BEGINNING
"We ruin someone, but we don't realize we are ruining ourselves too at the same time."
Guess the world decided to play with me.
Why in the world, the fricking, stupid world, should I have a call from the director? Like right now, as if all the seconds in the vast platform of time decided to just turn on me? This day couldn't get any worse than this.
From spilling the bright, red tomato sauce onto my not-so-white shirt (blame the washing powder), then changing my shirt to a blue one which luckily wasn't that smelly when I picked it up from the piled up laundry, and then finding that my skinny jeans that I had somehow managed to button up around my bulging waist had a bottle cap size hole which was threatening to tear, and then missing the bus because I forgot that it was a Monday and the bus would go earlier with a hectic crowd inside, and then almost knocking down the old lady with the crooked teeth at the reception and sending her to a pile of ashes, who was fortunately saved by the railing on the sides of the counter, to this. The director calling me. Why do I have to endure this?
"Okay, Ara. You got this." I told myself, trying to make use of all the motivational lessons that Joohyun gave to me while my eyes were on the glamorous, luxurious, one of the most and costliest things in the world; the great pizza. Why didn't I pay attention properly? I reminded myself of the vague memories of her telling how to hold up your head high and look straight in the eyes of the person who is speaking which demonstrates your confidence. For a wild moment as my trembling hand gripped the oak door of her office, I wondered what would happen. What in the world did i do? I did my job kind of okay, and i didnt commit any crime, unless stealing some candies from the cafeteria counted as one. They were just so addicting, with their shining blue wrappers and luscious gold designs. God, is that the problem? Would I get suspended? Would I get fired? Or perhaps, beheaded?
"Oh God, please, please, please, save me..." I mumbled to myself, trying to keep a straight face instead of breaking down and letting the salty drops fall onto her plush, velvet carpet. Her office was still the same as it always was; but she was nowhere in sight. I looked around with my brown eyes, trying to find her. She wasn't by the humongous transparent window, she wasn't in her sleek black office chair which I wished to sit on someday, she wasn't near the potted cactus plant which had withered after her continuous torture. Where was she?
I put down the yellow file I was holding in fright as I felt the door to the office open, it's poor back slamming on to the clean, spotless white wall. I hastily picked up the file as my director, Lee Seun, came in with a man dressed in a grey suit. I stepped aside as my director passed by, and I looked at the man's face clearly. He was a bit young, around his thirties, but his expression caught me. His eyes were pleading, and I knew what was about to happen. "Mam, please, I will do anything! Let me keep this job!" His almost crying, strangled voice echoed in my ear.
Seun turned back to face the man, her eyes malicious. Telling him in that grave voice that made me feel as if I was going to be buried alive, "Get out Mr.Khan. You violated the policies. Don't show your stupid, idiotic, nitwit face in this company ever again." The man opened his mouth as if he was going to say something, but then retreated and bowed, and silently walked out closing the door behind him, his head hanging low and I knew he was devastated, but I felt as if he had escaped the Pentagon or something. He was luckier not to face anymore of the vicious insults of this lady. I wondered what she would do if she had a child, she could make me almost pee in my pants. I was looking at the door, thinking about the poor guy, when I heard the director speak. "You," she said, which made me snap to my senses back. I turned my head to her quickly looking at her seriously while my body shivered, and I felt the feeling of suffocating with a plastic bag over your head.
"You are Song Ara, aren't you?" She asked, her voice calm, just like how the wind is soothing before the storm. "Y-yes mam." I stuttered slightly at the start and waited with bated breath, hoping she didn't hear my clumsy mistake. "I saw your papers on the topic of businessmen," she said, her eyes studying me like how a snake eyes it's prey. I felt vulnerable and exposed to her; but I maintained my calm face, just staring at her. "Can you explain to me why, you decided to say, shall I quote, 'businessmen are tragic people.'"she said, moving her long fingers to her cheek which was red in colour, probably from the crazy amount of blush she wore. I never wore it, with that money, I would buy the whole restaurant down the street.
But I did listen to her question. The answer was simple enough to answer; it was something I had already thought about on one of those days when Joohyun wasn't in the small apartment room, while I sat near the windowsill with a laptop on my lap, watching the rain pour down, the drops clearing the pavement of its dirt, as if god was cleansing his people.
"I think they are tragic because...all they care, all they ever will know, is about wealth, power and reputation. I thought about how hard it is to keep one's status high, and how just one single mistake can bring the person falling down from the highest stairs," I answered in a small voice, my fingers now tearing the bright yellow paper of the file, the bits falling to the ground. She looked at me in a different sort of way, before standing up. I watched as her slender figure turned to the glass window, her hands on her hips, as of contemplating something. I stood there nervously, my hands shaking slightly as I looked at her back, and I wondered how she could easily walk in a black pencil skirt that looked so tight and small on her. I preferred the comfiest pants, the one with the small, cute bears on it.
I removed my eyes from her dyed golden blonde hair as she turned back walking towards me. She stood infront of me, her sparkling blue eyes looking into mine. I stared back, not knowing what to do. My mind felt blank, as stupid sentences ran inside my brain and mind. "Ara,..." She began. "I can see you are having some sort of potential." She said, and my mind brightened like how the sunflowers shine in a tuscan yellow on a beautiful, sunny day.
"That is why I'm assigning you to this." She walked back, her high heels clattering on the teak floor. Pulling out a huge blue file she gave it to me, which I accepted. I looked through it and it gave me some pictures of a man who was quite popular around now. His face was chiseled, his nose looked small, he had fair white skin with jet black hair and thin pink lips. But what drew me to the pictures were his eyes. They were cold, devoid of any emotion. Just cold, like how you feel on a lonely winter day with the snow falling, landing softly on the white ground, cold like how the rain mercilessly drenches you as you stand without an umbrella. But what confused me was, what did the director want me to do?
"What should I do, mam,?" I asked this time my voice much better and louder. But I almost freaked out as I saw a smile on her face. It wasn't just a smile. A sinister, evil one. It was the one she showed whenever she was going to pour someone in trouble, just like how the wrongdoers are sent to hell.
"I want you to ruin him."
And I thought I wasn't getting beheaded today.
