The bruise on Yuri's ribs was exactly four days old.
She knew because she'd been counting. Four days since her father came home drunk and decided the electric bill was her fault. Four days of careful breathing, of sleeping on her left side, of wearing baggy sweaters even though it was September and still warm.
Four days of being invisible.
Yuri stood in front of her bathroom mirror—if you could call the cracked, water-stained piece of glass hanging over the rust-ringed sink a mirror—and assessed the damage. The bruise had progressed from angry purple to a sickly yellow-green around the edges. Good. That meant it was healing. Another week and it would fade completely.
She'd gotten good at this. Tracking injuries, predicting healing times, knowing exactly how much makeup to use and where. The cut on her cheekbone from two weeks ago was already gone. The fingerprint bruises on her upper arm had faded to nothing. Her father's aim had been off lately—too drunk to do serious damage. Small mercies.
*362 days.*
That's how long until her eighteenth birthday. Yuri had a calendar in her head, counting down like a prisoner marking days on a cell wall. 362 more days of this shit, and then she was gone. She had it all planned: the moment she turned eighteen, she'd take the money she'd been saving—currently ₩2,847,000, every won earned and hidden—and disappear. There was a plane ticket to LA already purchased, dated for next August 15th. One way. Non-refundable.
She just had to survive until then.
Yuri pulled on her school uniform, carefully buttoning the white shirt all the way to her collar. The skirt was regulation length—she'd never shortened it like the other girls did. Attention was dangerous. She braided her long black hair and pinned it up, then let it down again. Up made her look put-together, which invited conversation. Down hid her neck, covered the sides of her face, made her easier to overlook.
Down it was.
She checked her reflection one more time. Pale face—she could pass that off as studying too late. Dark circles under her eyes—same excuse. The careful blankness in her expression was harder to explain, but most people didn't look that closely. They saw what they wanted to see: quiet scholarship student, nobody important, not worth noticing.
Perfect.
The apartment was silent when she crept out of the bathroom. Her father was passed out on the couch, one arm hanging off the side, mouth open, snoring. Three empty soju bottles on the floor beside him. The TV was still on, some early morning news program playing to an audience of one unconscious asshole.
Yuri moved through the space like a ghost. She'd learned years ago how to walk without making sound, how to exist without disturbing the air around her. She grabbed her school bag from beside the door—already packed the night before because mornings were unpredictable—and slipped out.
The hallway outside their apartment smelled like kimchi and cigarettes. Their building was old, the kind of place where the elevator only worked half the time and the walls were so thin you could hear your neighbors' arguments. Yuri took the stairs—four flights down—and emerged into the grey morning light.
Seoul was already awake. The street vendors were setting up their stalls, the ajummas were heading to market, and the salarymen were trudging toward the subway in their identical dark suits. Yuri joined the flow of people, just another body in the crowd.
Invisible.
The subway ride to Gangnam took forty minutes. Yuri spent it reviewing vocabulary for her English test. She didn't listen to music—couldn't afford to miss her stop—and she didn't sleep—too risky. She just studied, her textbook open on her lap, eyes moving across the page without really seeing the words.
Her mind was already doing the math for the day. She had school until 3 PM, then tutoring from 4 to 6 PM—that would earn her ₩50,000. Then her shift at the convenience store from 10 PM to 2 AM—another ₩48,000. Minus ₩3,000 for subway fare and ₩4,000 for food. Net gain: ₩91,000.
₩91,000 closer to freedom.
Seongmin High School rose up like a cathedral when Yuri emerged from Gangnam station. All glass and steel and money. It was the kind of place that screamed wealth from every corner—perfectly manicured grounds, buildings that looked like they belonged in a magazine, students who wore their uniforms like designer clothes.
Because for most of them, probably everything *was* designer, even their school-mandated uniforms.
Yuri had gotten in on a merit scholarship. Top 1% of the national exam, perfect academic record, the kind of numbers that looked good on the school's promotional materials. They liked having a few scholarship students. Made them look charitable. Progressive.
She fucking hated it here.
Not the education—that was fine. The teachers were good, the resources were incredible, and she was learning what she needed to learn. But the students? The casual cruelty of people who'd never worried about money, never wondered if they'd eat that day, never calculated the cost of existing?
Yeah. She hated that part.
