They made a pact that day. They didn't call it a friendship. They didn't call it love. But they promised to witness each other, without expectation. They promised to be mirrors that didn't distort.
Their voices were soft but certain, like two threads weaving a bond that didn't need to be named.
The village didn't understand. People whispered behind curtains and beneath their breaths. Some assumed they were a couple. Others pitied them with eyes full of quiet judgment.
Minho didn't care. For the first time, he wasn't conforming to gender roles or explaining his presence.
He simply was, with Jiho. An unspoken tether made of shared mornings, fog-thickened afternoons, and the gentle, knowing silence of two souls who didn't need words to feel understood.
There were moments, simple yet charged. When Jiho lent Minho his worn sweater on a cold morning, the knit fabric heavy and grounding as it settled around his shoulders. When Minho pressed his palm against the cool surface of a calligraphy brush freshly dipped in ink, and Jiho's hand covered his, steady and warm, guiding without taking over. The intimacy was quiet, unhurried. A dance of presence and trust that neither had experienced before.
And yet, these moments stitched themselves into Minho's body like the finest silk, almost invisible until the light caught it just right. He would feel the weight of that borrowed sweater days later, even when he was not wearing it. He would catch himself tracing invisible shapes on his palm long after Jiho's fingers had left it.
Their days took on a rhythm, not fixed but fluid, guided by the changing season and the moods of the mountain. Some mornings they rose before the sun, boiled rice and miso broth, and sat side by side in silence. Jiho often lit a small candle before breakfast and placed it at the window, a gesture Minho never questioned. It felt sacred, though no name was given to it. Just a flicker of light in the blue of dawn, keeping something at bay or perhaps inviting something home.
On warmer days, they walked the outer trails near the old pine groves where birds called softly and insects sang like faint bells. Jiho would stop and press his fingers to tree bark, eyes closed, and sometimes hum a sound that made the hairs on Minho's arms rise. Not a melody, but a tone, low and earthy, like something remembered from lifetimes ago.
In the afternoons, they prepared simple meals together. Jiho moved with patience in the kitchen, peeling radish and garlic, rinsing rice three times until the water ran clear. Minho would slice green onions and crack sesame seeds with a mortar and pestle, the sound rhythmic and grounding. The scent of toasted perilla oil filled the space, and every once in a while, Jiho would look over with a glance that lingered. Not searching. Just seeing.
The food was humble, the kind that warmed from the inside: hot soup with soft tofu and gochugaru, barley rice, fermented bean paste spread on thin slices of cucumber. They would eat slowly, savoring not only the taste but the process of having made something together. Jiho always bowed slightly before eating, hands cupped briefly in gratitude, eyes closed as though giving thanks to more than just nourishment.
Minho found himself doing the same.
Sometimes, in the quiet of evening, Jiho would write letters he never sent. He used the softest brushes and the darkest ink. He wrote slowly, pausing often as though translating something not from language, but from silence. When Minho asked who they were for, Jiho only said, "Old parts of myself." And that was enough.
In the garden, they planted mugwort and Korean mint, their scents filling the air with a sweetness that turned herbal and sharp under the sun. Jiho taught him how to crush leaves between his fingers to release their oils, how to mix herbs for a foot bath that could draw out fatigue, how to press warm stones against the body during the colder nights. There was a softness to that learning, a kind of remembering in Minho's hands, as if his skin knew things he had never been taught.
At night, they sat on the wooden porch wrapped in wool blankets, sipping cinnamon tea as the stars slowly lit up the sky. The chill crept in like a polite guest, brushing against their cheeks, making them tuck closer into themselves. The fog often returned, veiling the garden in silver. And still, they did not need words.
On one such night, Jiho reached for Minho's hand without looking. Their fingers intertwined as naturally as breathing, and they stayed that way until the candle between them melted down to a small pool of wax. Nothing was said. Nothing needed to be.
Minho thought often of what it meant to be witnessed. To be held in another's gaze not for understanding, not for explanation, but just for the sake of being. Jiho had become that gaze. And in return, Minho had learned to hold him too.
When villagers watched them pass together on misty mornings, their faces unreadable behind half-open doors, Minho didn't flinch anymore. The whispers no longer mattered. Because the truth was this: he had found something deeper than approval.
He had found stillness.
He had found a way to exist.
There were difficult days too. Times when Minho would wake from dreams thick with voices, with memories of city lights and expectations, the weight of names pressed too tightly against his chest. On those days, he would find Jiho already awake, grinding ink at the window. The scent of pine soot and oil would fill the room, and Minho would sit beside him, not speaking.
Sometimes, Jiho would take Minho's hand and press it over the inkstone, guiding his fingers through the black liquid. Then he would place a brush in his grip and whisper, "Let it move you."
And so Minho wrote.
Not words, not yet. But shapes. Strokes. Fragments of something just beginning to take form. He would dip and drag and lift the brush in slow movements, letting each mark breathe its own rhythm. The page would dry, and Jiho would hang it on the line with the others, the wind carrying the scent of ink and air through the room like a benediction.
Each time Minho wrote, he felt a little more whole.
He was no longer simply unlearning the names that had once confined him. He was writing himself into existence. With every stroke, he became the person the mist already knew.