SURE 3

“Is my face really red?”

“…Pardon?”

“You were staring at me so intensely.”

Ah, I messed up. My senses snapped back. I quickly took a step back.

“That was not my intention. I apologize.”

“I’m curious about your intention, but I’m too out of it from the spiciness to question it.”

When I bowed deeply in apology, the customer waved his hand as if to say it was fine, and as if he was going crazy because the spiciness would not subside. I took a carton of white milk from the refrigerator, put a straw in it, and brought it to him. My aunt, who was watching this scene while eating her sushi, snorted.

The customer accepted the milk without refusal, put the straw in his mouth, and drank it down in gulps. His Adam’s apple moved continuously.

“Thank you?”

“Not at all. I was the one who was rude, so the milk is on the house. I’m sorry.”

“My last name is Shin, but unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be the ‘Shin’ that means spicy.”

“Pardon?”

“Ah, it’s so spicy.”

It was a strange situation where his answers were somewhat off-topic, but the conversation continued. I wanted to ask what kind of spicy it was, whether it was the kind that cleared your sinuses or hit you in the stomach, or if it was the kind that just made your mouth burn, but since I had committed the rudeness of staring at a stranger, I quietly retreated.

While talking to my aunt, I tried hard not to glance at the customer. My aunt, who had quickly finished a plate of sushi, chuckled and stood up. The customer, with his face a little less pink than before, stood at the counter with his jacket and briefcase. I had not realized it when he was sitting, but he was taller than me.

“Thank you for the meal.”

“It doesn’t look like you enjoyed it much?”

My aunt teased him, and he shrugged.

“No, to be honest, I didn’t enjoy it much.”

“Oh, you. Next time, tell me you can’t eat spicy food. I’ll mix in some cheese for you.”

“I’d hate that even more.”

It seemed more like a sincere statement than a joke, so I managed a business smile. The problem was that the customer’s gaze was fixed directly on me. Just as I had looked at him, the customer was now openly scrutinizing my face up and down. Then, his swollen lips formed an ‘Ah’ as they curved into a smile.

After taking his card and before closing his wallet, the customer took out a business card, and his hand moved toward me. I took the business card in a daze and, out of reflex, took out my own business card case from inside my jacket.

“No. I don’t need to take one.”

“What do you mean.”

He gives me his business card but refuses mine. I wondered what kind of rude behavior this was, but the customer just shoved his wallet into his briefcase and smiled with his eyes.

“I just thought you were someone I’d be meeting soon, so I gave it to you in advance. I won’t be giving you one that day.”

“…”

“Well then.”

My aunt’s intrigued gaze shifted back and forth between me and the customer. I was the only one flustered here. Before I could say anything, the customer silenced me with a smile and left abruptly.

What the hell. I watched the customer’s back as he walked down the street that had already grown dark, then looked down at the business card in my hand.

Shin Taeyoon, Team Leader, Marketing Strategy Team, Shinyoon F&B

I lifted my head again and looked outside the shop, but the customer who had left was nowhere to be seen.

The tension that had built up throughout the day poured out the moment I unlocked the front door. My brain, which had been tormented all day, made my body heavy, begging to be cooled down, and my heels felt like they had turned to stone, making my Achilles tendons throb. As if a bear was sitting on each of my shoulders, they were so heavy that I could not even shower right away and just collapsed on the sofa, barely managing to loosen my tie. The soft fabric of the sofa wrapped around my limp hand.

In terms of fatigue, going to the office was much more intense than serving customers at the shop. This was probably because the desire for all of us to do well together still remained there.

Regardless of the size of the company, having the title of CEO sometimes brought a considerable amount of pressure. The employees might come to work mechanically for their salaries and bonuses, but to me, they were like comrades in a war, each holding a weapon of their own abilities.

Whatever our respective positions were, if I, as the leader at the forefront, showed any signs of weakness, the morale of my comrades would drop. That is why I was even more tense, to the point where I had no strength to lift a finger once I got home. To use an analogy from a game Yoon Sungjoon used to play, it was like being on the verge of death with my HP completely depleted, unable to get any healing.

