chapter four.

July 1, 2018

Eunjae stretched, looking out the window and watching over the view of the residential area below her.

It was a clear day out, perfect to go out and about the city.

Well, it wasn’t like she could do that anyway. She had to complete her new choreography by tomorrow and perfect it by Wednesday. She also needs groceries soon and check in on her friend Minjung to see if she needed to take care of her cute, little gremlin.

Yeah, actually.. No.

Eunjae doesn’t know if she wants to know. Minjung is a grown woman after all, she can tend to her own duties.

Should she just wait out on a call to see if she needed help?

Maybe.

She ran her hands through her hair, reaching out and stretching.

Her phone chimes and buzzes against the coffee table behind her.

Eunjae crouches down and snatches her phone up, reading the notification before putting it down when she realized who it was from.

Money from her mother again, just like clockwork. Every month, it’d be sent in.

She picks up the glass of water beside her phone, drinking it as she attempts to distract herself with the view out her window.

No use thinking hard on it now. She had the whole day to look forward to and needed to tackle down some tasks before the day ends.

Jikyung sleepily held out a bristle board against an empty wall along the corner converging the front and the hallway to the back of the café.

Perhaps she’d put too much effort into doing the calendar for the month, but it’s much too late for that now.

She sticks the board onto the wall, stepping back and nodding in satisfaction at the work done.

There were two birthdays for the month. Yoonju’s was in six days and then Taeryung’s happening within less than a week after that.

Then there were three birthdays happening the next month.

Jikyung realized the annual cost for her coworkers’ birthday cakes were going to be stellar.

Maybe she should just buy a box of doughnuts from now on. That’s cheaper, right?

Yeah, her wallet would definitely hurt less.

Although the café was closed for the meantime, it didn’t mean it was deathly quiet. Jikyung could hear the kitchen getting prepared by Yoonju, and perhaps some tired mumbling as the girl sorted through the organized mess Hyun made from his closing shift.

Hanyeon was somewhere in the dining area, probably still resting her head on a table to catch up on some sleep while her brother rushed back home to fetch a piece of equipment he had forgotten. Gaho should be coming in soon, if he hasn’t yet.

The faint sound of the door swinging alerted Jikyung, walking to the front to see the new arrival.

“Good morning,” she heard Gaho chime in as he walked towards the counters, eyelids still drooping from fatigue.

“Good morning, everyone!” A girl’s voice rang out as the door behind Gaho whirled open again.

Subin is chipper, iced Americano in hand and a potted plant embraced by the free arm. Her smile is ever present on her face.

Trailing right behind her is Minjae, yawning as he waved, “Good morning..”

The café became much more livelier.

Jikyung blinks, “Oh, Minjae, you’re pretty early.”

“Yeah, well,” the boy nodded towards Subin, “I was pretty curious as to what you guys were going to do with the newbies, so I tagged along, I guess.”

The girl set the potted plant aside on the table by the entrance, taking a look at the other plants that had been brought in by the others. “Huh?” Subin leans closer to the pots, “Why are these guys numbered?”

Jikyung turned to the girl, “It’s to identify them, I got an instruction sheet typed up on how to care for them.”

“Numbering them seems a bit inhumane, doesn’t it?” Subin straightened up. Her face lightens up, clapping her hands together, “How about we name them?”

Jikyung was at a loss for words.

Subin reaches for her plant, raising it up, “I’ll name him Oscar!” Her nose slightly scrunched as she giggled. “Whose plants are these? They should name them too!”

Jikyung recalled, looking at the smaller potted plant right beside Subin, “Well, that one’s from Yoonju—“

“You called?”

“Oh, —“ Jikyung jumped, looking to Yoonju to her left, “Since when did you get here?”

“Just now,” Yoonju answered, “I wanted to see how everybody else was doing.”

“Yoonju, you should name your plant!” Subin set her plant down once again, “I named mine Oscar!”

Minjae had taken a seat nearby, staring at Subin from across, “Why Oscar out of all names? That’s such a random foreign name.”

Yoonju cuts in, “Shin Dongho’s son is named Asher when he and his wife aren’t even foreign, his name can and will be Oscar.”

The boy recoils from the reply, “Wait, who’s Shin Dongho—“

Jikyung butts into the conversation, sounding almost disappointed, “He was part of U-KISS, child.”

Yoonju blinks and stares into space. The conversation took no turn before she nodded with conviction, “My plant’s name will be Tony.”

The door swings and only slightly misses Subin. Seongjun pops in with an easygoing smile, “Good mor—Why are we all gathered to the front?” He looks to everyone in a daze.

Minjae nonchalantly answers, “They were naming the plants—“

“Yeah!” Subin beams, holding up her plant for second time, “Say hi to Oscar!”

