Preparing to Fry Tomorrow
"Why does your voice sound like that? Did you catch a cold?"
Chi-yeol hesitated for a moment. He had brushed it off yesterday, but hiding it through today seemed impossible. In the end, he leaned against the sink and said quietly, "I... I left the company."
The line went silent for several seconds. Those seconds felt endless. He didn't need to imagine it to know the flood of thoughts running through his mother's mind in that quiet—worry, surprise, disappointment, and the careful concern that her son might be hurting.
After a long pause, her characteristically restrained voice came through. "Did you... get let go?"
He could have softened the truth, but Chi-yeol simply admitted it. "Yes."
"Aigoo."
That single word strangely tightened his chest. His mother didn't burst into tears or make a scene. Instead, she asked a very practical question. "Did they give you any money?"
Chi-yeol let out a small laugh. That was his mother, through and through. "Yes, some. There's severance. I won't starve to death immediately."
"Why do you talk like that? Who said anything about starving?"
"It's basically the same thing."
"It's not. And you—come home. Let's talk face to face."
At those words, Chi-yeol set his coffee mug down. He stayed quiet a moment, then said, "I'll come on the weekend. Today I just... need to think."
"Think about what?"
After the question dropped, he looked out the window. Thin sunlight was spreading across the rooftop of the building opposite his. He knew he had to say something, but unlike last night, the words didn't come easily. He worried it would sound too rash, that his mother would worry first and foremost, and above all, he still couldn't quite believe what he was about to tell her.
Still, he finally forced the words out. "I'm... thinking about trying my hand at business."
"Business?"
"Yes."
"What kind?"
After a brief pause, Chi-yeol wet his lips and answered. "A chicken shop."
This time the silence on the other end stretched even longer. Chi-yeol could roughly picture its shape: a tangle of My son must have been too shocked, But he has loved chicken since he was small, and Still, running a business isn't for just anyone.
At last his mother spoke, slowly. "You had that thought the same day you got laid off?"
"Yeah."
"Goodness."
"Why?"
"No... Don't people usually rest first and think things over?"
Chi-yeol smiled briefly. She was right. Most people would. They'd take a few days off, meet friends for drinks, tidy up their résumé, and examine realistic options one by one. But why hadn't he done that? Why had he searched for chicken shop startups instead of job listings on the very night he was cut loose? Probably because the idea had been turning inside him for a long time. He'd simply never had the courage to speak it aloud.
"If I rest, I think the fear will only grow."
That wasn't a lie. His mother must have sensed it; she let out a long sigh. "If you've truly set your mind on it, I won't try to stop you... but you have to research it properly."
"I know. I'm not saying I'll start tomorrow."
"What about money?"
"I'll have to run the numbers."
"You've always been quick with calculations since you were little. But life doesn't follow calculations."
At that, Chi-yeol laughed before he could stop himself. It was a slightly bitter laugh, yet better than yesterday's. "No one knows that better than your son."
"And that's something to laugh about?"
"I have to laugh. Should I cry instead?"
"Don't cry. And make sure you eat."
As always, it ended with food. Chi-yeol was grateful for that simplicity. The comfort his mother could offer had always been like this. She never pretended to have all the answers—just told him to eat, come home on the weekend, and look into things carefully. Maybe that was enough. When life fell apart, what a person needed might not be grand encouragement but simply someone reminding them to have lunch.
After he hung up, the room felt a little less suffocating. He added a new line to his memo pad.
Mom doesn't oppose it right away.
Writing it made him laugh at himself. He wondered why he was noting something like that, yet somehow it felt important. Family reactions had that effect. Nothing was decided yet, but it still shook a person's heart. The fact that his mother at least hadn't said "Don't even dream of it" gave him a strange push forward.
Around lunchtime, Chi-yeol decided to walk around the neighborhood. Staying inside would only make his thoughts spin in circles. He tied his sneakers and stepped out; the sunlight was surprisingly bright. The snack shop at the mouth of the alley smelled of frying, and the laundry owner across the way was busy folding shirts. As he walked slowly down the street of small shops, scenes he had once passed without a second thought kept catching his eye. Some cafés were quiet even on a weekday afternoon, while certain kimbap places had a constant stream of takeout customers. Chi-yeol found himself counting patrons, comparing locations and sign sizes, studying the flow of foot traffic in front of each store. He knew exactly what he was doing, yet he couldn't stop. His eyes had already changed.
