Do You Still Love Design?
After every debate had ended, Middleton returned to the headmaster's office.
It had been a truly long day, and yet there was not the slightest trace of weariness on him.
Now, let's see.
A few things said in the debate had lodged in him more stubbornly than the rest—Olivia, Vint, Snyder, and Park Jihoon. He had just taken up his fountain pen, meaning to set their arguments down however briefly, when—
Knock, knock.
At the sound of knocking from across the room, Middleton lifted his head a fraction.
"Yes."
The door creaked, and in answer to Middleton a tall man entered. It was the head of academic affairs. He came forward and carefully held out a file for signature.
"Someone was absent from today's debate."
At the team leader's words, Middleton checked the papers. The name was Jack Grylls. The reason given for the absence was attendance at a Navy Day ceremony?
Perhaps because Middleton tilted his head, the team leader supplied an explanation at once.
"I'm told Jack's grandfather was a pilot in the naval air service."
He had fought in the First World War and been discharged with grave wounds; yet in the Second, when the German U-boat fleet was strangling the Royal Navy, he had volunteered despite being well outside the age of service and flown dozens of operations.
"Regrettably, he was killed in the Battle of the Atlantic in 1943. After the war, he was awarded the Most Honourable Order of the Bath."
If the man had distinguished himself enough to receive the Order of the Bath, then of course the whole family would be invited to Navy Day.
Having finished, the head of academic affairs asked carefully, "Please assign him to the honors class, at the headmaster's discretion."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Wasn't it the case that the children of renowned nobles are given priority placement in the honors class?"
"Yes. That is so. But Jack's grandfather..."
He might have received a decoration, but surely not a title. And so the boy could not claim a noble's privileges—that, more or less, was the meaning. Middleton's own view, however, was unequivocal.
"Don't nobles enjoy their privileges because they fulfill their duty to society?"
"..."
"Jack's grandfather bore a duty heavier than any noble's. Why, then, should his descendant be treated as less?"
"Even so, under the school rules..."
"Which is precisely why I said it was the headmaster's discretion."
In other words, if the decision caused trouble, he would bear the whole of the responsibility himself. At that point the team leader had no further reason to object.
"Then I'll assign Master Jack Grylls to the honors class, as you've said."
At the team leader's words, Middleton gave a quiet nod.
That night I made myself a simple salad, then sat on the sofa with a book. The plot dragged on more dully than I'd expected, and I was nodding off and jerking awake again when—
Ding-dong.
The doorbell cut through the quiet. Still half asleep, I rubbed my eyes and headed for the front door. The fridge had been running low; Baker had probably turned up with another armload of groceries.
"I told you, you really don't have to..."
I opened the door as I said it. And then—huh? Waiting for me was someone I hadn't expected in the least.
"Olivia?"
"Sorry for showing up out of nowhere."
She always wore a leather jacket. Tonight she was in a light coat instead, the finest cashmere—probably a piece from the very top of the Ralph Warren line. She asked, quietly, "Can we talk for a minute?"
"Out here?"
"If that's uncomfortable, I can come in."
"Mm."
Having her inside was the more uncomfortable option. Then again, hunting down a café at this hour felt wrong too.
"I'm the only one home. Is that all right?"
"If you're all right with it."
Cool enough. Well. If we were just friends, a guy and a girl, there was no real reason it couldn't be done.
"Come in."
Footsteps. The click of heels.
"Looks like a house a noble would live in."
"You think?"
"Yeah. It has dignity. Like heritage built up over a long time."
"Like the clothes you're wearing?"
Instead of answering, she gave me a strange little smile.
"What do you want to drink?"
"Got any coffee?"
"It's nighttime. You sure?"
"I napped for ages. Sleep's a lost cause tonight."
I let out a short laugh, and the coffee carried us, naturally enough, into the kitchen. In movies you sometimes see a dining table more than ten feet long, the sort that looks as if it was sliced from a single enormous tree. Mine was exactly like that. Eating there alone had always felt a little desolate, but with someone sitting across from me the feeling was unmistakably different. I took cups from the cupboard and poured the coffee. Most days I was too lazy for anything but a mug; for a guest, though, I brought out the proper cups, saucers and all.
"Wedgwood."
"Huh?"
"It's a vintage line."
"...?"
She must have read my face.
"This." She looked down at the cup. "It looks at least fifty years old."
