Chapter 743

“When does the holiday start?”

“The 29th.”

“That’s still far away. This is so boring.”

“What can we do about it? There’s no choice.”

Bada looked at the calendar. The number 29 felt so distant. She wondered when she could escape this classroom where even her breath turned white from the cold. Although they did turn the heater on, that was only during class. The classroom in the morning was practically a refrigerator.

“Bada, what are you going to do over the winter holidays?”

“Go traveling with my boyfriend.”

“Really?”

“I’m definitely going to go this time.”

“To where?”

“We’ll go skiing. I saved the money that I was going to use to buy our oppas’ album for traveling. We’re going to decide on a date as soon as the holidays begin.”

“Good for you. I would go somewhere too if I had a boyfriend.”

Her friend sighed.

“Bada, Bada!”

Suddenly, another friend of hers opened the door and rushed over to her. A wave of cold air rushed towards her. Bada grabbed that girl’s hand, asking if it was cold. She was shaking slightly.

“What is it? Why are you in a rush?”

“Did you watch the drama yesterday?”

“Drama? What drama?”

“The one your brother appears in.”

“The one my brother appears in? New Semester is on Saturdays, isn’t it?”

“I’m not talking about that one. Didn’t you watch this one?”

Her friend opened her phone. Bada saw Maru, making a dazed expression inside that fuzzy photo.

“Oh? That is him.”

“Right? I almost forgot to do my homework because I was watching this. It was really fun.”

“Why didn’t I know about it?”

Bada took out her phone and texted her brother: Oppa, did you shoot a drama? A reply came back quickly since he was just fooling around at home: Y. She didn’t expect a lot from him, but wasn’t just a single letter ‘Y’ a little too simple?

“Then why didn’t you tell me about it, goddammit. What a funny guy.”

Bada imagined that Maru was yawning right now.

“Is it him?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Didn’t you know about it?”

“He doesn’t tell me stuff like this. He actually gets quite embarrassed. Anyway, how was it? Let’s set aside the drama since you said it was good. How was my brother’s acting?”

“Yesterday was the first episode, and he was just normal.”

Her friend looked around before pointing at a boy reading a comic book.

“He was just like that. You know, those ordinary people.”

“I guess that’s the kind of role he plays. Didn’t he look awkward?”

“Not at all. Also, there’s a girl he’s paired with, and she was a bit cute. I wanna pinch her cheeks.”

“A pair? A girl then?”

Bada tapped on her lips. She thought about how he made a strange expression on the bus during the day of the CSATs. She thought that he got into a fight with his girlfriend. She stood up and went over to the computer installed at the teacher’s seat. Her friends followed her.

“What’s the title?”

“Pojang-macha.”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

She typed on the keyboard and searched the drama on the web. A short introduction of the drama came up along with a poster. The viewing rate was 2.4%. She clicked on the list of actors.

“It’s her, this one.”

Her friend pointed at the monitor. Kim Yuna; just as her friend said, the girl looked quite cute. This seemed to be her debut piece as the only thing that came up when she searched for her name was a politician with the same name.

“My brother appears as a couple with her in the drama?”

“Yeah. From the looks of it, I think he’s going to confess today and start going out with her. They said it was only 4 episodes long, so it shouldn’t take that long.”

Bada looked at Yuna’s face before shaking her head. She was probably overthinking when she thought that he fought with Gaeul-unni over this girl. She knew that her brother wasn’t such a prick.

“Give me the mouse for a sec.”

Her friend placed her hand on the hand that was holding the mouse. She scrolled down before clicking one of the search results which opened in a new window. There was a short review along with some pictures from the drama.

“The drama looks like it’ll do well.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because of this café[1] I’m showing you. I use my sister’s account to browse it from time to time. I can look up places that sell cosmetics at a cheap price. You see that number up there? 400 thousand is the number of members here. The dramas that get posted here as interesting usually do well. The drama that aired on KBS last time didn’t do that well at first, but it spread around once someone here said that it was really fun.”

“Really?”

Bada told her friend to show some comments. She logged in before opening the comment section. There were about 100 comments, and they were all written during the night. They were posted less than 10 minutes after the drama ended.

“A drama that makes you hungry? What does that mean?” Bada asked.

“You’ll see if you watch it. I was going crazy too. You know how I don’t eat ramyun because I’m on a diet, right?”

“I know. You didn’t budge when we placed some ramyun in front of you as a test.”

“Yet I ended up cooking ramyun in the middle of the night yesterday.”

Bada became shocked and touched her friend on the cheeks. They definitely felt a little swollen.

“Really? I thought you were never going to eat it.”

“But watching that made me go crazy. You know that cooking program I always watch at six in the evening, right?”

“The thing you always watch on your phone before self-study classes after school?”

“Yeah. I can usually hold back even after watching that, but not this one. Just the color of it is different. It’s an evil drama. I can feel their intention to feed the viewers food.”

“What the, is this drama related to food? And cooking and stuff?”

“Well, no. For now… it’s a romance drama, I guess?”

“Your answer sounds kinda vague.”

“You’ll see when you watch. It’s kinda hard to explain in words.”

“Really?”

Bada said ‘hmm’ as she looked at the hundred-something comments.

* * *

“Senior, here, have some coffee.”

Park Hoon accepted the paper cup given to him by a junior producer.

“Did you watch Jayeon’s piece yesterday?”

“I joined halfway through. I had some work to do, so I didn’t watch it properly.”

“I’m sure she’ll ask you about it. Looks like you’re gonna get an earful today.”

