Days passed in suffocating slowness,
as if time itself was tiptoeing through Kim's life.
He went to college like everyone else, sat among the crowd,
but his eyes held no light.
The laughter of others drifted past him like distant echoes,
and his heart felt like a locked room where no sunlight could enter.
Then, on an ordinary day like any other—he turned his head… and saw her.
Mary.
Walking down the same hallway.
Her hair shimmered beneath the sunlight, her smile unchanged,
exactly as he had memorized it.
But one thing was different—
him.
He didn't move.
Didn't smile.
Didn't even breathe.
His gaze lingered for a moment,
then he simply walked away as if she wasn't there at all.
He wasn't pretending to be calm—
there was simply nothing left inside him to hide.
She passed by with soft steps, saying nothing,
only casting a brief look his way—
a look like someone trying to bring back a man who'd already died standing.
But his face…
was an empty mirror, reflecting only a cold silence that whispered:
> "I've cried enough… until every feeling inside me turned to dust."
Weeks slipped by after that silent encounter,
as if nothing had happened.
Yet Mary's heart couldn't rest.
Sometimes she saw him from afar,
sitting alone at the back of the lecture hall,
his expression lifeless—
as though life itself had lost its meaning within him.
He didn't talk to anyone.
Didn't laugh.
Didn't even get angry.
He simply existed—
like a machine continuing to breathe without purpose.
And one day,
she decided to approach.
Step by trembling step,
her heart quivered as if standing on the edge of a cliff.
> "Kim…"
She whispered his name softly—like an apology.
Yet the sound felt foreign on her tongue after all that time.
He raised his head slowly,
eyes empty of all emotion,
as if they'd weathered every storm and found only eternal silence at the end.
> "Do I… really mean nothing to you?"
She smiled nervously,
her fingers fidgeting in fear of his answer.
He said nothing.
Just looked at her for a moment—
then replied in a voice so cold it carried no trace of life:
> "I'm sorry… have we met before?"
The words struck her chest like a blade cutting through open wounds.
She stumbled back a step,
wearing a broken smile to hide the collapse inside her.
He turned away,
walking off slowly,
while her eyes followed his fading figure—
as though she was watching the ghost of someone she once loved.
> "Even forgetting wasn't his choice… it was his only way to survive."
And in that moment,
Mary understood—
the man she once loved no longer existed.
The one who passed her in silence
was merely a hollow shell…
of a soul that died the night they parted—
and was never buried.