Had I just served a guest from a cup that was fifty years old?
"Something like this, you can name your price."
"Really?"
"You didn't know?"
I scratched at the back of my head. Second life or not, this wasn't cars or bikes. How was I supposed to know my teacups?
"Dad collects vintage Wedgwood. Not just cups—he buys an absurd amount of silver flatware, too. The moment something looks even a little old, he grabs it like a man possessed and only checks what it is afterward. Thanks to that, I've picked up all sorts of things."
Fair enough. A fifty-year-old teacup was hardly the taste of a seventeen-year-old girl, and still less of a girl who rode a bike. Olivia took her time with the aroma, then brought the coffee to her lips. She drank the way a bird wets a dry throat, and only then spoke.
"Surprised I turned up out of nowhere?"
I nodded.
"I went back and forth on it, but I still wanted to come."
"Why?"
"The conversation we had at school."
I remembered. She had opened up about her relationship with her father. Carefully, she went on.
"There were things I never got to finish saying. Waiting until term started felt too stifling, so I just ran over."
"..."
"Can you spare me a little time?"
I looked into Olivia's eyes. Like a fledgling whose thirst had not yet gone, she waited for my answer.
"If it isn't too long."
"Yeah. Twenty minutes. Thirty at the outside."
"All right."
For about ten minutes after that, she poured out every last thing she had not been able to finish saying in writing: how much she had loved her father; the misunderstandings she had suffered while following him into design; and how, as a result, she had ended up completely twisted, right up to the present. To lay herself bare to this extent, a considerable trust had to exist between us, didn't it? In truth, today was practically the first real conversation we'd ever had. Well. That was beside the point. I looked at Olivia again.
"What is it you want?"
"Huh?"
Did she want to repair things with her father? To set people's misunderstandings straight? Or had she simply needed to vent, so that the feeling of being understood was enough? At my question she sank into thought. Time crawled, and still she did not seem to find a sharp answer.
"You don't know what you want?"
"It's... I really don't."
"Want to think a little longer?"
"Is that okay? I think we'll blow right past the time we agreed on."
"It's fine. Think it through."
How much time passed after that, I couldn't say. She pushed her hair back, closed her eyes, went through one reaction after another, and at last let out a small sigh.
"I'm all mixed up."
"Should I give you more time?"
"No. It hurts."
I shifted in my seat and asked, "You prepared for a design contest?"
"Yeah."
"To make your father happy?"
"Right."
"If you hadn't placed, would the time you spent preparing have been useless in your life?"
"No. Not like that."
She thought for a moment, then went on.
"At first the goal was winning a prize. That was what would make Dad happy. But it turned out to be more fun than I expected."
"What did you make?"
"It was just a ridiculous idea. How do you turn a department store into a place that makes your heart race? So I designed a space."
"How?"
"You empty out an entire floor. Then you turn it into a brand experience hall. Once a month a new brand moves in... and limited pieces released only for that window..."
Huh. I had heard this somewhere before. And she had conceived it in this era—and gone so far as to place in a contest?
"Not that it was ever built. It was too far-fetched. And emptying a whole floor is just too big a scale."
That settled it.
Olivia is someone Hyeon-gang absolutely needs.
If, by some chance, Grandfather finally caught hold of my sleeve and would not let go, I could lay Olivia's card on the table and make the deal then.
Grandfather, this friend would be more help to you than I am.
For the sake of that rose-colored future, though, I first had to see the counseling all the way through. I spoke calmly.
"How was the spatial design?"
"How was it?"
"I meant, did you enjoy it."
"Oh. Yeah."
She nodded.
"Imagining doesn't cost anything, so the whole time I was awake, that was all I thought about. I kept at it and never got tired."
"And now?"
"..."
Silence was her answer. A moment later I met her eyes and asked, "Do you like design?"
Her face said, what kind of nonsense question is that? I let a beat pass, then asked again.
"Do you like design?"
"..."
"Do you still like design?"
The first thing that had come to mind, listening to Olivia, was Buzzer Beater. Her situation was much the same. The beginning had been her father, and yet she had gone on to the triumph of placing in a national contest. The hint was there. A girl for whom her father's arms had been enough would at last be remade into a person in her own right, walking toward a dream that was hers. The question held all of that. I asked her one more time.
And a moment later, her eyelids began to tremble.