To Kiss An Idol

ADD

217 The Reprimand of Dae

Jae-Hwa kept yawning and drinking coffee from her traveller mug. Her bags kept slipping from her shoulder. Even her jacket was hanging from one of her hands.

“Woah! Did a hurricane hit you?” laughed Nivritti.

“Oh, shut up!” groaned Jae-Hwa and again lifted her bag but again it refused to stay in its place.

“Just give your bag to me,” said Nivritti.

Finally, Jae-Hwa opened her eyes completely and looked at Nivritti. “Oh, I hate you. How do you look like this, and I look like this?”

Nivritti took Jae-Hwa’s coffee cup and bags out of her hands freeing her hand so that she could wear her jacket properly. “Because I finished my work at night and had a good night’s sleep. Did you sleep at all?”

“After your message, I grew restless. I thought I should finish everything and then sleep. But then it was too late so I thought I would get up early and finish it. So, I tried sleeping but tension and anxiety didn’t let me sleep. Ultimately the alarm went off and I didn’t sleep at all, uh... huuh… huuh,” pouted Jae-Hwa.

“Is this how you cry?” asked Nivritti, disgusted.

“I am going to kill you!!!” shouted Jae-Hwa. Two people who were inside the lift started staring at Nivritti.

.....

“She does not mean that,” said Nivritti and stood beside Jae-Hwa. “Why are you so worked up? Did you not finish the summary?”

“Whatever questions there were on the template, I did only that,” replied Jae-Hwa.

“That is great. So, why are you so cranky? You finished the job,” asked Nivritti.

“Coz, I didn’t get any sleep,” sulked Jae-Hwa.

“Okay, let’s get you another coffee,” said Nivritti and first took Jae-Hwa to the cafeteria and bought her a cup of black coffee and got herself an orange tea.

After they reached their respective seats, they started their laptop and kept drinking their drinks in silence. They waited for Dae and Chung-Ho. After minutes Chung-Ho arrived but Dae was still not there.

“Good morning, everyone!” greeted Chung-Ho and everyone present in the department greeted him back. “Rencontre team! Where is Seong-ssi?” he asked.

“No idea,” replied Jae-Hwa.

“Maybe running late,” said Nivritti.

“Okay, we will start the meeting as soon as he arrives,” informed Chung-Ho and sat in his seat.

Dae could not sleep, could not eat, could not do any work as his mind was still stuck on Missmatch’s blog. No statement from the PR team was giving him anxiety. Because of that, he was unable to complete his summary and hence was running late.

Every time he would sit down to work on the summary, his mind would go back to the PR team and their extra effective investigation team. He was worried that everyone would find out about his meeting with Missmatch.

Running for his life, he arrived at the office. His hair was flowing in every direction possible. Like a fool, he paired his professional suit with casual tennis shoes. His shirt was all wrinkly and very much visible through his coat.

“Sorry… sorry… I am late,” he came crashing through the door and shouting.

“It’s okay, relax,” said Chung-Ho and then turned to look at him. “Woah! What happened to you?”

“Could… not… wake up… on time. Sorry, Choi-ssi, sorry,” Dae stopped at the door to catch his breath and kept gulping after taking in a few breaths every second.

“Seong-ssi, please sit and drink water. Relax for a few minutes. We will start the meeting after half an hour. Will that be okay?” said Chung-Ho.

“Thank you, Choi-ssi!” said Dae and walked towards his seat.

Dae threw his bag on his table and sat on his seat with a soft thud. He let his head rest on the headrest of the chair and kept breathing inhaling and exhaling loudly with his eyes closed to slow his heartbeat. After he could breathe easily, he drank a bottle of water and calmed himself down.

After half an hour, Chung-Ho ordered the Rencontre team to take their laptops and get ready to present the summary to him. Everyone obliged and carried their laptop to the conference room. Chung-Ho warned everyone else to keep working and not gossip. He told them that the CEO was going to come to the script department, and that everyone should be on their best behaviour.

All four walked into the conference room and Jae-Hwa and Nivritti sat next to each other. They didn’t want to sit next to Dae and chose to sit on the opposite side. Chung-Ho sat in the middle of Dae and the girls and pulled his chair closer to the table.

