The Assistant Manager Plays Innocent

The next morning, my heart pounded the whole subway ride in to work. After what we'd done last night, what face was I supposed to wear at the office? What if she couldn't even meet my eyes? Or the opposite—what if she gave it away so badly the entire team noticed? I drafted about a dozen scenarios over two stops. Spend two years in planning, and even your worrying comes out storyboarded.

The moment I opened the office door, all twelve of them turned useless.

"Choi Woo-jin."

I was just sitting down and shrugging off my coat when Da-hee came over at a steady clip, sharp from head to toe. The shirt buttons that had been undone one by one last night were fastened straight up to her collar, and there wasn't a single crease in her slacks. With a cool, blank expression, she dropped a folder of documents for approval onto my desk with a flat thud.

"Materials for the afternoon meeting. Check the figures and print a clean copy for the team leader's report."

Even her voice was cold. It was so perfect a performance of the professional mentor that I could hardly believe this was the same person who had clung to me in the break room last night, gasping my name. To anyone sitting nearby, we were nothing but a strict senior and her contract-worker junior.

But I could see above her head.

A laugh nearly burst out of me, and I pinched my thigh. Squee. Behind that face of ice, she was practically stamping her feet all by herself. Looking closer, I saw she couldn't meet my eyes head-on—she was staring at the right-hand corner of my monitor, biting her lip hard to keep the corner of her mouth from climbing. She couldn't act. I was pretty sure I'd have known even without the words over her head.

"Yes, Assistant Manager. I'll compile everything and have it up before lunch."

"Yes. Look it over carefully. No typos."

She turned and went back to her seat, stiff as a robot. From behind, only the tips of her ears were bright red. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠A moment later, a messenger window popped up.

Even playing innocent, she had to do it this adorably. So this was what an affection rating of a hundred looked like.

Around nine-thirty I went to the copy room to print something. I was waiting for the multifunction printer to spit out paper when the door opened and shut. It was her. She wasn't holding anything. She hadn't come to make copies.

"…Hey."

"Yes, Assistant Manager."

"Don't call me Assistant Manager. There's nobody here."

She leaned her back against the side of the printer. She folded her arms, unfolded them, then folded them again.

"Last night. You don't regret it, do you?"

"I don't."

"…Really?"

"Really. Do you?"

"Why would I? I'm the one who said we should."

She said it while staring only at the printer. The machine beeped a low-paper warning. She jumped, yanked the tray open, and loaded paper. Once it was full she glanced at me, then flicked my tie with a finger.

"…Then we're good. I've got a field visit today, and I'm heading straight home after. See you tomorrow."

And she left. I gathered every printout myself. All she had done in the copy room was load the paper and go.

That sweet mood didn't last. An emergency team meeting had been set for ten.

"Everyone, take your seats."

Team Leader Ye-won stood in front of the whiteboard. Her face was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the same ice as always, but today her color was pale, and there was no blood in her lips.

"A notice from the Management Planning Office. Brand Team 2 has been placed under review for reorganization and dissolution next quarter."

The conference room froze. Manager Park fiddled with his knockoff watch and rolled his eyes, and Da-hee's expression hardened too. What had only been a rumor was real. Our team had finished dead last in the division for two quarters running, and around the company we were already called the ragtag exile. It wasn't surprising, but hearing it outright left my stomach cold. If a team vanished, a contract worker had nowhere to go.

"Whether we live or die will be decided by next week's presentation on the new moisture ampoule. The division head has staked the whole division on this lineup. If we lose here, our team gets torn apart. That is all. Each of you, prepare your assigned part without a single gap."

With only that, she slipped into the team leader's office. The rest of them could barely breathe. But just before the door closed, I looked above her head.

…Sobbing?

I stared blankly at the shut door of her office. She had delivered the notice like a blade, and on the inside she was choking up over where her people would go. The Ice Team Leader was nowhere to be found. Behind that door was one person in a full panic over her team.

A little later, heading toward the break room to cool my head, I caught a strange scene through the door, which stood slightly open. The team leader was rummaging alone through the emergency-snack drawer under the sink.

"I skipped breakfast… my blood sugar's crashing… my head won't work……."

