Tteokbokki and Pork Cutlet
After the sports festival ended, Yeoncheong accepted Suyeon's suggestion that they all grab something to eat together.
What if she tries to run off? Pushed out ahead of the pack as they passed through the school gate, Yeoncheong glanced back. Seoha, Suyeon, Hasol, and Nayun — including herself, that made five.
"Isn't this way too many people?"
She asked because she genuinely wanted to know, but the answer came back as an unexpected knife between the ribs.
"If I had my way I'd have invited more, but I couldn't think of anyone else I'm actually close with."
Suyeon, for her part, hadn't seemed to have any such intention at all. When Hasol shot her a look, she hurriedly apologized.
But pulling out a knife that had already struck didn't make the wound disappear.
"No, it's... it's fine. I'm used to it by now."
"You're not supposed to get used to that, though?"
Nayun's perfectly reasonable point. Suyeon leaned her head forward slightly, like she was about to hoist Yeoncheong onto her back.
"Yeoncheong, you know it was honestly a mistake, right?"
"Then obviously."
"Ahh, Yeoncheeeong~"
At that soulless answer, Suyeon grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her.
All Yeoncheong had in mind was eating whatever and heading home quickly. So when her friends asked where they were going, she left the choice entirely up to them with a vague, "Wherever you want."
For a little while, Yeoncheong — who had no idea where they were headed — simply trailed behind the group. Before long, they arrived at their destination.
"A snack shop?"
Her question trailed upward at the end. Taking it as an actual question, Suyeon nodded.
"Yeah, let's get tteokbokki. It's really good here."
Following her friends inside, Yeoncheong stepped into the shop after them.
Tteokbokki...? Weren't we supposed to be having dinner?
Even at the awkward in-between hour before dinner proper, the place had customers. Her friends took a table for four, and Hasol pulled over an extra chair — which turned out to be Yeoncheong's, as the last one through the door.
True to form for a snack shop, the menu had everything from tteokbokki and ramyeon to gimbap and pork cutlet, but her friends didn't show the slightest flicker of deliberation.
"So we're ordering tteokbokki?"
Amid the nodding heads, Nayun adding two rolls of gimbap was the entirety of the discussion. With consensus reached in a heartbeat, Yeoncheong never found a gap to squeeze a word in.
Hasol set the utensils down on a napkin, and Nayun poured a glass of water for each of them.
Yeoncheong took a sip of the water Nayun had handed her, then asked Suyeon, "Is this dinner?"
"No, we'll eat dinner when we get home."
"Ohh...kay?"
When Yeoncheong pressed for confirmation, Suyeon only looked puzzled in return.
"Yeah... that's why I only ordered one serving each, isn't it?"
One serving of tteokbokki per person, an hour before dinner — a snack. In her head, Yeoncheong could almost hear the sound of every common-sense notion she'd ever held crumbling to pieces.
So it wasn't dinner after all... I thought it definitely was.
Only then did Yeoncheong understand why they'd come to a snack shop.
The tteokbokki was delicious. They split the gimbap Nayun had ordered, too, and since it had been a while, Yeoncheong ate her fill and enjoyed it.
And yet.
I'm still a little hungry...
Yeoncheong looked around at her friends. At some point they'd stopped eating and thrown themselves wholeheartedly into gossip. The sports festival talk — which had been in full bloom — was finally winding down, and the subject of report cards had just surfaced.
"Ugh... the report cards are coming out soon, aren't they? I really don't want to show mine..."
At Suyeon's whining, Nayun bristled. "Hey, I'm sitting right here next to you and Yeoncheong, and that's what comes out of your mouth?"
"I don't want to show it, so I don't want to. What of it?"
"Fine, then let's trade report cards. With your grades, I could flash it around and brag on the spot."
Just as Suyeon and Nayun started scuffling, Seoha chimed in. "What about you two, Hasol and Yeoncheong? Nobody says anything when you bring your report cards home?"
"Us? My parents know I work hard, so they don't give me a hard time about it."
