Before we could really start working, there were a few things we needed to prepare.
First of all, we were still looking for an office that would serve as our main base. I'd walked around tirelessly, checking property after property, but I still hadn't found anything that truly satisfied me.
The problem was the conditions.
A shower room and a nap room.
Any building suitable for office use that also had shower facilities inevitably ended up being quite large—and with only three people using the office for now, choosing something that big felt like too much of a burden.
It seemed I'd need to keep looking for the office a bit longer.
As for Yoo Eunha and Hwang Juyeon, they were currently "negotiating" with Hwangsan's HR department.
Or rather, it might be more accurate to call it blackmail disguised as negotiation.
The choice they were giving them was simple: either accept their immediate resignation, or have the sexual harassment incident that the company had tried to bury exposed to the public.
Judging by everything the company had done so far, there was a high chance they'd choose to let the two of them go quietly and end it there. For a major corporation, a revelation about covering up workplace sexual harassment would be a serious blow.
Compared to that, letting two employees resign was easy.
Hwangsan probably didn't consider the Strategic Planning Team all that important to begin with. So, according to Deputy Manager Yoo Eunha, the company would most likely send the two of them off without resistance and cover everything up.
After that, Hwangsan might dissolve the team entirely—or rebuild it around the remaining parachuted team leader and the harassing senior manager.
What a fantastic team that would be.
I couldn't help but look forward to seeing how things would turn out.
Today, I came to see Soyeon after a long time.
Up until now, I'd been dodging her here and there under the excuse of being busy, but I was starting to reach my limit. If I avoided her any longer, she looked ready to show up at my place again.
Today was Wednesday—a day when her lectures ended early.
So I parked my car in front of the university she attended and waited for her class to finish.
"Suhyeok oppa—!!"
From afar, Soyeon spotted my car and called out loudly.
She waved her arms wildly and jumped up and down as if trying to get my attention—not just mine, but everyone else's too.
…Soyeon. Aren't you embarrassed at all…?
After waving goodbye to what seemed to be her friends, Soyeon ran straight toward my car.
Even in this heat, she really was energetic.
"Oppa!"
She ran right up to the front of the car and called me again.
Her bright expression was dazzling. Fresh sweat shimmered healthily on her forehead.
"Get in already. Aren't you hot?"
"Nope!"
She hopped into the passenger seat and immediately turned the air conditioning up to full blast.
She said she wasn't hot, but the moment she got in, a wave of hot air rushed into the car.
I took a handkerchief out of the glove compartment and handed it to her.
"It's scorching outside—why are you running around like that?"
"Hehe. Because I wanted to see you as soon as possible, oppa!"
Dabbing her sweat with the handkerchief, Soyeon smiled sweetly.
Honestly. If she couldn't even talk like this, she'd at least be a little annoying.
With today's energetic Soyeon in the passenger seat, I started driving again.
It was lunchtime.
"So, where shall I take you today, miss? Should we grab lunch or something?"
Last time, I'd stubbornly insisted on gukbap just to tease her. Today, I was planning to treat her to something proper.
But Soyeon's answer was completely unexpected.
"Let's go eat gukbap, oppa!"
"…Gukbap?"
This time, I was the one taken aback.
Gukbap? Did she think I liked it just because I took her there once?
"You don't have to force yourself to match my tastes."
"I'm not forcing myself. I just really want to eat it."
Her bold reply left me speechless.
"Oppa, don't you know gukbap is trendy among female college students these days?"
"…Who would know about a trend like that?"
If you asked ten people, all ten would say they had no idea.
But Soyeon, looking dead serious, started chattering enthusiastically about gukbap.
"Lately, my friends and I go around every day looking for good gukbap places. Which place has the richest broth, which one gives the most generous portions. We even have a gukbap club at school."
"A gukbap… club…?"
The name was painfully old-fashioned—though I wasn't really one to talk.
"We meet every lunchtime and visit one gukbap restaurant near campus each day. Then we score them, and the really good ones get a 'Gukbap Michelin Star.'"
"…I see. Gukbap Michelin."
"This Saturday, we're all going on a gukbap expedition all the way to Yangpyeong!"
"S-Sure… have fun."
Was she messing with me? I couldn't tell where the joke ended and where she was serious.
There was no way ordinary female college students liked gukbap enough to form a club. Even if I stretched my imagination, I could understand Soyeon liking it—but not everyone else.
"You're not dragging along friends who don't want to go, are you?"
"Do I look like someone who'd do that? I told you—female college students these days all love gukbap."
"Yeah… sure."
"Ah! You don't believe me, do you?"
"I believe you, I believe you."
I didn't believe her at all, but I nodded along anyway.
Just imagining a crowd of female college students sitting around a gukbap restaurant made my head spin.
Hmm. Gukbap, huh.
Was there a good place nearby?
"Then how about going to a really good gukbap place, even if it's a bit far?"
"Sounds great!"
I decided to take her to a place a coworker had once recommended.
Back when I was working, I knew about places like that but never went. When I was dating Sojeong, places like gukbap restaurants were never an option.
And I wasn't about to drive all that way just to eat a bowl alone.
The drive took about thirty minutes.
It was a bit far—but with a girl beside me chatting nonstop, there wasn't a moment to get bored.
Somehow… it felt fun.
I was actually excited just to go eat gukbap. It was a strange feeling.
After arriving, Soyeon went in first while I parked the car and secured us a seat.
Judging by how naturally she moved, she definitely wasn't new to this.
"As expected, pork gukbap is the way to go. It's the classic, right?"
"Yeah. The classic. I'll have pork gukbap too, then."
"Sir! Two pork gukbap, please!"
