The house was too quiet for someone so loud inside.

Han didn’t grow up properly. He aged, yes—his bones lengthened, his face thinned, his voice deepened. But his heart stayed small. Confused. Messy. He still tied his shoes wrong. He ate cookies for breakfast. He cried when the lights flickered off. He didn’t know how to be a person. He only knew how to make them.

That’s what the room was for.

Dozens of sculptures sat there—half finished, mouths gaping, limbs reaching for things Han didn’t know how to name. He gave them hair, clothes, little poses. He held their hands and whispered to them like dolls. Sometimes he made them argue with him, just so someone would say he was wrong. Other times he just needed them to tell him it was okay to not know things. That it was okay to need someone.

He never heard that growing up.

But he could build it.

And out of all the pieces and paint and tired hours, there was one that stayed—Minho.

Minho stood by the window, always. Bare feet. Soft shoulders. Blank expression carved like it was waiting for something to change. Han made him slowly—first a sketch, then a frame, then flesh-like clay and paint with careful layers. He gave Minho kind eyes. A strong back. A quiet mouth.

He wanted Minho to be someone who didn’t leave. Someone who listened. Someone who understood what Han couldn’t say out loud: “I don’t know how to be here.” “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” “I feel like I was left behind.”

At night, Han curled up beside the wall with a blanket far too small, talking to the room like it was a giant parent that had forgotten to pick him up. “I’m fine,” he’d mumble, thumb brushing the edge of a plastic cup. “I don’t cry anymore. Not like before.” Then he’d look at Minho. “But it’s just us now, right? That’s all we need.”

One day, his voice cracked mid-sentence—and a voice answered.

“I know.”

Han froze.

Minho had moved. Just slightly. Eyes lowering toward the floor, then lifting again, slow and unsure—like a newborn learning balance.

“You’re real,” Han whispered, tears climbing without permission. “You weren’t supposed to talk yet.”

Minho took a breath. It sounded like it hurt. His chest rose awkwardly.

“You made me because you needed someone to stay,” he said.