The two, who were edging past scuffling into genuine roughhousing, joined the conversation.
"Ugh, my parents nag me every single time — 'If you just studied at home like Siyeon does, you'd be first in your class.'"
"Same here. 'If you spent even half the time you spend on sports studying, you wouldn't need makeup classes.'"
"...Isn't that actually a fair point, though?"
"Hey. You done talking?"
Maybe it was because they were sitting right next to each other — the pair launched into another argument, and Seoha turned to Yeoncheong.
"I... don't really care about report cards."
"Really? Your parents don't say anything about them either?"
At Hasol's question, Yeoncheong nodded. There was no one at home to look at her report card and say anything, so it wasn't a lie.
"That can't be right? You of all people should be getting nagged about grades the most."
Suyeon's provocation. Sensing the beginnings of an all-out war, Hasol swiftly wrestled back control of the conversation.
"Anyway, setting that aside — Yeoncheong, are you still hungry? Should we order more?"
Her stomach was indeed still insisting it hadn't had enough. Yeoncheong had been chewing absentmindedly on the end of her chopsticks, and when Hasol reached to add more tteokbokki to the order, she cut in hastily.
"Pork cutlet. I want the pork cutlet."
This time it was her friends — who had mentally filed this outing under pre-dinner snacking — whose eyes went wide.
Why do men love pork cutlet so much?
Because it's cheap, filling, and delicious? Because it's meat?
There were any number of reasons, but none of them really mattered. What mattered was that even after becoming a woman, Yeoncheong still found pork cutlet delicious.
The thin, crispy panko over a thick, juicy cut that was everywhere these days was certainly good — but the old-school style cutlet you only found at places like this snack shop had survived this long for very good reasons of its own.
The signature sauce, the way it soaked into the shell so the outside turned faintly soft while the inside stayed crisp. The thin, tender cut of pork. Even the unremarkable but tasty little salad on the side.
Her friends, who had been deep in their chatter, couldn't help but turn and stare when they saw how visibly different she looked eating the cutlet compared to the tteokbokki.
Nayun swallowed hard and asked, "Good?"
"Mm-hm."
Mouth full of pork cutlet, Yeoncheong nodded up and down. Nayun eyed the cutlet for a moment, then went on.
"You're not eating dinner when you get home?"
Not a question a one-word answer could cover. Yeoncheong chewed thoroughly, swallowed, and opened her mouth. "It's fine. This is dinner."
"Do your parents know? You haven't even called home."
Yeoncheong hadn't so much as pulled out her smartphone once since leaving school. At Hasol's worried tone, she tilted her head.
"Why would I call? I live alone."
For Yeoncheong, who had spent far more of her life alone than not, it was simply a remark about an ordinary day. For her friends, it was anything but.
Suyeon and Hasol's voices shot up at once. "What?! Yeoncheong, you live by yourself?!"
"So that's why you rent a place near school?"
The two of them, realizing they were in a snack shop, sank into their chairs and took deep breaths to compose themselves. Hasol recovered first and spoke up. "Why didn't you ever tell us?"
"I mean... it's not like this is some huge deal or anything... so I just didn't bring it up."
Seoha, who had been quietly lost in thought, joined in. "So that's why you said you didn't care about report cards. There's no one to show them to."
A bullseye. Nayun muttered, sounding almost envious, "Huh. Yeah. That adds up."
So that was why Yeoncheong had been so nonchalant through the entire report card discussion. Her friends now knew the truth.
Having heard the whole story, Nayun clicked her tongue in disappointment. "Aw... so there's no way I can even beg one bite off your dinner."
"So that's why you kept asking if it was good and whether I was having dinner at home?"
Nayun nodded. Leaning back against her chair, a faint trace of regret still lingering on her face.
"Then from the start, you should've just asked for a bite. Here."
Yeoncheong speared a piece of pork cutlet with her fork and held it out to Nayun.
"Oh no, don't. You said it's your dinner."
"You had tteokbokki, you had gimbap. Just say thanks and eat it. My arm's getting tired."
