The Terror of Habit
"I knew it."
In the end, the Eagles failed to complete the comeback and notched their fourth straight loss. They called it a four-game skid, but the last ten games sat at one win and nine losses. It was a nine-game losing streak in everything but name.
I practically threw my phone down and wiped my forehead. Just when were the Eagles going to win a championship? They'd manage it before I died, right? The Chicago Cubs had gone a hundred and eight years between titles, and it had only been a little over twenty since the Daejeon Eagles last took one. Thirty teams in the majors, ten in Korean pro ball. By simple math, they ought to pull it off within a decade. I could only pray they would.
"Did they lose?"
"Ack! You scared me."
I jumped and spun around to find Gwak Hyeona standing there.
"Ah — you haven't left yet?"
"You told me to make myself comfortable, so I did."
"Ah... right."
I hadn't expected her to take that quite so literally. I'd figured she would have headed out ages ago. She'd clearly rested well — her face looked completely refreshed.
"I'll be going, then. Get some rest, Beomjun."
"Yes. Thank you for all your hard work today."
"Of course. I'll see you tomorrow."
After exchanging goodbyes, Gwak Hyeona left the room. Her footsteps were light.
Click. Clack.
The door shut, and I was alone again. Time to sleep, I guessed. It was nearly ten. My eyelids grew heavier by the second. I peeled off my pants, slipped under the covers, and settled in for the night.
Bzzt-bzzt-beep.
The alarm dragged me out of sleep. I pried my groggy eyes open, hauled myself out of bed, and headed for the bathroom.
"Ah..."
I turned around, went back to the room, and pulled my toiletries from my bag. After a quick wash-up, I headed for the kitchen. I grabbed the rice cooker pot off the dish rack, rinsed the rice, added water, and set it in the electric cooker. From the fridge I pulled out the pork shoulder I'd bought yesterday, along with some vegetables, and started prepping.
This morning's menu: spicy stir-fried pork. Time to replenish all the protein I'd burned through overnight.
I was deep in the cooking when I heard someone behind me.
"Beomjun? You're up early."
"Ah, yes. Did you sleep well?"
It was Gwak Hyeona, wearing dolphin shorts. Those legs were something else. Sunlight streaming through the living room window caught along them, and the lines were stunning.
Oops.
I'd been staring way too obviously. I yanked my eyes away and snuck a glance at her face, worried I might have offended her.
"I did. Did you sleep well, Beomjun?"
"Y-yes. I slept well."
"That's good."
I couldn't tell. I couldn't read a single emotion on that face. Focus on the cooking. You don't mess around in front of a hot pan. But I couldn't — because she was slowly walking toward me.
Was she coming over to call me out for staring at her legs? No. Thinking about it, that was unlikely. No man ever chewed a woman out for looking at his legs. Anyone who did would be treated like a lunatic. Over here, it was the opposite: a society where a man could stare at a woman's legs all he wanted and nobody would be uncomfortable. This was a world that had gotten it right.
So why was I so nervous? The closer Gwak Hyeona got, the more it ate at me. What was she coming over for? And without saying a word, at that.
She kept coming toward me — then veered off toward the water dispenser.
Phew.
That nearly gave me a heart attack. Relieved, I went back to stirring the pan — and then Gwak Hyeona let out a startled cry.
"Ah—!"
She sounded flustered. I turned with a puzzled look and found her staring at my lower half, eyes wide.
What? Why is she so shocked by my legs?
Bewildered, I looked down at myself. Nothing weird down there. Just a perfectly ordinary pair of underwear on a perfectly ordinary lower half.
......Underwear?
"Wh-whuh-huhhhk?!"
Wh-what. Why am I only wearing underwear?
Why? Because I never put my pants on, that's why. It was habit. The habit of not putting on pants from the moment I woke up until I sat down to eat. Putting them on the second I got up was a hassle, but sitting on a chair in just my underwear felt grimy, and that was how the habit had formed. I'd always gotten up, washed up quickly, made breakfast, and only pulled my pants on right before sitting down at the table. It had become second nature, and it had stuck. So I hadn't felt a thing was off — I'd just been wandering around in my underwear like always, and I was only realizing it now.
I clapped both hands over my crotch and bolted for the bedroom. I yanked on the pants sitting by the bed.
"Hah... shit."
It all got recorded, didn't it. Me sleeping in nothing but underwear. Me wandering the house in nothing but underwear. Even me cooking in nothing but underwear. She'd have to watch all of that while she edited. And maybe the viewers would see it too. I'd told them they could use whatever they wanted, so asking her to delete it felt... awkward. She'd cut it if I asked, of course — but my pride wouldn't let me go back on my word.
