Chapter 23

Maybe it was thanks to that carefree attitude that he could so easily come up with creative ideas…

And for being so tactless, obviously.

With no warning, Na-Yool felt a ‘I, too, was like that once, before getting worn out’ nostalgia that did not fit her age. It was indeed unreasonable to think so when one looked at Seung-Jae. After all, the 28 years old was only one year younger than her.

“Anyway, don’t be discouraged.”

“I am not.” Because she did not get scolded. Threatened . . . maybe.

“A donkey motivated to move by whipping will naturally get whipped, don’t you know?”

“Huh? What kind of analogy is that?”

“Look at me. For someone who has so much to say to you, think about the annoyed ‘you are not worth talking too’ look the President gives me each time I get kicked out of a project.”

“So what, are you saying I’m the donkey?”

“Isn’t it why you get whipped the most by the President? Verbally?”

The mention of him punishing her verbally brought back strange memories to her head. Kwon Si-Jin’s lewd voice. His sardonic smile. His Adam’s apple peeking out of his shirt where the tie was loose…

… What on earth was wrong with her since that day? Had the accumulated overwork fried her brain? She had barely got rid of the lustful demon who had tortured her all over the weekend, but as soon as she had entered the office, she showed signs of relapse.

It was all because she had the misfortune to meet with that jerk right from Monday morning.

Na-Yool vigorously shook her head as if to shake off all the obscene and unpleasant things in her mind. Meanwhile, Seung-Jae, as was his habit, passed in front of Na-Yool and stretched out his arm to open the glass door for her, and said, “No matter how I think about it, I think I am right.”

“… I understand your good intentions, but don’t you think it’s weird?”

“It’s not that I want to justify why you are the only one the President treats like shit, Ms. Na-Yool, but…”

He bent his head to her ear to whisper the ‘treating you like shit’ part and raised his head again.

Suddenly, Na-Yool saw his face  –  which she always thought playful and carefree – under a new light. Apart from the fact that he was an albatross, right now, with both Kang-Hee and Ye-Eun on maternity leave, he was the only witness who could testify of her hardship. Therefore, she could not hate him.

He patted Na-Yool’s shoulder once again. “It is all because you are too competent.  Because you are so competent in anything you do.”

“You really think so?”

“You know the President is not the style to even open his mouth if he judges his interlocutor not worth talking to. Just look at how quiet he is with me!”

“But on the other hand, if I was doing as great as you said, he would not have any reason to want to talk to me in the first place.”

“Well, that’s true. But why are you receiving my comfort in a negative manner?”

“It’s okay. Drop it now. I was not discouraged anyway.” Na-Yool said as she waved her hand.

“I kept worrying about it! Especially after I saw you both this morning.”

“What would you worry about?”

As she had in her mind he was a tactless guy, she was a little touched that he surprisingly cared about her, but she continued talking without giving it much importance.

“I am used to his disagreeable words anyway…”

The only difference from usual was that it had nothing to do with work, and that she had to forcibly listen to her drunk ex-boyfriend’s messages, got interrogated on her private life, and it all ended with a ridiculous threat coming from nowhere…

“Sure enough, you keep being in a daze since this morning, you keep muttering weird things by yourself…”

“……”

“You don’t seem to be yourself, so how could I not worry?”

Ah, it’s not that he was attentive. It’s me who was just crazy. Na-Yool calmly admitted the truth. She had undoubtedly lost her mind.

“… I will try to act less crazy. And try to draw less attention during work.”

“Oh, I’m fine with it… It’s you who is not okay.”

Sadly, she was not okay for a very different reason than the one Seung-Jae worried for. Her sound mind, her moderate moral sense…