Under Fluorescent Lights

At 10 p.m., the grocery store is still awake.

The fluorescent lights hum softly above narrow aisles stacked with instant noodles, bottled drinks, cigarettes, and snacks that seem to exist for moments like this—moments when hunger is small but persistent, when sleep feels close but not quite reachable. Outside, the street has thinned out. Inside, the owner stands behind the counter, unhurried, waiting.

Ms. He has been here since morning. She will close at midnight, and return again at eight.

“This store has been open for three years,” she tells me, almost casually. Her family runs it together. They came to Shanghai in 2008, from Zhejiang, following a path already traced by the previous generation. Her mother once ran a shop near Renming Square; now they are the second generation keeping the lights on.

Working late, she says, is not something to romanticize—but it is also not something she complains about.

“The store is how we make a living,” Ms. He says. “So I don’t really feel tired. As long as business comes in, I’m happy.”

Night does not exhaust her in the way people often imagine. Mornings are slower, quieter—fewer customers, fewer interruptions. By night, the store feels more alive. People drift in carrying the weight of their days.

When I ask how her body has adjusted to this rhythm, she shrugs.

“I still sleep about eight hours. I started working when I was very young—my body is used to it.”

Used to it. The phrase returns often in conversations with people who work late. Not because the work is easy, but because resistance has slowly been worn away.

There are moments of tension. Drunk customers, especially, make her uneasy. Foreign customers sometimes struggle to communicate what they want. There are small risks that come with staying open while the rest of the city shuts down. Even payment carries its own quiet anxiety.

“Most people scan and pay,” Ms. He explains. “But sometimes with those tap payments, people tap and run off—and the money hasn’t come through yet.”

It’s a detail most customers would never notice. For her, it lingers.

And yet, when I ask her about change—about whether working nights has altered the way she sees the city or the people in it—her answer softens.

“I think the biggest thing is that I’ve learned to accept everyone.”

She tells me about customers who come in late at night with bad moods, buying things they don’t really need. About how she no longer argues, no longer insists on being right.

“I feel like I’ve become more able to empathize. I try to help emotionally, if I can. You become gentler.”

Gentler. Another word that lingers.

Ms. He standing behind the counter

Late at night, the store becomes a temporary shelter for many kinds of people—locals, foreigners, tourists passing through. Recently, Ms. He has noticed more visitors from places like Iran or Arab countries, fewer from Europe or the U.S. People bargain harder now, she says. Everyone asks if it can be cheaper. Money feels tighter than before.

Sometimes, the differences between people show up in unexpected ways. She laughs as she tells me about a small black figurine—Labubu—that foreign tourists have been buying excitedly.

“They find it amazing. But to me, it’s very ordinary.”

She pauses, then adds, “what we think is special isn’t always what others think is special. Their souvenirs are things we’d never buy. Even with cigarettes—they care more about the packaging than the taste.”

Aesthetic differences. Cultural distances. All passing briefly through a shop that stays open while the city sleeps.

When I ask why her family keeps running the store, her answer is honest, almost blunt.

“To be truthful, it’s because there’s no better job.”

At her age, she says, company jobs are hard to find. They’re inflexible. You can’t leave because a child is sick, or an elder needs care.

“Only by running our own store do we control our time. Life has smoothed out our edges.”

The phrase lands quietly between us.

Working late has changed her, too, she admits—aging her faster, exhausting her body.

“Night shifts are really draining,” she says. “Even you students—staying up late to study makes you tired.”

If there’s one thing Ms. He wants to change, it’s not the job, or the hours, or the store.

“I want to be more patient,” she says. “I don’t want to be so harsh with my child. He’s only in kindergarten.”

Before I leave, I ask her what she would say to another night-shift worker.

“Rest is important,” she says simply. “Health is, too.”

Near midnight, the store is still open. The lights are still on. Somewhere in the city, others are just beginning their shifts.

This grocery store does not chase ambition or promise transformation. It does something quieter. It stays open. It waits. It offers small comforts to tired people passing through—and, in doing so, slowly teaches its owner how to meet the world with less sharpness, and more care.

Under fluorescent lights, working late, she has learned how to be gentle.