his breath, eyes lifting instinctively toward the ceiling. “This is what you wanted, right?”
Silence answered him.
He placed the new phone neatly on the desk and slipped the old one into his bag.
He would keep it.
Not for himself.
For Jeongwoo.
Because someone had to remember.
Junghwan’s gaze drifted toward the shelf stacked with sketchbooks.
Jeongwoo loved to draw.
His hands shook as he opened one.
There he was.
Haruto.
Smiling in pencil lines. Laughing in soft shading. Captured in moments that Jeongwoo’s memory might forget, but his heart had known well enough to draw.
Junghwan carefully tore out each page with Haruto’s face, each sketch that held his presence, and tucked them into the large folder he had brought.
With every rip of paper, something inside him tore too.
When he finally stepped back, the room looked the same.
Neat desk. Quiet walls. Morning light filtering through the curtains.
But Haruto was gone.
No photos.
No messages.
No drawings.
No words.
Only a hollow space where a love story used to be.
Junghwan stood alone in the silence.
He had erased him.
Just like he promised.
From that day on, Jeongwoo’s world lived inside a screen.
Every morning, he opened his laptop, read the digitized version of his notes and journal, and typed new entries with careful fingers — documenting a life he had to relearn again and again. The paper journals were gone. The old phone was gone. The traces were gone.
Only the edited version remained.
The day after the switch, Junghwan went to see him.
Jeongwoo didn’t know Haruto had died.
And yet… he looked like someone grieving something he couldn’t name.
“I guess the data transfer for my messaging app failed,” Jeongwoo said glumly, staring at his new phone. “It sucks. They reminded me of how much fun you and I had. Now I can’t look at them.”
Junghwan’s chest tightened.
He stepped forward and wrapped his arms around Jeongwoo, pulling him into a firm hug — tighter than usual, almost desperate.
“It’ll be okay,” he said, voice low. “We’ll do even more fun stuff starting now. Not just in texts. In real life.” His fingers clenched slightly in the fabric of Jeongwoo’s shirt. “I… I’ll make sure your tomorrows are fun, okay?”
Jeongwoo stiffened in surprise at the uncharacteristic intensity.
But after a moment, he relaxed.
“Okay,” he murmured softly, resting his face against Junghwan’s shoulder. “Thanks, Junghwan.”
Junghwan closed his eyes.
He would carry it.
All of it.
Over the next few days, Jeongwoo slowly stabilized. The hollow look faded from his eyes. He settled into his new routine. Morning journaling. Afternoon drawing classes in town. Evening walks in the park.
Soon enough, the familiar brightness returned.
The old Jeongwoo was back.
Junghwan, now busy with university, visited on weekends whenever he could. On weekdays, Jeongwoo walked alone through the park paths, leaves crunching under his shoes.
Sometimes he paused beneath certain trees.
Sometimes he looked around as if expecting someone to appear beside him.
Something crucial was missing.
But he didn’t realize it.
One warm afternoon, Junghwan and Jeongwoo walked through that same park together.
It was the place where Jeongwoo had once gone on his first date.
With Haruto.
Jeongwoo had suggested it casually, without knowing why.
The trees had long since shed their blossoms. The branches were bare, shadows stretching thin across the ground.
As they walked, Jeongwoo spoke hesitantly.
“It’s hard to explain… but I feel like I’ve forgotten something very important.” He stared ahead, brows drawn together. “I just can’t remember. I guess that’s only natural, considering my memories disappear every night.”
Junghwan swallowed.
He said nothing.
A little less than a year later, everything changed.
Jeongwoo recovered from his amnesia.
The recovery was gradual — confusing at first — but steady. He enrolled in prep school. The months rolled by. Summer faded. Fall arrived, crisp and golden.
Now they were sitting across from each other at a café.
Jeongwoo had a sketchbook open in front of him.
It was filled with drawings.
Of Haruto.
And he was looking at Junghwan with a question in his eyes.
“Do you know who this is?”
Junghwan felt the air leave his lungs.
He stared at the page.
He had missed one.
