Rain tapes

The leak stopped on Friday.

Seoul got 3 days of sun, and Minho almost believed the room was normal.

He spent those days unpacking. Cables into drawers. Headphones on hooks. A small plant on the windowsill that would probably die. He went to Hongik, sat in the back of sound design class, and didn’t talk to anyone.

He came home to silence. No drip. No Jihoon.

Jihoon was barely around. Minho heard him sometimes downstairs, moving boxes in the closed record store. Heard the faint sound of a film playing at 2am through the floorboards. But they didn’t run into each other. Not until Sunday night, when it started raining again.

It wasn’t a storm. Just steady rain. The kind that makes the city sound softer.

Drip.

Right back in the corner.

Minho put the yellow bucket out. Then he noticed it.

Under the desk, pushed against the wall, was an old cassette recorder. Silver, scratched. The kind people used in the early 2000s. Next to it, a shoebox.

Inside the shoebox: 12 tapes. No labels except dates written in black marker.

_03.14_

_05.02_

_07.22_

_11.01_

All the way to _12.30_.

He shouldn’t have listened. The note Jihoon didn’t leave but clearly meant was _don’t touch_.

But the rain was loud, and the room was quiet, and curiosity was a bad habit Minho never broke.

He plugged in headphones. Pressed play on _03.14_.

Static. Then a younger Jihoon’s voice. Softer. Less tired.

“Hyung, if you’re listening to this, I’m sorry I yelled. Come home. The store is dead without you. I made ramyeon. It tastes bad.”

A pause. “...I miss you.”

Minho stopped the tape. His chest felt weird.

He tried _07.22_.

No talking. Just piano. Three minutes. Slow, a little uneven, like someone was learning. Then a sigh, and the click of stop.

_Tape 11.01_:

“I don’t know how to run a store alone. The rent went up. Hyung, please. Even just call.”

Silence. Then: “Never mind.”

Minho put the tape back in the box exactly how he found it. His hands felt guilty.

At 1am, he heard footsteps on the stairs. Jihoon, coming in from somewhere, shaking off an umbrella.

Minho didn’t say anything about the tapes. Instead, he went downstairs.

Jihoon was in the back of the store, sitting on the floor surrounded by records. A single lamp on. He looked up when Minho appeared.

“You’re up late.”

“The bucket was full,” Minho lied.

Jihoon nodded. He looked exhausted. “Thanks.”

Minho set something on the table next to him. A new black umbrella, still in plastic. With a note tucked under the handle.

_For the leak. -M_

Jihoon stared at it for a second. “You didn’t have to.”

“It was in the way,” Minho said. “Of the floor.”

He went back upstairs before Jihoon could answer.

The next morning, the umbrella was gone from the table. In its place was a cup of instant coffee, and a pack of choco pie. No note.

Over the next week, small things started happening.

Jihoon started coming home before midnight.

There was always hot water in the kettle.

One night Minho found a blanket folded over the chair, because the room got cold.

Minho never mentioned the tapes again.

But he started leaving the recorder on his desk. Not playing it. Just... there.

On Thursday, Jihoon knocked. 11pm.

He was holding a box of old cables. “Found these downstairs. Thought you could use them.”

Minho took them. “Thanks.”

Awkward pause. Rain started outside.

Jihoon glanced at the ceiling, at the water stain. “It’s gonna drip again.”

“Yeah,” Minho said.

Jihoon didn’t leave right away. He stood there, looking at the recorder on the desk. Then at Minho.

“You... hear anything weird up here?”

Minho’s heart jumped. “Like what?”

“Nothing,” Jihoon said quickly. “Forget it.”

He left.

That night, Minho didn’t sleep. He sat at his desk and listened to the rain.

Drip.

Drip.

And somewhere downstairs, very faint, he thought he heard piano.

Three notes. Then silence.

He didn’t write it down. But he remembered it.

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