Chapter 33
Don’t Sit Next to Hana
The 9th floor of DK Foods was made up almost entirely of meeting and seminar rooms.
One large seminar room, one small seminar room.
Two large meeting rooms, four medium-sized, six small.
And one “S” meeting room.
The “S” didn’t stand for Small—it stood for Secret.
Just as the name implied, this room was designed for high security.
It had no windows, and once the door was closed, it automatically locked.
Only authorized personnel could enter by tapping their employee cards at the door during the scheduled time. Bringing in unregistered individuals would result in severe disciplinary action.
Inside that S meeting room, Hana and Gu Donggeun sat across from each other with a rectangular table between them.
Hana looked slightly tense as she reviewed the printed meeting materials.
“Ugh, there’s a typo.”
A rare curse escaped her lips. Hana closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Then, in a very low voice, she muttered,
“Gu Donggeul.”
Startled, Gu Donggeun straightened up in his seat.
“Yes, yes, sunbae-nim.”
“Page 12. What’s going on here?”
“Huh?”
He shrugged, seemingly clueless.
‘Page 12? A few typos aren’t the end of the world. Why’s she acting like I committed a crime?’
He casually flipped to page 12.
And his face turned ashen in an instant.
“Wha…? How did this…?!”
“Same menu, different g.r,a,d.eᅟᅥᆾㅇraᅟᅥᇂ level of meal kit.”
Was that even a typo?
It felt wrong to call it that. It was beyond forgiveness.
Hana had prepared the meeting material herself and sent it to Donggeun. There definitely hadn’t been a typo like this when she handed it over.
His only job had been to print out three copies of the file.
But for security reasons, materials for the S room could only be printed using the printer inside it. That’s why Donggeun had come early, 20 minutes before the meeting, to print them out.
“This is seriously weird! I double-checked—there were no typos. Maybe I accidentally hit something with my elbow?”
Whatever that excuse was, it only made Hana more annoyed.
This wasn’t the time for “how did it happen?”—it was time to fix it.
He just needed to say “I’m sorry” and print a new one. But he kept flipping back and forth through the document, repeating “this doesn’t make sense.”
Her neck started to stiffen with irritation. If he’d been sitting next to her, she’d have smacked him—full power.
Hana pressed down her rising anger and said as calmly as possible,
“I don’t care what happened. Just print a new one before the Director gets here. Forget ours, just his.”
As long as the version for the person getting the report was clean, that was good enough.
She checked the time.
9:55 AM.
Five minutes left before the meeting.
Still enough time to print one copy and staple it.
Just as she began to relax, she noticed Donggeun hesitating in front of the laptop, looking awkward.
“Gu Donggeul, what now?”
“Uh… Sunbae-nim, what was it originally supposed to say?”
Hana almost let a curse slip again.
Whether it was an elbow or that dense brain of his—wasn’t there an “Undo” function?
If she got angry now, she knew she wouldn’t be able to stop before the Director walked in. So she inhaled deeply and spoke in a restrained tone.
“Press Control + Z.”
“Ah… right.”
“Just print page 12. Two copies.”
She had originally meant to only print a new copy for Siwan, but decided Donggeun needed one too. Clearly, he hadn’t reviewed the materials properly.
“Got it.”
Once the situation was under control, Hana sat down with a sigh of relief.
Whew. First meeting with the Director, and I almost got humiliated thanks to Gu Donggeul.
Ugly behavior looks uglier when done by someone you dislike. Pretty people can get away with it.
An eternal truth.
The ones you dislike always seem to act more dislikeable. Even when they do something decent, it still looks wrong. Why did he always have to make things worse?
Every time this happened, Hana was hit with guilt and self-doubt.
He keeps making me the bad guy… seriously.
Is it okay to hate someone?
She didn’t think so. But Gu Donggeun kept pushing her to do just that.
To be fair, he wasn’t a terrible person. He hadn’t done anything evil. He was just a new hire, fresh off probation, and mistakes were understandable.
The real issue was what happened after the mistakes.
He rarely took initiative to fix them. More often than not, he just panicked and waited for someone else to step in.
