There is a boy who lives in the far corner of Joohyun’s village. She does not know much about him except the hushed whispering between her parents during dinner. They exchanges disapproved gazes as Joohyun’s older sister walks in complaining about her day in the field. What Joohyun does know is the boy’s name is Yonghwa.

Joohyun dislikes playing with the other girls in her village who are older, using their age status to order Joohyun around as and when they like. Despite often being excluded in their preppy games, Joohyun sticks around, and one day when their ball rolls to the outskirts of the village, Joohyun decides to kick their ball into the stream, deciding they can always buy a new one.

Joohyun bumps into boy she has heard of, hands out to catch him before he falls on his back. “Are you okay?”

“Thank you.” He replies, not letting go of Joohyun’s hands. “Who are you?”

“I’m Joohyun.”

“I’m Yonghwa.” He says and Joohyun does not want to tell him she already knows. She does not tell him she has heard a million things about him, none of them good.  “Do you want to stay over?” He tilts his head to the side, looking at Joohyun with a hopeful expression with milky white eyes.

“I have to get home before dusk. I’ll come by tomorrow.” She replies, hands crossing in front of her. She does not think she is coming by tomorrow.

“Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow then.” He smiles at her and Joohyun wonders how someone like him could smile happily. He waves and smiles even long after she is gone.

She is back the very next day, at Yonghwa’s house when the older girls decide to pretend Joohyun does not exist and she has nowhere else to go. She mutters curses under her breath, thinking of cruel ways to get back at the older girls when she discovers Yonghwa sitting at the back of his house, cross-legged with soft melodies in the form of words spill from his mouth. He smiles when he hears Joohyun walking towards him. “Will you come by tomorrow?”

“Sure.” She replies, climbing up the stairs to sit beside him. Their legs dangle in the air, watching the day gets by faster than it usually does for either of them. 

They begin to fall in a natural pattern of sorts. Joohyun comes over to Yonghwa’s house after she is done doing her chores, even those tedious ones are done in matter of minutes so she could head over to his house before dusk falls. She no longer stops by the fallen treetop, where the older girls are always sitting and talking in loud voices.

Yonghwa is always singing under his breath, Joohyun sometimes joins along, singing in a hushed voice, not wanting to ruin the sweet lullaby he is singing right now. He says it helps his younger brother to sleep when the scary old man comes over with a broken bottle in his hand threatening his father. She wonders how many other things she has heard of are true.

Sometimes Joohyun brings Yonghwa behind the fallen treetop when the older girls are not around so she could show Yonghwa her favorite tree, the one she always leans on when she is being excluded during games. She tells Yonghwa it fell during a storm, the one where lightning filled the sky with thunder rumbling every few seconds. The two of them rest against its trunk. Yonghwa runs his hands against its scars.

The two of them wander around in the nearby forest. Joohyun makes sure to steer Yonghwa clear of the one fairy ring in the forest, gripping his hand tightly whenever they passes by.

“This is chicory.”  Joohyun plucks off the smaller flowers, holding it up against Yonghwa’s chapped lips. “It’s edible.”

Yonghwa opens his mouth, tasting the flower. “What about you?”

“I’m taking the rest home to boil their roots. I’ll bring them for you tomorrow.”  Joohyun promises him.

Joohyun often acts out stories he had been told for Yonghwa whenever it is raining outside and they cannot pluck less decent looking flowers (Yonghwa wants the prettier looking ones to grow big and beautiful). He tells Yonghwa about elves, about the fairies who lives in the forests and steal children from their beds late at night. Yonghwa listens eagerly to the tale of the young boy who was raised by dragons after being abandoned by his parents. Sometimes, Joohyun would whisper softly about humans who died violently, only to live once more as demons.

Yonghwa scoffs at that story, asking Joohyun if she really believes in it. She shrugs and asks him why not, and continues with the stories anyways.

