Last Night, the Numbers Began to Appear

11:40 p.m. The twelfth-floor breakroom at Hyuella Cosmetics.

The lights were off and the blinds half-drawn. Orange streetlight leaked through the gap and striped the marble counter, while a single standby lamp on the coffee machine blinked green. No one usually came in here at this hour. That was probably why the breathing sounded so loud.

Yank— Assistant Manager Seo Da-hee hooked a finger through the knot of my tie and hauled me in. My weight pitched forward. We were close enough for our noses to touch, and the smell of peach hand cream hit me all at once. She wore it every day. I had been breathing it in from the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠next desk for two years, and at this distance it was a completely different scent.

"Hey, Choi Woo-jin."

It was dark, and yet her eyes were strangely easy to see. Her lips trembled, just a little.

"You... you're going to keep pretending you don't know?"

There was no room to answer. She rose onto her toes and kissed me outright.

My head went blank. Her lips met mine—careful for a heartbeat, then quickly urgent. Her arms circled my neck. Through the white shirt she always wore with the top two buttons undone, her collarbone showed, and the thigh pressed against me past her slacks was hot. The black bob tickled my jaw. Already her fingers were finding the buttons of my shirt and working them open, one by one.

This was actually insane. The company breakroom. With my own mentor.

But if I was honest, it wasn't her lips that undid me most.

Right above her head, blue letters floated in the dark air. The kind of window you only ever saw on a game screen.

Ninety-one. Why was I seeing that number? Why was something like a game stat floating over the head of our blunt, easygoing mentor?

...I ought to start with yesterday. If last night's blackout hadn't happened, I still wouldn't have any idea what that number was.

Yesterday afternoon I was turning over the usual misery of a Korean office worker, the way I always did.

My name is Choi Woo-jin. Twenty-six, five foot ten. Ask ten people on the street about my face and about eight of them would say "pleasant enough" and keep walking. That was the ceiling. The only person who had ever called me handsome was my mother. My love life had been a blank for three years. I went around saying it was because I was busy. It wasn't only because I was busy.

The problem wasn't my face. It was where I belonged. Hyuella Cosmetics, a mid-sized cosmetics company; Marketing Division, Brand Team 2; a contract worker in his second year. A seat built for swallowing every stray chore while a conversion to full-time hovered somewhere up ahead. On top of that, our team had the worst sales in the company, and the rumor was we might not even exist next quarter. Give a person too many reasons to be anxious and he goes calm instead.

At three in the afternoon, the messenger window in the corner of my monitor blinked.

By your second year, even messenger replies develop a ranking. There was the soul-spent "Yes, sir!", the easy "Sure~" reserved for people you actually liked, and the flat "Yes." with every feeling scraped out of it. My heart was, of course, on "Yes." A contract worker was permitted exactly one of the three.

A dry cough drifted over the partition. Manager Park Tae-shik. Thirty-nine. Hair shellacked with pomade gleamed under the fluorescents, and on his wrist hung a counterfeit luxury watch he said he'd bought in Jongno. Gold-buckle belt and all. A man who lived on surface shine alone, and the only manager on our team.

"Hey. Woo-jin."

He jingled the fake watch and stuck his head up over the partition.

"Looked over the proposal. Thing is, you're buried in the details, you know? Our Woo-jin still can't see the big picture. The big picture. Hyung'll touch it up, so shoot the original PowerPoint to my email again. I'll carry it into this week's division strategy meeting."

Touch it up. As if I could fail to know what that meant. He would slap his own name on the cover and walk upstairs with the plan I had built through two weeks of all-nighters. Third time this quarter alone. He was also why I had failed the full-time review twice. The credit went to him, and when the criticism came he set me out in front—the contract kid was still a little clumsy, he'd say.

Chagall... there goes the Temu Human, walking off with my file again.

The curses rose in my throat. My mouth was smiling anyway. Two years will teach you that.

"Yes, Manager. I'll put it in the shared folder right away."

"That's it. That's our Woo-jin. Quick on the uptake. I'll put in a strong word for you at this review."

He patted his belly and wandered back to his seat, as if I didn't know exactly who had given me the lowest score last time.

I was pressing at my temples when a cold can of coffee landed on the desk with a thunk.

"Hey, Choi Woo-jin."

Assistant Manager Seo Da-hee. Twenty-nine, five foot four. A black tasseled bob that left the line of her neck clean, a white shirt undone by about two buttons, slacks—my mentor, at the desk across from mine. Also the only person on this team who actually looked after me.

She tipped her chin toward the manager's seat.

"Manager Park stole your proposal again, didn't he? God, that guy seriously pisses me off."

Having her get angry in my place loosened something in my chest. It was strange that way. If I got angry, it was a contractor throwing a tantrum. If she got angry, it was simply the right thing said out loud.

