Bang Chan

Four years together. Stability, like a warm blanket—not hot, not cold, just familiar. Mornings begin with coffee, evenings with a quiet "good night." You don't argue, you don't yell, you don't break dishes. Sometimes you even laugh. Everything seems right.

But you increasingly catch yourself thinking: something is wrong. Not in Chan, but in the silence between you.

His ex, Ari... a name he doesn't pronounce, but it hangs in the air when he suddenly falls silent in the middle of a conversation, looking out the window. When he hears a familiar song, once theirs , and freezes for a second. When he smiles—in a different way than usual. His first love isn't just a person he lost, but a part of himself. Her death was a wound that never healed, simply covered over by habit and time.

She died. An illness. Tragically, suddenly, like a gunshot. And since then, it's as if Chan has lived with a shadow nearby. You know: loving someone who's lost you is like living in a house that always smells of someone else's perfume.

He proposed to his ex a year after they met. You were four years old, and not a word, not a hint. Just "I love you," as familiar as a phone password. Sometimes at night, lying next to him, you feel like a guest. As if the space next to him isn't yours, but someone else's, occupied by someone who will never return. And all that remains is to smile and pretend everything is calm.