“Okay, show me what you all have done,” asked Chung-Ho. “Let’s start with the senior.”

Dae looked at him and gulped with shame and fear. He avoided looking at Chung-Ho. “What?” asked Chung-Ho.

“Um… Choi-ssi, sorry I could not finish the task. I will do it now, very sorry,” Dae lowered his head and apologised.

“You have a whole week, Seong-ssi,” shouted Chung-Ho. Everyone flinched after seeing his angry avatar.

“Sorry,” Dae apologised again.

“What about you two?” asked Chung-Ho angrily.

Nivritti looked at Dae who was sitting in front of her like a puppy who got wet in the rain. She felt bad for him and now if she would tell Chung-Ho that she completed her task, he would berate Dae even more. But she didn’t want Chung-Ho wrath.

“Um… I tried but I don’t know if I succeeded,” Nivritti humbly tried to tell him that she completed the summary. She didn’t want Dae to look bad.

“Yeah, me too. I don’t know what else he would want from this update session but whatever was in that template, I tried answering that,” yawned Jae-Hwa.

“Oh my god! Why did you guys wait for the last day to complete the summary?” scolded Chung-Ho.

“Of course, to get more numbers in our summary template,” replied Nivritti.

“Okay, Jae, show me,” asked Chung-Ho. Jae-Hwa pushed her laptop toward him and showed him an Excel file. She had 10 rows and 2 columns filled with every question that the template gave her. Chung-Ho glanced at her figures and kept mumbling to himself and kept running his fingers over the screen. “Okay, hmm… this is good. This will do, good, good.”

Jae-Hwa beamed with happiness and happily sat straight. Chung-Ho gave her laptop back to her and then looked at Nivritti. She opened a Word file and pushed her laptop toward Chung-Ho. She knew she added a few questions on her own and was not sure that Chung-Ho would like them. She kept fidgeting with her fingers as every single bone in her body was nervous.

Chung-Ho looked at the word file Nivritti opened for him, and his eyes widened with surprise. On the template that he gave everyone, there were only 10 questions, But Nivritti’s summary had almost 20.

“You… you did this?” asked Chung-Ho with widened eyes and an open mouth.

“I am sorry, I am sorry, I thought this would help so I added a few questions. Sorry! I will delete it, give me,” shouted Nivritti, haphazardly trying to correct her mistake.

“What are you talking about?” shouted Chung-Ho. “This is great. This is amazing.”

“Huh… what?” Nivritti kept blinking at him unable to comprehend what he just said.

“This is great. Why didn’t I think of these categories?” yelled Chung-Ho, happily.

“You like it?” asked Nivritti, confused.

“What do you think?” Chung-Ho rolled his eyes.

“Okay!” finally Nivritti smiled.

“So, this time it would be difficult for you two to add these categories in such a short time. So, you are off the hook for this time. We will add these categories in future update sessions. And Seong-ssi, what is wrong with you? Your juniors completed the summary, and you could not do that. Was the task so hard? One of your juniors even did a better job than any of us. She even outsmarted me. You are supposed to be my right hand, but I don’t think you are up to that task. I think Hae-Ran would be better than you.

“I have spent so many years grooming you. Are you trying to disappoint me? If yes, congratulations, you succeeded. A simple task, a very simple task, just 10 categories and you could not even complete that. Where is your mind nowadays? I thought it would be you who gave us a kickass idea for Rencontre but yours was the worst. What is matter with you? Are you bored with your work? Do you not want to become the HOD?

“Two juniors are doing a better job than you. You are supposed to teach them but every day I think they are teaching you. What am I going to tell Hu-ssi, that the man I chose to head the Rencontre team is useless? Do you want me to give your work to these two, that way maybe our work would be completed on time?

“You didn’t complete your work, you didn’t finish your list, you arrive late and on top of that you arrive like a homeless person. You know Hu-ssi will be here. Do you want him to see you like this? Messy hair, the tie is undone, the shirt is wrinkly, the shoes are wrong. Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed too? I don’t know what is happening with you or why you are acting this way but get your act together. I am sitting here with you. Complete the list within half an hour,” Chung-Ho kept ripping into Dae.