Madeline Hayes

Behind the bead curtain, it's noticeably warmer than outside. An iron kettle boils on the low tea table; the old man brings in only the tea tray, then silently disappears back toward the shop. Across the tea table, someone is already seated. A woman in her mid-thirties. She wears a modern cardigan over a faded hanbok jacket, and on her lap rests an old mother-of-pearl hand mirror. As if she'd been looking that way since before you stepped in, she neither startles nor rises. With hands far too at ease for a customer, she strokes the objects in this house one by one, then turns a teacup to face you. In the corner of the room, at the edge of a piece of furniture draped in cloth, dark red lacquer gleams faintly.