얼음꽃 (Frost Flower)

Chapter Four

Jessica drummed her fingers on the table irritably. Thirty minutes. This was, by far, the longest time she had been made to wait and no, she was not the least bit happy about it.

A girl with an innocent face was seated beside her. She knew exactly what the drumming meant, and hastened to speak, "Maybe she was caught in a jam, Miss Jung. You know how traffic is like around here on Friday mornings."

"Seohyun, please don't. You know how I feel about silly stories like that." Whatever the reason, she was not at all interested to hear it unless, of course, somebody actually died in the process. That would be a different story altogether. Anything aside from that would fall under the category of worthless excuses.

"I'm sorry." The girl flipped through the papers before her, making sure again that they were in place.

"What'd you say her name was again?"

"Im Yoona." Seohyun replied, glancing down at the list of applicants for the day. There was something vaguely familiar about the name that made Jessica stop and ponder for a bit.

"Miss Jung, are you sure you wanna be here for this? If this is taking up too much of your time or if you have more important business to attend to, you can leave this to me. I'm sure I can handle it."

"Thanks, Seohyun but I'm staying. I'm gonna make sure the chosen one is worthy enough this time. Can't afford another Do Kyungsoo, you know what I mean?"

"Yes, Miss Jung."

Minutes later, the door burst open without warning and in rushed a girl with messy hair and an unkempt outfit. A styrofoam cup was in her hand and she took a large gulp before plopping herself down clumsily onto the chair before the two women.

They watched her intently as she dug into her bag and pulled out a crumpled file, which they assumed included her poorly-written resume, "Here ya go, boss." The file landed onto the table with a bang and was carelessly nudged forward. Jessica refused to touch the sloppy set of documents but cleared her throat instead, expecting some sort of apology to happen.

"What?" A pair of large eyes shot up to meet her cold ones and the moment eye contact was established, the two appeared to be in shock. Grabbing the file before her hurriedly, Jessica flipped through the girl's profile, frown deepening as her eyes travelled down the page.

"This is a miracle! God has answered my prayer sooner than I expected!" The girl extended her arms towards the ceiling as she spoke, earning another weird look from Seohyun. Her random exclamations were effortlessly ignored as Jessica was still busy scrutinizing the details of her miserable resume.

"You know, you were the first person to brush me aside like that. Did you know how heartbroken I was when you didn't even look at me that night?" She continued and this time, managed to successfully secure the woman's attention.

"I'm sorry, what?" Jessica raised her head to look at her.

"Did you not like it when my friend told you I thought you were really pretty?"

"That was you?!"

"I'm still feeling guilty that you left because of me. Do me a favor and lemme buy you a drink as compensation sometime soon."

Jessica slammed the file shut and offered one of her deadliest glares, "I'm not interested."

"In me or in females generally?"

"Umm, Miss Im, you're here for an interview. If you don't mind, I'm gonna start asking you a few questions now..." Seohyun did what she could to ease the tension going on between the two women.