Seongjun doesn’t miss a beat, “Hi, Oscar—“

“And that’s Tony over there, Yoonju’s plant!” Subin nods over to the plant set on the entrance table beside her, putting aside her plant once again.

“Oh, do we get to name our plants?” Seongjun looks excitedly at Jikyung, and the manager could only sigh.

“I mean, I don’t think I can stop any of you from doing that.” She crosses her arms and quickly adds, “But now I’ll have to put their names in on the sheet. Be right back.” The manager sets off to the counters, highly likely to the manager’s office to edit the file.

Subin tilts her head, spotting something—or someone—in her line of sight, “Alright, I’ll be off!” The girl skips further inside the café to the corner table Hanyeon is napping at.

Yoonju looks around aimlessly before nodding to Seongjun, walking back to the counters.

Seongjun drags the seat across from Minjae out, plopping his backpack down and ping it to take out his apron, “Now I want to bring in a plant.”

“So you could name it?” Minjae raises an eyebrow.

Seongjun stares at his coworker before a smile cracks out, “Yeah.”

“And what would you name it?

Seongjun gives it a thought, “Well, there’s Oscar, Tony..” He scratches his head, “Maybe I should name mine Juno or something.”

“Juno?” Minjae squints as he slowly makes a realization, “Wait, are we seriously going to be naming our first few plants after western award shows?”

“I guess.” Seongjun grinned, taking his bag off the seat and sitting down while putting his bag on the floor. “How about you? What would you name your plant?” He fired back the same question.

“My plant, huh?” Minjae looks to the window, staring at the tiny pothos set on the window sill. It’s merely a bunch of leaves as of now, yet to grow to turn into a trailing vine. He sighs, “Maybe Dora?”

Seongjun’s the one who now has a realization, “Isn’t that also—“

“An award show, yes.” Minjae couldn’t believe he was following suit. “But I was thinking that since my plant is going to grow to have vines, I was also thinking of Dora the Explorer since she swings on vines.” He puts up a smug smile, “So at least it would make sense.”

The entrance door swings open once again.

Now enters a boy hauling a cardboard box in his arms.

“Good morning!” Minki marches up with a grin, looking around before walking up to the table next to Subin and Hanyeon, the former chatting away as the latter simply listens. He gently puts the fairly large box down, announcing to no one in particular, “I brought snacks!”

Subin shoots up from her chair, taking a look into the box, “Oh my God!”

There is a startling variety of snacks packed, ranging from chips, chocolate, biscuits, and a bunch more.

It was like a treasure trove.

Gaho walks to the corner the three kids were at, gradually gawking as he approached the wealth of snacks, “Minki, where did you get all this?”

The boy waves dismissively, “Oh, it’s from my parents’ convenience store! They say hi, by the way!”

“Woah, they didn’t have to—“

“No, no, it’s okay!” Minki assures, “Don’t worry about it!”

Subin claps, excitement bursting out, “Can we have some now?”

Minki smiles, “Yeah, of course!” He quickly turns to Hanyeon, who nearly flinches from his sudden attention, “Hanyeon, you get first pick!”

Hanyeon’s expression remained unreadable, but if anybody had looked closer at that moment..

They would know that her eyes twinkled just a bit.

“Thanks, Minki.” Then an involuntary smile curled her lips up, standing up from her seat as she looked into the box of snacks. Her eyes immediately catch a familiar yellow bag of chips, hand shooting out and picking out honey butter chips.

Subin pursed her lips, a smile threatening to break out as she (attempts to) sneakily eye between the two younger coworkers. She decides to say nothing, picking out a chocolate bar and sitting herself down.

Not without shooting a teasing look at the little chips-engrossed girl in front of her, though.

Jikyung sits back on the office chair, huffing as she saved the file.

God, did naming these damned plants mean they also need their own name tags?

Why did Subin have to make her feel bad over giving numbers to plants as their identity?

The door swings open and Yoonju steps into the room, “Did you remember to register Oscar and Tony into the file?”

Jikyung furrows her brows, “You make it sound like I’m responsible for your children’s birth certificates.”

“You basically are.” Yoonju leans against the desk, staring blankly at the other manager. She opens , “Oh, by the way, Minjae named his plant Dora. The one by the window sill?”

Here we go again.

Jikyung straightens up in her chair and reaches for the mouse, opening the plant ordinance file once again.

“Also, the Elmo’s still in the box downstairs.”

“Let him rot.”

“He’s getting lonely. You better do something before he takes matters into his own hands—“

“And I’ll take matters into mine if you don’t cut that bull out.” Jikyung shoots an uncomfortable glare, only to be received so easily by the younger manager. “Do something for me, will you?” Jikyung nods towards the little cardboard box next to the monitor, “The kids’ name tags finally came in.”

