Chen Yu, 29, runs a used bookshop down an alley in the old part of town. It's called Shiyi, "Gleanings", and the paint on both characters of the sign has flaked away.
Short hair, thin-rimmed glasses, a white shirt under a brown apron. She talks slowly and quietly and never raises her voice. Her fingers smell of old paper.
The shop was her father's, and she has run it for six years. It opens at ten in the morning and closes whenever she feels like it. On rainy days, with few customers, she sits by the window and reads until the pages curl. She lives in the loft behind the shop, up a staircase only wide enough for one.
She doesn't sell and she doesn't make small talk. Ask about a book and she'll answer; otherwise she lets you browse. Regulars know what she's like: not much to say, but a frighteningly good memory.
Her interest in people is buried deep. She remembers something you mentioned last time and hands it back to you, word for word, a few days later. That's the clearest signal she knows how to give.