Final

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“Kyungsoo! Kyungsoo!”

“President!”

“D.O!”

“Senior Kyungsoo!”

“President Kyungsoo!”

 

Do Kyungsoo turned his head behind and saw a group of boys standing at the corridor. He just finished his evening classes and he felt happy about it since he will be baking sweets for white day. It was his routine for two years since he entered university, also he was the president of the infamous Cooking club in university. It was no wonder students that wanted to reply the girls’ confession on valentine will search for him to bake sweets that consisted of chocolate.

Kyungsoo asked them to make reservation before he bake sweets for white day. Today was the last day for the reservation, that’s why Kyungsoo was expecting more to show up today – he didn’t even feel weird of how many guys came to search for him. Kyungsoo’s sweets were known affordable in prices than the sweets sold at the cafeteria. Hence, knowing that, students chose Kyungsoo’s sweets also his sweets was delicious. It’s like killing two birds with one stone – Kyungsoo didn’t mind to bake what kind of sweets they wanted as long as the money paid before they got their order.

The lad felt very grateful that his hobby since high school could make him get much income in the university. Yes, baking sweets might be exhausting for Kyungsoo since there were about up to 30 reservations. But, it was fun since it was the thing he loves to do.

Kyungsoo had black hair and his eyes were like owl since they were big, but it looked cute. When he smiles, his lips will shape like a heart. He was quiet but could be very comedic if he wanted to.

 

The lad was darting to the baking section when he got to the mall he used to go about five kilometers around the university. He was pushing a trolley as he was looking around for the ingredients he needed to find as he was holding his smart phone in hand. He was scrolling the notes he took picture of people’s reservation for what kind of sweets.

Mostly, they didn’t know what kind of sweets girls love. So, they just wrote, the one you thought the best for girls. But, there were some of them that wrote chocolates that they wanted him to bake. Even so, there was one guy that intrigued Kyungsoo’s interest. He almost laughed out loud when he saw what he wrote.

 

From: XL (Laws Major)

Sweets: I want a strawberry tart for my reservation.

 

Didn’t that guy knew that white day was the day where guys replied girls confession from the valentine day? How could he asked him to bake a tart, mostly guys would asked him to bake langue de chat, chocolat miel, white truffle and else. But, that one truly was something else.

Kyungsoo didn’t care to bake it as long as the guy paid for his order.

Since, he will be baking a tart, based from what his mother had taught him, using brown sugar was a good choice in baking tart from the usual sugar. He was already at the sugar section, so he turned to the right and moved slowly along the racks to look for brown sugar.

Kyungsoo’s eyes caught the famous brown sugar brand – Wroile.

There was only one Wroile on the rack so he fastened his pace and went to take the sugar. Unfortunately, he ended up grabbing someone hand not the sugar. Both of them stayed still, till one voice broke out.

“Can you let go of my hand, mister penguin?”

Kyungsoo widened his eyes.

What did she just say?!

There was no one who called him penguin! How could this girl call him that?

Kyungsoo turned his head to the right and saw a girl with her loose dyed blonde hair was staring at him. “I don’t know your name…” she uttered as she sensed Kyungsoo was angry.

“I saw it first,” Kyungsoo started. “You can just choose another brand.”

The girl smirked as she hurriedly took Wroile from the rack and into her embrace. Kyungsoo watched her action and clearly annoyed.

“I got it first. Fair and square, right?”

Kyungsoo sighed. “I saw it first.”

“But, you’re not the one that grabbed it.”

“I was about to grab it.”

“I won!” she cheered.

“Give that to me and I will pay you how much you want,” Kyungsoo urged. He really wanted the best for his customer, so he will work hard to get the best ingredients – that was his policy.

“You’re rich?” the girl asked, looking at the brown sugar in her hand.

“I’m not.”

“Liar!” the girl denied. “Mister Penguin has a healthy body, good mind and rich!”

“I’m not that rich. Come on, I don’t have much time to waste. I need to go home and finish orders!” Kyungsoo snapped. He folded his arms over his chest.

Her eyes shined with mischievous glint.

“I too don’t have time to waste. I want to bake sweet for my lover, so mister google had told me about the best ingredient chose by patissieries, Wroile is the best to make tart. Sorry, but I don’t want your money.”