He thought he had collected them all — every drawing, every trace. But this sketchbook must have been hidden too well.
He took a slow sip of water to buy time.
There was no need to hide the truth anymore.
Jeongwoo no longer had amnesia. The risk — the fragile instability — was gone. If he told him now, it would hurt. But he would survive it.
He would heal.
“Oh, him?” Junghwan said lightly. “He’s just a guy you saw a couple of times at the library during summer break in high school.”
Jeongwoo frowned.
He wasn’t satisfied.
“But why are there so many drawings of him?”
“You were just getting into drawing portraits,” Junghwan replied. “You wanted to have a guy to draw instead of just me all the time, and he offered to help.”
Jeongwoo’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“I never saw anything about that in my diary. And why did I hide the drawings? I found them behind my bookcase.” He hesitated. “Now that I think about it, I used to hide important things there when I was younger.”
Important things.
Junghwan’s stomach dropped.
He remembered the sticky note.
Even if I recover, always remember Watanabe Haruto. The important things will always be in an important place.
It hadn’t been metaphorical.
Jeongwoo had been trying to protect his own memories.
“I found this sketchbook back there,” Jeongwoo continued, pouting slightly. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence.”
He looked up.
“Junghwan… are you hiding something from me?”
Junghwan had imagined this moment before.
He could laugh it off.
He could fabricate a better story.
He could protect him one last time.
There were so many options.
But looking at Jeongwoo now — unsettled, searching, vulnerable — Junghwan realized something.
He had already erased enough.
“Jeongwoo, that guy…” His voice faltered.
There was no way he could lie.
Not about this.
“He was your boyfriend.”
The words fell between them like something fragile shattering.
Jeongwoo made a bewildered sound.
“My… boyfriend?”
Junghwan nodded slowly, hands trembling under the table.
“You loved each other.”
Silence thickened the air.
“But, Jeongwoo…” Junghwan forced himself to continue. “He’s… no longer in this world.”
Jeongwoo’s fingers tightened around the edge of the sketchbook.
“He died.”
The café noise faded into nothing.
Confusion swallowed Jeongwoo whole.
He could hear Junghwan’s voice. He could see his lips moving. But the words felt distant, like they were underwater.
Boyfriend.
Fake couple.
Every day.
Junghwan explained how it had started — an odd encounter. How that strange beginning had turned into a pretend relationship. And how, somehow, pretending had turned real.
He told Jeongwoo that they saw each other every day.
That Jeongwoo, who had once been fragile and uncertain, grew stronger because of him.
That each version of him — each “daily Jeongwoo” — had become brighter, more optimistic, more alive because Watanabe Haruto was there.
And then—
One day, suddenly, Haruto died from a heart complication.
Junghwan’s voice wavered as he continued.
Haruto’s last request had been to erase every trace of him from Jeongwoo’s journal.
Erase him.
Jeongwoo sat there, stunned.
He wasn’t angry.
Not at Junghwan. Not at his parents.
They had done what they thought was best. He could see that now. If he had been in Haruto’s place — dying, afraid of hurting the person he loved — he might have made the same choice.
That wasn’t what made his chest ache.
What appalled him was this:
He had forgotten.
He had so easily forgotten someone he had loved that much.
Junghwan kept apologizing, over and over, voice breaking.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Jeongwoo shook his head each time.
“You shouldn’t worry about it,” he whispered. And he meant it.
His gaze drifted down to the sketchbook in his lap.
He had no idea the boy in those drawings had been his boyfriend.
Even now, flipping through the pages, no memory returned. No sudden flash of recognition.
And yet—
His heart was beating too fast.
Maybe his body remembered.
Maybe his heart was trying desperately to tell him something his mind could not grasp.
He traced the pencil lines gently. Haruto smiling. Haruto looking annoyed. Haruto with wind in his hair.
He still couldn’t remember.
But his eyes burned.
From sadness? Regret? He didn’t know.
Later, they went to Junghwan’s room.
With a sorrowful expression, Junghwan held out a stack of notebooks, an old phone, and a large folder filled with drawings.
