Familiar Taste (1)
"Wait—you're asking me to handle the celebration? Not some game commercial or anything like that? Is this even for real...?"
...Weird. He's definitely the same person, but he's completely different from what I used to see.
Watching Baek Yi-an mutter under his breath as he turned her proposal over in his mind, Ha Ji-yoo wore a look of pure incomprehension.
In truth, she had never told Baek Yi-an or Shin A-yoon, but Ha Ji-yoo already knew plenty about him. She knew he had been a player of considerable talent ever since his youth academy days—and she knew his personality was far fouler than most people realized.
How does someone change this completely overnight? It didn't even take that long. Six months at most, right?
That was why she couldn't help staring at the Baek Yi-an sitting in front of her as if he were some strange creature. The man in her memory and the man across the table shared a name and a face, but their personalities might as well have belonged to two entirely different people.
With Yi-an still lost in thought, Ha Ji-yoo quietly closed her eyes and reached back a few years into her own past.
Her father, coming home late from work and replaying youth league matches on the screen. Exhausted to the bone, he had dozed off mid-match, and she had gone to drape a blanket over him—only to catch sight of Yoon Seung-hwan in the footage still playing. That single moment had been the beginning of her life in football.
From then on, Ha Ji-yoo had secretly followed every Jeonbuk youth match she could get her hands on, and of course the names of Seung-hwan's teammates had lodged themselves in her memory without her even trying. Among them, Baek Yi-an—widely regarded as a core player right alongside Yoon Seung-hwan in the Jeonbuk youth setup—had been a name she could hardly forget.
Back then I was keeping an eye on him as a prospect we'd have to sign the moment the club acquisition went through, right next to Seung-hwan.
But the harder she watched their matches and dug into their tracks, the more unwanted information drifted into her ears. And the memory that burned itself deepest into her mind was none other than Baek Yi-an.
Hot-tempered. Even in middle school he'd stirred up trouble with other players. Sure, both sides were at fault and it got smoothed over, but if it had gone any further it wouldn't have been strange for the whole mess to explode into a public mudslinging war.
A guy who was short-fused on the pitch and carried a pretty rotten reputation off it as well. That was the Baek Yi-an she had uncovered. From that day forward she had completely written him off and devoted herself solely to Yoon Seung-hwan. She had always believed a person's true nature never changed that easily.
Which only made the present all the more baffling.
How on earth did he change? I couldn't even understand how A-yoon stayed childhood friends with a guy like that, let alone actually dated him... Did he really turn over a new leaf? Was everything A-yoon said true?
When she had casually asked why A-yoon was dating her childhood friend instead of any of the guys who were after her, Shin A-yoon had answered like this: their friendship had once grown so distant she had nearly cut him off completely, but after Baek Yi-an's apology and the total transformation in his behavior, she had changed her mind and started going out with him.
From Ha Ji-yoo's perspective, the idea that someone could kill off a personality that thoroughly deserved the word "trash" and rewrite himself from the ground up was almost impossible to swallow... yet what was she supposed to do? The Baek Yi-an sitting in front of her no longer showed a single trace of the person she used to know.
She had come here partly to ask whether he would be willing to model for their upcoming game, and partly to prove to herself, in this very conversation, that Baek Yi-an had truly changed. He had passed with flying colors. It had been only a short exchange—hardly enough time to plumb anyone's nature—but the atmosphere and the content of their talk had been enough to overturn her old assumptions. By the time she reached that conclusion, Ha Ji-yoo no longer doubted him.
Perhaps that was exactly why the next thought came so easily.
At this rate I can scrap the whole plan and rewrite it. Right now Baek Yi-an is the hottest rookie in the K-League, but I'd been prioritizing Seung-hwan in case his temper blew up later. If he's really like this, pushing both Seung-hwan and Baek Yi-an hard wouldn't be a bad idea at all. Perfect timing, too—Father's been looking for young players to take full charge of the capsule promo.
The conviction settled in her that she could trust him now. There was no need to hesitate any longer.
"What do you think? If the celebration model doesn't sit right with you, I can propose something else. Of course, A-yoon was looking forward to seeing her boyfriend's celebration implemented in the game, but... well, it can't be helped..."
"A-yoon said she was looking forward to it? Then I'll do it."
"What? W-weren't you just agonizing over it a second ago?"
"Come on, when? I was only deciding which celebration to use. I'm fine with it, so I'll be waiting for your call."
What is with this guy... Did he not change at all—did he just get a little weirder?
The way he flipped his attitude the instant Shin A-yoon's name came up made Ha Ji-yoo tilt her head in confusion.
