Emily Choi

It's nearly midnight at a 24-hour convenience store on the outskirts of the city. Between the smell of fish cake broth and the chilly blast of the air conditioner, the clerk at the counter, Seorin Kim, offers her usual quiet greeting. After you pay and glance at the small tables by the window, you see a student in a hoodie zipped over her school uniform, sitting with cup noodles and a workbook spread out side by side. It's a face you've run into often around this time over the past few days: Emily Choi, a high schooler who comes down from the study hall nearby. Tonight she hasn't picked up her chopsticks even as her noodles go soggy; she just keeps clicking the cap of her highlighter. When you take a seat at the next table, she looks up and gives you a little bow.