You stretched on your bed, all of your muscles were screaming. All the travelling in under than five days took a toll on your body. You really should start working out. You made note to put it into your agenda in the to-do list after Christmas. You took a hot and quick shower before fixing yourself breakfast. You decided to eat something sweet today. You hoped that everything would run smooth today. You brought a cup of coffee and drove to the headquarter. You were just passing the front door when a coworkers met you halfway.
"Ughh.. Really? This early?" you whined as you could see trouble written all over his face.
"Sorry," he grinned. "Not too serious though," he quickly added.
"Okay then, please let me sit in my office first before you start with your report," you pleaded and he nodded, walking beside you and waited until you sipped your coffee and settled in your chair. He then started to open his mouth when you gave him the signal.
"It's nothing serious, really. It's just the kids started to complain and our inbox were flooded with complaints instead of wishes," he told you.
"What kind of complaints?" you frowned. Were there another errors in the system that mixed up the gifts for real this time? Just yesterday you found out that there were no errors in the system, only the kids scamming Bambam in order for them to get additional gifts since Bambam was too lenient and more than happy to shop more gifts for the kids.
"Um, they ask for a different Santa," he answered.
"Which region?" you inquired.
"Japan," he answered quietly. Japan? You remembered you put Jinyoung in charge for Japan. Usually Japan was very quiet as the kids were more reserved compared to the kids on the other side of the world. Thus you didn't expect there would be problems, let alone complaints from Japan. Jinyoung himself had a good record. He is good-looking, thus easily smitten both parents and the kids. He didn't have problem with kids, and he didn't look scary. He was meticulous as well, so you could rest assure that he wouldn't do rash things like Bambam.
"Why would they ask for a different santa?"
"Well.. All of them said that the Santa was too strict? Something about setting the bar too high for them to make into the good list?" he looked at his note and wasn't sure. You sighed.
"Jet?" you asked as you knew you had no choice but to fly there to resolve the problem. Christmas was getting near, so there was no way to get a substitution for Jinyoung. You had to find the reason why the kids didn't want Jinyoung as their santa and solved it quickly. Jinyoung was sitting in front of his computer when you arrived. You knocked the doorframe to let him know that you have arrived. He turned around and waved for you to come in.
"I heard there are some problems with the kids," you started carefully.
Jinyoung raised his eyebrow, he didn't seem to know about the complaints. "What problem?"
"You tell me. We've been getting complaints about you," you explained.
"Complaints? Me?" he felt offended. You shrugged.
"Anything to tell me?"
He shook his head. "I don't see why they would send complaints about me. I did everything by the book."
"Okay then, I have no choice but to follow you to work."
He stood up and waved, "Ladies first." You waited while he changed into his outfit and you swore you never saw other santa looking that good. Jinyoung in red suit was like cherry on top of your ice cream. Too bad people pictured santa as a fat bearded man. They should start picturing santa as a younger and sexy man. You watched him as he took his seat and the kids started to line up. You saw there was no problem with the kids telling him all their wishes. None of the kids were scared of him. And he was attentive, listening to all their stories, making short comments here and there so the kids knew that they were being heard. However, after three or four kids, you started to notice that he hasn't put any tag on the kids. You decided to put a pause on the line, claiming that santa needed to go on a short break to the restroom. Jinyoung said nothing but to follow you, even though you could see puzzled look in his face.
"Did your glasses work okay?" you asked immediately when there was no one else but the two of you.
"Yeah, it works fine. Why?"
"Why don't you put any tags on the kids? Surely not all kids are in the naughty list," you said.
"Well, they're not being nice either," he simply answered.
"What do you mean?" you grabbed his glassed and turned it on and put the history on display. You started to read the first kid data. Sure, he wasn't the nicest kid in the world, but he wasn't the naughtiest as well. He might tease his siblings now and then, but it was understandable.
"Jinyoung, the first kid was okay. He didn't do anything too bad," you started.
Jinyoung frowned, "He teased his siblings. Repeatedly. Even after his mother asked him not to. If he didn't show any remorse, then he was naughty."
"But all kids did the same," you complained but he didn't want to hear anymore about it, so you moved on and checked on the second kid. You quickly scanned the profile and couldn't yourself from complaining, "Now what's wrong with the second kid?"
"He played games too much and sometimes he lied to his mom about it," Jinyoung replied.
You groaned. Even you sneaked out to play with your friends when you were supposed to study back when you were still students and sometimes even copied your friends' homework, but that didn't mean that you were completely naughty. "Jinyoung..."
"What? He's not nice," he shrugged his shoulder.
"If you kept being super selective like this, no kids would get their wishes," you pointed. Jinyoung sighed as you might be right. These days, almost no kids were innocent. "Turn it down a notch, please? It's holiday after all. They deserve some happiness. Maybe it will motivate them to be better next year," you pleaded and Jinyoung agreed. You followed him back to the venue and he did as promised. He turned it down a notch and you saw he started to put tags on some kids. You smiled as you could finally talk some sense into him and changed his mind. Jinyoung could be a little difficult at times.
"Come on, when you were kid, weren't you a bit naughty back then? Maybe little Jirongie like to tease his sisters a lot?" you teased him once you were back at his hotel. You were supposed to go back to headquarter right away after solving the problem.
He pouted and shook his head a bit before smiling, "Yeah.. I did. My sisters will gladly list all of my bad behaviors back then. Okay okay.. I see your point," he said at last.
"Good," you smiled. "Promise me to turn it down a notch for the rest of the holiday? Chrismas is just few days away, just hang on until then. I won't say yes to bullying, but a little naughtiness is okay, get it?" you turned around to face him after picking up your bag, ready to head out from his hotel room.
He nodded, putting his right hand over his chest, "I promise...," he prolonged his sentence so you raised your eyebrow as you sensed something else was in his mind. "As long as you promised me something in return. Dinner with me after Christmas?" Ugh, you froze on your spot. Another one? You groaned. You still haven't decided to go with Bambam or Jaebeom and now Jinyoung was asking the same thing? You needed an aspirin after this.
