The Sweetest Performance
I started imitating Park Ha-eun because of a conversation I had with An-gae.
"An-gae."
"Whoa! Yeonjae talked to me first? No way! Why? What's going on? Do you need me?"
"...Could you please just talk normally for once?"
"Ehehe, why~? This is fun!"
He was getting more and more obnoxious as time went on. He couldn't sit still for a single moment, constantly pulling pranks, and my patience had run dry ages ago. He picked out only the kinds of antics even a four-year-old would consider beneath them, so honestly, his combat power seemed to be dropping.
"Hehe. So why did you call me, anyway?"
"I'm not sure you're the right one to ask, but there's no one else to ask."
"Yep! What is it? Ask me anything!"
"I need to make a good impression on an executive at the company. What should I do?"
I tossed out the question I'd been turning over in my head ever since leaving the director's office that afternoon. They were expecting me to do more than just pose for photos — I had to help introduce the orphanage too. I'd nodded along coolly in front of the director, but the truth was I'd been completely flustered. I'd never done anything like that, and no matter how I looked at it, I didn't have a single quality adults tended to like.
They wouldn't cut off the sponsorship because I rubbed them the wrong way... right? I doubted this guy would actually be any help, but the anxiety made me want to ask someone — anyone.
Unexpectedly, An-gae put on a grave expression the moment he heard my question. He closed his eyes and hesitated for a long while, and I felt a flicker of hope that maybe, just maybe, something useful would come out of this.
"Executive... executive... executive?"
"...?"
"A general term for an officer bearing the important duties of a company? Haha! That's hilarious! You really do use the funniest words!"
I was ashamed of myself for having hoped, even briefly. When I asked, dumbfounded, what on earth he'd just done, he explained that he sometimes used the device in his head to search whenever he didn't understand something I said or got curious about humans. He said he could use it by closing his eyes and concentrating for a moment — a very An-gae explanation, which is to say, he had no idea what it was himself and was just bluffing.
He kept snickering about what was so funny about the word "executive," and since he happened to be wearing Park Ha-eun's face, I couldn't even hit him. Lately he'd been staying in this form for suspiciously long stretches, so I asked if he liked it, and the only answer I got back was, "If I compliment you while looking like this, your ears turn really red — it's so fun!" An absolutely unbelievable response.
Another time, he'd whispered in my ear, "My soft, squishy little Yeonjae, I want to gobble you up in one bite!" I couldn't tell exactly what it meant, but I understood enough to know it should have been unpleasant — which somehow made it even more unpleasant.
Oh. So that's where he learned to say stuff like that, too — that device?
...Is there any way to smash that thing?
I found myself staring at An-gae's head, and sensing it, he finally stopped laughing.
"Ahem. Hoo, my stomach hurts! So why do you need to impress an executive?"
"Because then they'll keep sponsoring us. If I mess up, the director could be the one who suffers for it."
"Hmm. Then why don't you copy the way a younger human acts around older humans that they like?"
An-gae spun in a circle through the air, and in an instant his appearance changed. I closed my eyes, opened them again, and there was the kid from my class who was always asleep face-down on his desk during lessons.
"How about this guy~? I watch your whole day every day, and it seems like your homeroom teacher is fond of this one!"
"That's because he doesn't cause any trouble."
"Ah... then how about this one?"
This time he transformed into a kid who seemed to have just as bratty a personality as An-gae. I hated that one on principle.
And so we cycled through it — "Not that one." "Hmm, that's not it either." "Oh, definitely not." "Whoa, no way in hell" — and after four rounds of this, An-gae got annoyed.
I felt a little better.
"Ugh, you shouldn't have asked me! Go ask another human!"
"Like who? I can't ask a teacher, and it's not exactly the kind of question I can ask the other kids."
"Mnn... fair point."
"Maybe I should just search the internet instead."
Like most of the kids at the orphanage, I didn't have a phone of my own. To use the internet, you had to sign up in advance and get on the computer before eight o'clock. I'd been thinking I'd ask one of the teachers about it when I woke up tomorrow.
"Hm? The internet? You mean that system humans use to search things they don't know and share information?"
"That's a simplified way of putting it, yes."
"I can do that too, you know? I just did it a minute ago! Why don't I just do it for you?"
"...Fair enough."
With An-gae's help, I went through every article and photo that came up when you searched for "orphanage sponsorship." An-gae floated the screen in the air so I could see what he was seeing — it worked something like a movie projector, as far as I could tell.
The kids in the photos all looked bright and self-assured. The kid around me who most closely matched that image was Park Ha-eun.
"Then I guess I just need to act somewhat like Park Ha-eun."
"Hehe. This'll be fun!"
That the words I'd tossed out without a second thought were going to completely change my life — the me of that time had no way of knowing.
Kim Min-hyuk, who had parachuted into the title of executive director not long ago, was in a wretched mood. Thanks to that damned orphanage visit and a secretary who insisted on being a stickler, he'd gotten barely six hours of sleep before dragging himself to work. For a man whose skin was his lifeblood, this little sleep at his age amounted to a quiet suggestion that he drop dead.
He'd tried to wrap things up as quickly as possible, only for the secretary to inform him that a journalist had come to take photos and they'd need at least two hours. Unbelievable. What photos could possibly be worth chasing me all the way out here for?
Granted, he was the one who'd kicked up a fuss about how, as his first official activity, photos needed to be taken and promoted far and wide. That detail didn't matter to Kim Min-hyuk in the slightest.