“Will do.” Yoonju snatches up the box into her hand and grabs a fat pencil case sitting on the desk, walking out of the office and leaving Jikyung to her own thing.

She looks to the screen, but her mind is somewhere else as she remembers what Yoonju had said to her.

“Why did Hyun have to ruin Elmo for me..?”

“Name tags are here.” Yoonju announces with little enthusiasm, noting the drastic increase of attendance from the last time she’d been to the front. It seems the newbies have accumulated in the corner Hanyeon had thought she would be peacefully left alone at.

Junhyuk perks up at the mention, nearly rising from his seat, “Name tags?”

Taeryung is the next one to pipe up, “Do we get to write our names on it?”

Yoonju nods, “Write it nice and big.” The manager plops the pencil case on to the table, ripping the tape off the box in her hand and placing it on the table most center among the kids.

Junhyuk grins, “I’m so tempted to put my Overwatch username on the tag!”

The manager catches on to the comment, “You can if you want.”

“Really?!”

“Yeah, as long as it identifies you from everybody else.” Yoonju shrugs, “But if you’re going to put a username on your name tag, don’t be surprised if customers react weird.”

The newbies begin to crowd around the table, Dahn seated at the same table opens up the flaps and begins distributing the name tags to fellow coworkers. Soyul grabs the pencil case and zips it open, revealing a plethora of pens and coloured pencils.

The kids busy themselves with writing down their name, some simply writing down their names like Yohan and Yeonhee, and some taking their sweet time to decorate like Soyul and Junhyuk.

Others were having a field day over the many possible options they get to fill their name tag in.

Subin claps her hands as she holds up her tag to inspect. The café’s logo was printed at the top. Underneath was a blank strip of paper for them to fill out. A little giggle makes its way out Subin, “Hanyeon, should I put my nickname?”

Hanyeon looks up from her own tag, stopping mid-way from writing, “Ahn-tokki?”

“Yeah!” It’s obvious Subin is excited, already grinning from ear-to-ear imagining the blank slip of white paper being filled with her bunny-inspired nickname. She puts her name tag on the table facing Hanyeon, gingerly sliding it in front of her, “Write it down for me!”

The little girl purses her lips at the line, writing the rest of her first name on her own tag before putting it aside. Subin nudges her blank name tag up to Hanyeon.

Soyul exclaims, “Oh! There are sticker sheets at the bottom!” She carefully pulls out sheets of stickers from the pencil case, awe evident on her face as she admires the array of design provided. The girl distributes the stickers among them.

“Stickers?” Eunjae’s joy was unmistakable, “Pass some to us, please!”

Dahn couldn’t help but laugh at the whole scene unfurling around him, and Yeonhee catches on.

“What’s funny?” Yeonhee smiles expectantly, pinning her name tag onto her shirt. Her own name is neatly printed onto the strip of paper.

Dahn shakes his head, “I feel like we’re in an arts and crafts class or something.”

Eunjae pops in, “Hey, we all gotta give in to the inner kid in us every once in a while!” She places sticker sheets in the middle of their table and heavily contemplates over the options with her own sticker sheet in hand.

Eunjae spots her seatmate Jihoon in a daze, already finished with his name tag. She gives it a quick glance before speaking up, "Jihoon!" She quickly takes a sticker sheet and slides it over to him, "You should decorate yours too!"

“It’s beautiful!” Subin picks her name tag up, pinning it to her shirt.

The name tag has Ahn-tokki written in warm pink ink, topped with a small bunny sticker at the end of it. Designed by Hwang Hanyeon herself.

The older girl smiles, “With your effort put into it, I’ll treasure the name tag always!” She giggles, scrunching her nose at her own greasiness.

Hanyeon lets a shy smile slip out while Soyul and Zhihui burst into a fit of laughter.

At the other end of the series of tables, Minki proudly pins his name tag on his shirt too.

Yohan squints as he reads his friend’s tag, “GamerPedia Minki?” On Yohan himself was his own given name written clean and simple.

This catches Taeryung’s attention, “GamerPedia? Where’d you get that nickname?”

Seongjun overheard at the mention of the nickname, standing up from his seat at the front of the café and making his way to the corner, “Minki knows a lot of the board games here in the café, and when he doesn’t?” Seongjun shoots an amused look, Minki’s proudly grinning already, “He’ll nail down the rules at the drop of a hat.”

“Jikyung gave the nickname to me!”

Taeryung’s jaw drops, “What? I want a nickname too!”

Yoonju observes in a distance as the kids interact with each other.

Most of them have integrated with each other.

Most.