Yeoncheong slowly lowered her outstretched arm. In the end, Nayun offered her thanks and bit the cutlet straight off the fork.
"Ow. You could've just taken it and eaten..."
"It's good."
Watching Nayun chew away with a completely guileless smile, the others couldn't hold back any longer either.
"Yeoncheong, me too. Just one bite."
"Me too..."
Yeoncheong stared at her friends in open disbelief. "What is this? When I was the one ordering, you all just stared at me with your eyes bugging out."
Hasol and Suyeon, embarrassed, looked away. "Well, watching you eat made me want some too," Suyeon said.
"Exactly. It's your own fault for eating so deliciously."
"Hah..."
With a hollow laugh, Yeoncheong soon speared another piece with her fork. "Here."
Hasol deftly slid only the cutlet off the fork. Then Yeoncheong held out the next piece to Suyeon — who simply sat there.
"What are you doing?"
"Ah."
Suyeon had her eyes closed and her mouth open wide, waiting to be fed. Seeing that, Yeoncheong was reminded of herself, once upon a time.
Her gaze drifted naturally to Nayun, who'd been with her back then — and Nayun, apparently thinking the exact same thing, grinned back at her.
Suyeon narrowed her eyes slightly and curled up the corners of her mouth. Terrified of going red to the ears, Yeoncheong shoved the cutlet into her own mouth instead.
Eyes still closed, Suyeon savored the bite in her own mouth. "Delicious. Reminds me of the old days."
Yeoncheong shut her up by pushing another piece of cutlet straight into her nonsense-spouting mouth.
At some point only one piece remained. Yeoncheong hesitated a moment, then offered the last bite to Seoha. "Seoha, here."
"Oh, I'm fine, really."
"Everyone else had a piece. You should too."
Suyeon tried to say something, but she was too busy swallowing the cutlet that had landed in her own mouth to be understood.
"Thank you."
Seoha glanced between Yeoncheong and the cutlet, then sat up slightly. Sweeping a strand of hair off her shoulder and tucking it behind her ear, she opened her mouth — just wide enough for a piece of cutlet — and took it off the fork.
Covering her mouth, she chewed slowly and swallowed, then smiled a small smile. "Delicious."
Five girls spilled out of the snack shop, every single one of them grumbling at the same friend.
"Seoha, when did you even pay? Without us noticing?"
"While I ran to the bathroom."
Suyeon latched onto her and pressed hard. "How much was it? I need to pay you back."
"Hmm. I honestly don't remember."
Seoha played innocent. The four of them pressed her relentlessly, but she didn't budge an inch. When it became clear no one was going to back down, Hasol proposed a compromise.
"Then next time, it's on us. Got it?"
"Yeah, that's right. Seoha, don't even bring your wallet."
Suyeon nodded along in agreement. Seoha smiled. "Alright. I'll look forward to it."
Chatting as they went, the five found themselves out on the main street before they knew it — and it was time to part ways.
Hasol and Nayun were headed the same direction, and Suyeon's route overlapped as far as the bus stop. Seoha waited for her car, while Yeoncheong only had to walk back toward the school.
"See you all tomorrow, guys."
Just then, spotting the bus pulling up, the three of them waved — and toward Seoha and Yeoncheong, waving back, but especially toward Yeoncheong, Suyeon shouted:
"Yeoncheong, clean your place up! We might drop by whenever!"
"I'm not giving permission for that!"
Having waited with Seoha until her car arrived, Yeoncheong was the last to leave.
By the time Yeoncheong got home, it was well past her usual dinnertime. Normally she'd have grumbled her way through making dinner, but tonight she was in a leisurely mood.
She hung the spare uniform she'd packed in her bag in the closet, then tossed her poor, long-suffering gym clothes — worn ragged over two days of the festival — into the washing machine.
Gathering fresh underwear and pajamas, Yeoncheong headed straight for the bathroom, where she showered while humming a tune, entirely unlike her usual self.
It was the effect of a rowdy evening spent in company — her first in who knew how many months.