“Ah… I’m tired…”

The fact that I was having such useless thoughts meant it was time to wash up and go to bed. I lifted my heavy body, threw my jacket on the sofa as if shedding skin, and unbuttoned my shirt. The scent of the office diffuser still lingered under my nose. The problem is that my sense of smell becomes sensitive when I am tired.

There was nothing in the refrigerator but bottled water and beer. Who was it that said cooks hate cooking at home the most? I was the same. I had developed a neurosis from smelling food all day while running the business. I could not stand the smell of food in my own home. I always ate out or ordered delivery, so my refrigerator was always barren.

I felt like I would pass out immediately if I drank beer in this state, so I took out a water bottle. Yoon Sungjoon, who used to live at my place when we were dating, had nagged me to death about getting a water purifier instead of constantly creating plastic bottle waste. When I told him I did not like strangers visiting, he would act two years older than me, even though he was two years younger, saying he could just stop by and watch while I was at work.

The plastic bottle crumpled. Now that we have broken up, it all feels so pointless. I thought of Yoon Sungjoon, from whom there had been no contact since I had hurled insults at him, and clutched my throbbing head.

Forget it. Let’s not stress myself out over it and just take a shower.

I turned on the faucet, and warm water soaked my head first. I quickly became drowsy and was just standing under the hot water when I thought of the man I had met at the shop.

I have never spaced out while looking at a customer’s face while serving them before. Thinking about it again, I wonder if I was crazy. Fortunately, he did not seem offended and responded playfully, so I avoided an embarrassing situation, but I had definitely been rude.

Well, that feeling disappeared the moment I received his business card.

Business cards are sometimes exchanged as a formality, but they are also given with a clear purpose. He must have had a meeting scheduled, so why did he come alone? No matter how I think about it, I cannot understand it with my common sense. He could have given me the business card as soon as he entered the shop. This wasn’t a blind test, and he acted as if he had been waiting for me…

I turned off the faucet. The body wash foam swirled down the drain. It felt like my own mind. After quickly rinsing off the foam and brushing my teeth, the sleepiness that had overwhelmed me earlier completely vanished. With a towel on my head, I took a can of beer from the refrigerator and sat on the sofa.

I liked the feeling of the carbonation hitting my throat as it went down. It was a stimulus that signaled the end of the day. After drinking about half, I put the can down, then suddenly grabbed the jacket I had taken off and took out the business card that had been bugging me throughout my shower.

Shin Taeyoon, Team Leader, Marketing Strategy Team, Shinyoon F&B

So why did he come? Shouldn’t market research have been done before throwing out a proposal?

‘No, to be honest, I didn’t enjoy it much.’

The face that had responded jokingly so that the rudeness would not be perceived as rude came to mind. Even though his face was flushed, the way his eyes looked at me steadily, and the angle at which his swollen lips curved smoothly, was more wary than friendly.

Was the meeting tomorrow? I put down the business card and was about to contact Sojung, but I checked the time and stopped. If I contact her now, I’ll get an earful of curses. I was about to watch a late-night Premier League game with my beer when my phone vibrated. It was Kim Jinwoo, a senior I met in the military who shared the same sexual orientation as me.

“Yeah.”

—Woon. What’s this? I hear Yoon Sungjoon is getting married? I got a mobile wedding invitation.

That bastard Yoon Sungjoon, I swear…

“He sent it to you too?”

—He’s trying to rake in the gift money for all it’s worth. Hey, didn’t he whine to you? From the looks of it, it seems like he must have been through a lot of shit. He’s a total psycho, that bastard.

“Don’t even talk about it.”

—Are you going?

“Why would I go there?”

—Right. It would be weird to go. It’s not like you’re going to run off with the groom at the altar.

“If you called because of Yoon Sungjoon, hang up. I’m tired.”

—Hey. He was just the appetizer. Woon, let’s play golf. I finally graduated from being a golf newbie.

