The night didn't just fall that evening — it drowned the world.
A still, airless kind of darkness pressed against the walls, the kind that made even time hesitate to move forward. The ceiling above Ren blurred and wavered, faint moonlight bending through the thin curtain like dying breath.
The faint hum of the ceiling fan trembled in the silence, as if the air itself feared to disturb him.
Ren lay on the cold floorboards,
body heavy,
limbs limp.
His breath came in short bursts, uneven and shallow, as if his lungs no longer remembered the rhythm of being alive. His fingers twitched against the floor, trembling, reaching for something that wasn't there.
Something ,
someone,
That would never be there again.
He blinked.
The ceiling rippled like a mirage.
Was this what it felt like when the world stopped needing you?
His throat was dry. When he finally spoke, his voice cracked open like glass breaking in slow motion.
"Dear God… I know I've never been good at this," he whispered, his breath shaking.
"But if you're still listening… just once… listen to me now."
The words crawled out of him, heavy and raw.
"I failed every role You gave me.
A bad son.
A bad brother.
A bad friend."
His voice trembled harder.
"And worst of all — a bad lover. She deserved peace… but I gave her pain instead. Her family's broken because of me. She's crying because of me…"
He clenched the fabric over his chest, as if trying to rip his guilt out of his heart.
"Please," he gasped.
"If there's still any mercy left .... take me instead. Let her live without this pain. Let her smile again. Take everything from me if that's what it takes."
But the room didn't answer. Only the quiet ticking of the clock, slow and cruel.
The silence pressed heavier.
It felt alive — whispering back she's gone.
He didn't know anymore if he was awake, or trapped between sleep and death.
The lines blurred.
Memories came like waves — fragments of a life that already felt borrowed.
Serin's laughter beneath the cherry blossoms.
Her shy smile during those late-night video calls.
Her sleepy voice murmuring,
"Goodnight, idiot."
And then the last one — her scream, her brother's rage, the sound of glass breaking, her crying.
Ren pressed his palms against his ears.
"Stop…"
he begged softly.
"Stop showing me that."
But his mind refused to listen. Each image stabbed deeper — the moments that once made him whole now carved him apart.
"I loved her," he whispered.
"I did everything wrong… but I loved her more than my own life." His voice cracked again.
"If love's a sin, then let me burn. I'd rather burn than forget her name."
The shadows shifted.
From the corner of his vision, the room seemed to distort — stretching, bending.
And then he saw them.
Dozens of himself.
They stepped out from the walls like reflections made flesh ..... ghostly versions of him, their edges blurred by shadow and moonlight.
Their eyes glowed faintly, silver like cracked mirrors catching dying light.
Each one whispered words he already feared, their voices overlapping — soft, venomous, familiar.
"She deserves better."
"Once a loser, always a loser."
"How many more hearts will you break, Ren?"
Their tones weren't cruel — they were calm, disappointed, almost pitying.
That made it worse.
Ren stumbled backward, his breath sharp.
The air felt heavy — like the entire room was closing in on him. The ceiling warped. The floor pulsed with faint ripples, as if time itself was trembling beneath his knees.
He pressed his palms to his ears, shaking.
"Stop… please…"
But the whispers grew louder, circling him like vultures made of guilt.
One of them .... the version of him with tired eyes and a forced smile — stepped forward.
"You said you'd change after her. But you still ran from everything that hurt."
Another version — younger, smiling under spring sunlight — tilted his head.
"Do you even remember her laugh anymore, Ren? Or did you bury it too?"
Ren's throat tightened.
"I remember…"
His voice cracked.
"I remember everything."
The reflections smirked in unison, small, broken smiles.
"Then why does it sound so far away now?"
The air went cold. The room dimmed, like the world was inhaling before collapsing.
The "good son" appeared beside him, blood on his hands, holding a photo of his parents.
The "lover" knelt, clutching a cracked phone that glowed with Serin's contact name.
The "broken one" stood behind him — silent, his face hollow, his shadow spreading wider than all the rest.
And together, their whispers merged into one voice .... not loud, but deep, shaking something inside him.
"You keep saying you'll change… but every time someone believes in you, they're the ones who break."
