The Forty-Day Doll 8
Because of the conversation about yesterday’s lunch, I ended up having lunch with them—something that had never been planned.
I had thought of it as little more than a kiss meant to turn away from the situation, but when Secretary Choi called to say he had come to pick me up around lunchtime, I realized it had become real.
“Have you ever been to Panokjeom, Yeeun?”
“No.”
I didn’t even know where it was.
“It’s a little pricey, but of all the galbitang I’ve ever had, it’s easily in my top three.”
“That good?”
Learning about a good restaurant was always welcome, but a meal with the boss was not something I particularly wanted. Still, when someone offered information like that, matching their energy was simply how office life worked. I pretended curiosity and searched the place on my phone, then tossed out whatever details I found so the conversation would keep moving. Secretary Choi filled in what he knew, and a natural back-and-forth formed between us. After about ten minutes of driving, we arrived at a large building done in the hanok style. A staff member who recognized Secretary Choi led us straight to the private room where the boss was waiting.
“You’re early.”
“Yes, sir. The lights were with us, so we made good time.”
“Sit.”
Secretary Choi—my senior, in a manner of speaking—took the seat across from the boss, and I sat beside him.
But the boss hadn’t looked at us once since we came in. He stayed glued to his phone, then finally flung it down in irritation.
“Jesus. This crazy bitch picks a fight over every single thing.”
As the lowest person at the table, I kept still.
“Is something the matter, sir?”
“Who knows. Same old nagging from that woman. Always is.”
The phone he had thrown down started vibrating.
“Ugh…”
It kept ringing.
“This call’s going to take a while. Go ahead and eat without me.”
He picked up the phone and walked out.
“…When he says ‘that woman,’ does he mean his mother?”
“His stepmother. The boss’s family situation is… a bit complicated, yes.”
Not long after, the door opened again. A server appeared with side dishes and bowls of galbitang.
“Shall we take our time, then.”
The boss only came back once the galbitang had gone lukewarm. He sat down as if nothing had happened and ate in silence, but the sour mood clinging to the table kept anyone from speaking. The meal ended in that quiet. Afterward they dropped me off alone at the hotel and drove away again. I didn’t mind being left behind. I had eaten well—that was enough—and the fact that the boss was miserable only made me glad.
“Get yelled at. Really get it. Get torn apart.”
How happy had I been, deep down, when I heard the chairman had chewed him out? Since I couldn’t harm him myself, all I could hope for was that someone higher up would make his life hard. And whenever stress got to him, the boss had a habit of simply not showing up. He was probably off to a room salon or somewhere similar to blow off steam, but for me that was pure good news. The things he demanded of me climbed higher by the day, as if he were testing how far he could go, and the shame of it never left me. Even one fewer day of that was something I would have welcomed with both hands.
An ordinary day passed. The next day, the boss didn’t come in either.
Once I clocked out, it would be the weekend. That left ten weekdays. In other words, if I held on for just two more weeks, this life would be over.
I was packing up with something close to a light heart when the boss appeared.
Fuck…
He walked into his office without a word.
I finished getting ready to leave, then knocked on his door—the bare minimum of courtesy.
— Knock knock.
[…]
No sound came from inside. It wasn’t as if I had knocked too softly for him to hear.
I knocked again. Still nothing. Carefully, I eased the door open—and my eyes met the boss’s. He was sitting at the reception table.
“I’ll be heading out for the day.”
Instead of answering, he crooked a finger, beckoning me over.
I should have just run.
If a superior was still on the clock, saying goodbye before you left was the least you could do. But in two weeks this arrangement would be finished anyway, and ours had never been a relationship that deserved good manners. Even so, I had offered the bare minimum of a farewell…
And now I was caught.
“…I’ll be heading out for the day.”
I repeated the greeting as if I hadn’t seen the gesture.
Then his voice came.
“Come here.”
“…”
There was no getting out of it. I stepped inside.
“Take your coat off.”
Ordinarily, if he only needed a quick word or a simple favor, he never told me to take off my coat. So when he did, it meant this would not be short or simple. Still, wanting to leave as soon as possible, I laid the coat on the sofa where he sat—a silent signal to wrap it up quickly. Whether he noticed or not, he only glanced over the coat once and looked straight ahead again.
“Massage my shoulders a bit.”
The reception sofa was deep enough that you had to sprawl to reach the backrest. He propped his feet on the table and sank into it. I moved slowly behind the sofa and began working his shoulders.
“Harder.”
I put everything I had into my grip, hoping it would hurt.
“That’s perfect.”
He liked it instead. In moments like this, I hated how weak I was.
Following his requests, I pounded with my fists, then kneaded with my hands, over and over.
“That’s enough.”
He stood, went to the display cabinet, and took down a bottle of whiskey and two glasses.
“Sit.”
He was in a guest seat rather than the place of honor, so I took the chair across from him. He patted the cushion beside him.
