Dara glanced out the window and watched the buildings past her while grinding her teeth to dull nubs. She couldn’t believe she had to ride the bus when there was perfectly functioning car at home. Today is her working day at the surf shop but her parents refuse to lend her the car. Apparently, football practice was more important than a job.

To top it all off, Dara had been calling Seunghyun to confront him about his seedy, underhanded spending but he never picked up. Then, two hours later, she received a text from him saying

Seunghyun

imati snošaj

I had to research what does that mean since I don’t speak whatever it is and found out  it’s Croatian and I hope I’m not as curious as I don’t like what it truly means. Dara rested her head on the seat in front of her and sighed. This is what her last week of summer vacation had come to. Public transportation and receives text from a pig. Incredible!

“Next stop: Marina/Venice” an electronic voice said over the loud speakers. The bus came to an abrupt halt and Dara shuffled down the aisle and onto the sidewalk. Looking around, she noted the beach was absolutely packed.

As soon as she entered the shop, she noticed two things. One was the store felt like a human oven and second was that the store was in absolute chaos. Dara hurried to the back room to drop off her purse before going back to the floor. Her boss said that there will be a new employee coming today unfortunately she doesn’t know what it looks like.

She became frustrated in the mayhem of the store and the high temperature.  she decided to go to the air condition control and turns it on.

“What the hell!” a voice boomed over the crowd. A dark brown hair guy emerged infront of her. “What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded

 “I think I’m turning on the air conditioning” she hissed at him.

“Excuse me?” he lashed out. “I don’t think that’s your call to make”

“I think It is” she said. she gave him a small wave. “My name is Dara. I work here. I guess you’re the new guy”

“You?” he asked with skepticism.

Dara nodded. “Me” she repeated lightly.

He gave her an appraising look. “Damn high schoolers” he muttered under his breath. “What was Sean thinking?”

“I’m not a high schooler! I’m in college already besides I have this job for more than a month already. What is your name?”

“Taeyang” he grunted. He gave her another look. “I doubt you have ever surfed, let alone picked up a board”

“So?” she challenged

“So you shouldn’t be working here!” Taeyang exploded “Go work at the mall or something”

“Well, Sean is the owner of the shop. He hired me to work here” she pointed to the floor “and here I will work, and do you really want to stand here arguing with me when there’s a whole crowd of customers?”

Taeyang narrowed his eyes and stalked away without a word.

“This should be fun” Dara mumbled sarcastically while she the AC.

For six hours Dara worked non-stop manning the cash register and cleaning up after customers. For the most part, she stayed out of Taeyang’s way, she doesn’t understand why he is so mad at her but she doesn’t care. How she wish it was Bom who is working with her instead of him but Sean said that he will be helping the sales.

As her shift came to an end, Dara went to the back room to collect her things. Exhausted, she flopped into a chair and let out a long sigh of relief. A deep chuckle came from the door and Dara jerked up.

“Long day?” Sean asked leaning against the doorway

Dara groaned. “You have no idea.”

He chuckled again. “I think I do. How was your shift?”

“Well, your new sales guy hate me but he knows what he is doing and a lot of ladies come to her and sell pretty well so it’s ok, if he acts like a jerk ” she answered sardonically her eyes widened a second when she realized who she just said that to. “uh.. I mean.. it went really great.”

Sean shook his head with amusement” Problems with Taeyang?”

Dara snorted “that’s an understatement”

Sean laughed “I’m sorry about that. Before I forget, I just change my phone so I need your number in case we are under man” Sean said while pulling out his phone from his pocket.

Dara was about to recite her number before she remembered she wouldn’t have her phone for few more days. She debated whether or not to give him her number but decided against it. She didn’t want him to call and get Seunghyun. God knows what that guy would say. She can’t take the chance of getting fire.

“Dara?” Sean prompted

She pulled out Seunghyun’s phone from her purse. “Hold on one sec, I’m not sure of the number.” She looked through his settings before coming across the number. She reeled off the ten digits before noticing there was a text. She opened it up and froze before throwing it across the table like it was a contaminated with something. “Gross! Yuck! Gross!” Dara exclaimed with disgust.

Sean looked back and forth between her and the phone. “What’s wrong?”

She rubbed her face and moaned. “Oh god, my poor eyes. I’m so sorry you had to see that” Dara mumbled to herself. “I’ll wash you out as soon as I get home”

“You okay there?” Sean asked bemused. He picked up the phone and chocked on his own spit when he saw the screen. “Do you normally get sent pictures of some girls’ s or is this special circumstance?” Sean turned the phone toward her and she quickly covered her eyes.

“Don’t show me that!”

“Hmm. Not bad. A little on the small side” Sean said while looking at the picture

“Sean!” Dara reprimanded.

“She wrote something below it. You want me to read it?”  Sean asked

“I don’t know, do I?”

Sean chuckled at her. “It says she really enjoyed last night and hoped your roommate wasn’t too mad at getting kicked out. She wants a repeat tonight at 11”

Dara grimaced at the thought. She mentally crushed Seunghyun and wished him an incurable disease.

“Soo…” Sean trailed off. “Anything you want to tell me?” he said in sing-song voice

“I hate the male species” Dara said hotly.

Sean looked at the picture of the girl and then back at her. “I think I get that” he said deadpan.

 “Not like that” she grabbed her phone and quickly pressed the home button so she wouldn’t have to see the vile picture. “I just hate how utterly disrespectful and rude they can be” Dara rumbled as she remembered Seunghyun and his large box of condoms. How she wished she could get revenge on him.

“This generalization aimed at a specific person?” Sean ask intuitively