Ren's eyes widened, tears streaking his face. "I never meant to—"
"But you did."
The words hit like a blade to the chest.
He collapsed, breath shattering, hands trembling as he whispered,
"Then what am I supposed to do?"
The "broken one" stepped forward, leaning close enough for their foreheads to almost touch. His voice was quiet — more human than any of the others.
"Maybe stop pretending you're still alive."
The silence that followed felt heavier than death itself.
Their voices echoed endlessly, circling him like vultures.
He stumbled backward, clutching his head, screaming ....
"Shut up! Shut up!"
But the echoes only multiplied, louder, crueler.
He ran ... through the dark, through himself .... until his legs gave out.
He fell to his knees, the breath ripped from his chest.
And from above, in that darkness, a voice broke through.
Not divine. Not cruel. Just… heavy.
"Do they ever leave, Ren?" it asked quietly.
"The faces you wear for others?"
Ren looked up, shaking, eyes wide. "Who are you?"
The voice came again — softer, almost kind.
"Every time you look in the mirror, you meet someone new. But which one is you, Ren?"
He stared blankly upward, tears blurring everything. The silence that followed was deafening.
Then—A voice from somewhere far away, fragile and trembling:
"Ren?"
He blinked.
Static crackled in his ears.
Airi's voice wavered through the phone, soaked in panic.
"Ren, please… answer me…"
A thud echoed.
A clatter of metal.
"Ren?!" Her tone cracked.
"Ren, PLEASE answer me!"
The phone hissed.
Faint breathing.
Then ..... silence.
Airi froze.
For a heartbeat, the world stopped ... Then she ran.
Barefoot.
Breathless.
Wild.
Through empty streets, under flickering streetlights that painted her tears in silver.
The cold bit her skin, but she didn't care.
Her nightdress clung to her knees, torn by the wind.
She didn't feel it .... she just kept running.
"Please be okay. Please. Please."
Her lungs burned, but her heart ... her heart was breaking faster.
When she finally reached Ren's house, her hands were trembling so badly she almost dropped her phone.
The lights were off.
The gate creaked open with a groan that echoed like a warning.
Everything was too still.
Too quiet.
And then she saw him.
Ren.
Not standing.
Not waiting.
But lying there ... beneath the moonlight, in the courtyard of his home.
The same balcony above where he had once talked to Serin under a sky full of stars.
The same balcony he once pointed to on a call, smiling through sleepy eyes ...
"Let's get married here someday, okay? Just us."
Now that same balcony looked empty ... only the wind swaying the curtains, and a phone light flickering weakly near the edge.
Airi froze in place.
Her breath caught in her throat.
Her body refused to move.
"...Ren?"
The whisper left her lips like glass breaking .... No answer.
She stumbled forward, legs shaking violently, tears already blurring her sight.
Her feet splashed through puddles, water mixed with something darker, redder, still warm.
Every step closer made the world fade, sound, color, everything.
The air smelled faintly of metal and cherry blossoms.
She fell to her knees beside him.
Her trembling hands reached out, brushing against his hair, cold with dew.
"Ren…"Her voice cracked.
"Wake up… please, wake up…"
He didn't move.
His body lay twisted beneath the balcony, his arm outstretched, as if he'd tried to reach the sky one last time.
The moonlight traced his face, soft and unreal, peaceful, almost smiling, like he'd finally found silence.
Beside him, a single cherry blossom petal rested on his wrist, pink fading into crimson.
Airi's sobs came raw, from a place no human should ever have to reach.
She clutched his hand to her chest, shaking her head violently.
"You promised her, Ren… you promised you wouldn't break…"
The phone near him buzzed faintly.
The screen cracked,
but still glowing.
Call Duration: 42:37.
"Ren…?"
Airi looked up, her vision swimming, her lips trembling into a broken whisper
"Serin…"
The sirens hadn't arrived yet.
The world hadn't realized what it had lost.
Only the wind moved, carrying petals down from the balcony, landing softly around him like snow.
And in that still courtyard, a boy lay beneath a cherry blossom sky, a girl's voice echoing from miles away, and spring itself seemed to hold its breath.
She fell to her knees, shaking him, calling his name again and again, until her voice dissolved into sobs.