“These are the real journals and notes you wrote,” Junghwan said quietly. “And more pictures of Haruto. The diary will tell you everything about your time with him.”
His voice trembled.
“I’m sorry. I should have told you right away after you recovered. I’m so sorry for keeping it from you these past months… and for depriving you of your most important memories.”
Jeongwoo stepped forward and took the stack from him.
“You have absolutely nothing to apologize for,” he said firmly. “Words can’t express how grateful I am to you. Thank you. I mean it.”
Junghwan’s eyes filled with tears again.
Back home, Jeongwoo sat on his bed and gathered his courage.
He opened his diary.
The entire story was there.
From the day they met to the day Haruto died written in his own handwriting.
As he read, he could see it.
Haruto always by his side.
Haruto treating him with gentle care.
Haruto trying to fill each day with joy.
He had written about Haruto’s subtle habits, his interests, even his obsession with being sanitary. He had described the way Haruto smiled faintly when something troubled him.
Jeongwoo couldn’t read everything in one sitting.
But through the ink, he could feel him.
Living.
Breathing.
The journal had a special section labeled “My Boyfriend- Watanabe Haruto,” filled with details — birthdays, preferences, little facts that only someone deeply in love would bother recording.
Twilight fell as he read.
His room darkened slowly.
A knock came at the door.
“Dinner’s ready,” his mother called gently.
“I’m not feeling well. I’ll eat later,” Jeongwoo replied.
There was a pause.
“I heard you learned about him,” she said softly. “About Haruto.”
Jeongwoo blinked in surprise.
“Junghwan called,” she explained.
Through the door, she told him not to blame Junghwan. That all of them had struggled. That they had done what they believed would protect him.
“Mom… did you know him?”
She shook her head slowly.
“I wish we had met him properly. We never got that far.” Her voice trembled. “But your father and I are deeply grateful to him. On the anniversary of his death, we always visit him. We kept it secret from you.”
Jeongwoo’s breath caught.
“There’s no question in our minds,” she continued. “He was the person who believed most in your future and protected your heart.”
She was crying now.
Crying the same way she had when Jeongwoo’s amnesia first disappeared.
After a moment, she wiped her tears and forced a smile.
“Let me know if you get hungry.”
Her footsteps faded down the stairs.
Jeongwoo closed the door and sat on his bed, hugging a pillow tightly.
The darkness deepened outside his window.
His thoughts were scattered, colliding, overwhelming.
Minutes passed.
Moonlight spilled into his room, pale and quiet.
He wanted to remember.
He prayed he would.
Finally, he picked up his old phone.
With trembling fingers, he opened a video file and pressed play.
At first, there was the sound of rattling.
Wind.
Then—
His own laughter.
Bright. Carefree. So innocent it almost hurt.
Gradually, he remembered.
It was the day he had insisted they ride a bike together.
“Jeongwoo, you shouldn’t lean forward like that. You’ll fall off.”
Another voice.
Calm.
Steady.
Haruto.
“I’m fine! You’re just a worrywart!”
“You’re just a daredevil.”
“What? I can’t hear you over the wind!”
“…Nothing.”
“Haruto, thanks for another good day.”
“What? Did you say something?”
“Nope, I didn’t say anything.”
The recording ended.
Jeongwoo’s entire body trembled, like it was resonating with something buried deep inside him.
He had laughed like that.
He had loved like that.
And he had forgotten.
Tears slipped down his face silently.
From the next day on, whenever he didn’t have prep school, Jeongwoo began visiting the places he had once gone with Haruto.
The park.
The beach.
The quiet streets they used to walk.
He stood in those places, eyes closed, letting the wind brush against his skin.
Trying to feel what remained.
Trying to rebuild a love story from echoes.
Trying, desperately, to remember.
Three years passed quietly.
Time did what time always does — it moved forward, whether hearts were ready or not.
Now in his fourth year of university, Park Jeongwoo was still searching.
He had followed his own handwriting like a map. He visited the café they used to sit in. The park where petals once fell into their hair. The quiet streets where laughter had echoed between buildings.