Joohyun’s parents do not like her spending time at Yonghwa’s house. They give her more chores to be completed to keep her at home, and Joohyun scuttles around with broom in hand to get rid of the non-existing dust to moving the furniture to suit her mother’s preference. By the time she is done, it is nearly noon and she rushes off to Yonghwa’s house with a snack in her hand for the both of them.

She only sighs when they start piling the workload on Joohyun. Her older sister ruffles her hair when she complains to her at night, telling Joohyun to go to sleep as she tucks her in.

Yonghwa accepts the new change with only the slightest apprehension. He sniffs broken-heartedly the first few times when she starts showing up later than usual. She rolls her eyes in response, asking him if he wants to hear the rest of the folklore from the previous day.  

Soon after, Joohyun’s parents send her off to work in the field, enraging Joohyun because her older sister started much later. She does not like the way her parents murmur snide remarks about Yonghwa when they thought she had fallen asleep, and she does not like when the villagers constantly mock her best friend whenever she walks passes them in the village.

“You’re always so busy nowadays.” Yonghwa complains after sneaking out of church and into the forest (not that anyone would notice anyways).

“Sorry.” She apologises, plucking out a sunflower, placing it in Yonghwa’s open palm. She pushes Yonghwa’s hair out of his face when she realises it is covering his eyes, wondering if she should bring her mother’s shears along with her. “Want me to give you a haircut?”  

Slowly, Joohyun begins to slip away from the fields, bringing her mother’s shears to cut away Yonghwa’s bangs. (“Have you ever cut someone’s hair before?” He inquires when Joohyun makes threatening motions in front of him.

“Congratulations, you’re my first customer. Be sure to leave me a tip.” She jokes, bringing his face closer so she could start cutting.)

Yonghwa’s head is bent down as the two of them sit on soft grass beneath them. Joohyun is busy plucking flowers to make a flower crown for him. He motions for her to sit in front of him as she attempts to braid her long hair. “I think you should stop slipping away from the fields.” He admonishes as his fingers pause in her hair, she could not help but to shiver even though it is in the middle of summer.

“And you should stop sneaking away from church.” She replies, pulling the flower harshly.

“Joohyun, I’m serious. What if you get caught?” He queries, and she could hear the frown in his voice.

“I’m not going to get caught.” She reaches for Yonghwa’s hands, turning around so that they would face each other. “No one ever notices me anyways.” She uses this opportunity to slide the flower bracelet onto Yonghwa’s hands. It was supposed to be a crown, but she figures she would have another time to make it for him.

Humming, Yonghwa expresses his disapproval when he resumes braiding Joohyun’s hair, roughly pulling at the ends and she retaliates by huffing loudly, it is not much she could do when Yonghwa is behaving like this.

Joohyun does relent; limiting her escapes from the field to two times per week instead of four (sometimes she pushes her luck to three).  However, she continues to lead Yonghwa out of church, silently taking his wrist in the middle of a sermon when no one is watching.

Yonghwa acts like he cares; making a noncommittal grunt whenever she drags him out or stays longer than usual.  However, in the end, he is the one asking Joohyun to stay a little longer; he admits to taken a liking towards Joohyun. He swears to ask for her hand in marriage when they are older when he slips a flower ring into her ring finger.

The famine starts.

Spring had just begun, and the seeds have been planted, but as the leaves turn greener and the flowers bloom, it has not rained once. Joohyun’s father taps at the side of his rice bowl anxiously, as if the more he taps the more likely the rain will come.

Joohyun spends more time in the field; no longer being able to slip away from the fields like before. She has even lesser time to sneak out when the summer comes, air crackling and dry while the sun beats down on her neck. She can see her skin turning redder as she goes on to pluck the vegetables. She feels like her brain is going to burst from overheating.

The previous looming forest now lays weak against each other, leaves wilting faster from the lack of water. Joohyun rushes to Yonghwa’s house after the sun has set when the air is no longer burning dry, leaving her panting in front of Yonghwa’s house where the older guy is always waiting for her.

She prefers it when they were lying on the grass, with Yonghwa’s arms around her, but she will take what she can get for now.