Sirens pierced the night.
Neighbors woke, lights flickered on, but Airi saw none of it.
She only saw him, his hand limp, his chest faintly rising.
The paramedics arrived.
The red and blue lights flickered across his pale face like dying fire.
Airi climbed into the ambulance, clutching his hand so tightly her nails dug into his skin.
"Pulse is faint,"one medic muttered.
"Keep pressure on the wound."
Airi's hands shook uncontrollably.
She leaned close, whispering, voice breaking,
"You promised her, Ren… you promised you wouldn't break."
His fingers twitched — barely.
Maybe his lips moved.
If they did, the word that escaped was soft — almost a breath.
"Serin…"
Her tears fell on his arm, warm against the coldness spreading beneath his skin.
The ambulance doors slammed shut.
The sirens wailed again, tearing through the sleeping city.
Meanwhile—
Serin sat alone.
The room around her was chaos ..... shards of glass glinting on the floor, a family portrait face-down on the desk, her laptop shattered beyond repair.
Her parents' voices had long since gone silent.
Even her brother's rage had burned out into exhaustion.
Now, there was only her, curled on the floor, knees drawn to her chest, eyes red and hollow.
The wind pushed softly through the open window, stirring the curtains.
The moonlight spilled in, weak and silver.
She lifted her gaze, staring blankly at that same moon ..... the one Ren always said connected them.
"Ren…"she whispered, voice trembling.
"Are you looking at it too?"
The question went unanswered.
Only the wind replied, a soft sigh.
Then something floated in, a single cherry blossom petal.
It landed gently on her desk.
It's edges glimmered faintly in the moonlight, tinged red.
She froze.
Her trembling fingers reached toward it.
Her breath caught.
"Ren…?" she whispered again.
But her voice barely existed, it cracked halfway through, dissolving into a sob.
The two sounds, a heartbeat and a clock tick, echoed together, out of sync, across two distant rooms.
Two souls : one fading, one waiting .... both under the same indifferent moon.
Serin's tears fell silently.
Ren's hand twitched faintly.
"Please," she whispered. "Come back to me."
The wind stilled.
The cherry blossom petal slipped from her palm, drifting to the floor.
Ren's vision blurred.
He could barely feel his fingers now.
The world was slipping away, piece by piece, sound first, then color, then warmth.
Someone shouted his name, but it sounded muffled, as though underwater.
"Is this what it feels like to leave?"
His mind wandered.
Back to her.
To the way she laughed. To the way she'd fall asleep mid-call.
To that one promise she whispered under the cherry tree,
"If we ever get lost in life, let's meet again in spring."
Ren's lips curved faintly.
Even with everything gone, that memory was warm.
"Serin…"he breathed. "You promised you'd stay …"
The world was soft.
Too soft.
Everything sounded like it was underwater .... the sirens, the footsteps, the voices calling his name.
Ren couldn't tell if his eyes were open or closed anymore.
The ceiling lights above him blurred into white halos, trembling like dying stars.
His chest burned, but he couldn't feel the pain, only the weight.
Heavy.
Cold.
He tried to move his fingers, but even that felt like reaching across an ocean.
Somewhere far away, a voice kept breaking through ... trembling, cracked.
"Stay with me! Please, stay with me!"
He couldn't tell whose voice it was.
Maybe Airi's. Maybe Serin's. Maybe… just the part of him that didn't want to go yet.
The smell of rain drifted in through the open door.
He remembered that night, cherry blossoms in the wind, her laughter tangled with it.
He wanted to tell her he was sorry. That he tried. That he never meant to make her cry.
A tear slipped from the corner of his eye, tracing down his cheek.
"Serin…"he whispered.
The word barely left his lips.
The monitor beside him stuttered.
Beep…
beep…
beep....
Then ..... silence.
His breathing hitched once, then slowed… slower…
The world dimmed to a single sound, wind brushing the curtains.
A cherry blossom petal drifted in through the hospital window, carried by that same gentle wind.
It landed on his chest, right above the bandage.
For a moment, it looked like his heart was still beating beneath it.
And then—
Everything went white.
"Spring ended for me the day her voice fell silent."