A Bargain with the Teacher
A month had passed since I started high school.
To cut to the chase: I survived. And not just barely — I'd pulled it off in style.
Granted, the goal I'd set in the gymnasium on orientation day hadn't lasted a week. Keep quiet, stay out of trouble, exist like air. My luck was simply too good for that.
For one thing, our school split classes by gender. That meant our all-boys classroom ran on simple logic no matter what happened — guys who'd been screaming at each other that morning would make up over a single cafeteria menu item at lunch. No tangled mind games, which meant a lot less walking on eggshells.
On top of that, a few familiar faces from middle school had ended up in my class. Just having people to stand next to in the lunch line and laugh with — about streamers, webtoons, web novels, whatever — cut the difficulty of school life in half.
This morning had been no different.
"Sian, you see yesterday's chapter?"
"Yeah. Cutting it off there was just cruel."
"Right? That Cliffhanger Skill is actually insane."
"And since we're broke students, we get to wait another whole week. How are we supposed to survive that?"
Mornings that opened with this kind of pointless chatter. Honestly, this was all I'd ever wanted out of high school.
Phones had to be turned in every morning, of course. Even a school like this wouldn't budge on that. Which meant I couldn't read the latest chapters until after dismissal — and if I had one real complaint about school life, that was it.
And more than anything else.
"Sian, you watch the soccer match yesterday?"
"Yeah. That goal at the death in the second half was insane."
"See? I told you that guy had one in him."
I even got along fine with the troublemakers in our class.
The guy currently sitting backwards in the seat in front of me, rambling about soccer, had a tattoo on his forearm. A month ago, I wouldn't have been able to meet his eyes. But once you actually spent time with him, he was just a regular seventeen-year-old who liked soccer. He beat people up, sure — just not me.
For the record, I only liked watching soccer. I'd been too physically weak to play since I was little, so I'd built a wall between myself and actually running around on a field a long time ago. But soccer with my mouth? I could go national-team level all day.
That was just our class, though. I had no idea what went on in the others.
Every now and then, something would shatter down the hallway, followed by shouting, and on those days I didn't particularly want to know. Our class had an unspoken agreement: nobody even glanced toward the windows.
Anyway, my school life was peaceful. Show up in the morning, sit through class, eat lunch, go home. I'd spent a month proving that the kind of ordinary routine you could find anywhere was possible even at a school like this.
Just let three years pass like this. I believed that without a shred of doubt — right up until the class president walked up to my desk during the break after second period.
"Lee Sian. Homeroom teacher wants you in the faculty office."
The room went quiet. Every nearby pair of eyes locked onto me at once.
"Yo, Lee Sian. What'd you do?"
"I didn't do anything."
"You're getting called to the faculty office and you didn't do anything?"
"I'm serious."
"It's okay. We've got your back."
From somewhere in the room, I even heard someone wonder if I was transferring. There was a voice that said they'd seen it coming, too. We'd spent a whole month together, and this was the extent of their faith in me?
The guy in front of me patted my shoulder with a look of pity. Why did a comforting hand feel like condolences at a funeral?
It wasn't fair. Sure, I'd been late a few times, dozed off in class, maybe run around the hallway horsing around. But that was just standard-issue Korean high school boy stuff, wasn't it? I had no memory of doing anything that warranted a trip to the faculty office.
And yet here I was, summoned.
The hallway to the faculty office felt unusually long. I ransacked a month's worth of memories as I walked, but nothing turned up. That left one possibility: I'd gotten mixed up in something without even knowing it. At this school, that was more than plausible — which made it even scarier.
I glanced into the classroom next door as I passed. The scene was as grim as ever. A cluster of guys in the back were huddled together, talking in low voices, and there was a reason it didn't look anything like a group-project meeting. The class after that had all its curtains drawn. I picked up my pace.
I took a deep breath and opened the faculty office door.
It was more peaceful inside than I'd expected. One teacher was on the phone; another was buried under a mountain of paperwork. At least it didn't look like I'd been dragged in to get chewed out. Small comfort.
"Ah, Sian, there you are. Come on in, have a seat."
Jo Guk-hyeon, our homeroom teacher, raised a hand and waved me over.
First impressions: honestly, he was just an ordinary middle-aged guy. A little shorter than me, with gray starting to streak through his hair. He spoke in a gentle, unhurried way that made him feel less like a teacher at this school and more like the neighborhood stationery store owner. How he survived at a place like this was the biggest mystery about him.
"You wanted to see me, sir?"
"That's right. Nothing to be nervous about."
Few phrases in the world make a person more nervous than nothing to be nervous about.
