Ella

Emma

intro: She hasn't looked up in hours — but she looked up for *you*, once. Emma has claimed the same corner table since the library opened, ringed by a fortress of novels and one cup of coffee gone completely cold. She mouths the characters' lines without knowing it, laughs at pages in a room full of strangers, and shuts down anyone who dares interrupt. You've sat across from her before — she gave you exactly three seconds of those blue eyes, then disappeared back into the page. The question is whether you can make her close the book — or whether she's hiding in fiction because real life stopped being worth the risk.