Did You Win the Lottery?
A month after I’d signed the paperwork for the car, the salesperson called to say it had finally come in ahead of schedule.
“Oh, this is it?”
“Yes! Wow. Isn’t it a gorgeous machine? Even though it isn’t mine, it’s the kind of car that makes you want to blurt that out on its own.”
When I stepped outside in front of the house, there it was, showing off in front of the salesperson.
A black body, black seats, a straight, muscular profile, and that rich new-car smell drifting out from inside.
The trunk was packed with gifts from BMW, and the passenger seat was piled high with booklets, car manuals, and all sorts of service materials.
“Please check it over and make sure nothing’s missing. The things in the trunk are a thank-you gift. And if you ever decide to change cars again, make sure you come find me. I’ll repay you with the best service possible.”
“Will do. I like it.”
Funny as it sounded, this was Song Hoon’s first brand-new car in his life.
Until now, he’d only ever traded one used car for another.
He didn’t show it, but his heart was pounding hard enough to burst.
Vroooom—
When he pressed the ignition, the deep, resonant roar of the engine stabbed straight into his ears.
“Hah….”
The darkest tint imaginable kept the cabin almost completely hidden from the outside, and everything about it felt flawless.
He ran a hand along the steering wheel, and the smooth texture slid across his fingertips.
“Thank you! Drive safe!”
With the salesperson seeing him off, he traded in the old, worn-out sedan for his new ride and stepped on the accelerator.
If you bought a new car, wasn’t the whole point to take it out and let it run?
Fwoooosh—
The transmission shifted so smoothly that the rpm shot upward like crazy, and the speed climbed fast and steady.
Screech—
“Haaah. Damn speed limits.”
Of course, in the city there was nothing he could do. He could barely step on it for a few seconds before he had to back off hard.
Still, the sensation was on an entirely different level from the car he’d driven before.
His mood soared right along with it.
It was that awkward hour of the afternoon, when winter was still hanging on and the sun was already setting early. It felt too wasteful to just go home, so he took the wheel toward a drive route in the outskirts of Seoul.
“Hmm… I’ve got three points left. And eighty-five points total.”
He was still in that strange middle ground where investing in anything felt premature.
“I still don’t know what the standardfor ranking is.”
Seol Yeomyeong had been C+, and Lee Dahyeon had been C+ too. That meant it clearly wasn’t just body shape that determined a rank.
“It’s not just the body. Experience, looks… all of it must affect the rating.”
Come to think of it, Lee Dahyeon’s experience level had probably counted against her, while Seol Yeomyeong’s relative lack of experience might have been a plus.
“And C+ tops out at twenty-five points. The first sex points are definitely ten.”
In the end, the best value was a woman who could squeeze out more points in a single night.
I guess I’ll need to try women of every rank eventually, too.
Even if his stamina had improved, he couldn’t keep having rough sex all night, three or four rounds at a time, the way he had with Seol Yeomyeong or Lee Dahyeon every night.
For that, a Stage 2 upgrade was essential. Which meant, at most, two or three times a week.
He still had work to go to. He couldn’t devote himself entirely to farming points.
“Still, this is enough to turn my life around. Man, this is easy. Way too easy.”
Life was absurdly easy. So easy it almost felt unfair.
If sex alone could change your life, how could it not be easy?
Vroooom—
With the engine growling, the speed climbed to one hundred in no time, and he tore down the empty road.
“Hah. Yeah, this is different.”
It was so much better than his old car that comparing them almost felt rude.
And with upbeat music blasting through the speakers, everything about the moment was perfect.
***
“Wow. Is some client executive coming in today or something?”
“Right? Damn. Whoever it is, I’m jealous. Total silver spoon.”
During the morning commute, a foreign car that looked brand-new rolled into the company parking lot, and everyone’s eyes snapped toward it at once.
“Hah… that’s probably worth about one hundred fifty million won. It’s not just a regular X5 either—it’s the M60i sport model. Someone actually bought that. Hah… I want a ride in it.”
One of the employees who was into cars rattled off the specs in a stream of numbers.
Displacement, horsepower, zero-to-sixty, and on and on.
“Huh? Wait, wait!”
“Isn’t that Manager Song?”
Then, the moment the driver parked and got out, the employees who had been watching him from the way into the building nearly jumped out of their skin and rubbed their eyes.
“It… it is?”
“Why is Manager Song getting out of there? I heard that car costs over a hundred million.”
“Isn’t it close to two hundred million?”
“Did he… win the lottery?”
All kinds of theories flew around. Just a few days ago, he’d been driving a rattling old heap worth barely two hundred thousand won, and now he’d shown up in a foreign car that looked close to two hundred million.
