Stress Upon Stress
I glanced at the clock.
It was neither too early nor too late. Preparations were complete. From this point on, all I had to do was execute what I had planned.
The old me would have been so tense my body locked up, but after doing this more than ten times it had become as natural as breathing. I rose from my seat.
Only Riyeon watched me out of the corner of her eye. Our handsome team leader was flirting with another female teammate, utterly indifferent to what was happening around him. That was how he always was—even if I reported that I was about to do something like this, he would just smile to himself, tilt his head, say “Sure, go ahead,” and then contradict himself later. Whether I told him or not, the result was the same, so I had stopped telling him.
Incompetence gets you bypassed by your subordinates. There is no other choice. Even if you follow procedure and show respect, how are you supposed to work with someone who has no idea what he is supposed to be doing?
I glanced again—this time at Riyeon. When our eyes met she pursed her lips, gave me a smiling look, and typed furiously. She was probably sending me a message. Admirably enough, I had answered every one of Riyeon’s texts from this morning right up to the present moment while still preparing for this.
I allowed myself a faint smile. Image mattered. Bad image meant you could not do business. That team leader held a rank and salary far above what he deserved precisely because of that pretty face of his.
I turned sideways. Riyeon’s sidelong glances intensified. I had no idea what fantasy she was spinning, but it was all wrong, Riyeon. I walked past her. As I did, I lifted a finger and lightly brushed her hair. Her back went taut—the sign that she was both pleased and nervous.
All right. Time to go. I had made contact with a beautiful woman, so I was invincible. I was not doing this for nothing. I needed motivation. Motivation for why I had to handle this myself. The reason was simple: to protect Riyeon, the people in the company, and the company itself.
Knock knock.
“Come in.”
“Good afternoon, sir~.”
Stepping into the CEO’s office, I saw a very large, heavy solid-wood desk. The job posting had claimed they were a flat organization, yet a nameplate reading “CEO Yu Jongseok” sat proudly on that desk. The CEO himself had the kindly look of a man hovering between middle age and old age. Do not be fooled by that. Businessmen who have succeeded or founded companies are basically people who got there by clinging to their own stubbornness; no matter how nicely you put it, they will not listen to anything that is not what they already want to hear.
“Sir, about what you mentioned on Monday—signing a contract with a subcontracting firm and stationing our managers together with the subcontractor’s day laborers at the center.”
I began with the biggest possible smile, projecting the impression that I was not intimidated by him in the slightest. In truth I was not afraid of the CEO. The law was far scarier.
“Ah! That was Team Leader Gyeongji’s idea. Doesn’t seem like a bad approach. What do you think?”
“The concept itself is fine, but….”
Still, he was my direct superior, so I decided not to tear into it from the first sentence.
“It’s illegal. If the subcontractor’s people and our people are mixed together, that’s illegal dispatch.”
“We’re only managing them, right? We’re not doing the work ourselves.”
The terminology flying back and forth was a little dense, but for any company that operated a logistics center these were basics you were supposed to know. Yet even companies that had been around for ten or twenty years often had executives who were clueless about them. Ever since the push for modernization, national and economic growth had come first; companies had grown precisely by ignoring every minor and major law under the attitude of “How are we supposed to do business if we follow all that?”
“This is a pretty big deal. You know Vendorstream, the IT firm that got selected as a unicorn company recently? You had dinner with them not long ago, didn’t you?”
“Oh, yeah, I know them! Man, those guys are raking it in. We need to automate our centers, cut labor costs, and push our profits higher too.”
“Their CEO went into detention yesterday.”
“What?!”
“Caught for illegal dispatch. It was even on the news.”
I pulled up the article link on my phone and showed him. Only then did the CEO’s face turn serious.
“Sir, every illegal act except those under civil law is a criminal matter. And it’s a two-strike system. First time they tell you to correct it; get caught again and the executives go straight to detention. The big conglomerates actually spend hundreds of millions on ‘social contribution’ and cut deals so they never end up inside. But Vendorstream was in the red—they had no money. They boldly committed illegal acts with empty pockets, couldn’t make a deal, and became the first well-known startup CEO to get locked up.”
A little side note here. Vendorstream? I was the one who ratted them out. That was my previous company. Even there I had been a fighting cock; after they ignored my warnings several times I walked out and delivered justice. The same CEO who publicly spouted human-rights rhetoric would throw a fit inside the company and order day laborers cut because someone on the production line had sighed from exhaustion—how was that right?
