Chapter 10
Chapter 10. Loafers
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[What do you want to eat?]
Taeseo frowned, looking at the message on his phone. When was this message sent for them to be replying now?
Kwon Taeseo had his pick of the litter too. There were kids lining up in Seoul just to get a single reply from him... To receive a reply from a country kid only after a long while.
[Chicken]
As soon as Taeseo sent the text, a reply came.
[We sell chicken at our convenience store too...]
"Who do they think they are, trying to sell me that..."
Convenience store chicken isn't freshly fried; they keep it warm after frying. Even if the taste were acceptable, the soggy batter was never Taeseo's preference.
He was about to type "Never mind" when another message arrived.
[What kind of chicken? Sweet and spicy? Fried?]
[Half and half]
[I'll buy it on my way home from work. I'll be there at 7. There are no chicken places that deliver to our town.]
"They really live in a backward place."
At least he was getting chicken, so his primary objective was met. Now he had to solve the problem of being stuck.
The biggest reason he was lazing around at home playing mobile games was that he didn't have a car.
In the height of summer, the red earth of the sun-drenched, treeless countryside seemed to scorch like fire. He had no intention of walking around such a place on his own two feet.
Just this morning, the chauffeur had brought the Porsche to the convenience store.
[Where are the car keys?]
As soon as he messaged the chauffeur, a reply came back.
[They are being kept at the construction site office.]
Since it was a car worth 180 million won, they couldn't just leave the keys lying around, so they were apparently kept at the site office.
[Bring the car keys.]
[Mr. Manager... I'm in Seoul.]
His title had changed, and so had the company's treatment of him.
He could continue working with Woo Hyunwoo, his secretary, but this time, he was working alongside a colleague as an equal, a manager to manager, rather than in a subordinate role. The chauffeur had been reassigned elsewhere as of today.
[---]
He sent a message with two dashes, and the chauffeur backed down.
[I will contact the staff at the site office and have them send the car keys immediately.]
[Okay.]
It was a day that was unsatisfactory in many ways. Taeseo got out of bed, lit a cigarette at an angle, and went into the bathroom to shower.
While others were preparing to leave work, he was just starting his day.
As he was drying his wet hair, a message arrived. It was from Yuna.
[Please come to the convenience store to pick up the chicken.]
The time indicated below the message was 7:01 PM. She had said she'd arrive around 7, and she kept her promise precisely.
Still, if she was going to bring it to her room after work, she could have just brought it to him. Who was she telling to come and go? Taeseo replied with swift fingers.
[You bring it.]
[I have to place an order right now.]
[You said you were off work, but you're working again?]
[Yes.]
Yesterday she had worked the convenience store counter, and according to the local loafers' gossip today, she had gone to the factory to work. It seemed she was working at the convenience store immediately after finishing her factory shift.
Grumbling about her tough life, Taeseo roughly towel-dried his wet hair and went out the door.
As he entered the convenience store on the first floor, the bell on the door jingled.
Yuna, standing at the counter, looked up from placing an order on the POS system when Taeseo entered and confirmed his face.
"The chicken is on top of the counter. Please take it."
As if she were busy, as soon as she finished telling him to take the chicken, she looked back at the POS system and started typing on the keyboard. The sound of her typing echoed in the empty convenience store.
Taeseo glanced at the bag containing the chicken, then went to the convenience store refrigerator and picked up two cans of beer.
He walked to the counter and gestured towards the cigarettes with his eyes. Yuna pointed to one of the imported cigarettes his gaze had landed on.
As Taeseo nodded, she picked up the barcode reader and scanned the beer and cigarettes.
"Ten thousand won."
Her face, working mechanically, seemed to say she was tired. Her voice was weaker than yesterday, perhaps due to fatigue.
"What kind of customer service is that?"
"Convenience store work is busiest right after a shift change. I have to check what's sold, place orders, reconcile the day's sales, and set aside the cash collection."
"That aside. Do you work somewhere else during the day?"
"Yes. Why?"
"So I can text you if I have something to ask, like today."
"Ah, yes. But I can't answer calls while I'm working. I have the day shift for a week, so I get off at 6. If you send a text, I'll reply around lunchtime or when I get off."
"Okay."
Ahn Yuna put the items Taeseo had purchased into a plastic bag. As he took the plastic bag with the beer and cigarettes and the bag with the chicken and turned to leave, Ahn Yuna quickly added.
"Oh, and the owner of Seongwoo Baekban asked me to tell you she's sorry. She said she'll refund the money when you come by."
"Why go to such lengths."
He hadn't intended to get his money back for the food he had ordered anyway. Ahn Yuna's expression turned serious at his dismissive tone.
"We have to settle accounts properly. And the chicken is 17,000 won. I'll send you the account number by text, so please transfer the money."
"Okay."
Her insistence on settling accounts made it seem like she was worried he might skip out on the chicken payment.