Why on earth would he ask me, someone who has zero interest in golf? The self-employed people I know have a golf group and go on tours of golf courses every weekend, but I was never into it. Well, most of them are more interested in the byproduct of networking than in golf itself. Of course, I might get some scraps if I tagged along.

“I’m busy.”

—Hey, you’re always busy, but you still manage to date just fine. Why won’t you play golf?

Because it’s not fun. I’d rather catch up on sleep than stand around swinging a golf club. The weight of my eyelids was getting heavier and heavier. I’m dead tired.

“Ah, hang up. My eyes are closing.”

—Want to go on a blind date? There are a lot of guys who want me to set them up with you. It would be fun to show up at Yoon Sungjoon’s wedding holding hands with a new boyfriend and sit on the groom’s side.

“Did you not hear me say I’m not going…”

—Who knows? Maybe I heard it with my asshole. Let me know anytime if you’re interested. Hyung knows your type well. Huh?

“You just worry about yourself.”

Unlike his lighthearted tone about setting me up on a blind date, Kim Jinwoo was a man of pure love. When he dated someone, it was for a minimum of three years, and just when we would joke that they were going to settle down, they would quietly break up. The reason for the breakup was always the same. His partner cheating on him, tired of the unchanging Kim Jinwoo.

Jinwoo knew his own personality but did not try to change it. He said that he was sure someone who felt a similar way would appear again in his life, and he did not want to cling to the pants of someone whose heart had already left. I called it a pathetic farce mixed with bullshit, and Kim Jinwoo criticized me for being a heartless bastard.

But good people are generally surrounded by good people, so the people in this community that Kim Jinwoo knew were probably like him, with simple personalities without any rough edges. I knew that, but it was still a hassle. Maybe I had just gotten sick of dating itself after being with Yoon Sungjoon.

—Okay. Go to sleep.

“Yeah, you too.”

—If you ever want to play golf, just call…

I hung up without hearing the rest of his sentence. I threw my phone on the table and stared at the business card next to it before getting up. I’m just going to brush my teeth and sleep.

“You’re here?”

As I entered the conference room, Team Leader Im greeted me with a slightly nervous face. There were three places set with a laptop and a bottle of water each. As I sat next to Team Leader Im, the bottle of water across from us must be for Team Leader Shin Taeyoon. I glanced at the water bottle with no label.

“Why is there only one bottle of water? Is Team Leader Shin Taeyoon coming alone?”

“Yep. He openly said that since today is just for us to feel each other out, there’s no reason to bring along an extra burden.”

It was a startling expression. It’s true that all we have to do is review the proposed contract terms and start negotiations, but for the side that’s coming to make the proposal to openly describe it as a ‘day to feel each other out’… He even belittled his own team colleague as a burden to a company that could become a business partner. It was a fitting expression for someone who had unabashedly critiqued the tteokbokki’s taste in front of my aunt, but… does he not separate his personal and professional life at all, even while working for such a big company?

“But Mr. CEO, is it okay if it’s just me? Don’t we need to call the sales team leader?”

Team Leader Im asked subtly, her eyes wide.

“Are you nervous?”

“Ah, my friend scared the hell out of me. Dammit, they said he’s really prickly.”

“You just do your job. Why are you scared? It’s not like he’s a ghost.”

“I’m not scared of ghosts. And people are scarier than ghosts.”

“Why are you intimidated by someone from another company? If you’re going to be intimidated, be intimidated in front of me.”

“Gosh, where else can I find a boss as easygoing as you, Mr. CEO? Ah, I don’t know. I am a pro. A total pro.”

Team Leader Im, who was giving herself a pep talk while clenching and unclenching her right hand in front of her face, straightened her back at the sound of murmuring nearby. The sound of a chair being pulled out, light greetings exchanged with several people, the steady click of dress shoes.

Knock, knock. The large silhouette reflected in the glass wall of the conference room knocked twice and pushed the door open. Team Leader Im and I also stood up from our seats.

“Hello.”

“Yes, hello. I’m Shin Taeyoon from Shinyoon F&B. It’s a pleasure to meet you?”