Underwear exposure, huh. The buzz would be insane. First the shirtless shots, now the briefs. I was on the larger side, so the front of my underwear had been sitting pretty full. I'd been walking around completely unbothered, so the cameras would have caught every last bit of it. How could I be this shameless?
Beating myself up, I left the room. I headed back to the kitchen and found Gwak Hyeona stirring the pan. From this angle, the U-shaped counter blocked the view of anyone's lower half. That was why she'd only noticed my underwear — and freaked out — once she got close.
I sidled up next to her, fidgeting.
"Please let me... I'll take over..."
"Ah. Yes. Here."
Gwak Hyeona handed over the spatula with awkward, stiff movements. I couldn't bring myself to look at her face, so I locked my eyes on the sizzling pork. I heard her fill a cup from the water dispenser and drink.
Clack.
She set the cup down and just stood there. The sound of cooking meat filled the kitchen. In the thick, awkward silence, Gwak Hyeona finally spoke.
"I-I'll keep it a secret."
"...But the cameras caught everything."
"I turned them all off before I went to bed last night. We just need to delete the footage from the camera in your room."
"Ah..."
Should I say I was relieved? The relief of not having to show my underwear to the masses. And yet, for reasons I couldn't quite name, I also felt a tiny bit disappointed.
"Thank you."
"I'll just..."
Gwak Hyeona disappeared toward my room. She was going to delete the files right away, apparently.
"Hoo..."
Once she was gone, a long sigh of relief slipped out of me. I genuinely thought I was going to die of embarrassment. I'd almost unveiled my tented briefs to the entire world. I was a little disappointed I wouldn't get to show off my impressive equipment, but it was still too early for that. This was a completely different feeling from going shirtless. I was mortified.
I shook my head hard, trying to shake off the shame. She'd said she'd delete it, so I should just forget about it. No — I shouldn't forget. I should take this as a lesson and be careful. Extra careful. Grateful to Gwak Hyeona, who was blunt but deeply considerate, I focused on finishing breakfast.
Gwak Hyeona stepped into the room Park Beomjun was using. With practiced hands, she unmounted the camera and stopped the recording, then scrubbed backward through the footage at high speed. After rewinding for a while, she stopped at last night — the moment Park Beomjun had taken off his pants and lain down in bed. She split the clip and deleted everything after that point.
Park Beomjun's underwear was gone from the camera now. Completely. But the camera wasn't the only place that image of him in his briefs had been saved.
Gwak Hyeona remounted the camera and left the room. When she stepped into the bathroom, her face was as red as a perfectly ripe apple.
"Thanks for the meal."
"This is so good."
"Is it normal that I'm already looking forward to lunch?"
"Yep. Totally normal."
Gwak Hyeona and Staffers One, Two, and Three spoke up in turn. Two people were missing — they'd edited through the night and clocked out at dawn, apparently.
"Ugh. Chew, chew. ...s'good..."
Choi Yeram was still eating, her movements sluggish from the muscle soreness. One spoonful, a grimace. Another spoonful, another grimace. It was a miracle she was moving at all.
"We'll clean up!"
"Yes. Thank you."
Once again, I was shoved out of cleanup duty. Fine by me. Not having to deal with the annoying dishes was a win. I grabbed my toothbrush and brushed my teeth. I finished in the bathroom, walked into my room — and someone called my name.
"Beomjun."
"Yes? Ah..."
It was Gwak Hyeona. I stood there fidgeting as the embarrassment welled back up, and she walked over. Her face was as expressionless as ever as she spoke.
"Do you happen to know how to give a massage?"
"...A massage?"
"Yes. Something like a sports massage."
I'd even given up my bed for her last night, and she was still all business. I could have felt a little hurt, but right now that professional attitude was actually putting me at ease.
"Yeram's groaning that she can barely move from the muscle soreness. If you know how to give a massage, I think we'd get some good footage."
"Ah... I know a few simple things. But it's not really massage — it's stretching. Stretching that helps loosen up the muscles."
There were so many fitness YouTubers out there that you could pick up stretching just by poking around a little. I knew a handful of stretches that were good for working out the knots.
"Hmm. Stretching would work too. Yeram's going to be in pain either way."
"Pardon?"
"Just rest for now. I'll call you once everything's set up."
With that, Gwak Hyeona turned away. Had I heard that right? She'd definitely said it was fine because Choi Yeram would be suffering either way. It was true that the more the channel owner suffered, the more the viewers enjoyed it — but I hadn't expected her to be that blunt about wanting it. She really didn't pull any punches with her own boss. Whatever happened to the considerate woman who'd been looking out for me?
Gwak Hyeona strode off without a hint of hesitation.