Whether that was true or not, our own CEO Yu Jongseok, who had always felt inferior to Vendorstream’s young founder, allowed a faint smile to slip out at the misfortune.
“So is there another way?”
“There is! Which part should I start with?”
The CEO checked his expensive metal wristwatch and stopped me.
“Ah, sorry about this. I’ve got an outside meeting right now—I have to head out.”
“I’ll organize everything and email you a report by tomorrow morning. I’ll CC the team leader as well.”
“Got it~.”
He shrugged into his coat as he spoke. The outside meeting seemed to be real. A bitter taste filled my mouth. From the atmosphere just now it looked like my words had landed perfectly, but businessmen forget within minutes or dig in their heels and circle right back to square one. That is why you have to lock down a firm answer the moment you bring something up—and the timing had been bad.
Ah… stress. My head felt hot and my skin pulled dry and tight. The one thing that used to blow stress like this away had been the joy of watching everything—until the NTR Drift ruined it. While I was bouncing around with Riyeon I could at least look away from the stress, but it still never resolved; it only kept accumulating. It was not that I disliked Riyeon at all, but softening her manic, obsessive affection consumed so much energy that I could never secure rest for myself, nor recover.
“Thank you for your hard work, sir.”
“Good work~.”
I sighed, closed the CEO’s door behind me, and then froze under every pair of eyes suddenly fixed on me. What the hell was this? Had something blown up?
“Injae!”
“Yes?”
Minjeong from Management Support—who had the worst social radar in the entire team—came charging straight at me. From farther away Riyeon’s gaze turned murderous.
“Did it finally go through?”
“Excuse me? Did what?”
“The lunch allowance cards for each employee!”
These people knew the company’s situation perfectly well yet were stuffed full of nothing but their own greed. Even the handsome team leader was looking at me with expectant eyes. Operating profit had already tanked this year and everyone was panicking—how could Management Support be the ones to float the idea of increasing welfare spending even further? The more I thought about it, the more it pissed me off. They had naturally maneuvered things so that I would be the one carrying the flag. Sure, since arriving I had created a few basic welfare benefits that had not existed before, but this was different.
“I just went in for something else.”
I answered flatly, exhausted. People openly showed their disappointment. If you want it so badly, you go do it. You need money in the company to give welfare; if we give it and then cancel it later because of circumstances, you’ll just scream at me again.
Stress. Stress. Stress.
As long as you work at a company, this seems to be an unavoidable fate.
“Team Leader, can I have a word?”
“Sure, shall we?”
I called the team leader into a small meeting room and told him everything that had happened in the CEO’s office. He had tensed up at my summons yet still smiled for the benefit of watching eyes; once we were inside and I started explaining, his expression grew more and more sour. In his own mind the illegal-dispatch scheme had been a brilliant idea meant to score points; I had smashed it head-on, so of course he was uncomfortable. Even after hearing that Vendorstream’s CEO had gone to detention he still wore that face—proof he cared nothing about the company and was blinded only by his undeserved salary. Looking after yourself is important, but only if the company you are milking is still alive. And this guy was a team leader.
“Fine. Got it. Any other good methods?”
See? His tone had already lost all respect. At first he had tried to order me around however he liked; after I shattered him a few times like this his attitude had turned thoroughly sulky.
“There are a few options….”
“Organize them, report to the CEO, and CC me. Let’s do it that way.”
He tossed the words out and left the meeting room first. I leaned the chair as far back as it would go, closed my eyes, and let out a long, deep sigh.
“Hooooooo~ fuck.”
How the hell did I ever quit smoking? That was how much stress you used to give me—enough to drown out all the rest. You absolute bitch.
The whole world is crawling with bitches and bastards.
“Ha, fuck, maybe I should just quit.”
It was only talk. If I quit again there was nowhere left that would take me. Even when you do good work, if you never stay long, who is going to hire you?
I opened my phone to check whether any messages had piled up.
Riyeon’s careful invitation. Thank you for reading my mood. You wear me out, but you wear me out in a positive way. Today, though—between the lack of sleep and everything else—I genuinely just wanted pure rest.
Riyeon checking several times in case I might wander off somewhere else. I was truly sorry, but even that was putting too much strain on my body and mind right now.
Throb.
Ah, my heart hurts.