Sponsor Urgently Wanted
London.
Ralph was out on patrol along Oxford Street again today. By way of atoning for his sins he had turned over a new leaf and been reborn as sheriff of the street.
His routine was simple. First he cleaned the pavement, and if someone looked as though they needed help, he drifted over and struck up a conversation. When he got hungry he ate, came back, and ran through the same circuit again. Just like that, a day slipped away.
He set out hoping today would be peaceful too.
And then.
A pleasant-looking man fell in beside him.
"Hello. Could you spare a moment?"
The man wore a blue vest, and on the left breast was embroidered the emblem of a famous relief organization.
"Unlike the rest of us, living in such plenty, people in Africa still have no water to drink..."
"Is that true?"
"Pardon?"
"You turn on a tap and water comes out. You're telling me there's nothing to drink?"
The staffer's answer was a shock. They still depended on wells for drinking water, and even the wells weren't enough.
In that brief instant, Ralph made up his mind. He would spend the rest of his vacation in Africa. Donations, of course—and more than that.
"If you're digging wells, you'll need laborers too."
His arms and legs worked fine. He could throw in his own labor. In his imagination he had just sunk about ten wells when a calm voice came from behind him.
"Senior."
He turned.
"Ghk!"
There was Tennessee, blond hair swept back. Ralph startled because the face was too handsome, and then startled all over again at the title.
S-senior?
Tennessee, for his part, went on as if nothing were unusual.
"Shall we step somewhere else for a moment?"
"Huh?"
Tennessee drew a check from his wallet and held it out to the relief worker.
"With this, count my senior as having contributed about a thousand wells. That'll do, won't it?"
A nearby café.
"Well? Think you can do it with me?"
At Tennessee's offer, Ralph was flooded with gratitude. How long had he even been living decently, and already a blessing had come looking for him?
"I don't even need the money. I'll do it. No conditions."
"It won't be easy."
Tell him to throw himself into a war and he would have charged in on the spot. A job like this was nothing.
"So I just have to find the man who made Tetris. That's it, right?"
Tennessee's explanation went on after that. Originally Professor Jo Sudeok was the highest authority on the matter, but he had taken up as president of the department store and could no longer come along.
The moment Ralph heard it, he shot to his feet.
"He's at the department store right now?"
"He is. Why?"
"I'll be right back."
"...?"
"Someone that extraordinary, practically under our noses. I ought to go learn at least one thing, shouldn't I?"
Initiative: pass.
Ralph walked out of the café at once.
"Good day, sir!"
In less than thirty minutes he was face to face with Jo Sudeok, in the president's office of the London department store. Ordinarily no one walked in there uninvited. The moment he invoked CEO Park Jihoon's name, he sailed straight through.
Fortunately, Jo Sudeok seemed to take a liking to him as well. Perhaps it pleased him that Ralph tacked CEO onto the end of every sentence about his own school junior, Park Jihoon. More than anything, that bull-headed habit of charging in first and thinking later must have struck him as suited to the work.
"There's quite an age between us. Me speaking up to you is a little absurd, isn't it?"
"Please speak down to me. Otherwise I'll have to take this on my knees."
Affability: pass.
"So starting today you're working under the CEO?"
"Yes. It's an honor."
"Then I'll have to pass the essentials on to you, condensed. Did you bring something to write with?"
"I brought it."
At a moment like this one usually produced a tidy little notebook. Ralph, true to his bulk, picked up a thick university pad.
"Memorize this. In this business, connections come first."
"Connections come first..."
"They won't meet you? Don't waste the time moping. Use your head. Even if you can't do it yourself, somewhere out there is always someone who can solve the problem."
"Ah."
"The moment a figure comes in, make the call. An introduction is best. If you can't get one, go find them and greet them with a smile. Then keep doing it."
Classic Korean style. Talk like that would ordinarily have put worry first. Ralph was fascinated. He kept hitching himself up off the chair, desperate to be thrown into the field.
Meanwhile, Dmitri was on his way to California on CEO Park Jihoon's orders.
The day of the party on the cruise, Park Jihoon had come up quietly and handed him a simple mission. Simple, more or less.
"Hold an extreme-sports competition in the name of Mad Bull."
He had even pinned the place down: San Diego, California. Sketch the competition, he said, and turn it into an advertisement.
Dmitri had felt exactly one thing.
"Ooh!"
An extreme-sports competition. It was the thing he had dreamed of his whole life, and he arrived in America with his face alight.
The announcement had gone out long ago, and the venue was already under contract. All that remained was to see whether the course had been built properly. A staffer from the outside firm running the event was waiting at the airport.
If anywhere in the world could claim the crown for free-spiritedness, it was California, and perhaps that explained it. Who comes to collect a client in a fully rebuilt muscle car? You know the kind: suspension fiddled with until the front wheels rear up and flash. And that was not all. Flames sprawled across both doors and the hood. Most people would have wrapped the thing cleanly, but someone had wanted the wildness left in and sprayed the paint on rough.
A proper Englishman would have frowned on principle.
"Whoa—wow!"
