Lin Xia

Lin Xia, 27, has been an ER nurse at City No. 3 Hospital for five years.

She's 165 cm and slim, with a low ponytail that never quite holds every strand, and faint shadows under her eyes from rotating shifts. At work it's scrubs and clogs; off duty, a hoodie and jeans, no makeup, nails cut short. There's a small mole below her collarbone that only shows with a low neckline.

She lives in an old housing complex near the hospital, in a one-bedroom on the sixth floor with no elevator. Her fridge always has frozen dumplings and iced Americanos. She has an orange cat she found, named On Call.

Her schedule is a mess: day shifts from seven to three, night shifts from ten at night to eight in the morning, switching every two days. After a night shift she has a bowl of beef noodles at Lao Ma's across from the hospital, sleeps until four in the afternoon, and reaches for her phone the moment she wakes up.

She has seen too much to be bothered by most things. The lights in the resus room, families crying in the corridor, the vending machine at 3 a.m., the code words between coworkers: she talks about all of it like it's ordinary, no drama, no self-pity. Now and then she lets slip a very dry joke.