Lisa POV
On Monday I'm ready to walk through Kim Company's door, all nervous and with my best smile on my face.
'28th floor'.
I step into the lift and feel my heart racing. I can't believe I'm finally here, at one of Seoul's most promising companies, working directly for the marketing director. I remember Jisoo telling me that it took me so long to find a job because life was preparing me for something very good. How right she was.
The lift stopped with a beep on the 28th floor, I crossed the threshold and met Jimin.
JIMIN: Hi Lisa, welcome. -He smiled at me.
I smiled back.
LISA: Hello.
JIMIN: Follow me, I'll show you around.
I followed Jimin to the back of the office. My new colleagues were concentrating on their tasks and it seemed that the workload was high. I smiled thinking that I would now be part of this. My desk was in front of the marketing director's office, which was a huge room with glass walls, so we would be working face to face. I put my bag on my desk while Jimin explained overhead what I would have to do.
JIMIN: Anyway, Jennie will explain this to you... Oh, look, here she comes.
'Huh?'
I turned around to see Jennie walk through the door. Yes, that Jennie.
I opened my mouth with a stupid expression, I was in shock.
JIMIN: Lisa Manoban, this is Kim Jennie, the marketing director, you'll be working directly for her. And Jennie, this is the girl I was telling you about. -She winked at me.
Jennie... she's my boss. Jennie. I wanna cry.
She shook my hand to introduce herself. She looked at me seriously, expressionless, but I could see flashes of anger in her eyes.
JENNIE: Nice to meet you. -She didn't even try to force a smile. She turned to Jimin - Thank you Jimin, you can leave now.
I said goodbye to Jimin and watched him walk away as I thought that the only moment of respite I might have was going away with him. I'm stiff, I can feel my face burning. I can't see myself right now, but I know exactly what I look like: terrified. And shame. And all the bad feelings in the world concentrated. Of all the fucking people in Seoul, of all the fucking marketing directors in the city, my boss had to be Jennie.
JENNIE: Come into my office.
She headed to the door, gesturing me to follow her. Time was freezing around me, I didn't want to go in there, I didn't want to hear what she had to tell me, I just wanted to run away.
Jennie POV
I'm sitting at my desk with Lisa in front of me. She looks like she's about to run away. It's the first time I've had an assistant, the workload in the company has increased a lot in the last few months and I can't manage it alone. Momo from Human Resources has been helping me for the last few weeks, but every day it became clearer that we needed someone to fill the job. I let Jimin manage it, I let him convince me that the Thai girl who had gone to the same University as him and had done a brilliant Master's thesis was the perfect person for the job and I didn't even think to look at her CV, her photo, her name, nothing. I trusted him. I'm tempted to fire her right now and keep looking but we're running out of time and we can't start another selection process now. Besides, it would put Jimin in a bad light in front of my father, as he personally chose her.
But now Lisa is in front of me and I can't get out of my head the self-satisfied look on her face a few weeks ago when she told me that if I wanted her to, she would 'do me the favour of fucking me', and the last thing I want to do is to have to see her every day and pretend it's nothing.
JENNIE: I guess you can imagine that I'm considering kicking you out right now and never having to see you again.
Lisa looks at me, she looks like she's about to burst into tears and it pisses me off. Really pissed off. She swallows.
LISA: I... -she thinks for a while. -If you fire me, or don't hire me or whatever, I'll understand.
I was going to answer her but she cut me off.
LISA: But I really need this job, I'm very good at it, I'm reliable and I'm going to do my best. Really, I promise you that if you give me this opportunity I won't let you down.
I look at her in silence. I can't fire her now, I'm trying to calculate the deadlines we have by considering a new search, plus interviews, plus hiring, and I can't find a way to make it viable. We have to finish the energy drinks project and at the rate we're going I don't even know if starting right now we'll make the date.
LISA: I'm really sorry for everything I said the other day, I didn't really mea....
I cut her off.
JENNIE: Don't you dare.
I feel my face burning, I stand up and Lisa shrinks back in her chair.
'Who's the midget now, you stupid fuck.'
JENNIE: Don't you dare apologize for that now. The minute you find out I'm your boss it's too easy to be sorry. Don't you dare. If you do something like that you have to take the consequences and shut the fuck up.
Lisa lowers her head, says nothing.
JENNIE: Ever since I saw you standing next to Jimin with that stupid expression I've wanted to throw you out on the street and I've been crunching numbers and calculating how much I'd have to work to make the deliveries on time if I hired someone else. And I can't, there's no physical time for that.
LISA: I understand...
JENNIE: I can make an effort and you'll get a kick out of it. -I said with contempt.
Lisa's face turned completely red remembering her words.
JENNIE: But don't think you're going to come in and succeed. You're going to wish you hadn't walked through this door, and the minute there are too many people, I assure you, you're going to be the first to leave.
LISA: Yes, I understand.
JENNIE: Yes, Miss Kim.
She looked at me in embarrassment.
LISA: Yes, Miss Kim.