He gave a look of pity at Ahn Yuna, who was worrying unnecessarily, to someone who wouldn't even take back the money for the food left uneaten, and turned to leave. The sound of the bell behind him indicated someone had entered the convenience store.
One of the local loafers who had been hanging around outside earlier had come in. He remembered the guy's face because he had a particularly memorable appearance, like a cattle thief.
"Oppa Jaeseop, you're here."
"Give me a pack of cigarettes."
Suddenly, Taeseo remembered what he had heard earlier that day and turned to look at the man named Jaeseop.
The burly man, dressed in a matching black tracksuit, stood at the counter with his hands in his pockets in a swaggering posture.
Ahn Yuna didn't even spare Jaeseop a glance and found the cigarette he was smoking, scanning its barcode.
"Are you busy these days?"
"Ah, yes. We have a lot of orders at the factory, so I'm working two shifts."
"They said the cosmetics sell well there, so I guess you really have a lot of orders."
"Ah, yes."
Judging by his short replies, the guy was clearly annoyed, yet he persisted in talking to Yuna.
"When you have some free time, let's go for drinks. You might not know because you didn't go to college, but you're supposed to learn drinking from your elders when you're twenty. Ever heard of 'judo' [drinking etiquette]? That's how you learn to drink properly? Without making mistakes."
Taeseo thought the way he kept calling her "unnie" was idiotic and left the convenience store.
Suddenly, the words he'd overheard earlier that day came to mind.
'If we don't drink, how are we supposed to get her into bed?'
It must have been that cattle thief who was dying to get Ahn Yuna.
Taeseo's days in Seongwoo-eup were monotonous. Since he hadn't intended to go to work every day in the first place, he treated it like a vacation, waking up late, grabbing a quick bite, smoking a few cigarettes, and playing mobile games.
After being engrossed in mobile games for several days, he started to get bored, and Hyunwoo's pressure to return to work intensified.
[Manager. I received a call from headquarters. They're asking why you aren't coming to work.]
[Just say you're adapting to the site.]
[You know Executive Director Kwon Taejin is waiting. I'm going to die, really.]
"This incompetent fool can't even resolve that one thing."
[Please, please, please come to work. I'll come pick you up, so please, please, please come to work. Please.]
[I said I'll come back after a week's rest.]
[The public officials are constantly calling because the civil complaint filed at the town office hasn't been resolved, headquarters is in an uproar, and I'm dying too.]
[What complaint?]
[About that land that was staked out.]
Taeseo lowered his message window and looked at the dazzling characters on his mobile game screen.
Since Taejin hadn't blocked mobile payment, he had been spending freely, making in-app purchases without restraint.
His characters became more elaborate day by day as his money never ran out, but the thrill of progression was diminishing, and he was starting to get bored.
"Games these days don't have that nail-biting tension like the old days. That tension."
In fact, he had been thinking about returning to work since last night because the game had become boring.
Waking up at an unusually late hour, Taeseo showered and put on slacks and a pique shirt. Over that, he wore the work jacket Hyunwoo had left.
Looking at the jacket with "Namkyung Development" written on it, he let out a small laugh.
Looking like this, who would ever think he was the second son of Namkyung Group?
He picked up the work cap that lay beneath the work jacket and stood in front of the shoe rack, contemplating whether to wear sneakers, but he chose to put on neat boat shoes.
Even though he lived like a dissolute person, there were rules he strictly followed. He never walked around barefoot, and he always wore dress shoes when going to work; these minor habits were instilled by his upbringing.
Stepping outside the building, the bright summer sun hit his forehead. The black Porsche parked in front of the convenience store was exposed to the summer sun without any shade.
Just looking at the car made his skin feel like it was burning. Taeseo frowned and entered the convenience store to buy an iced Americano.
The bell jingled, but no greeting came. The convenience store counter was empty.
Taeseo's gaze naturally drifted to the parasol table in front of the convenience store window.
As usual, the local loafers were gathered under the convenience store umbrella, smoking cigarettes and playing games. Among them was Jaeseop, the one who had called Ahn Yuna "oppa."
Jaeseop seemed to be the leader of the group, and young men around their mid-twenties were animatedly chatting around him.
When Taeseo tapped on the glass door, a pale-faced young man who had been cheerfully chatting next to Jaeseop reluctantly got up. He had a delicate, fox-like appearance. It seemed he was the part-time worker filling in while Ahn Yuna was at work.
Seeing him chatting with friends outside the convenience store during work hours, he didn't seem like the diligent type.
Suddenly, he wondered if Ahn Yuna knew that her part-time employee was chatting with friends instead of staying at the counter.
Considering she worked at the factory and also at the convenience store herself, Ahn Yuna didn't seem to be well-off. If she paid this loafer minimum wage, what would be left at this rural convenience store?