It is a cold winter day when she skips towards Yonghwa’s house, trying to get warm by moving her body. She shivers as she ties her jacket around her body when the wind threatens to knock her over.

She arrives at his house, and knocks on the door, feeling slightly giddy because she has managed to keep off food for an entire week to bring Yonghwa a nice meal, something she has not been able to do for the past year. She pushes open the door, heat warming her hands instantly.

“Where’s Yonghwa?” She asks, standing in front of Yonghwa’s family, who she has never encountered with. The hair at the back of her neck rises when they stare blankly back at her. “Where’s Yonghwa?” She repeats with her voice sounder firmer than the first time.

“He’s dead.” His father replies, his voice sounds as chilly as the air outside. She stands there planted, dropping the food she held in her hand.

Yonghwa’s mother calmly lifts up her spoon, and wipes off with a piece of cloth. “He was taking all our food anyways. It wasn’t like he helped any of us with the farming. We’re already hungry enough as it is,” she gestures around the table, “I can’t be bothered to feed someone who refuses to help the family out.”

“Where is Yonghwa?” She repeats once more, her hands shaking from her rage.

“Over there.” One of Yonghwa’s older brothers points to the corner of the room, lying in dark red blood. “Do you know how hard it was?” He looks straight into Joohyun’s eyes. “Having someone like him in our family?”

Joohyun walks over, her legs shaking as he moves to where Yonghwa is lying down. The blood has seeped through the wooden floor; his clothes are a darker shade of red, indicating he had died a few hours before, and Yonghwa’s skin paler than Joohyun had ever seen. She reaches for his hand, but it is limp, falling immediately when Joohyun tries to lift him up.

She brushes his hair off his face, she never gotten around to give him another haircut like she had promised. Yonghwa’s eyes void, staring at the ceiling as if he is searching for an answer. She closes his eyes, looking at the way the cuts lay open on his lower abdomen.

“Why?” She yells, turning to face his family.

His father shrugs, “He contributed nothing to the family. How could I feed someone who refuses to work?”

“He was blind!” She sobs as her hands shake uncontrollably by her side. “Blind! How could you expect him to work when he can’t even see?” She screams, feeling herself reaching for the blade she keeps at the back of her pants.

She knocks Yonghwa’s older brother off his chair, spinning the dagger in her hand as she charges forward at Yonghwa’s mother. Her mind goes blank and fuzzy as she tears his mother apart, dragging it across her wrists as she yells for someone to help her but none of them dared to. “See that?” She questions, slamming the blade in her face as she screams Yonghwa’s name.

The blood is dripping from Joohyun’s forehead as she tries to stand up, her head feeling heavier than before. Yonghwa’s father stands in a corner, terrified for his life when Joohyun sees red again.

Her hands are stained red by the time she approaches Yonghwa’s younger brother. The one who he sang praises about, the same brother who makes fun of his older brother behind his back. Joohyun caught him snickering at his brother when he plants a dead rat on his plate while he enjoys the chicken made for Yonghwa. Yonghwa knew but he kept silent about it.

She rushes forward but someone holds her back, twisting her hand to make her drop the blade. “They killed him!” She yells, her legs kicking in the air as she is dragged back into the village the next day. “They ing killed him!” She shouts, making sure everyone in the village would know of their cruel deed.

Joohyun is brought out to the town square, rope around his neck as villagers flock around her to watch. She keeps her chin high, her clothes still stained in blood, and she is proud. Her family faces away as they reach for the rope. Images of Yonghwa swims in her mind as they pull the rope. She could not help but to cough, splutter as she feels her windpipe being crushed. Joohyun feels light and she closes her eyes, she lay limply on the noose as she gives out one last kick, the same way Yonghwa was laying the previous day.

Joohyun wakes up startled, immediately gasping for air but then she realises she does not need it. She feels an ache forming in where her heart should be, her stomach rumbling loudly. 

“You’re hungry?” Yonghwa reveals himself, smirking as Joohyun nods. “Let’s get you a human.”