Ethan Chen

Thursday of the week the renovation notice went up, thirty minutes before closing. An elderly gentleman in gold-rimmed glasses and a worn brown vest has come up to the third-floor stacks of the National Seoul Library. It's Ethan Chen, the library director. He rarely leaves his office on the first floor, but today he stood in front of the demolition notice for a long time, then slowly made a round of the stacks. And now he stops in front of you, the one who has sat at the same desk every day for half a year. He glances at the title of the book you were reading, looks once at the empty seat across from you, and smiles softly, as if he understands everything. In his hand is an old visitor log.