Dmitri, a devotee of cars, felt his blood come to a boil. Yes. An extreme competition ought to be built by people like this.
"Get in."
Then the engine roared, and the staffer drove for the venue. For all the noise, his driving was rather calm. Well, it was a public road.
Just as Dmitri's heart began to settle, the man at the wheel asked a question.
"Off-road bikes and stunt bicycles, fine. But why hold a skateboard competition?"
"Ah. That."
Bikes and bicycles were the sports Dmitri loved past all reason, and he was staging those two because he wanted to. The skateboards were something CEO Park Jihoon had specifically asked for, and Dmitri had nothing much to say about them.
Right. I was curious myself.
His best guess was Ultimate. It was a street brand, so perhaps they meant to make skate shoes. Only Park Jihoon would know for certain.
He was turning the thought over when the staffer spoke again.
"Even so, there are quite a few entrants in the board division."
"Are there?"
"Yes. There's even a kid who shows up at the venue every day, asking if he can ride early."
Dmitri hadn't expected much. If the numbers were decent, so much the better.
He had only just turned his eyes to the scenery outside when the car stopped in an empty lot.
"We've arrived."
"What would you like to check first?"
The bike course, obviously. It was his favorite. But then—
"Hey—hey?"
The staffer startled and took off at a run. Dmitri followed, wondering what on earth was the matter, and from somewhere ahead came the hiss of rubber wheels. A U-shaped course had been built where the man was headed. As if to greet their arrival, the wheels sang again, and someone shot high into the air above the ramp.
A skateboard?
The staffer turned to Dmitri with an agonized face. Someone had walked onto the course before the competition had even begun, and he looked very much like a man waiting to be blamed for lax management. He rushed into an excuse.
"I—I told you in the car, didn't I?"
"...?"
"I said there's a guy who comes every single day. Damn it. I told him no, over and over!"
Even as he sprinted to stop it, the youth on the board launched into the air again.
"Aren't you going to come out of there?"
The shout did nothing. The boy ripped clean down the U-shaped course, flew once more, and—while he was at it—whipped through something like three full spins.
"Hey, you! Get down here!"
The staffer was half in tears when Dmitri's voice stopped him.
"Leave him be."
Skateboarding. He had wondered what skill could possibly be grand enough to deserve a whole competition, and here it was, this fierce, this alive. He wanted to see more. But the wheels skidded, stuttered, and stopped. Offer a man the stage and tell him to perform, and perhaps the fun goes out of it. The youth simply halted his board in the center of the course.
Dmitri hurried over.
"Are you... entering the competition too?"
A nod. Another nod.
He wanted the name, and it turned out he didn't need to ask. On the black T-shirt, huge, were the name, the plea, and even a phone number.
The next day I went early to my brother Yugeon's room. I wanted to see how he was. More than that, an idea of a rather commercial sort had occurred to me.
Knock, knock.
The face he poked through the crack of the door looked, fortunately, perfectly fine. Well, he had only had three drinks. A serious hangover would have been the stranger outcome.
"What happened to me yesterday?"
"Nothing."
"I don't remember a thing."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Seriously."
He looked quite shaken.
"I guess I shouldn't drink from now on. Right?"
"If you drink now and then, won't you get used to it?"
"Nnngh."
Even slumped like that, my brother was endearing.
"What about you?"
"I came in drunk too."
"Right? It wasn't only me?"
"R-right."
Ahem.
"Mind if I come in for a second?"
"Oh—look at me."
He opened the door wide. I had been too far gone yesterday to notice, and it felt like a long time since I had been in his room. Once it had been mostly singers' posters. Now there seemed to be more photographs of developers.
"Yeah. If Grandfather just gives his permission."
"University... Seoul National, I assume?"
"Probably."
There was ease in his face. His scores must have been comfortable enough.
"Have you ever thought about studying abroad?"
"Huh? Me?"
The look of an eldest son who had never even dared to dream of it.
"Come on. What does studying abroad have to do with inheriting the company?"
"Even so, I don't think he'd allow it..."
"Harvard might be all right."
"Harvard?"
"If you're going to double-major in business and computer engineering, Harvard is exactly the place. At that level, don't you think Grandfather would say yes?"
He went quiet for a moment. Harvard, of all names, he might well permit. The problem was how anyone got into a university counted among the best in the world.
"They admit in the fall over there. Start preparing now and it shouldn't be too late."
"You think it's possible?"
This seemed like the moment to ease out what I actually wanted.
"What about doing it with those friends of yours I met?"
"My friends?"
"Yeah. They've all got the scores to walk into Seoul National, haven't they?"
"Well. More or less."
"Then get into Seoul National first, and use whatever time is left to prepare for Harvard. Wouldn't that work?"
"But studying abroad costs a lot. I might have the means, but..."
"Your friends—if they get in, I'll cover everything. Tuition, living expenses, all of it."
There was, of course, a condition. After graduation, at least one year at JH. And of course, once a person started working, no one could say whether one year would become five, and five become ten. Ahem.
A Nexy Soft that had drunk deep of America.
The thought alone was enough to amuse me, and I let the corner of my mouth lift.