We'll Fix Anything, We'll Make Anything
Ding-dong.
"Who is it?"
"Freight delivery."
"Freight delivery? One moment."
Major General Hwang's wife called to her husband, who had been resting in the living room.
"Honey. They say there's a freight delivery. Do you know anything about this?"
"Freight delivery? Ah!"
Without a shred of hesitation, Hwang Dae-gyun opened the door and hauled the enormous package inside.
"What on earth is this?"
A look of pure happiness spread across his face as he tore into the box.
"It's the chair Master Kang made for me!"
His wife gave him a blank look.
"Master Kang? You mean the man who made you that chair a little while ago?"
"That's right. I asked him to make me another one so I could use it at home, too."
When the last of the packaging fell away, Cheol-woo's second chair emerged into the world.
All right. Let's see...
Hwang Dae-gyun swallowed once, then sat down.
"Ahhh...!"
It was, once again, perfection. The very sensation of sitting was nothing like any chair he had ever known. He had spent another ten million won on this second chair — twenty million on two chairs alone — and he could not have cared less. When sitting could feel this good, what was twenty million won?
His wife, however, watched him with a look that said she did not quite understand.
"Is that chair really that wonderful?"
"Of course it is. Honestly, now that I have one at the base, I can actually get work done. I finally feel like a human being again."
"Is that so? Would you mind if I sat in it too?"
"Go ahead. Try it yourself."
He stood, and his wife eased herself slowly into the chair.
It's just a chair. What's all the fuss...
And then—
"Oh...?"
It felt as though the chair itself were reshaping around her body. Lee Se-ran, wife of Major General Hwang Dae-gyun, was not merely a housewife. She was a writer by profession, and so she had always been particular about her chairs. She had never encountered anything like this in her life.
How can anything be this comfortable?
It was as if the chair itself possessed a life of its own.
"Well? Comfortable, isn't it?"
"Yes... no, I've never sat in a chair this comfortable. He's no ordinary craftsman."
"It'll feel a little less perfect for you, though."
"Pardon?"
Hwang Dae-gyun turned the chair and showed her the engraving on the back.
"See this? This chair was custom-made for me and me alone. So you won't feel quite what I feel."
"Is that so...? Hmm..."
She had never known a chair like this existed, and now she was being told it was not even the best it could be. The thought of one tailored to her own body made her desperately curious.
How much is left in that savings account...
She thought of the installment savings she had started years ago.
"Honey. Could I have Master Kang's number...?"
That aside... I do need to advertise...
Making two chairs had put a fair amount of money in my hands, but if I wanted a steady stream of work, I was going to need publicity. The workshop sat in a rundown industrial zone. Without any advertising at all, customers simply would not come.
"How much does online advertising even cost..."
I switched on the computer and looked up the prices.
"What? Why is this so expensive..."
Even a simple banner ad cost more than I had imagined. There were cheaper options, but those looked like they would not do much good.
"Nothing in this world comes easy..."
Disheartened by the absurd prices, I lay down on the bed and was stroking the cat when I heard the front door open.
Who's that?
I went out to the entryway and found a welcome face. It was my younger brother Jeonghwan, home on his hundred-day leave.
Mother, who had been preparing lunch, rushed to the door and pulled him into a tight hug.
"Aigoo, my boy. You've worked so hard!"
"Not at all. Hard work? Please. I'm home. Loyalty."
After the hug, he turned and saluted me as well.
"Loyalty."
I returned the still-awkward salute of a private.
"You did well. Come on in."
"Yeah."
As was often the case with brothers two years apart, a faintly awkward atmosphere settled between us. And the one who broke it was none other than the family cat, Pingping.
Hissss!!
It had only been a few months, but Pingping failed to recognize Jeonghwan and puffed up, hissing. Jeonghwan stepped inside, looking indignant.
"Hey, Pingping. That's cold. It's only been a little while and you don't even know my face?"
He held out his hand. Pingping sniffed it a few times, then remembered.
Mrow! Mrow!
Pingping darted over and began rubbing against him.
"There we go. You remember me now. That's right, that's right."
I smiled at the sight.
"So? How's army life treating you?"
Jeonghwan took off his cap, set it down, and asked in a serious voice.
"Hyung, what the hell did you do to the Division Commander?"
"Do? I just made him a chair he commissioned."
"You can get that kind of attention from one chair?"
"Major General Hwang is looking out for you?"