“…”
The memory of the day he had smashed me with a beer bottle came back unbidden. He didn’t care. He patted the seat again.
“Over here.”
I sat beside him reluctantly. He set the two glasses on the reception table, poured whiskey into mine, and put the bottle down. Without thinking, I filled his glass in turn. He raised his glass as if for a toast; I clinked mine against it out of form and wet my lips.
The harsh scent of whiskey filled my mouth and slipped out again on my breath.
“What do you do when you get home?”
“Watch dramas or movies.”
“Boring hobby.”
He sipped alone.
“Getting along with your family?”
Family, to me, was a formal idea at best. Still, I understood that what “family” meant to someone who lived only once was different from what it meant to someone like me, forever drifting.
“I don’t even know their faces.”
“…”
He took another sip.
“Shouldn’t have asked.”
He swirled the whiskey in his glass.
“You and me both—we’re a real pair of wrecks.”
“…”
“Isn’t there anything you’re curious about with me?”
“No.”
The relationship was ending soon, and I had no plans to see him again. Even if something had interested me, the only feeling left was spite, so I had no desire to ask.
He drained his glass in one go and didn’t set it down. He just held it and looked at me. Understanding what that meant, I refilled it.
“There was a novel that left a real impression on me once.”
“…”
“You know it? A novel called The Compass.”
I didn’t. I had never cared for novels.
“It’s about a boy who crosses the open ocean with nothing but a compass, heading for the North Pole.”
He let out a deep sigh, as if sifting through memory.
“Following the direction the compass pointed, he came right up to the North Pole he had been aiming for.”
“…”
“That’s where he meets an old Eskimo, and there’s a scene where he asks about the Pole.”
Quiet breathing settled into the faint ambient noise, soft as white static.
“…The boy asked the old man what was at the place the compass was pointing to.”
“…”
“The old man told him there was the North Pole, packed full of ice.”
He smiled, slowly.
“Then the boy asked him: so what’s beyond the place the compass points to?”
“…”
He turned his head gradually and looked at me.
“What do you think he answered?”
“…I don’t know.”
“The old man said the sea comes out again.”
He took a sip.
“The boy asked again: then which way should I go? And the old man answered like this—”
He paused for a moment. Then:
“Go in the direction the compass does not point.”
“…”
“Funny thing is, if you look at the first edition, it doesn’t say ‘pointing’ at all. It absurdly says ‘teaching’ instead.”
It took me only a few moments to catch on after he said that.
“So there’s another meaning.”
“Exactly.”
He raised his glass with something like pleasure. I clinked mine against it and wet my lips again.
“I’m always stuck drinking with empty-headed bitches. Drinking with you is actually nice.”
“…”
“So—was that ‘teaching’ a typo?”
“It could have been. Or it might not have been.”
“Why?”
I thought for a moment. He sipped and waited while I did.
“The author might have put the typo in on purpose to emphasize that line. Or there could have been a hidden meaning that made him do it deliberately. If neither applies, then it was just a plain mistake.”
He smiled, pleased.
“Right. On the surface it’s a novel about a boy’s life, but if you match the meanings piece by piece, it’s a social critique—about how adults decide children’s futures. Looked at that way, ‘teaching’ was an intentional typo by the author.”
“…”
“So then why did it get changed later to ‘pointing’?”
I thought again. Plenty of hypotheses surfaced at once.
“There could have been any number of reasons.”
“For example?”
“Once the book spread, public opinion may have forced them to call it a typo and fix it. Or the publisher changed it without the author’s knowledge—plenty of possibilities.”
“Would the author have changed it?”
“I don’t think he would have done it on purpose.”
He laughed soundlessly and drank. Then he let out a long breath.
“Here’s the absurd part. The author died right around the time the first edition went to print. So later the publisher just arbitrarily swapped the word.”
“…”
He raised his glass; I met it and sipped.
“And because of that change… the old man’s words to the boy became an invitation to set out on a new journey.”
“…”
“Even though the line wasn’t meant for the boy. It was meant for the reader.”
Hearing that, I tried to work out why the boss had brought the story up. No matter how I turned it over, I couldn’t find any resonance or buried meaning that fit our situation.
It seemed like idle talk—and yet, looking at him sitting there so blankly, I felt a deep loneliness coming off him.
“…What are you going to do after you quit?”
I hadn’t planned anything particular. As long as I could feed myself, a modest income was enough. I wanted a quiet life, so I had no interest in becoming a model or celebrity or any other kind of public figure. People who lived off the public’s gaze had to live conscious of that gaze—couldn’t even jaywalk without thinking twice. I hated that.
What I wanted was simple: a small citizen who made a reasonable living. That was all.
“Probably…”
People said a beautiful woman was the equal of someone who had passed the four great civil exams—but this was still Korea, a country obsessed with academic pedigree. So I would have to wash the stain of a middle-school diploma off my record.
“I’m going to university.”