It was the year everything fell apart.
A storm tore through your village like a god with no patience. The shrine—the sacred place you and he had built from mossy stone and childish promises—was reduced to rubble. The woven charms you once tied with red thread lay waterlogged and broken. You tried to rebuild it, trembling, hopeful. But he didn't come.
And when he finally did, it wasn't with hands to help. It was with words sharp enough to splinter everything left between you.
> "Why don't you care anymore?"
"Because caring doesn't save anything. Spirits don't save anyone. They're just stories."
You weren't ready for that truth. You weren't ready to lose your best friend to something as cruel as doubt.
> "You're just scared to believe!"
"And you're too weak to stop!"
You both cried.
You both walked away.
---
Weeks passed. His family packed quietly, and one day he was just gone.
No goodbye.
But you couldn't let it end like that. Not completely. Not when so much still burned in your chest.
You returned to the shrine one last time—ruined, muddy, but still sacred in your memory. And there, beneath the tangled roots of the banyan tree, you left a scrap of paper folded tight.
> "If spirits ever come for both of us... I'll still protect you. Even if you don't believe anymore."
_______.
(You had given him a name once. Not his real one, but one only you used. One only you remembered.)
You waited, silently hoping he would come back and find it.
He never did.
Or so you thought.
What you didn't know was that he did return—after you were gone. That he found the note, years too late. That one name, long buried, would become the spark that one day brought him back through fire and eclipse.
---