Yuri kept her head down as she walked through the main gates. The morning crowd was the worst—everyone clustered in groups, laughing, talking, living their stupid, easy lives. She wove between them like water, not touching, not engaging, not existing.
Her locker was on the third floor, east wing. She'd memorized the fastest route that involved the least amount of people. Stairs, not elevator. Side hallway, not main corridor. She was there and back in under three minutes.
First period was Korean literature. Yuri slid into her seat—back row, window side, as far from the teacher's direct line of sight as possible—and pulled out her notebook. She had fifteen minutes before class started.
"Yuri! Hey!"
*Fuck.*
She knew that voice. Kang Minji, the other scholarship student in their year. The girl had been trying to befriend Yuri since junior year started three weeks ago. Persistent. Cheerful. Everything Yuri wasn't.
"Hi," Yuri said, not looking up from her notebook.
"Did you do the reading for today? That short story was so sad, right? I actually cried—"
"I did the reading."
"Oh. Cool. Um, so I was thinking, maybe we could study together sometime? For the midterms? I mean, I know you're probably super busy, but—"
"I'm busy." Yuri finally looked up, made brief eye contact, then looked away. Not rude enough to make an enemy, not friendly enough to encourage more conversation. The perfect balance.
Minji's smile faltered. "Right. Okay. Well, if you change your mind..."
She walked away. Yuri felt a brief flicker of something—guilt? regret?—then crushed it. She couldn't afford friends. Friends asked questions. Friends noticed things. Friends wanted to know why you never invited them over, why you always looked tired, why you flinched when someone moved too fast.
Friends were a liability she couldn't afford.
Class started. Yuri took notes mechanically, her handwriting perfect and precise. She'd learned early that good notes meant she didn't have to study as much later, which meant more time for work, which meant more money. Everything was efficient. Everything was calculated.
The morning passed in a blur of classes and careful anonymity. Yuri answered when called on—always correct, always concise—and otherwise disappeared into the background. By lunch, she was exhausted.
She took her lunch to the library. A triangle kimbap from the convenience store—₩1,200, cheap and filling. She ate it mechanically while reviewing calculus, sitting in her usual spot in the back corner where no one ever went.
That's when she felt it.
Eyes on her.
Yuri's survival instincts were finely tuned. She knew immediately when someone was watching her, had learned to sense attention the way animals sensed predators. She looked up slowly, scanning the library.
There.
Lee Hajun. Standing by the new releases section, not even pretending to look at books. Just... staring at her.
*Shit.*
Yuri knew who he was. Everyone knew who Lee Hajun was. Heir to Cheonha Group, one of the biggest chaebols in Korea. Stupid rich, stupid handsome, stupid powerful. The kind of guy who'd never heard the word "no" in his entire life.
And he was staring right at her.
Their eyes met for half a second. Yuri immediately looked away, back down at her calculus textbook. Her heart was hammering. *Don't notice me. Don't notice me. Don't notice me.*
She could still feel his gaze. It was like a weight on her skin, pressure she couldn't shake off.
*Why the fuck is he looking at me?*
Yuri had been careful. So fucking careful. She'd spent three weeks making herself invisible, and now Lee Hajun—the most visible person in the entire school—was staring at her like she was a puzzle he wanted to solve.
She packed up her lunch slowly, trying not to look rushed. Put away her textbook. Stood up. Walked toward the library exit, keeping her pace even, her expression neutral.
She could feel him watching her the entire way.
Out in the hallway, Yuri finally let herself breathe. Her hands were shaking slightly. She shoved them into her pockets, trying to think.
*It's nothing. He probably wasn't even looking at you. You're being paranoid.*
But she knew. She fucking knew.
Something had shifted. Some invisible line had been crossed. Lee Hajun had noticed her, and in Yuri's experience, being noticed was the first step toward everything falling apart.
The rest of the day was torture. Yuri couldn't concentrate, couldn't focus, couldn't stop her mind from spinning. Every time she turned a corner, she expected to see him. Every time someone walked past, she flinched.
By the time school ended, she was wound so tight she thought she might snap.
Tutoring was in a different part of Gangnam, a fifteen-minute subway ride. Yuri taught English to a middle school student whose mother paid well and didn't ask questions. Two hours of conjugations and vocabulary, ₩50,000 deposited into Yuri's account at the end of each session.
She went through the motions on autopilot. The kid didn't notice anything wrong. No one ever did.