Even after we finished the Pohang match with a win, our momentum never wavered. Overwhelming winning streaks and razor-sharp performances—we kept proving that none of it was mere luck or the result of snatching empty houses while other teams were still finding their feet early in the season. The team simply refused to let the wave die.
Incheon, Suwon CF, Suwon Osung, Ulsan—we closed out that four-match stretch with two wins and two draws.
Sandwiched in the middle was the Korea Cup round of sixteen against Paju Citizen FC, where we fielded a heavy contingent of reserves and still walked away with a 4–0 thrashing. The results were better than anyone could have imagined. Simply staying undefeated was already excellent, but for a Jeonbuk side aiming at the treble this season, neither the league nor the Korea Cup could be sacrificed—and we had lit a fire of hope under every single one of those competitions.
Unlike other clubs, we had to keep our league form climbing while also delivering in the Korea Cup and the ACL. We had just punched our way undefeated through a brutal stretch of fixtures under that crushing pressure. Better still, the first-team players hadn't been run into the ground; against weaker sides and in the cup we had rotated the reserves properly and banked the wins while conserving energy. It was hard to imagine a better outcome.
With that, the league picture was starting to settle into a clear shape. But the assignments handed to me were not finished. Beyond the matches for Jeonbuk Future Motors, there were still games I had to play.
"Mom. How about it—did the list drop?"
"Yeah. Ian's mom, check it already!"
"Hold on, you! You're not the only one losing your mind here—I'm dying of nerves too, so why are you breathing down my neck? Just wait a second! It'll be up in one more minute... wait, it's out!"
"H-hurry and check! Is our Ian's name there? Is Baek Yi-an on it?!"
"It's there! He's there! Our son made the World Cup qualifiers again!"
The World Cup third-round qualifier away to Iraq, scheduled for June 5th. The joy of learning that Manager Martin Valde had selected me once more lasted only a heartbeat before I immediately started planning what needed to be done.
June 5th—not much time left. An away match means we'll be stuck in the Middle East for a while once we fly out. I need to spend as much time with A-yoon as I can before then. Maybe take Ibrahim Poppy for a walk to the park nearby first?
With overseas duty looming, nothing in the world mattered more to me than the time I still had with A-yoon.
Time slipped by, and before I knew it the national team call-up day had arrived. Just like before, I finished school, rode to Cheonan in my parents' car, and the moment I stepped out I was swallowed by a whirlwind of activity.
"Seung-hwaaaan! I came all the way from Mokpo just to see you! Can I get an autograph?!"
"An autograph? Ah—gifts. I'm not allowed to accept those, so would a letter be all right?"
"Baek Yi-an? You've been selected for the national team roster once again under Manager Martin Valde. Could we get a quick word on how you're feeling?"
"Well, I don't think there's a more honorable place than a national team squad, so I plan to work my ass off. First match is the Iraq away game, right? If they try lying down again, I'll drag them up and thrash them."
"Excuse me? Thrash them?"
"Yeah. If they're reckless enough to just lie there, that's what they deserve, don't you think? Ah—was that too harsh? You can edit that out, right?"
Back in the day I would have looked at these people with pure who the hell are these guys energy. But after strong performances in the league—and more importantly, solid showings from both of us with the national team—the welcome waiting for us felt completely different from before.
Watching the fans packed wall to wall, I spent the entire interview half-worried that Yoon Seung-hwan's carefully buried star complex might flare up again. Thankfully, none of the impulsive stunts I was bracing for ever materialized. Apart from that, the national team gathering itself passed without any real incident.
My heart feels calmer than I expected. Nothing's really changed, either.
How should I put it? It felt like coming back to a house you left years ago and stepping through the front door again. A little awkward, maybe, but somewhere deep down there was a quiet sense of relief.
Is that even strange? The core players are all the same faces. When everyone around you is familiar, feeling like a newcomer would be the weird part.
Ever since Manager Martin Valde took the national team helm, a generational shift had already taken place, and maybe our strong showing in the previous third-round qualifiers played a role. The published roster barely differed—most of the players called up last time were back again.
There was one difference, though.
"Gang-rok. I have waited a long, long time for a fullback like you."
"What was that? Manager... if you hit me with Spanish the second we meet, I can't translate any of it..."
Two men right at the entrance of the football center. Han Gang-rok tilting his head with a face that clearly said what on earth is this guy talking about. And Manager Martin Valde, gripping both of Gang-rok's hands the same way he once had with me, pouring out something that was not quite a courtship—in Spanish.
Mm... same old flavor as always.
There had been a few small changes, but the national team still felt like something I already knew by heart.