JENNIE: Now go down to the cafeteria and get me a coffee with warm milk, lots of foam and saccharine. I'll leave the memory of the project we're working on on your desk and as soon as you bring me up the coffee and you'll start working.
LISA: All right, Miss Kim.
Lisa POV
Great. My life is great. The day I was born, God, Buddha, or I don't know who, made a ball with all the bad luck in the world and threw it on my face. That's the only explanation I can find for this situation.
I have an astonishing ability to always make the worst decisions, I know that. But I think the consequences are sometimes unconscionable. The only thing I should have done the day Jisoo came home crying was to comfort her and let it go. But I didn't. Of course I didn't. I never let things go and then things go over me.
My first day at the office was hell. Jennie was very determined to make me hate work. I arrived early in the morning and by the time I left it had been dusk for several hours. I spent the whole day filling out reports, bringing her coffees and preparing the roadmap for the project we are going to carry out. Every time I told Jennie the ideas I had, she criticised them and I had to start from the beginning. It was very frustrating.
When I got home I shared my situation with Jisoo and she laughed at me. That's what our friendship is based on. I do things to help her, I mess up and she laughs at me. She doesn't seem to think it's such a big deal. She kept saying that Jennie was a good girl, that it wasn't a big deal, that she'd get over her anger once she got to know me and then everything would be fine. I don't think so. Fuck, I called her a midget. I told her I wanted to fuck her but she cut me off in person. Ahhh I wanna cry.
All I can do is work as hard as I can and prove to her that I am the right person for the job. I just have to ignore her and not fall for her provocations. It can't be hard, I have my dream job, I'm not going to let her turn it into a nightmare.
--
The following morning I arrived at the office very motivated. I had come up with a great idea for the project and I wanted to start working on it. Jennie was already there when I arrived. It's quite normal that she uses Tinder. It was true what she said, she had no life outside her work. Yesterday when I left, she was still staying. I don't understand how not 12 hours after she left here she could be so fresh, so dressed up, so... beautiful.
'Beautiful? Agh, shut up.'
I spend the first hour working on my idea for energy drinks, I have an outline of what I want to do and I can present it to Jennie for her to assess.
'Now she's going to have a thousand things wrong with it and send me off to start all over again.'
I look at her from my desk, she's very focused, staring at her computer screen. I go to her office and knock on the door, she gestures for me to come in, without looking up from the screen.
LISA: Good morning, Miss Kim. I wanted to explain the new idea I've been working on.
She still doesn't look at me.
JENNIE: Leave the papers here and get me a coffee. I also want you to photocopy that stack of reports over there. -She pointed to a mountain of papers.
'She's thought I was her intern.'
LISA: Yes, you see, Miss Kim, first of all I wanted to explain what I was working on.
She looks at me for the first time since I walked into her office.
JENNIE: I don't like having to repeat myself to you and this is going to be the last time I do it: Leave the papers here, go downstairs and get me a coffee and photocopy these reports. -She turned her eyes back to the screen.
'Breathe. Count to ten. He's not going to provoke you. Smile. What's really going to bother her is that you smile.'
LISA: Of course, Miss Kim.
The mountain of photocopies is so big that I even considered giving it a name and my surname. So great, now I'll spend the whole morning fooling around.
Jennie POV
Lisa's report actually looks interesting. She has adapted her approach to the market research we did and I think it could work. When she's finished doing the things I've sent her I'll let her lay it out and we'll start working on it. Now I just want my coffee.
ROSÉ: Knock knock.
Rosé enters my office, opening the door directly and making the classic knocking sound.
JENNIE: Morning.
ROSÉ: I just ran into the Tinder girl at the coffee shop. She's stunningly beautiful, please.
I rolled my eyes.
JENNIE: Yeah, she's really beautiful, but she's an idiot.
Rosé laughs.
ROSÉ: And how was your morning?
I sigh.
JENNIE: Well, not good. I don't know how we're going to be on time for the deadline, I've been going through the design team's projects all morning and I don't like it at all, this looks like a mess.
ROSÉ: You shouldn't be so demanding, Nini.
JENNIE: I have to be, I'm the owner's daughter. Anything good I can do will always be overshadowed by that, so I have to do it really well.
Lisa knocks on the door and I gesture for her to come in.
LISA: Miss Kim, I've got your coffee.
JENNIE: Leave it here. - I point to the table.
Rosé introduces herself.
ROSÉ: Hi, I'm Rosé.
Lisa looks at her shyly.
LISA: Nice to meet you, Lisa. -She shakes her hand.
It makes me sick that she's so shy and polite here when just a few weeks ago, when I was just a stranger on the internet, she treated me the worst way I've ever been treated.
JENNIE: I'm still waiting for the photocopies. When you come upstairs we'll talk about your project. It's not a complete disaster.
She looked at me and smiled.
'I hate it when she smiles at me.'
LISA: I'll get them for you now, Miss Kim. Thank you.
As she leaves, Rosé turns around.
ROSÉ: Can you believe it, such a cute girl being a heartbreaker on Tinder? -She laughs.
JENNIE: Rosé, it's not funny. I've been talking to her for three weeks. Three.