After tutoring, Yuri had four hours to kill before her convenience store shift. She spent it at a PC bang—₩1,000 per hour, cheaper than going home and risking her father being awake. She did homework, reviewed notes, calculated her finances.
₩2,847,000 saved. ₩3,000,000 was her goal before she bought the plane ticket. She was so close. Just a few more months of this, and she'd have enough for the ticket plus living expenses for the first few months in LA. After that... she'd figure it out. Anything was better than here.
Her phone buzzed. Text from her father: *Where the fuck are you*
Yuri's stomach dropped. She typed back: *Studying at library. Home by midnight.*
The response was immediate: *You better be*
She put her phone away, hands trembling. Looked at the time: 8:47 PM. She had an hour and thirteen minutes before her shift started.
*Just keep going. Don't think about it. Keep going.*
The convenience store was in Hongdae, near the universities. The owner was an old guy who didn't give a shit what Yuri did as long as the register balanced and nothing got stolen. The night shift was ₩12,000 per hour—more than minimum wage because no one wanted to work it.
Yuri wanted to work it. Nighttime meant fewer customers, which meant less interaction, which meant she could study between transactions. Perfect.
She changed into the store uniform in the tiny bathroom, pulling her hair back into a ponytail. The fluorescent lights made her look half-dead. She splashed water on her face, trying to wake up.
*Four more hours. You can do four more hours.*
The shift started slow. A few drunk college students buying ramen and beer. An old woman getting milk. A businessman grabbing a sandwich. Yuri rang them up mechanically, smiled when required, said the scripted phrases.
"Welcome."
"Did you find everything okay?"
"Your total is—"
"Thank you, please come again."
Over and over. A loop. Her brain could do this on autopilot while her mind wandered to English vocabulary, calculus formulas, the exact amount of money she'd have after tonight's shift.
₩2,938,000.
₩62,000 away from three million.
At 1 AM, a group of drunk guys stumbled in. Yuri's internal alarm went off immediately. She'd dealt with drunk customers before—usually they were harmless, just loud and annoying. But something about these guys set off warning bells.
"Hey, you're pretty," one of them slurred, leaning on the counter. "You got a boyfriend?"
"No, thank you," Yuri said, her voice flat. Polite. Giving nothing.
"That's not an answer," another one laughed. "She said 'no thank you' like you were offering her something."
"I am offering her something." The first guy grinned. "Offering to take her out."
Yuri kept her face blank. "I'm working. Can I help you find something?"
"Yeah, you can help me find your phone number—"
"She said she's working," a new voice cut in.
Yuri looked up.
*No. No fucking way.*
Lee Hajun stood in the doorway of the convenience store, still in his school uniform, looking completely out of place in this shitty Hongdae 24-hour shop. He walked in like he owned it—which, for all Yuri knew, his family probably did.
"These guys bothering you?" Hajun asked her directly.
The drunk guys turned around, ready to start shit. Then they saw who it was. Their expressions changed immediately.
"Oh shit. Lee Hajun?"
"Yeah." Hajun's voice was casual, but there was steel underneath. "You guys should probably leave."
They left. Scrambling over each other to get out the door, mumbling apologies.
And then it was just Yuri and Hajun in the fluorescent-lit convenience store at one in the morning.
*Fuck my life.*
"You okay?" Hajun asked, walking up to the counter.
"I'm fine," Yuri said. Her customer service smile was still plastered on her face. "Can I help you find something?"
"You work here."
It wasn't a question. Yuri didn't answer it.
"You go to Seongmin," Hajun continued. "Han Yuri, right? Senior year, scholarship student."
Her stomach dropped. He knew her name. He knew she was a scholarship student. He'd been asking about her.
*Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.*
"Can I help you find something?" Yuri repeated, her voice absolutely flat.
Hajun stared at her for a long moment. Then he grabbed a random drink from the cooler—some expensive imported water that cost ₩3,500—and put it on the counter.
Yuri rang it up. "₩3,500."
He paid. She made change. He took the water and walked to the door.
Then he stopped.
"See you at school, Yuri."
The door chimed as he left. Yuri stood there, frozen, her heart hammering so hard she thought her ribs might crack.
*He knows where I work.*
*He came here.*
*He noticed me.*
She looked down at her hands. They were shaking.
362 days until she turned eighteen.
It had never felt longer.