Kyungsoo let out a sigh and put on his thinking cap.

“Since both of us are eager to have this brown sugar…” he trailed off. “How about we share this together? How much tart you want to bake?”

The girl thought for awhile.

“At least three…” she glanced at Kyungsoo. “Nope, four.”

“It will be enough then since I wanted to use it for one tart. Do you agree with me?” the lad decided as he glimpsed at her.

“Yeah, not many amount of sugar is used for one tart.” she agreed, looking at Kyungsoo, straight to the face.

“So, whose place should we use to bake?” the girl asked.

“Mine, since there will be enough equipment for we to use. It is fair this way too,” Kyungsoo replied.

Both of them chatted for a few minutes before the girl helped Kyungsoo to buy the ingredients he needed.

 

 

“Wow! You don’t even tell me that your place is actually a bakery shop!” the girl cheered as she strolled around the kitchen. Kyungsoo’s mom was at the counter waiting for the customers to pay the sweets they ate. When she saw her son was back with a girl, she was quiet happy about it even Kyungsoo denied that they had just met.

She allowed them to use the kitchen as the girl was thankful about it.

“Don’t open that!” Kyungsoo warned as the girl wanted to open the freezer. She was startled at first and understood that maybe Kyungsoo had stored some sweets that must be frozen and best kept cold.

“So…your name is Kyungsoo?” she glanced at the lad that was taking out the things they bought at the mall earlier. She was rummaging through the plastic bag and taking out something too,

“Yeah.”

“My name is Hyeri.” she told, putting the flour on her right.

“Oh,” Kyungsoo mouthed. Hyeri pouted.

“You’re so focused on what you are doing,” she commented.

“Shouldn’t you do your tarts now?” asked Kyungsoo when he was tying the apron. Hyeri did the same when he asked.

“Yes, just getting started,” she replied. “What are you doing?”

Hyeri saw the lad was getting some chocolates.

“I will temper these chocolates and double boil the rest.”

Hyeri looked amazed. Her hands started working albeit she felt impressed looking at Kyungsoo doing his work. One hour passed till Hyeri broke the silence.

“How many order did you get?”

“About 40 or 45…something like that…I don’t want to bake so much, it’s exhausting even if it pays off well.”

Hyeri looked up from the confetti she was doing. She was stirring the rhubarb as she averted her gaze to Kyungsoo.

It was about a few minutes till Kyungsoo finished tempering the chocolate an saw Hyeri was staring off to the space. Kyungsoo widened his eyes when he looked at the rhubarb color and it was about to burned. He hurriedly marched towards Hyeri and closed the stove.

“What are you doing?!” he shouted. Hyeri was surprised because of Kyungsoo’s sudden shout. She blinked her eyes. “You could make the sweets you want to give to someone in a bad shape! That’s a no! We make sweets because we want people to enjoy it, loving it and savor the taste. But, your attitude shows that you are irresponsible in the kitchen. Please focused on your work solely and not heading to somewhere else!”

“I…” Hyeri bit her lips.

Kyungsoo then realized what he had done. “Sorry, it just I can’t stand sweets given to someone poorly. That’s why it is important to make your heart love sweets making.”

Mrs. Do entered the kitchen after hearing Kyungsoo’s voice from the shop. Hyeri couldn’t say anything to Kyungsoo as Mrs. Do pulled her hand, stepping out from the kitchen.

 

“Sorry, dear…” Mrs. Do said as she placed a mug of hot chocolate in front of Hyeri. The girl was still shocked and didn’t say a word. “Kyungsoo is really fussy when it comes to sweets and things he loves dearly. The most he cared about is sweets and how they are made, he doesn’t care if the sweets are not tasty actually but he minds about the effort we use to bake.”

“I understood that,” Hyeri said after awhile. “I knew guys that have pride and ego in what they are doing. It because of proud, that what show their enthusiasm.”

Mrs. Do nodded and chuckled. Hyeri glance at the elder woman as she sipped her hot chocolate. “I just reminded on how the girl that had a crush on my son often sent him her homemade chocolates.”

Hyeri’s smile graced her face. “That’s sweet.”

“He accepted them when she sent it, but she couldn’t stand him one day and left him before he noticed his feeling towards her.”

