I have to pay 300,000 won in rent in just two weeks… and utilities come out three weeks after that.
There was no one he could turn to for help. He tried to shake off the bleakness with a dry wash of his face, but the despair kept crashing in without pause, and he wanted to cry. Why had Glock suddenly announced a closure now of all times? It couldn’t have been planned.
Earlier that morning, Yuhyeon had organized roughly a week’s worth of food ingredients. If they’d intended to close the very next day, there was no way that volume of stock would have come in. Which left only one conclusion. Chae Seongjun — his injury and the closure seemed connected.
…And what good does knowing that do me.
Even if the assumption was right, it wasn’t something he could do anything about.
Just focus on work for now.
He stared into the mirror, trying to will some color back into his ashen face. He couldn’t spend the whole shift hiding out in the changing room. His nerves were still rattled from the shock, but Yuhyeon forced himself to move. He relaxed the miserable expression he’d been wearing and pressed cool fingertips against his swollen eyelids.
What do I do about this.
The mark on his neck caught his eye. Anyone who saw it would think he’d been in a fight. Yuhyeon pulled his shirt collar up as far as it would go to cover it.
Only once he had his earpiece on did Yuhyeon finally take his post in front of the kitchen. He glanced toward the kitchen, where things were more agitated than usual, and caught snippets of the staff’s conversation. Inside, employees were gathered together, voicing their distress. The head chef spotted Yuhyeon the moment he arrived and waved him over.
“Yuhyeon, you heard about Glock closing, right?”
“Yes…”
“Everyone’s in an uproar about it right now. The part-timers are looking at two months with no pay — some of them are saying they might as well quit.”
The head chef heaved one heavy sigh after another, saying the sudden closure had put a lot of people in a tough spot.
“But why the sudden shutdown? Do you know anything?”
“What would I know.”
Yuhyeon kept his mouth firmly shut, not bothering to bring up the fact that the boss had been injured.
Come to think of it — is it only the part-timers who aren’t getting paid?
From what he’d just heard, it sounded like the full-time employees would be on paid leave for the two months. If he wanted to breathe again, becoming a regular employee was the way. Yuhyeon recalled a rumor he’d heard about part-timers sometimes being converted to full-time, and cautiously brought it up.
“Um… are the kitchen staff getting paid during the closure?”
“Hm? Yeah, they are.”
“I figured… It’s just a rumor, but I heard that sometimes part-timers get converted to full-time here. If I asked the manager about it, do you think there’s any chance for me?”
“Full-time conversion…? A rumor?”
Yuhyeon rattled off the words without even pausing to breathe, and the head chef tilted his head. After a gesture that said he’d never heard of it, a quiet murmur followed — “Is that what they mean?”
“I didn’t realize something like that was going around among the part-timers…”
“I’ve been on serving duty for three years and never got offered anything like that, so I figured it was probably just a rumor. Is it really not a thing?”
“It’s not entirely wrong. But I haven’t heard the specifics myself either… It’s hard for me to say one way or the other.”
The head chef waved a hand to clarify that it definitely wasn’t about hiring kitchen staff, then looked Yuhyeon up and down.
“That said, there’s a reason you haven’t made it in three years. You’d basically need to be twice your size.”
“…What kind of job requires that?”
Was it for heavy lifting, or was it Glock’s security staff? Whatever it was, since the answer was no, Yuhyeon deflated.
“Well, I couldn’t say exactly…”
The head chef shrugged and told him he’d be better off giving up. So it wasn’t that any part-timer could become full-time — there were specific conditions. Since it wasn’t a service role they were filling but something that called for a physically imposing build, it made sense that Yuhyeon had never seen a fellow server make the transition. The head chef gave his drooping shoulder a light pat and changed the subject.
“By the way, the boss is here right now. He came yesterday too, and today — what’s the occasion?”
“The boss is here?”
“Yeah. The manager got called in too, so I’m guessing they’re meeting about the closure. The fact that the manager actually showed up at this hour makes it pretty clear.”
The manager’s presence barely registered with Yuhyeon. What struck him was the simple fact that Seongjun — who had only just come out of surgery — was here. He thought back to the moment he’d found him. The blood-soaked restroom and Room 1. He’d been in a state that called for hospital admission and rest. How long had it even been since he was transported there — and he was already out walking around?
“Anyway, whatever’s so serious in there. People keep filing into that room one after another — you can’t breathe.”
The head chef waved a hand in front of his face, saying the smell of so many alphas was giving him a headache. Yuhyeon had gotten a sense of the kind of people Seongjun surrounded himself with before, so he just responded with a blank “I see…” and didn’t think much of it.
Some minutes passed. Yuhyeon had been standing at the kitchen entrance with nothing to do, no guests calling for him, when a short chime snapped his attention up. The number display on the wall was blinking. Room 3’s call bell had been pressed.
That’s where the boss is supposed to be.
Yuhyeon picked up his order pad and headed into the hallway. Before opening the door, he loosened the stiffness from his expression and worked his facial muscles a few times. He had no idea how Seongjun would react to seeing him. Maybe he’d say thank you. Though thinking back to how he’d thrown his phone across the room, that didn’t quite seem like the man’s style.
He’ll at least pay for the phone, right?
Whatever happened, all Yuhyeon needed was the taxi fare and the phone cost reimbursed. If Seongjun wanted to throw in a thank-you for saving his life on top of that, all the better. Yuhyeon steadied his breathing, knocked twice on the door, and stepped inside.
“Is there anything you need—”
“What the f*ck.”
He hiccupped mid-sentence. The scene inside unsettled him completely. A row of heavyset men were kneeling in a line, and in front of them, Chae Seongjun was lounging on the sofa with one leg crossed over the other. One of the men had growled a slur aimed directly at Yuhyeon.
“Oh — oh, Yuhyeon, looks like the call bell was pressed by mistake. You can head back out.”
The manager, who had been standing near the boss, wiped a bead of nervous sweat from his brow and gestured for Yuhyeon to leave. From the reactions of everyone in the room and the manager’s demeanor, it was clear Yuhyeon had walked in at exactly the wrong moment.
As Yuhyeon moved to retrace his steps, Seongjun entered his line of sight. He looked so put-together that it was hard to believe he was the same person who had been so badly injured. The pallor that had bled into his face, the clothes drenched in blood — it all felt like something out of a dream. If Yuhyeon hadn’t been in his right mind when he found him, he might have convinced himself he’d imagined the whole thing. The composure was that disorienting.
Without proper rest, a full recovery should have been near impossible. And yet Seongjun shattered that assumption entirely just by being here. Even looking at him a second time, Yuhyeon found it so strange that his eyes refused to move away — and eventually, they met Seongjun’s. His gaze slid smoothly downward and came to rest somewhere near Yuhyeon’s neck. Yuhyeon realized in an instant that he was looking at the engagement ring. Worried he might think it had been stolen, Yuhyeon moved to return it right then and there.
“You deaf son of a b*tch. You got wax in your ears or something? He said get out.”
The man who had thrown the slur at him earlier advanced toward him in a threatening manner. If the manager hadn’t stepped in to stop him from swinging that thick hand in Yuhyeon’s face, Yuhyeon would have been on the floor by now.