His feet halted in front of a small chicken shop. It wasn't a franchise—just an independent neighborhood place. The shutter was half-raised, probably for lunch prep, and the clink of oil containers being organized drifted from inside. Chi-yeol stood there without thinking, simply staring at the shop. It wasn't large, the sign was slightly faded, and the menu board could hardly be called stylish. Yet strangely, it felt alive. The company building where he had worked until yesterday had been sleek and enormous but suffocating; this shabby little shop was narrow yet somehow carried the scent of people.
The owner, wearing an apron, came out. A man in his mid-forties. When their eyes met, the owner spoke first. "Orders start at five."
Chi-yeol waved his hands in embarrassment. "Ah, no. I was just... passing by."
"Oh." The owner started to head back inside but noticed Chi-yeol still scanning the shop and smiled. "You must really like chicken."
Chi-yeol smiled awkwardly. "I do."
"It shows. There are people who look at shops with those eyes. The gaze of someone who eats and someone who thinks about running the business—they're a little different."
Chi-yeol's heart jolted. For a second he wondered if the man could read minds. But the owner simply laughed, unconcerned, and closed the lid on the oil container. "If you're looking into it, whether it's a franchise or independent, look at as many as you can before deciding. Anything that looks easy on the surface is what you should trust last."
"Pardon?"
"It's obvious advice, but people always learn it last."
The words were casual, yet they lingered. Chi-yeol answered with a small "Yes." The owner said nothing more and went back inside. Chi-yeol wanted to stop him and ask a dozen questions, but he didn't have the courage yet. He stood there a little longer, then slowly turned away.
As he walked, his shoulders somehow felt lighter. He hadn't received grand advice or sudden certainty. It was simply that a real chicken shop owner had recognized someone like him at a glance, and that felt oddly meaningful. Perhaps his face now clearly showed both a man who had lost his direction and one who was trying to begin something new.
On the way home he stopped at the convenience store and bought two triangular gimbap and a carton of milk. It was the same hurried lunch he had always grabbed while working at the company. Back in his room, unwrapping the food, he suddenly laughed. Even the day after being laid off, lunch was still triangular gimbap. A person's circumstances could change overnight, but their palate changed far more slowly.
Still, one thing was different from yesterday: he had no afternoon schedule today. Instead, multiple tabs about starting a business were open on his laptop, and the to-do list in his memo pad kept growing.
That afternoon, Kang Chi-yeol spent his time not as a man who had quit his job, but as a man researching something. He read the requirements for government-backed loans, skimmed posts in startup forums, and deliberately sought out failure stories. The accounts of failure felt far more real than tales of success. Stories of sleepless nights because sales wouldn't come, of spirits crushed by a single bad delivery review, of mental health wavering every time oil prices rose. The more he read, the more afraid he became. Strangely, though, the fear didn't make him turn away completely. Instead, he thought that if it was this frightening, it might actually be real.
As the sun began to slant, he added another line at the bottom of his memo pad.
If it's scary, it's more likely to be real.
Still, I'll look into it.
After writing the sentences, Chi-yeol didn't close his laptop. This time he typed more specific terms into the search bar: small-capital chicken shop startup, independent chicken shop profit margins, how to analyze chicken shop market areas. As the search terms changed, so did the screen. He stared at those shifts for a long time.
Nothing had truly begun yet. He was simply a man who had signed a letter of resignation. His bank balance was still discouraging, and fear might return tomorrow morning. Even so, one thing was clear: a different sentence had taken shape inside him compared to yesterday.
A man pushed out of his company. Forty-one years old. Never dated, and it felt embarrassing to call his life crispy. Yet, strangely, a man who had begun to want to fry something with his own hands.
Evening light stretched into the room through the window. A thin orange glow settled across the laptop screen, and dried coffee rings marked the bottom of the mug. Kang Chi-yeol gazed at the scene for a while, then quietly leaned back in his chair.
The anxiety still sat in the center of his chest. But its shape had changed from yesterday. If yesterday's anxiety had been a bottomless pit, today's felt like the entrance to an alley he had never walked down. Dark and unfamiliar, yet the kind of place where you had to step inside to discover where it led.
He reached out and wrote one last sentence at the very bottom of his memo pad.
Starting tomorrow, I'll really look into it.
He stared at the short sentence for a long time. Strangely, it felt like the most believable promise he had made all day.