And even when the fault was clearly his, he rarely said, “I’m sorry.” He only did it once Hana kicked up a fuss, and even then, it looked like he was apologizing just to appease her.
To others, it might’ve looked like she was forcing a poor guy to apologize.
Then there was the irrelevant chatter. He’d always bring up off-topic questions, making it harder to focus.
Even worse, he’d send her good-morning texts every day, acting all familiar.
Hana closed her eyes and silently prayed.
God, can I please be allowed to dislike just this one person? I know You said to love our enemies, but Gu Donggeun isn’t an enemy. So can’t I just… dislike him?
A strange presence made her open her eyes—Donggeun was approaching with his notes and pen, inching closer.
“What are you doing?”
“Huh? Just… sitting down…”
“Oh… okay.”
Logically, the reporting officer and the project lead should sit next to each other—so it made sense for Hana and Donggeun to be side-by-side.
But she’d spent so much time hating him that even the right thing now felt wrong.
Feeling a little guilty, Hana apologized.
“Sorry. I’m just a bit tense.”
Disliking someone didn’t mean she couldn’t apologize when she was wrong.
Ideally, he would’ve just said, “No worries,” and sat down quietly. But Gu Donggeun couldn’t help running his mouth.
“It’s okay. If you’re that sorry, wanna grab coffee after the meeting?”
“…You really are… ugh, never mind.”
If she kept talking, she’d definitely curse. So Hana decided to shut up.
“Sunbae-nim, I was joking. Just joking.”
He dragged his chair closer with a loud screech.
Hana’s face hardened as she pushed his chair away with her foot.
“Don’t come closer. Sit over there. You’re making me uncomfortable. Sit exactly there.”
At 10 o’clock sharp, the lock on the meeting room beeped.
And then Siwan walked in, dressed in a clean suit.
In one hand, he held a notepad; in the other, a drink carrier with three cups. Steam rose from the cups—they were clearly hot drinks.
“Good morning.”
His hairstyle was different today.
Usually, he wore a slicked-back style, giving him a sharp, older look.
But today, his naturally wavy hair was parted 2:8, lightly styled with wax—natural, yet neat. It gave him a softer, more approachable appearance.
When he locked eyes with Hana, he smiled.
It wasn’t a fake “salesman” smile meant to impress. It was just a spontaneous smile—because he’d seen her, and his face reacted before he could think.
Hana’s heart gave a little flutter.
No way… was it because of what I said yesterday morning?
But she quickly shook her head at herself.
No, there’s no way. Don’t be ridiculous. Stop being so full of yourself.
One day earlier, early morning.
The subway came to a stop with a hiss and the doors opened. Siwan stepped in, dressed in a neat suit.
His hair looked like it had been left to dry naturally, parted casually at 2:8.
Usually, he styled his hair with loads of wax at the office, going for that trademark slicked-back look.
But during his morning commute, this was his usual look.
He raised a hand toward Hana.
She always sat in the same spot, so he didn’t need to search.
− “Good morning, Deputy Manager.”
− “Good morning to you too, Director.”
As he smiled and sat beside her, Hana thought to herself:
Honestly, I think he looks better with this hairstyle than that slicked-back one…
It wasn’t a sudden realization—it had crossed her mind every time she saw him like this. Plus, she had some health concerns. Siwan wasn’t in the best shape, always taking a bunch of medications, so she wondered if slathering product on his hair every day was really good for him.
She must’ve gotten too comfortable commuting with him every day, because she blurted something she normally never would have.
− “By the way, Director, this hairstyle suits you really well.”
Caught off guard, Siwan ran a hand through his hair.
− “Really? So you don’t like the slicked-back style?”
− “Oh no, that’s great too! It’s just… I personally prefer this softer, more natural look. It makes your expression seem kinder…”
Halfway through, Hana realized what she was saying and abruptly stopped herself.
She bowed her head in panic.
− “Ah! Sorry! That was completely out of line.”
− “No, not at all. So you’re saying you like this style better?”
Hana said nothing.
Instead, she hid her flushed face by bowing even lower.