“I was just wondering how to run away too.”

Just as he pressed the button for the elevator,

“The two of you! Wait!”

He saw Jayeon take off her ID card from her neck and run over. Park Hoon exchanged gazes with his junior and kept smashing the elevator button. 2…1… Along with a clear ring, the door opened.

“Seonbae!”

He waved at Jayeon, who was scanning her ID card at the entry barrier before pressing the ‘close’ button. He saw Jayeon panting as she approached them.

“She’s gonna get you anyway. If you’re gonna get beaten up, you might as well do it early.”

“I’m going to run away until lunch at least. If that doesn’t work, I’ll just hide in the president’s office.”

The elevator opened again. He turned around the corner as he sipped on the coffee he was holding. At that moment, the door to the emergency staircase opened and Jayeon ran out from it. She, with ragged hair, looked like she was out for blood.

“Senior, allow me to take my leave first.”

The junior ran away, telling him to pay back for the grace of the coffee. Park Hoon approached Jayeon with twitching lips.

“Looks like you’re looking after your health these days, Jayeon. You’re even taking the staircase. Stamina is definitely important in this work. Good job.”

“Stop the nonsense. Why did you run away from me?”

“Run away? Oh please. I pressed the ‘open’ button, but the doors closed by themselves. Do you think I wanted to run away? If I did, I wouldn’t be here.”

“Do you mean that?”

“Of course. Here, have some morning coffee. You should calm down a little as well.”

Jayeon narrowed her eyes and accepted the cup.

“You should watch your eyes. Oh, and also, the drama looked pretty decent. You got me enraptured throughout the whole thing.”

“Senior Park.”

“Yeah?”

“Did you even watch it? I can’t really believe you. I mean, you’re busy these days with something, aren’t you? You can be honest with me. You didn’t watch it, did you?”

He couldn’t let that smile fool him. That was a trap; a trap that would make him suffer for the rest of the day. He had to gloss over this to gain peace for the day.

“Of course I did! It’s your debut piece after all. I mean, everyone at the company must have watched it. Also, there are all those things I taught you. I have the duty to check them, don’t I? I watched everything from beginning to end, so stop suspecting me.”

He ignored the frosty eyes as much as possible as he kept walking. He had to be careful if he didn’t want to get bitten by the bulldog.

“How was the opening?”

“It was good.”

“What about the text font? I had a hard time choosing one.”

“That was good too.”

“There’s nothing else you want to say to me?”

“I could feel Yoo Jayeon’s sense of aesthetics. It was pretty good, you know?”

Jayeon crumpled the paper cup in her hand. Park Hoon felt like the crushed cup was his own body. It became even harder now to tell her that he only started watching halfway through. As Jayeon’s eyes became sharper and sharper, a savior appeared.

“Chief!”

He waved his hand at the chief producer in delight and approached him. He finally found a good excuse to escape from Jayeon’s clutches.

“Ah, yes. Hoon! Good morning.”

“Chief!”

“I said good morning!”

Park Hoon clearly saw that the chief producer’s eyes fell on Jayeon for a moment before looking away. The chief producer was also running away from her.

“Senior Park.”

“Yeah?”

“How was the story?”

He couldn’t breathe anymore. Last night, his brain had mostly given up on working after talking with writer Choi Haesoo. He only watched the drama intermittently while talking about Maru, so there was no way the story remained inside his head. Uhm, err, the thing is - he stalled for time while saying those words.

Just then, he saw the newest member running over with the viewing rate sheet. The daily workflow of the drama department started with checking the viewing rate sheet in front of the president’s room. Park Hoon hurriedly lifted his finger.

“Oh, your viewing rate sheet is out. You should check yours now.”

“Ah, right. I too now have concrete evidence.”

Jayeon clasped her hands and walked over to the sheet. Park Hoon sighed in relief. Jayeon, who was checking the viewing rate sheet, quickly waved at him to come.

“What is it?”

“It’s 2.4%. This isn’t wrong, is it?”

“What? It’s 2.4%?”

Park Hoon exclaimed before taking a look at it himself. The viewing rate was on par with when the YBS late-night series was a fixed show.

“That’s pretty good.”

“I was expecting more like 0.7%. Man, how many times more is that?”

“Wow, Yoo Jayeon. You’re on a roll.”

The producers of the department all came around and gave a word or two. Jayeon took out her phone and took a photo.

“See? I told you I’d do it.”

Jayeon cheered. 2.4%. The producers of the dramas that aired during the golden hours might snort at this number, but it was more than decent for a late-night drama, especially one that had been halted for a long time and was only used as a filler.

“Watch today. I’ll make it past 3%.”

“Hey, hey. 3% is taking it a little too far. RBS, with their bigshot casts, can only manage 4%.”

“They’ve fallen for mannerisms, haven’t they? People don’t like mini-series without a sense of refreshingness. Just watch, I’ll prove that to you tonight.”

Jayeon seemed pretty confident. Park Hoon retreated after telling her that it was going to do well. He was almost bitten by a fighting dog, but thankfully, luck was with him today. As he was about to go to his seat in relief, Jayeon caught up to him.

“But seonbae, wasn’t the jump shot a little too long?”

“Hm?”

“I mean the jump shot in the latter half. I put about 15 seconds of it with some background music, but now that I think about it, that might have been a little boring. It might even be a little too abrupt. What did you think of it?”

Park Hoon sighed as he looked at Jayeon’s stubborn eyes. It seems like it was going to be a painful day today.

[1] Basically an internet community/forum.