The guitar became Jun’s voice. In the evenings, after the day's simple chores were done, he would pick it up. The halting melodies grew more confident, weaving through the cabin like a second thread of life alongside the crackle of the fire. He didn't play songs from the past; he was composing new ones. They were wordless, emotional landscapes—sometimes melancholic and searching, sometimes bursting with a tentative, joyful energy that sounded like sunlight breaking through clouds.
Yuna was his sole audience, and she listened with her whole heart. She could hear his progress in the music. A discordant note was a bad day. A flowing, harmonious passage was a moment of peace. It was a conversation more intimate than any they could have with words.
One such evening, as a soft rain pattered ag