From deep in the drawer she pulled out a dust-covered chocolate bar, went to take a bite, then checked the back of the wrapper, and her face crumpled.

"…Expired last November? Ugh, nothing ever goes right…."

With tears clinging at the corners of her eyes, she tossed the bar into the trash. From behind, it was impossible to believe this was the same person as the Ice Team Leader from the conference room. I was holding back a laugh when a chime sounded by my ear.

Another quest. The reward even came with Proposal Speed-Reading—the thing I needed most, with the presentation looming. If I wanted to keep the team from disappearing, I had to steady that secretly hopeless team leader's nerves first. And honestly, I wanted the reward.

I went down to the convenience store on the first floor and picked an egg sandwich and a hot Americano. There was one important detail. Whenever she ate while looking over documents, she always dribbled at the corner of her mouth. I'd seen cookie crumbs stuck to her blouse more than once in meetings. So I cut the sandwich clean in half with the store's plastic knife, set it on a napkin ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠with two wet wipes, and—while ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠she was summoned to the division head's office—slipped it beside the approval documents on her desk and left.

Just before lunch, she came back to her office and stopped in front of her desk. I was drinking water at the cooler in the break room, and I saw it through the glass. She stared at the wrapper for a long time, then at the halved face of the sandwich and the wet wipes, and her eyes went round.

I nearly sprayed my water. Freeze-dry. Because my fingers were long, she wanted to freeze them and keep them forever? I never would have guessed a fangirl like that was hiding behind a face so cold. And my fingers aren't even that long. They're ordinary. Probably.

In that moment my head went clear, and the market-analysis report open on my monitor started to read at twice the usual speed. Fifty pages came into view at a glance, like a table of contents, and only the key numbers rose on their own. Proposal Speed-Reading. With this alone, the overtime would be cut in half.

I ate lunch with the two youngest on the team. Both were regular employees in their second year, and their faces were darker than mine. If the team disappeared they'd be scattered to other teams, they said—but who would welcome people from the last-place squad? I only listened. Regular employees, at least, got scattered. A contract worker just ended. I didn't bother saying so. Today, of all days, the gukbap—rice sunk in hot broth—tasted too salty.

In the afternoon there was a meeting on the detailed strategy for the ampoule. Around the long conference table sat the team leader, Manager Park, Da-hee, and me. Of all places, she was right beside me. Midway through, the team leader asked how wide we should set the target age range. Everyone else only said the twenties and thirties, but the second-quarter numbers I'd speed-read earlier came back to me, and I raised my hand.

"I think we should narrow it further, to office workers within that range. On page twenty-seven of the second-quarter report, searches related to office dryness are up more than forty percent from last year."

The team leader stopped her pen and looked at me. Her face said Do you have a basis for that?—but when I cited the page, she silently flipped the report open to twenty-seven and checked. Then she wrote office workers on the whiteboard. In two years, it was the first time an opinion of mine had gone up there.

The meeting rolled on in earnest, and under the table something tapped the toe of my shoe.

I kept my eyes fixed on the screen and put all my attention into my feet. The tip of her black pump was tapping lightly against the top of my foot. I glanced sideways. She was nodding with the most serious face in the world, writing something in her notebook—but the corner of her tightly closed mouth was lifted, just a little.

Above the table, a strict mentor. Beneath it, a lover playing footsie. The tickle climbed from my toes all the way to my heart. Honestly, I only half remember what the meeting was about.

When it ended and we came out into the hall, Manager Park came swaggering over, fiddling with his knockoff watch, and draped an arm across my shoulder. The smell of pomade hit hard.

"Woo-jin. The final file for tomorrow's division-meeting presentation—make sure it's in the shared folder tonight. Hyung'll give it one last look in the morning. Gotta refine the big picture."

"Yes, Manager. I'll have it up tonight."

"Yeah. That's our Woo-jin."

He patted my shoulder twice and walked on. Above the back of his head, his inner thoughts floated up.

The moment I saw it, the corner of my mouth rose on its own. For two years I'd only found out after it had already been done to me. This time I knew a day early. A day was enough.

Yes, Manager. So that's how you want to play it.

Looked like I'd be working late tonight.