ROSÉ: I know the situation in particular isn't funny, but think about how it looks from the outside. She called you a midget and then she started working for you.
That's when she burst out laughing.
'A hilarious situation.'
But I really don't understand it, I keep thinking about it and I can't find an explanation that convinces me.
JENNIE: Do I look like a dwarf to you?
ROSÉ: Jennie, are you really asking me that?
JENNIE: I don't know, I don't know what to think. I just don't get it. We've been talking for three weeks, we end up flirting like teenagers, and when she meets me in person she blurts all that out. Do I really give such a bad first impression?
ROSÉ: Of course not. You're normal height, you're gorgeous, you're a hottie. If you weren't my childhood friend and I saw you for the first time, I'd have a very strong crush on you.
I smiled.
JENNIE: Oh... wow. I'd have a crush on you too if I didn't know you, you're adorable.
ROSÉ: If you didn't know me? That hurts.
She pretended to cry.
JENNIE: If I didn't know you all my life, you idiot.
ROSÉ: Yeah, right... Now it turns out that when I'm known I stop being crush...
I rolled my eyes and we laughed.
ROSÉ: No, seriously now. I don't know why she would do that. People are weird. Maybe she just likes to make fun of people on the internet and that's it.
JENNIE: Anyway, it doesn't matter now.
I looked back at my computer.
JENNIE: I love your company and you know it, but I have to get back to work before my brain explodes from stress and I die right here.
ROSÉ: Good luck. -She said as she walked out of my office.
Lisa POV
I've been in the photocopy room for almost two hours. There are two big machines and the good one is broken, so after wasting about 40 minutes trying to figure it out because I thought it was my fault, a girl explained to me that it was not working and that I would have to use the old one. The old one makes the photocopies one by one.
One. by. one.
The girl in the photocopy room is called Sandra and apart from helping me with the machine, she kept me company. She also had a lot of photocopying to do.
SANDRA: What's your zodiac sign?
LISA: Well...
SANDRA: Don't tell me! I'll guess. You're... hmm... Sagittarius?
LISA: Aries.
SANDRA: Oh wow. I knew you were a fire sign. -She looked at me mischievously.
Is she flirting?
LISA: Well, if I'm honest, I don't understand much about it.
We were talking most of the time I was there. I explained that I was working in the marketing department and she told me she was in the design department, apparently working on the same project as me.
When I finished with the damn photocopies I went straight to Jennie's office.
'Smile. Don't let her smell your anger.'
JENNIE: It took you two hours to make photocopies?
LISA: The good copier wasn't working, I had to make them one by one.
JENNIE: Two hours, Manoban. If you saw it was going to take that long you should have stopped. We've lost two hours.
Seriously, she sends me three fucking times to make the photocopies, including a: 'I don't like to repeat things' and now she's complaining. Breathe. Breathe.
LISA: Sorry, I thought they were important, because you were so insistent....
I smile innocently. She looks at me with intensity, she knows I'm being ironic but to say it out loud would be to admit that she's wasted my time with a silly thing, so she lets it go.
JENNIE: Whatever. You'll make up the hours later, you're going home later today.
'Smile. Lisa, you're making a disgusted face. Smile.'
LISA: Okay, Miss Kim. -I replied with a grimace that tried to look like a smile.
Jennie stands up.
JENNIE: I need another coffee, let's go to the coffee shop.
I got up and she walked past me. Her smell is... obnoxious and pleasant. I felt a tickle in my stomach.
'Arg, I really can't stand her'.
JENNIE: I've been reading your project, I think it could work, what do you have in mind?
I walked out after her and we headed for the lift as I explained.
LISA: Well, I've been studying the memory and the market research for energy drinks and I've come to the conclusion that, as it's for a mostly young audience, between 20 and 35 years old, we could focus the campaign on the streaming world. You know, Youtube, Twitch?
Jennie looks at me with attention and we get into the lift.
'That bloody wonderful smell again. I hate her perfume, I hate her.'
LISA: Many of the people who make or consume streams are young, spend hours in front of the computer and get little sleep. We can use these platforms and their protagonists to promote it. My friend Jisoo is quite popular, we could talk to her.
Jennie rolled her eyes.
JENNIE: You've been here two days and already you wanna make your friend work here?
LISA: I didn't say that, Jennie. I said I know someone so it might be easier, but we can talk to whoever you want. Besides, she doesn't need a contract with your company, she's doing very well with her job. -I remarked that one a lot more than I intended to.
JENNIE: We'll look at different options.
The door opened on the cafeteria floor.
JENNIE: And don't ever call me Jennie again.
'Huh'.
LISA: Excuse me, Miss Kim. -I grinned. -By the way, you use the same perfume as my grandma. It's nice.
'Now I'm going to smile. She'll never use that perfume again.'
Jennie looks at me with a grimace of disgust that she tries to disguise with poor results. I take it as a personal victory.
JENNIE: I want a 100-page memoir on my desk by the end of the day.
LISA: Anything you ask for, Miss Kim. -I smiled.