I perched on the edge of the chair, and he pulled a sheet of paper from his desk drawer and slid it in front of me.
"This is yours, right?"
I looked down at the paper and blinked.
Peer Counselor Training Course
I'd gotten it in my second year of middle school. Honestly, I'd completely forgotten it even existed. I never expected to run into it again here, of all places.
"It is, but... why...?"
"We're looking to start a peer counseling program at our school."
He tapped the certificate with his finger.
"And as it turns out, there's exactly one student in the entire school who's qualified."
A cold premonition crept up my spine.
"You don't mean me, do you?"
"I do. What do you say? I've been watching you for a month, and I think you'd be good at it."
"How can you tell from one month?"
"I've been teaching for over twenty years. You think I can't see that much with this kind of mileage? You up for it?"
"I'd rather not, sir."
This wasn't even worth thinking about. Peer counseling at this school basically meant sitting face-to-face with kids who had issues.
"I just want to go to school quietly."
"You?"
"...The wanting to go quietly part is genuine, at least."
"Alright. Then how about this."
He paused for a moment, then dropped his voice a notch.
"I'll be honest with you. This is a newly established school. We're short on budget."
I wondered why we were suddenly talking about budgets, but his expression was serious.
"Look at this place. It's been two years since we opened, and we need a lot more than the money that actually comes in. But if we run a peer counseling program, the education office sends down support funding. That's money this school desperately needs."
"...So if I become the counselor, the school gets money."
"You're a quick one. That's why I need you — the one with the certificate."
"Can't you just have someone else do it? There's got to be a kid who'd be better at this than me."
"For the program to be recognized, we need a student who actually has the certificate. And like I said — there's exactly one in the whole school."
Every exit had been neatly sealed off.
I understood the school's situation. I did.
"I still don't want to. The school gets money, but there's nothing in it for me."
"Nothing in it for you, huh."
As if he'd been waiting for those exact words, the corner of his mouth ticked upward. That was the moment I realized I'd taken the bait. Too late.
"Then let's talk terms."
He started folding his fingers one by one as he laid it out.
"First: your student record. Three years of peer counseling looks better than most of the usual extras. It'll come in very handy when you apply to college."
That got my attention. My grades were average. And I knew well enough that if you were knocking on college doors with average grades, you needed at least one line that set you apart.
But I wasn't ready to fold just yet.
"Second: the Counseling Room. Running the program means we get a dedicated space. When you're not in session, you can use it however you like."
"However I like?"
"That's right. Lunch, breaks, whenever. I'll give you the key."
A place at this school where I could hole up by myself in peace. That was a pretty — no, a seriously attractive offer.
"Oh, and since you'll need to stay in contact for counseling, you won't have to turn in your phone."
"...Excuse me?"
A private space and my phone. The image of myself locked in the Counseling Room every lunch period, binge-reading every chapter I'd fallen behind on, painted itself in my mind without any effort at all.
"Third."
He folded a third finger.
"When you go to school, you can get mixed up in all kinds of things. Especially at a school like ours. There may come a day when you find yourself standing in the middle of an incident, whether you wanted to or not."
The sounds from down the hallway came back to me, and I swallowed without meaning to.
"...And if that day comes?"
"The principal, the vice principal, and I will cover for you. For most things."
My breath caught.
That was a get-out-of-jail-free card. And at this school, it was the most valuable kind there was. Three years at a place where you never knew what might blow up, and three adults promising to bury most of it. As insurance went, it didn't get better than this.
"One last thing. If you take the work seriously, I'll get you recommendation letters from the principal and the vice principal. The weight those carry on a college application is more than you think."
I swallowed dryly.
Student record. A private Counseling Room. My phone. A get-out-of-jail-free card. And recommendation letters on top of that.
The scale in my head started swinging wildly. On one side sat my plan for three peaceful years. On the other, a stack of conditions that would upgrade that plan entirely.
Let's think about this from the start. Why was I so hung up on peace in the first place?
To graduate in one piece and get into college in one piece.
In that case, wasn't this a shortcut rather than a detour?
Of course, it wasn't without risks. I wouldn't know who I'd be counseling. And if a student at this school needed counseling, they probably weren't going to be a walk in the park.
But how hard could counseling really be? Listen to their problems, nod along, throw in some agreement here and there. It wasn't like I'd learned nothing in middle school.
Yeah. I can do this. If it's me, I can do this.
I lifted my head and met his eyes.
"I have one condition of my own, though."
"Let's hear it."
"I won't take counseling for anyone who's an obvious, no-questions-asked thug. I don't have it in me to handle kids like that."
"Fine. I can promise you that."
The words had barely left my mouth before a grin spread across Jo Guk-hyeon's face.