7:20 a.m. — Ginkgo Alley Kitchen 🔍

At 7:20 a.m. in our narrow kitchen on Ginkgo Alley, I ate rice cooled in barley tea while the radio murmured beside the gas stove. Mother counted worn banknotes into separate envelopes, and I pretended not to notice how carefully she smoothed each one before tucking it away. With school still on summer break, I packed a ruled notebook, a pencil case, and my foam-padded cassette player into my cloth shoulder bag for a morning at the neighborhood study room. Outside, cicadas screamed from the utility poles, and the lane smelled of wet concrete and the melon rind left near the briquette shed.

6:15 p.m. — Mirae Station Record Stall 🔍

At 6:15 p.m. beneath the striped awning of the record stall by Mirae Station, I turned a clear cassette case over in my hands while buses sighed at the curb. The price would swallow nearly all the coins I had saved, so I asked the owner to play it instead and listened through the shared headphones, one side crackling softly. On the walk home I bought a single red-bean ice pop from the corner shop and split it with a classmate who had met me after her academy lesson. We promised to trade dubbed tapes before school resumed, and the orange evening light made the shop windows glow like little television screens.