There are probably friends and neighbours who hold memories of Hayun's grandparents (they've lived in this neighbourhood forever) but their memories of them will fade in time, in a way that Hayun's never will. They'll move on with their lives and the kind couple who lived next door with their grandson won't even be a distant memory. So it really is up to Hayun to keep them alive in the only way he's capable of.

Which also feels like so much more responsibility piled on top of the boy already being crushed by it.

"I can see that now, but it didn't feel like it at the time." It felt like breaking a promise he'd made to see them again. "I haven't really thought like that in a long time, by the way. So if that's something you think you have to worry about, it isn't." At least he thinks it isn't.

Gathering up a little more of the fabric of Yohan's shirt, Hayun nods his head yet again. He doesn't want to disrupt Yohan's life with his own problems. He'll be fine. Eventually he'll be fine again because he has to be. But he nods anyway. "Thank you, Yohan. Not just for that but for tonight too. And everything else you've done for me. Thank you."