He repeated the same actions.
Ordered the same drinks.
Sat on the same benches.
Closed his eyes and tried — desperately — to remember.
It wasn’t simple.
Memories did not return all at once in some dramatic rush. They came in fragments. A tone of voice. A habit. The way someone said his name.
Still, he never stopped looking.
Even in the middle of lectures, even while surrounded by classmates and deadlines, part of him was always searching the corners of his own heart.
Little by little, he remembered Watanabe Haruto.
“Junghwan! Over here!”
The bright voice cut across the park like sunlight through leaves.
Junghwan turned toward the sound, scanning the wide stretch of green until he spotted him.
Jeongwoo was sitting on a large picnic blanket in a spot with a perfect view of the flowers. Sketchbook open. Hair stirred gently by the breeze. A few university friends sat nearby, laughing about something trivial.
Jeongwoo had insisted on choosing the spot himself this time. Said he didn’t mind arriving early — that time flew by when he was sketching trees.
Even while trying to recover memories of Haruto, he was living fully.
Brightly.
“You look cheerful as always, Jeongwoo,” Junghwan said as he approached.
Jeongwoo grinned. “I’m a little creepy when I’m not cheerful.”
Junghwan huffed a soft laugh.
He watched Jeongwoo chatting easily with his friends, sunlight catching in his eyes, and wondered—
Was this what Haruto had wanted?
A life where ordinary things could be taken for granted.
Where there were good days and bad days.
Where he could fall asleep at night and wake up in the morning without fear.
A life that kept evolving.
Maybe one day, decades from now, Jeongwoo would look back at this chapter — at love and loss — and see it as one part of a much larger story.
Not the end.
Just a page.
Later, wanting a moment alone, Junghwan suggested they take a walk along the path lined with cherry blossoms.
Jeongwoo grabbed his sketchbook.
“I want to draw the flowers,” he said.
The path was dusted in pale pink. Petals drifted through the air like quiet snow.
“The cherry blossoms are beautiful, aren’t they?” Junghwan remarked.
Jeongwoo tilted his head back, watching them fall.
“They really do look like snow. Snow that never knew the sky.” He smiled faintly. “I read that in my journal. We came here together, didn’t we?”
Junghwan nodded.
Jeongwoo flipped through his sketchbook absentmindedly as they walked.
Then his hand stilled.
The wind picked up suddenly, sending a soft storm of petals swirling around them.
There, on the page—
Haruto.
Drawn in pencil. A smile so gentle it almost hurt to look at.
Junghwan had never seen this drawing before.
“I remembered something else about Haruto,” Jeongwoo said quietly. “But I’m sure I haven’t remembered it all yet.”
He let out a long breath.
“I loved him… and he’s gone.” His voice didn’t break — it was steady, thoughtful. “But the memories are here inside me. Sleeping here in my body and my heart.”
He pressed a hand lightly to his chest.
“By remembering him, we can continue to live together. I can’t explain it very well, but it’s similar to hope.”
Another petal landed on the open page.
“The world is gradually forgetting him. But…”
A tear slipped from Jeongwoo’s eye. He wiped it away almost immediately.
“I don’t know why I’m crying. Maybe I’m still hurting. Except I feel warmth, too.” He gave a small, almost embarrassed smile. “I think I still love him.”
Junghwan said nothing.
He just listened.
“But it’s all right,” Jeongwoo continued softly. “I’ll fall in love again one day. I’ll reach out for happiness.” His fingers brushed over the drawing. “Until then… just a little longer.”
The petals kept falling.
In every drawing, Haruto was smiling.
Not fading.
Not grieving.
Smiling the way he had in Jeongwoo’s journals — gentle, steady, watching with kind eyes.
Haruto existed now in fragments.
In graphite.
In memory.
In the quiet warmth that lingered inside Jeongwoo’s chest.
The world might forget.
Time might erase details.
But as long as Jeongwoo remembered — even imperfectly, even slowly —
Haruto was still here.
Smiling beneath the falling blossoms.