As soon as she sat down, Soyeon confidently placed the order.
"When it's my first time at a place, I always try the pork gukbap first. You can tell if the broth is done right and if they're using good meat. If a place does pork gukbap well, everything else is good too."
"R-Right. Pork gukbap is basically the base for most of them."
She even had a philosophy about it.
It seemed Soyeon's love for gukbap was genuine. I felt a little bad for doubting her.
"One of my friends does YouTube, and if it works out, it can make a lot of money. I'm thinking of becoming a gukbap YouTuber myself someday."
"A gukbap YouTuber…"
"My nickname would be 'Gukbap College Girl'! What do you think, oppa? Not bad, right? I'd travel all over the country reviewing famous gukbap places! Old guys who love gukbap would totally watch it, don't you think? They'd get to see a pretty college girl too!"
"Sure, sure. Sounds like a great idea."
As we talked, the steaming bowls of gukbap arrived.
The first thing Soyeon grabbed was the bowl of cubed radish kimchi.
"Oppa, but did you know this?"
"What?"
"Some people don't like adding the kimchi juice to their gukbap. Isn't that funny?"
"Kh—"
"Seriously, kids these days don't know how to eat gukbap."
To be honest, I didn't particularly like it either.
That day, I'd only done it out of spite.
But because of that one experience, Soyeon seemed to have developed the belief that adding kimchi juice to gukbap was just common sense.
This is why first experiences matter.
I'd done something truly terrible to Soyeon.
I even felt sorry for her friend who'd been subjected to that kimchi juice "terror" because of me.
"Still, it's lucky that you and I both like it, oppa."
"Y-Yeah. Lucky."
"Then that means you and I are kimchi-juice-sharing partners now, right?"
Grinning, Soyeon poured kimchi juice into my gukbap without hesitation.
Looking at her innocent face, I couldn't say a word.
Even though she chatted endlessly before, Soyeon grew quiet once she started eating. When it came to food, she focused completely.
From time to time, she'd make comments like, "This place has a lighter broth," or "The kimchi is really fresh," or "The meat's a bit overcooked," like some kind of gukbap Michelin inspector.
All I could do was nod along in agreement.
"Oppa. But aren't you curious about how my sister's doing these days?"
"…Hmm."
As we were nearly done eating, Soyeon brought it up.
"If I said I wasn't curious, that'd be a lie. But not curious enough to go out of my way to find out."
I answered calmly on purpose.
To be honest… it did bother me.
Quite a lot.
"Unni broke up with the doctor she was dating."
"…Really?"
The news was so surprising I nearly choked on my rice.
I pretended to be unfazed and took a sip of water.
"Apparently he wasn't actually a doctor or something. She dumped him over it—but the atmosphere was really bad, you know? From what I could tell, it felt less like she dumped him and more like she got dumped."
I see… so she broke up with that guy.
I recalled the time I'd seen her at the hotel. The man beside Sojeong back then—his face was blurry in my memory.
"So she even fought with Mom, who introduced him, and the whole house is a mess. Ah, I don't want to go home. I wish there was some guy who'd let me crash at his place for a night."
Not a doctor…?
Did that mean she dated him thinking he was a doctor, only to find out he wasn't?
That's something you can check with minimal effort.
She didn't even look into it properly before dating him? After breaking up with me just to be with him?
How could she be that foolish?
If she'd asked me, I would've investigated thoroughly for her.
But it was probably something she couldn't bring herself to tell me—hence this result.
Sojeong really…
Let's stop here.
"Unni is kind of funny too. People keep telling her she's pretty, so she probably really thought she was amazing. She must've genuinely believed she'd find an even better man after breaking up with you, oppa. But any man willing to date a woman like her is bound to have issues."
"Soyeon."
"Yes?"
"Don't say things like that."
Soyeon stopped talking immediately.
"I may have things I'm disappointed about with Sojeong too, but she's still your family. You shouldn't talk about your sister like that. I don't want to hear you bad-mouthing your family either."
"Tch… fine."
She looked a little gloomy for a moment after being scolded—but soon regained her energy and started chatting again.
"Oppa. But you know, unni might come to you soon asking to get back together."
"…Hmm."
"What would you do then? If she asked to get back together?"
"That won't happen."
"Come on. You never know, right?"
"I won't meet her. She won't ask either."
"Even if she cried and begged?"
"…I won't. That won't happen."
It was hard to imagine Park Sojeong crying and clinging to someone.
But even if she did, we wouldn't get back together.
Soyeon didn't know this—but Sojeong and I had once run into each other at a hotel. Each of us with a new partner.
The future where we got back together had closed completely at that moment.
"Hey? You hesitated just now, didn't you?"
"I didn't. Let's drop this topic."
I was the one who'd been curious about Sojeong—but now that I'd heard, I regretted it.
I almost wished I'd heard she was doing well instead.
Hearing that she'd broken up again left an uncomfortable knot in my chest.
"Oppa. Hypothetically."
"You're still going on about this?"
"If your heart wavers because of unni… I'll take her place."
Soyeon smiled with an unreadable expression.
To me, that face looked exactly like Sojeong's smile.
"So don't ever get back together with her. Call me instead. I'll be her replacement. Okay?"
Sisters who looked alike—but were completely opposite on the inside.
Wearing the face of the woman I'd loved the most, with the personality I could only imagine in my dreams.
Park Soyeon was charging straight at me.
"…If you're done eating, let's go."
As I stood up with the bill, Soyeon quickly snatched it from my hand.
"I'll pay today. You brought me to such a good gukbap place, oppa."
The seriousness from earlier was already gone.
She smiled brightly.