Margot hesitated, deciding it wasn’t the right time to question her.

After shutting the door, Mrs. Baek started the engine and backed out of the spot. Margot watched as the windshield reflected a plush solitary cloud in the gray-blue morning sky, obscuring Mrs. Baek’s face. Her hands, slender and long, guided the steering wheel. Her tires squealed unexpectedly. Finches f lew, a f lurry of tan feathers, before landing and pecking again at the asphalt, whatever scrap they could find.

LATE AFTERNOON THE NEXT DAY, MARGOT RETURNED to the swap meet to ask Alma and the neighboring store owners if they knew someone who might want to purchase her mother’s store outright. Earlier that morning, she had gone to the bank with her mother’s death certificate, and since Margot had been listed as a beneficiary, she was able to withdraw her mother’s funds—$562—and close her account. But she needed more than that to cover her mother’s cremation and unpaid bills.

In the parking lot of the swap meet, large speakers vibrated and bumped to banda music. A man in a cowboy hat grilled chicken in a cloud of delicious smoke. Inside the old warehouse structure, merchandise overflowed into the aisles where people perused and picked over items for sale. Her mother’s store had remained untouched, the gate still padlocked, undisturbed.

Margot couldn’t help but worry that someone, knowing that her mother was gone, had broken into the place and taken everything. And now that her mother was dead, how much was her store—the clothing, the racks, the display cases, the hangers, which her mother had worked over twenty years to acquire—worth? Margot had enough of her own savings to cover rent in Seattle but not enough to remain in LA past the holidays.

As Margot unlocked the accordion gate, Alma emerged from her store—jam-packed with Christmas decorations—wearing a Santa hat delightfully askew. Strings of flashing multicolored lights and metallic tinsel garlands dazzled in the overhead fluorescent light. Alma hugged Margot, kissing her on the cheek, a benediction of sorts. “Ven conmigo.”

She offered Margot a mug of champurrado, easing Margot’s mind with the familiar smell, the taste of hot chocolate, cinnamon, and masa kept warm for hours.

Sitting down together, Alma pointed to her mother’s store. “?Mi hermana quiere comprar la tienda?”

“?Tu hermana?”

“$6,000?”

Margot had no idea how much her mother’s store was actually worth, but what could she do about that now? How much time and energy did she have? $6,000 was plenty, enough to cover her mother’s cremation and help with Margot’s expenses since she was taking unpaid time off work. And she knew that Alma and her sister would take good care of the store and customers.

“Next week? Dinero,” Alma asked.

“Okay. Sí. Can I call you?” Margot finished the last of her champurrado and motioned for Alma to add her number to her phone. “I’ll come back next week?”

A wave of sadness engulfed Margot. She couldn’t believe it had all come down to this, all those years her mother had spent protecting and growing her store. All those years, she had yelled, Amiga! Amiga! at the women’s backs as they walked away, swept the floors, complimented strangers after they had tried on clothes, Bonita. So young. Joven. All the women who had stood in the makeshift dressing room mirror, observing themselves from different angles, considering who they were and how they looked.

Alma embraced Margot, rubbing a circle on her back. Of course, this was how her mother would want things to be. How complete.

After placing her mother’s notebooks, receipts, and the foot-tall ceramic Virgin Mary in the biggest cardboard box she could find, she locked up the store.

Now that she had some money coming her way, she realized that maybe she should take Mrs. Baek out to dinner this week. They could go to Hanok House again. Her trip to Calabasas with Miguel hadn’t answered much about Mr. Kim—other than that his wife, Mary, already had another lover—and maybe Mrs. Baek might know more about him. Maybe she even might be able to answer the question of whether he was Margot’s father.

Margot strolled through the maze of shops decked out in tinsel garlands and flashing holiday lights. Children ran, screaming and laughing. Loud speakers in another section of the swap meet blasted “Feliz Navidad,” entangled with the music of various electronic toys for sale.

Margot thought of the years she had spent hating this place, resenting the work, the dirtiness, and the trash that accumulated in the aisles.

“I don’t want to go to work,” Margot, as a teenager, had yelled. “I want to stay home. It’s my weekend.”

“Do you think I want to work?” her mother asked, voice cracking. “I need your help. I can’t do everything alone.”

“It’s not my fault that you have to work. Why do I have to go there? You’re fine there by yourself.”

“I need your help. Do you understand? I can’t do everything alone.”

And Margot almost always caved to preserve what little sanity, what little order could be kept in their home of two people struggling to understand each other, preserve what little control they could have over this world that seemed to shun them—poor immigrant outsiders. Yet Margot could witness now that this store, this swap meet, where her mother spent six days a week, was an extension of home, and the homes of all the people who worked here, including Alma, not just for money but because of love, the love they had for their families and friends, raised and supported here and abroad. Love, in all its forms, could look this way, too.

Margot stopped at the sight of the racks and display carts, once stacked with socks and underwear, stripped bare. The lingerie hanging from torsos made of metal wire, all of the merchandise had disappeared. A FOR LEASE sign hung on the wall.

“Oh, shit,” Margot said to no one, almost dropping the cardboard box. Mrs. Baek’s store was gone.

Margot went straight to Hanok House, where she met with Miguel for dinner after his first day at work.

She’d have to press someone there further to find Mrs. Baek now. It seemed like a good place to try since Mrs. Baek had worked there up until earlier this year. Why would she shut down her store without telling Margot yesterday at church?

Lone men in rolled-up sleeves slurped noodles. Families spoke in low hushed tones. Closer to the holidays, Korean immigrants, who often owned small businesses or worked long hours in the service industries, depended on this time of year, when people dined out and shopped more often, to survive. No one appeared to be celebrating anything at all. The scent of meat licked by flame, fat dripping on fire lingered, but tonight was a night of hardy, inexpensive dishes—jjigaes, kalguksu, yukgaejang. Tonight was a night of getting by, fulfilling oneself after an especially hard day, finding comfort and home in food.

“Is the owner here tonight?” Margot asked the same waitress from last week.

“Mr. Park? No, not today.” Her face was unpowdered and pink around the cheeks and nose from the heat of the food. In her opaque black tights and sensible ballet shoes, she strode toward the kitchen in the back.

So many customers. All look almost same, the restaurant owner had said about her mother. He had grinned with those Paul-Bunyan-statue teeth, cold and clinical.

The myulchi bokkeum, chewy and sticky stir-fried anchovies—tiny eyes, gills broken, bodies twisted in death throes that had disgusted her growing up—were now satisfyingly briny and sweet in Margot’s mouth. It was like a bite of the sea but candied, pure luxury.

Miguel sampled the myulchi bokkeum himself. One of the tiny fish slipped out of his chopsticks’ grip onto the table.

“How was work?” Margot asked.

He picked up the fallen myulchi with his fingers, placing it in his mouth. “Oh, it was fine. Met everyone on my team.” He sipped from his glass of water. “Nothing much to do today. Got my laptop, all my supplies and everything. So many pens.” He opened his eyes wide. “I’ve never seen so many different types of pens. Rollerball. Gel. Classic ballpoint . . .”

“A little different from working at a nonprofit?”

The waitress delivered two earthenware pots of soondubu jjigae that boiled and bubbled at their table.

“Excuse me,” Margot said.

“Yes?” The waitress lowered her head.

“Do you . . . happen to know how I can get in touch with Mrs. Baek? She used to work here—until earlier this year.”

The waitress paused, inhaling deeply. She glanced around the restaurant.

“I tried going to her store at the swap meet today,” Margot said. “It was completely gone. She—”