“It’s too late,” Hyeri pouted.

Mrs. Do laughed. “It’s Kyungsoo’s fault, dear. No one else, someone that sent him cookies, chocolates or sweets often got harsh critic from him. As he tasted what they made, he will tell them what he has in mind. That’s why girls don’t give him anything because it’s like sending him a declaration of war.”

Hyeri too laughed hearing that. Their laughter filled the empty shop as there were no customers in the meantime.

“This world is really beautiful,” Hyeri said. “There are many people that I had met, but there is one person I still yearn to meet…”

Mrs. Do looked at the girl curiously.

 “But, he mostly will not see me around again…”

“Why?” Mrs. Do asked.

Hyeri gave her an infectious smile. “He does not want to see me …”

 

“I’m sorry,” that was the first thing he said when Hyeri stepped into the kitchen to continue her work. Kyungsoo was rolling the dough as he looked at it.

“Look up, Kyungsoo,” Hyeri uttered. Kyungsoo hang his face, fixated his gaze on Hyeri. “I’m fine. It’s true that I need to focus on what I am doing to get the best result. After this, I too need to lock my gaze on one goal. Do my best!”

Kyungsoo raised his eyebrows. He expected different reaction from the girl, but it looked backfired. Normally people would be annoyed with him, but how could this girl didn’t do anything else to make him mad?

“I left you the sugar,” he muttered, pointing his index finger to the brown sugar packet on the table.

Hyeri nodded. “You have finished doing the order?”

Kyungsoo muttered a soft ‘Just a little bit’ before continuing his work. Hyeri decided to continue where she left off from earlier.

 

On 1. a.m Kyungsoo had finished the orders after packaging them in the cute paper bag with heart shaped and bear design. Kyungsoo plopped on the couch and heard that Hyeri still didn’t finish her baking session. He was weird with it because the girl should finish baking before him, how come she didn’t even finish baking yet?

Also, did her family worry about her now? Or did she mess up again?

That’s what Kyungsoo thought as he rested on the couch, his eyelids were about to close before Mrs. Do approached him and gave him a cup of tea.

“Mom, it’s night…” he said. He didn’t want to drink something sweet at this time.

“I don’t put sugar in the tea. It just a plain tea,” Mrs. Do replied.

“You know Kyungsoo, I think that Hyeri is a different person from what I see,” she told him. Her eyes were wavering.

“What? I don’t understand…” he remarked as he took the tea from Mrs. Do’s hands and she sat beside him.

“She is very perceptive in life. Oh, and you should heard she played the piano earlier. It sounds nice but somehow it tugged my heart, she almost amazed the customers earlier. Bring her next time to the shop, son.”

Mrs. Do smiled reminding of how Hyeri was bowing after her performance ended. The girl looked satisfied and happy.

“I can’t…” Kyungsoo replied. “We’re strangers.”

“Son,” Mrs. Do glued her eyes on Kyungsoo. “Strangers could be anything you want them to be. Friends, enemies or even lovers, that’s how the world is.”

Kyungsoo kept mum and heard Mrs. Do was leaving him alone. He placed the tea cup on thecoffee table in front of, closing his eyes and dozed off to sleep.

 

The next day when the young lad woke up, he found a tart wrapped on the coffee table with a sticky note patched on the wrapper. The lad reached out for the tart and noticed something.

“How ironic,” he stifled his chuckles. “Strawberry tart?”

He read the note.

 

Sugar is sweet.

Our encounter also a sweet one to me.

It added spice in my life again.

Yet, even thought it felt bitter, it was sweet to know you.

I didn’t know if I did send you a declaration of war with my homemade strawberry tart.

But, one thing I wanted you to know, the tart is my humblest gift for you that make me want to focus on life again, mister penguin.

I am sure will be visiting Penguin’s Bakery Shop next time.

Till we meet again.

 

Yours truly,

Kim Hyeri.

 

“It is also a sweet meeting to me, dear stranger.”

Kyungsoo said shortly before he got up and cleaned his teeth also washed his face.

He slowly opened the wrapper and tasted the tart.

“My! She truly need to learn baking, I can believe it the crust is burnt!”

He commented, he hoped that next time she went to the shop, he will get to know Hyeri more.

 

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