"Don't even get me started. He calls me in every few days to ask if anything's hard, if I need anything. He even transferred me to the cushiest assignment in the unit."
"That's good."
But Jeonghwan's expression turned a little bitter.
"I just don't know if it's right to have it this easy..."
"Kang Jeonghwan. You think anyone's going to thank you for getting hurt in the army? The most important thing is to come home healthy."
The tone was a little stern, but I meant every word. There was a saying, after all.
When they need you, you're a son of the nation. When you're hurt or dead — who are you, again?
I did not want my family suffering in a place where no one would even remember their names.
"I... I guess so. Anyway, thanks, hyung. It's all because of you."
"That's so cheesy."
"Ahahaha. Yeah, I guess brothers don't usually talk like that."
By then Pingping had forgotten the hissing entirely and was pressed against Jeonghwan's side, singing a little purr-song.
"Pingping, scoot over a bit. I need to use the computer in the room for a minute."
Jeonghwan stood and looked over at me.
"Hyung, mind if I use your computer?"
"Ah, hang on — let me close what I was doing."
I went into the room and closed all the advertising websites I had left open. But Jeonghwan had already come up behind me and seen the pages.
"Hyung. You need to advertise something? Did you start a business?"
"I wouldn't call it a business yet... It's the workshop. The location's terrible, so I figured I should try to get the word out."
"Hmm..."
Jeonghwan thought for a moment, then clapped his hands as something occurred to him.
"Oh, right. Hyung, want me to post a promo in the game group chat I used to run?"
"A game group chat...? Ah..."
Come to think of it, Jeonghwan had been playing the same online game since middle school, and years of community involvement had left him with a fairly wide network. Still, I was a little skeptical that a gaming group chat would do much as advertising.
"Hyung, everyone's a working adult now, it's limited to Gyeonggi-do, and there are over five hundred people in that chat. It'll get some traction."
Hmm...
The professional agencies were too expensive anyway. Posting in that chat could not hurt.
"Yeah? All right, go ahead and put something up."
"Okay. Got it. Oh, hyung — do you have ad copy already?"
"Ad copy...? Uhh..."
...We make anything... We fix anything...
I organized the words in my head, then spoke.
It was the moment the slogan that would come to define All-Around Workshop was born.
"This isn't it!"
The man hurled the bowl in his hands, clearly dissatisfied with whatever he had just tasted.
Crash!
A rather expensive-looking bowl shattered across the floor. The people around him glanced at one another, then quietly swept up the pieces with a broom and dustpan. Someone approached.
"Chef... are you all right?"
"Hah... I'm losing my mind."
The man they called Chef was none other than Lee Jin-seong, owner and head chef of Cheonghak, a Michelin two-star fusion Korean restaurant.
What's going wrong...
He had been in a slump of late. Whenever he cooked, nothing went the way he intended. And the greatest cause of it all was the knife and the rest of the tools sitting on his station — a single blade and a handful of implements he had used since the day he became a chef.
To anyone else they might have looked like a worn-out knife and a collection of battered tools. But he believed he never would have reached where he stood without them. They meant that much to him.
Lately, though, the knife and the tools had been giving him trouble. He could not say exactly why, but he could not even cut ingredients properly, and his efficiency in the kitchen had dropped. When the food would not slice the way he wanted and the tools would not perform as he expected, the taste and the presentation changed of their own accord.
"Chef, if it's the knife, maybe you could try a different one..."
Lee Jin-seong let out a long breath.
"I do use other knives, you know..."
What kind of chef used only one knife? He reached for others from time to time. But the only time he ever hit his absolute peak was with that knife and those tools — the ones he had started with.
I'm going to lose it...
He had no will left to do anything more today. He stood.
"I'm going to step out and clear my head."
He took his phone and went outside.
"Hah..."
The outside air on his face helped a little. He felt marginally better than he had a moment ago.
A chat notification chimed.
What now.
He opened it. A notice had been posted in the group chat of the game he played to blow off steam.
A notice?
"What is this... they're pinning an ad as a notice..."
The fact that someone had pinned an advertisement as an official notice irritated him a little, but the poster was the group admin — a veteran among veterans — so he could not exactly complain. Telling himself it was nothing, he slipped the phone back into his pocket.
And yet—
They'll make anything, and they'll fix anything...?
The advertisement from a moment ago kept circling in his mind.
"Don't tell me..."