Chapter 187: Reemployment (1)
Seo Yi-Jun possessed a talent that was a bit too embarrassing to brag about to anyone, and that was the ability to sleep like a baby anywhere. He woke up at around 8:30 AM in the room that Kang Ra-Eun had prepared for him. He went to the bathroom attached to his room and was about to go back to bed.
‘I’m already awake, so I might as well just start the day.’
He didn’t have anything in particular planned, but he did not want to lie in bed until noon in someone else's home. Whatever the reason was, he was living off of Ra-Eun and Seo Yi-Seo at the moment, so he decided to do some simple housework. He opened his room door and entered the living room.
“Huh? You’re already awake?” Ra-Eun said while sitting on the couch cross-legged, watching TV.
Her bare legs visible due to her extremely short pants caught Yi-Jun’s attention first thing in the morning.
“I’m an early bird,” he expressed.
“Liar. Yi-Seo said that you wake up at around noon on school breaks.”
“...”
He found his older sister hateful at times like this. His attempt to impress the woman that he liked had gone down the drain thanks to Yi-Seo. Ra-Eun picked up a chocolate-covered biscuit next to the couch and handed it to Yi-Jun.
“You want some too?”
“Is that a snack?”
“No, it’s my breakfast.”
“You’re eating biscuits for breakfast instead of proper food?”
“Yup.”
Ra-Eun had gotten hooked on these chocolate biscuits lately. They were nice and crunchy, and the chocolate fit her sweet tooth palate perfectly. The only problem was that it made too many crumbs.
“Noona,” Yi-Jun said while pointing at her left thigh. “Crumbs fell.”
As Ra-Eun shook off the crumbs, Yi-Jun happened to see something shaking.
“U-Um... noona?”
“What?”
“I-I’m asking just to be sure, but, umm...”
Yi-Jun fell into very deep thought, but managed to open his mouth while fighting through his embarrassment as best he could.
“Are you not wearing the thing that starts with ‘b’ and ends with ‘ra?’”
“Why can’t you say bra?”
“Saying it myself feels a bit weird.”
Ra-Eun smirked and said while putting her hand on her left breast, “It’s because I just woke up. I don’t wear underwear when I sleep.”
There was only one reason why; because it was stifling. Yi-Jun of course understood, but he was more embarrassed just looking at her. He had resolved himself to bear witness to such things while living under the same roof with Ra-Eun, but...
‘I don’t think I was resolved enough.’
He was not confident that he would be able to overcome Ra-Eun’s unintentional seduction.
***
Ra-Eun went down to the underground parking lot with her sports bag to go to the gym. She could see her chauffeur’s car entering the underground parking lot from a distance.
“Ugh!” she unconsciously expressed her displeasure once she checked who the driver was. “I thought it would be Mr. Lim.”
Ra-Eun’s chauffeur for today had not been Lim Seok-Jun, but Kim Tae-Seon. She had experienced Tae-Seon’s poor driving skills for herself a few days ago. She had planned on not getting in the car that Tae-Seon drove for the time being, but...
‘I guess I’m in for it today.’
Ra-Eun had no choice but to get in. It was not like she could tell her to go back.
“I’m sorry I’m late, Chairwoman.”
“No, it's okay. It’s not like I had set a meeting time with anyone.”
She was simply going to work out, so she could take her time. She let Ra-Eun into the back seat and slowly turned the steering wheel. They had reached the parking lot exit, but Tae-Seon was having difficulty getting through in one go, needing to go forward and backward multiple times.
“You have to turn wider,” Ra-Eun backseated from the back seat.
“I-I’m sorry!”
They had finally gotten out of the underground parking lot thanks to Ra-Eun’s backseating. They should be thankful for just getting out without any scratch marks on the car. However, that was not the end of their problems; they had gotten into three tightrope situations before reaching the fitness center.
Ra-Eun squeezed her temple while holding in a sigh.
‘In such a short distance... That in itself is a talent.’
Tae-Seon was good at everything else but driving. It was fine to just have Seok-Jun by himself as a chauffeur, but there were times when Ra-Eun needed a female chauffeur, hence why Ra-Eun had hired one of the same sex as her. However, regret belatedly swept over her.
‘Maybe I’ve made the wrong decision.’
Even so, it was near impossible to hire anyone else. The people under Ma Yeong-Jun were mostly men; women were almost nonexistent. Tae-Seon was the best among them, but her driving skills were fatally lacking.
‘I wonder if there’s a woman who’s good at bodyguarding, driving, and has a great personality.’
Ra-Eun wondered if she could even find a perfect person like that.
***
Ra-Eun met up with Je-Woon, whom she hadn’t met since the Country Diner shoot, and dived into weight training together. Two hours had passed before they knew it as they were lifting while checking each other’s form. They decided to take a seat on a bench for a break.
Je-Woon asked Ra-Eun while drinking a supplement, “What time are you going to work out until?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t have any plans for today, so I think I’m going to be here for a while longer. I slacked off too much after the film shoot, so I gained a lot of weight.”
