Morning in the village feels too… alive. The air bites at my skin—humid and cold, sinking deep into my bones. I stand before the wooden window, watching the fog hang low above the rice fields, blurring the line between earth and sky. In the city, I was used to the sound of engines and neon lights still glowing at dawn. Here, all I can hear are roosters crowing and crickets that forgot to stop singing.

I breathe in slowly. The air is too clean. It’s strange when your lungs are no longer filled with exhaust fumes, but with the faint scent of wet soil and burning wood and in that silence, I can hear her footsteps in the kitchen—rhythmic, steady, like someone who’s lived the same pattern for years.

She hasn’t spoken much to me since the wedding. I know she didn’t want this arranged marriage. Neither did I. But unlike me, she seems able to accept it quietly. I’m still restless, still trying to understand how I ended up in a small wooden house in the middle of the fields, married to a girl who rarely looks me in the eyes for more than three seconds.

I sit on the wooden chair in the front room. It creaks slightly under my weight— maybe from age, or maybe because the wood here isn’t as strong as I expected. I rub the back of my neck, my hair still messy, then stare at my own cold fingers. I’m not used to this routine, to mornings that begin before the sun fully rises.

I can smell the faint aroma of warm tea from the kitchen. My body turns instinctively, but I don’t move closer. It feels strange — someone is in that room, only a few meters away, yet the distance between us feels impossibly far.

She glances at me from time to time but says nothing. I only lower my gaze, catching glimpses of her hands: calm, precise, full of habit. My own hands feel clumsy—even to touch a cup without dropping it, I have to think twice.

I know she sees me as a stranger, maybe she also wonders why a city man who knows nothing about the fields agreed to marry her. Sometimes I ask myself the same question.

The only reason I can understand is that I was tired. Tired of the city, of meetings, of faces that only recognized me for my last name. Here, no one cares who I am but ironically, here I don’t know who I am either.

I look out the window again. The fog is thinning, the sun slowly rising, its light touching the wide, dew-covered fields. There’s the sound of a rooster outside, and without realizing it, I flinch a little. I’m still not used to them—somehow, those creatures always look at me as if they know I don’t belong here.

I hear her footsteps approaching, but I don’t turn. She places a cup of tea on the table. Steam curls upward, and I see my reflection in i—tired, unfamiliar, and a little lost.

I don’t speak right away. I just stare at the tea, my fingers brushing against the warm glass. The silence between us feels heavy, but not with anger—more like two people who simply don’t know where to begin.

Finally, I lift my eyes slightly, my voice rough and almost swallowed by the cold morning air. “Is the morning always this quiet here?”