"Hardly the first time. Looks like he's lining up another one for this week's meeting."

"The big picture can drop dead. The only big picture on him is that gut. Want me to go stick it straight to the team leader?"

"If you stick your neck out, the whole team turns to thin ice. Me, I'm... a contractor. I have to swallow it."

"Are you stupid? You swallow what you're supposed to swallow. That's why they treat you like a sucker."

She clicked her tongue, but her eyes were worried. Back when I'd first joined and barely known which way was up, this was the person who had stayed through the night teaching me everything from Excel functions to the format of a proposal. Her mouth was rough. I still remembered how many convenience-store triangle kimbap she had bought me back then. Eleven.

That was when the team leader's door opened.

Click. Click— Two strikes of a heel and the air in the office changed. Kang Ye-won, leader of Brand Team 2. Thirty-three, five foot six. Long dark-brown waves, rimless glasses, a silk blouse and an H-line skirt. She was famous for proportions like a model's, but more famous still for the speed of her rejections. Around the company she went by the Ice Team Leader. Let a single Do it again drop in a meeting room, and that day's team lunch became gukbap, steaming ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠rice soup. Everyone felt they needed something scalding if they were ever going to thaw.

She set a folder of approval documents on my desk with a light tap.

"Choi Woo-jin. Last month's settlement report. It's a mess. Leave the facts and reorganize it."

"Ah... yes, Team Leader. If you could give me a specific guide..."

"I stuck a Post-it on it. Read it and apply it."

She cut me ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠off and disappeared into her office. I opened the folder. A yellow Post-it sat at the top of the first page, the handwriting neat, the line almost nothing.

"..."

Da-hee and I stared down at the note at the same time. She leaned in, shoulders dropping, and whispered.

"Hey... did our team leader just write 'handle it—neatly, with sense'?"

"...Yes. Figure it out, do it well, keep it exact, clean, and sensible. That's what it says."

"I can't take this. She never uses anything but stiff formal diction, and suddenly this? Is she doing a Gen-Z impression, or did she throw it because she's mad?"

"Hard to say. Could be code for 'figure out your resignation and get out.'"

"Pfft—hey! Don't make me laugh. You're spitting."

She smacked my shoulder, and the laugh broke out of her anyway. One Post-it from the Ice Team Leader and the office had turned into a sitcom. For the rest of that afternoon, every time she passed my desk she stuck on a note that stopped at "Handle it." The last one said "With sense."

It was past ten. Everyone else had gone home, and in the wide office only two of us were left—me, still hunting for the right answer to that Post-it, and her, going over the launch checklist. The air conditioner's outdoor unit hummed. She was someone who usually left before nine, but today, strangely, she hadn't gone. She was reading the checklist from the top for the third time. I found out later she hadn't been looking at the checklist at all.

"Assistant Manager, should I make you another coffee?"

"Hm? If you would, I'd really owe you. Feels like there's sand in my eyelids..."

I had just stood and taken a single step toward the breakroom.

Rrrumble—boom!

"Ah—!"

A shock climbed out of the basement, as if something down there had blown. The ceiling fluorescents flickered like mad, and one second later—

Pop—!

Everything died. The monitors, the hallway lights, even the coffee machine's standby lamp. A total blackout.

"Choi Woo-jin! Where are you?! Woo-jin!"

"Assistant Manager, don't move! I'm coming!"

I felt my way through the dark toward her desk. Then someone seized me around the waist and clung on.

"Woo-jin...!"

It was her. She had her face buried in my shirt and was shaking hard. This was a woman who usually killed cockroaches with a slipper. Through the thin shirt I could feel her heart beating, plain as a hand against my ribs.

"It's all right, Senior. It's just a blackout. Once the emergency generator comes on..."

Whirrr— The emergency lamp on the wall flared, and the office washed red. That was the moment.

Eeeee—! A sound meant to split my ears drove straight through my skull. Tinnitus. White flared across my eyes, then red, then blue, as if someone had taken a hammer to the back of my head.

"Ghk...!"

My legs gave. As I swayed she caught me. My ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠head felt as if it were rebooting—the way a computer screen dies and comes back a few times in the middle of an update. Exactly that.

I couldn't have said how long it lasted. Little by little, the ringing thinned.

"Haa... haa..."

I opened the eyes I had shut. Under the emergency light she was looking up at me. Her bob was a complete wreck.

"Woo-jin, what's wrong with you? Does something hurt? Your face is white as paper..."

Her trembling hand cupped my cheek. I couldn't answer. My mouth wouldn't come unstuck.

Just above her head, past the emergency light, two lines of blue text hung in the empty air.

"...?"

Thinking it might be a trick of my eyes, I rubbed them hard and looked again. It didn't vanish. If anything, it had grown sharper.

Seo Da-hee. Affection, 68. And... tonight, she was really going to say it?

Say what?