“No. That’s fine.” With the glass halfway to my mouth, I pause. “Who is paying for all of this?” I don’t know how much funerals cost, but it doesn’t seem right that a landlady and my father’s current girlfriend pay. On the other hand, is it right for me to do so? Pay for the funeral of the man who abandoned me? Mom wouldn’t approve of that.

“It’s been taken care of. Don’t worry.” Boyoung holds up the soju bottle. “Drink and I’ll refill your glass.”

And that’s how it goes for the next hour. Boyoung gives me a lesson in funeral etiquette in between shots of soju. After a bit, my butt and head both feel numb. Perhaps copious amounts of soju are the only way to get through these things.

“Did he look like me?” I blurt out after the two of us empty three bottles.

“Your father?”

I nod vigorously, almost too hard. I have to catch myself on the edge of the table so I don’t tip over. “I didn’t see it. Are you sure we’re at the right place? That you have the right guy? Didn’t you say that there are only a few last names in Korea? That it’s common for people to have the same name?”

“It’s not uncommon, but”—Boyoung bites her lip—“this is the right man.”

“No. We don’t know that for a fact. He doesn’t look like me at all,” I insist. I’m warming to the idea that this is all a mistake. In a city this big, with this many people, Boyoung could’ve gotten this man mixed up with my father. Relief pours through me, warming me in a way that none of the soju has been able to. “Yes. It’s not him.”

Boyoung gives me a pitying look. “He is the man from the email, Hara. I verified it. I would not lie to you about this.”

“Oh.” I deflate like a popped balloon.

“You do look like him. You have his eyes. They’re shaped like dragon eyes, long and dark, sloped like a fishhook. Very pretty. You have very pretty eyes. Mine are too small.” Boyoung covers one of her own pretty and, in my opinion, large eyes shyly. “Plus, because your eyes are long, you have a nice eye smile.”

“An-n eye smile?” I don’t know what that is. When I was little, kids would make fun of my eyes, calling them “rice eyes” because they were the shape of a grain of rice, or sometimes “almond eyes.” I’d once held both a grain of rice and an almond to my eye. Neither had the same shape.

Boyoung closes both her eyes and smiles. Her black lashes form two small curves on her face. “Eye smile,” she repeats and then her lids pop up. She gives me a moment for this to sink in, as if she can sense that I’m having an epiphany.

Holy shit. An eye smile. There’s a name for it and it’s considered attractive. I feel like my worldview is shifting on its axis. I test out the eye smile. Behind my closed lids, in the darkness, I envision myself and it feels . . . nice.