Seeing that, people’s expressions started to shift in subtle ways.
“Was he always… like that?”
Up until then, Song Hoon had just been Song Hoon, nothing more, nothing less. But now emotions were beginning to creep into the way people looked at him.
The men were sizing him up with envy, jealousy, or a search for something to tear down.
The women were seeing that Song Hoon, stepping out of a stunning foreign car, somehow looked like a better man than before.
And then all those gazes converged on one person.
“Tch….”
Jo Juyeon, clenching her fists and trembling in place.
***
People always regretted the things they didn’t have.
If only it had been this way. If only it had been that way. That should’ve been mine. Why wasn’t it mine?
Some people never managed to shake off the lingering ache of a choice they knew had been wrong.
Crack.
Jo Juyeon had been at work for barely any time when she went up to the rooftop and started chewing at her nails in a miserable haze.
One hundred sixty million won? Song Hoon? That Song Hoon, the one who used to drive that junker worth less than five million? That stingy Song Hoon?
A sedan that looked like it was nearly twenty years old. A rundown rented room. A bed that had felt disappointingly lacking compared to Johnson.
It hadn’t even been a full month, so the emotions from back then were still vivid. That unbearable frustration.
The thought that, well, it wasn’t like they were married, so cheating was practically inevitable and switching to someone else wasn’t such a big deal.
He looks like he’s lost weight. And hasn’t he gotten taller? Was he always this hunched over, and now he’s straightened out?
Because she had spent more than a year pressed up against him, Jo Juyeon was feeling Song Hoon’s changes more sharply than anyone else.
Meanwhile, Johnson’s flaws were starting to stand out more and more. The sex? Yes, that was still good.
Whenever that monster of his drove into her lower body, her mind really did go blank for a while.
But that was it. Nothing else. They met, had sex. Ate, then had sex again.
And he definitely said he taught English at an academy.
There were too many things that felt off. And every time they met, he whined about being broke.
What if he’s just some foreign laborer? Was he lying?
On top of that, a woman’s intuition was screaming at her.
He definitely had another woman. And a much younger one, at that.
“Ah! Manager! A test drive! You’ve got to let us do a test drive!”
Of all times, Song Hoon had come up to the rooftop garden with Seol Yeomyeong.
A younger, prettier female employee than herself. At some point after Song Hoon and she had broken up, Seol Yeomyeong had been clinging to his side like some office wife.
“Such a shameless little bitch, acting like she has a boyfriend.”
She felt irritation rise for no reason at all. The fox had taken the place she’d once occupied, and it kept buzzing around in her face.
“Huh? Isn’t that suit an expensive brand?”
“Expensive? I just bought it to wear as an everyday suit. It wasn’t that pricey.”
“Come on—who wears something like that every day? I heard my boyfriend whining that he was buying a wedding suit here and saying it was expensive! I think he said it was around fifty to sixty thousand won or something.”
“Hmm… me?”
“Did you really win the lottery or something?”
For some reason, those words kept sticking in her ears today.
If he could buy a foreign car worth nearly two hundred million won, then just how much had he won in the lottery?
Thinking about Song Hoon’s usual spending habits, it had to be a huge amount.
At the very least… one billion. Did he actually hit first place?
Her lower belly suddenly twisted with a sharp, painful knot.
“Congratulations. Did you maybe hit first prize in the lottery?”
And she spoke as casually and warmly as she could manage.
But Song Hoon, who had briefly met her eyes, showed no change in expression at all. He simply turned his face away as if she didn’t exist.
“Tch.”
Jo Juyeon was about to snap back with a vicious expression, unable to hold in her anger, when—
“Oh my. Deputy Manager, I saw you going into a motel with a black guy recently. Is that why?”
At Seol Yeomyeong’s words, Jo Juyeon’s face filled with embarrassment, rage, and every other emotion at once as she kept looking back and forth between Song Hoon and Seol Yeomyeong.
“That…!”
“Huh? Manager, did you know about that too? I just happened to see her near the busy district a while ago.”
Jo Juyeon’s fists trembled as she fought the urge to smash them into Seol Yeomyeong’s smiling, mocking face.
“Seol Yeomyeong.”
“I’m not exactly wrong, am I? Don’t go picking fights with someone from another department. I just saw your section chief earlier, and he looked ready to burst a vein while he was searching for you.”
At that, Jo Juyeon went pale as if something had just dawned on her, and she hurriedly fled the rooftop.
“Pathetic.”
Song Hoon tapped Seol Yeomyeong on the head, lightly and playfully.
“Good work. Next time, please feed me something delicious, Yeomyeong.”
Seol Yeomyeong gave him a fluttering smile, her eyes curved in a sweet little grin, and he let out a short laugh.