Riri was just 19 years old when she first started going to Tokyo*s Kabukicho district to visit host clubs, where women pay to be entertained by men, in the hopes of meeting Roland, a celebrity host who regularly appears on TV.

The young woman, who goes by a pseudonym because she is avoiding debt collectors, reveled in the glamorous world of host clubs. And she found it eased a sense of loneliness in her. Since she was a baby, she has been separated from her parents and lived in orphanages.

It was in the sleepless town of Kabukicho that she met a host she fell for, hard.