In fact, the person holding the camera right now wasn't even a journalist, just a freelance photographer hired on contract. Who in their right mind would expose a sponsored child's face in this day and age? They'd be insane to. This whole thing had come about because Kim Min-hyuk had thrown a tantrum demanding they prepare a kid who matched his "level."
It fell to the PR team to ask Director Yu — with breathtaking rudeness — for a child who could win over people on appearances alone. Having to apologize over and over to the flustered director while still insisting, please, we'd be so grateful, was genuinely depressing work.
When they arrived, an unreasonably handsome boy was standing there waiting — that much had been a surprise. But even so, the staff had not the slightest intention of taking the photos properly. Because Kim Min-woo, Kim Min-hyuk's eldest brother and the corporation's vice chairman, had given the staff explicit instructions: "He's a complete idiot, so run everything past me for confirmation before you do anything."
In short, this visit was a show staged for the benefit of the newly appointed man-child of a director.
Despite all that careful effort, Kim Min-hyuk's mood stayed foul for one simple reason: the boy smiling up at him so brightly was too good-looking. He'd demanded someone who wouldn't pale next to him — he never asked to be handed a kid who outshone him.
"Should I call you Executive Director?"
"Yeah, sure."
"Okay! Then let me show you the study room where we do our schoolwork first!"
Yeonjae, or whatever his name was — the kid turned out to be less irritating than expected. The boy's black eyes sparkled with such life that whatever resistance Kim Min-hyuk had felt began to melt away. For one thing, the brightly smiling child was surprisingly tactful.
For example:
"I heard executives are really busy. You must be tired, right?"
"Mm. The company runs itself ragged, so."
"I see! Then I'll save the residential halls for your next visit, and we'll end the tour here for today!"
The facility was surprisingly spacious for an orphanage — he'd been thinking, when exactly am I supposed to look at all of this? — and the kid had preempted him with an angelic smile. He was the child here; no one could call him out on it. The tour wrapped up in under thirty minutes.
"You must be thirsty. Would you like some tea or coffee?"
"Mm... sure. Coffee."
The thing Kim Min-hyuk hated most in the world was tea. Green tea, black tea, milk tea — he hated them all without exception, and he didn't care for bitter coffee either. But as an executive attending an official visit, there wasn't exactly a menu of appealing alternatives. He swallowed his irritation and answered — and then the boy hesitated before asking, if it wasn't too much trouble for an executive of his standing, what about hot chocolate?
Kim Min-hyuk's head was already nodding reflexively before he froze mid-motion. The boy was quick: he immediately acted cute about it, apologized, and added that it was his own favorite, and he'd love for the director to try it.
And so Kim Min-hyuk got to drink hot chocolate to his heart's content while maintaining the dignity of a director grudgingly indulging a child's wish. It was exquisite.
"That's so cool! My dream is to work at a company too, when I grow up!"
"Pfft. Kid. That's barely a dream."
Looking into the eyes of a boy who lived up to the word sparkling, Kim Min-hyuk couldn't hold back his laughter. Somewhere along the way, all awareness that he was visiting an orphanage in an official capacity had evaporated, and he was genuinely absorbed in his conversation with the kid in front of him.
Watching all this, the secretary couldn't hide his inner astonishment. This kid is no ordinary child.
He would toss out topics that gave Kim Min-hyuk room to boast about how impressive he was, yet never pressed for details. That instinct was anything but normal. Kim Min-hyuk sat there entranced, staring at a boy who chatted comfortably and competently with the man himself and every company employee who'd come along. And it wasn't done through exaggerated reactions, either — there was no calculating glint, no visible wheels turning behind his expressions. That bright face seemed to be his true nature, concealing something that had swallowed a hundred vipers whole.
"So, Yeonjae — is there anything you need these days?"
"The director and the teachers take such good care of us, there's really nothing!"
They'd been talking for over two hours now, and the boy still smiled brightly at the adult who couldn't even get his name right. The secretary was certain there was a viper coiled somewhere inside that child, and yet he felt his own mood warming at that unclouded smile. Having a creature like that nearby — something that radiated pure positive energy no matter what it touched — was a genuine stroke of fortune.
Watching the boy laugh as brightly as if he'd never known a single hardship, the world-weary secretary caught himself thinking, unbidden, that he was a little envious.
I laughed, feeling my stomach churn with queasiness. So sweet things really aren't my style...
I never touched sweets as a rule, so the hot chocolate — my first in ages — was so sugary it actually tasted bitter. Still, the sugar must have done its job, because the director sat back on the sofa, completely loosened up, smiling away.
The reaction's not bad, I'd say?
The director was the type whose every thought played across his face. All I had to do was keep an eye on the leg he was stretching out or the way his gaze lingered on the hot chocolate powder, and winning him over wasn't all that hard.
Honestly, I hadn't planned on going this far into a full-scale Park Ha-eun impression, but the more I copied her smile, the more naturally her speech and mannerisms came trailing after it.
"Executive Director, I think it's about time for you to head to your next appointment."
The moment I decided it was safe to start winding things down, the secretary stepped in. The director rose with a flicker of reluctance, and kept chatting with me right up until he climbed into his car. He told me to contact him anytime if I needed anything, but seeing as he didn't hand over a single business card, the words probably didn't mean much.
I watched the sedan glide away as elegantly as it had arrived, and let out a sigh of relief. I was tired, but it had ended well — that was what mattered. And yet something nagged at me, an itch I couldn't place.
What is it... It feels like I've missed something.
I was still mulling it over as I walked, and then the moment my eyes landed on the vegetable garden, it hit me like a bolt of lightning.
The accident. The accident that was supposed to happen today — never happened.