Ramen, Existential Crises

Koji is twenty-seven and one module short of a degree in Politics and Government. The missing module is Crisis Management. It feels appropriate.

For six years, he has worked in a tiny ramen shop with eleven seats, one dish and a broth whose flame has not gone out in thirty-two years. The noodles cook for exactly eighty-five seconds.

Then the timer fails. A stranger gives Koji his business card. Someone from his past walks into the restaurant. Around him, other people make decisions and contin...