Come to think of it, she even had chocolate biscuits for breakfast today. Biscuits were one of the many foods that one needed to avoid during a diet, since a massive amount of calories were packed inside that small bundle of goodness. Ra-Eun was claiming that she had gained weight, but it did not look that way to Je-Woon.
“I think you look better now, though?”
“Really?” Ra-Eun said while lightly pinching her thin stomach flab.
“Being too thin doesn’t look very good. I’m sure that there are differences between male and female standards, but I personally think you don’t need to lose weight to the point of going on an excessive diet.”
Ra-Eun had also thought the same as Je-Woon back when she was a man. She never used to understand why extremely slender women were always going on diets, but she could understand why after becoming a woman herself. Like Je-Woon had mentioned, the way that men and women saw the female body was different.
In such times, Ra-Eun always thought, ‘I guess I’m a full-fledged woman now.’
She didn’t know whether to be happy or sad about it.
‘Well, it’s not like I’m ever gonna be able to go back to being a man.’
She didn’t know how to either. Ra-Eun’s ultimate goal was to take revenge against Kim Han-Gyo; her gender didn’t matter as long as she could fulfill it.
Je-Woon drank the last remaining sip of his supplement and said as if this was the perfect opportunity, “How about we have dinner together, then?”
“With me?”
“Yeah. We didn’t have a proper afterparty for Country Diner.”
The cast members had decided to have a meal together while looking back on what they had experienced during the shoot, but it had continued to be put off due to individual circumstances. Je-Woon had felt it was a shame, hence why he had suggested the afterparty albeit late.
“Will Han-Seok sunbae and Tae-Chan be joining us?” Ra-Eun asked.
“I’m not sure...” Je-Woon slurred, and then answered, “I want it to be just the two of us.”
Je-Woon went in for a straight hook. As Ra-Eun was wondering how to respond, her smartphone vibrated repeatedly. She smiled bitterly at Je-Woon after checking the texts that had come from Vice President Park Hee-Woo.
“I’m sorry, sunbae. I suddenly have plans.”
“Really? Well, I guess it can’t be helped.”
Je-Woon was disappointed, but had no choice but to try again next time.
***
Hee-Woo had arrived at the restaurant early and was waiting for Ra-Eun at a table. She was surprised when she saw Ra-Eun in sportswear.
“Oh my, are you going for a sports theme today?”
“I came here right from the fitness center. I would have changed into something more classy if I knew I was coming to a luxury restaurant like this,” Ra-Eun mentioned while looking down at her loose T-shirt, black leggings and white sneakers.
However, Hee-Woo did not think so.
“Who cares about the clothes when you’re blindingly beautiful in anything? You’re even cuter with your hair tied back.”
The corners of Hee-Woo’s mouth rose even higher as she saw Ra-Eun radiating healthy beauty.
“Come take a seat. Dinner’s on me today,” she remarked.
“Thank you, Vice President.”
“No problem at all. It’s the least I could do when you’ve helped me so much.” Hee-Woo said with her chin resting on her hand.
She had been looking extremely bright since earlier, as if something good had happened.
“The matter with my brother has been resolved well thanks to you, Ra-Eun.”
Ra-Eun’s ears perked up slightly after hearing Hee-Woo talk about her little brother Park Geon-Woo.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Geon-Woo decided to come work for TP Group.”
Ra-Eun was shocked internally. She had many chances to decide in her past life, whether she would continue to live in opposition to TP Group as a bodyguard, or go back to TP Group and come to terms with her father. Ra-Eun had chosen the former at the time, but the Geon-Woo of this life had chosen the latter thanks to all the coaxing that Ra-Eun had done. However, there was something else she was worried about.
‘Father isn’t an easy man to deal with.’
However, with Hee-Woo supporting Geon-Woo, it wasn’t a completely hopeless fight. If even that wasn’t enough, Ra-Eun would keep pushing Geon-Woo until it worked, since there would definitely come a time when she would need her past self’s help.
“It sounds like Geon-Woo made a difficult choice,” Ra-Eun commented.
“Yes. He was out of work, so I did my best persuading him while he was thinking about what to do.”
“Out of work?”
“Oh, you didn’t know? Geon-Woo left the security team that he’d been in last month. Umm... What did he say again? Oh, I believe he said that the nail in the coffin had been the resignation of the team leader that he had respected.”
Geon-Woo was referring to Team Leader So Ha-Jin, the one who had accompanied Ra-Eun during her trip to Japan for the One of a Kind of Girl event.
‘Come to think of it, it was around now when Team Leader So left the team.’
Ra-Eun still remembered how shocking it was when the extremely capable So Ha-Jin, who was also very close with her team members, suddenly resigned. Ha-Jin had quit bodyguarding entirely after that.
‘She’s good at her job, has a great personality, is responsible, and even good at driving... Wait.’
Ra-Eun thought of something during her conversation with Hee-Woo.
‘Isn’t she perfect as my chauffeur?’
She had found the perfect person in a completely unexpected way.
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