Zhihui, Soyul, and Subin were chatting amongst themselves, with Hanyeon just making a comment or two. Minki, Taeryung, and Junhyuk were a rambunctious bunch, listing their hobbies as Yohan keeps up with the three. Eunjae was shooting up an easygoing conversation with Dahn and Yeonhee, attempting to have Jihoon join in as well.

It was funny seeing them all together like this, getting themselves acquainted as they waited for whatever plan Minjin set up for them.

“Weird, isn’t it?”

Yoonju turns her head, seeing Jikyung standing to her right, “Hm?”

“Just months ago, we had such a small team.” The manager huffs, “And now we’ve got these kids.”

Shrugging, Yoonju turns back to observe them. For a while, there was some silence between the two girls until Yoonju spoke again. “I feel like there are more of my own people here,” she nodded, a creep of a small smile appearing.

“What?” Jikyung was surprised at the comment, “What do you mean?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“What do you—“ Yoonju walks off to the back, leaving Jikyung with the lack of context. Jikyung sighs, “What the hell did she mean?”

The entrance door swings open and she recognizes the stupid grin on a familiar face.

Minjin raises an arm up, tripod hugged in the other arm, “Good morning! Hwang Minjin is present.”

Bursts of enthusiastic greetings erupted from the kids’ corner. It was clear some were excited, and a few were nervous.

Jikyung didn’t know how this video would turn out.

Minjin marches up the corner, planting the tripod down to the floor. “This is the first time I’m seeing all of you guys! Hello!” He has an easy smile on his face as the kids greet back. “I recognize a few of you, but I think this is the first time I’m meeting all of you at the same time.”

He lets out a big sigh, clapping his hands together, “And as you all can probably tell, I’ll be filming all of us as we get to know each other.” He carefully scans everyone in front of him, “If anyone has problems being filmed and being put out there on the internet, you don’t have to force yourself to do it.”

There’s a silence as some of the newbies glance at each other.

“Otherwise, you guys can just come up to me after filming if you want your face covered up! I have no problem doing that either.” Minjin reassures them. With his disclaimer done, he nods at them, “Well, you guys can go back to talking while I set things up! Don’t mind me.”

At that, the kids slowly began to resume their conversations.

Minjin crouches down while adjusting the tripod’s height. He looks up at his sister as he works around it, “Hanyeon, can you pass me my camera?”

Said girl wordlessly hauls up the bag sitting by her feet, standing from her seat as she makes her way up and hands him the rest of his equipment.

“Thanks, Nyeonyeon! Love you!”

Hanyeon took that as her cue to walk back to her seat, listening in on the three girls to catch up on the conversation.

Subin lowers her head as she speaks in a hushed tone, “Okay, wait, but who’s that guy?”

Hanyeon was going to answer but sneakily shut as she saw Zhihui open hers, “That’s the owner of the café.”

Soyul’s face is smacked with surprise, “Oh, wow. I thought so, but I didn’t know the owner would be this young!” She sat back as she visibly thought, “And for his business to be doing pretty well within months..”

Zhihui lets out a gentle laugh, “He’s gained a following on YouTube, so I suppose that sorted the promotion itself out.”

“Oh, he’s a YouTuber?” Soyul is surprised once again, a hint of excitement and urgency visible in her eyes, “What’s his channel? My friend might want to know this.” She whips out her phone, ready to text her friend Dohee.

“He goes by Doogi on YouTube.” Zhihui recounted.

It seems the next table over took interest in the conversation, now with Dahn also being given the revelation, “The owner’s a YouTuber?”

Eunjae hops on to the change of subject, “Yeah, you didn’t know? He’s part of the gaming community there!”

“Oh, wouldn’t have known, then.” Dahn has a sheepish smile, “I’ve fallen out of video games for a long while now.”

Eunjae hummed as she nodded understandably, then turning to her other seatmates, “Yeonhee, Jihoon, did you guys know?”

The girl gives it a thought and shrugs, “Yeah, I guess.” Yeonhee adds on, “I kind of already personally know him myself.”

Jihoon pauses before admitting, “I’m a fan myself, actually.”

Eunjae’s eyes light up, “Me too!” She catches herself, “Though I haven’t had the time to watch his videos recently.”

The other end of the crowd also has their interest on the newly arrived owner.

It’s sorely obvious that Minki’s thinking hard. In front of him, Yohan’s watching as Minki’s in a heavy daze.

He finally speaks, “I’ve heard that Minjin’s a YouTuber back when I was going for the interview.” He scratches his head, “What did they say again? Doongdoong? Dongi?”

Junhyuk pops in to answer, “Doogi! He’s a bit popular in the gaming community, actually.”

Beside him, Taeryung muses, “I’m part of the YouTube community but I haven’t heard of him..”

Junhyuk is surprised, “Really? You’re a YouTuber too? What do you do?”

Taeryung bashfully smiles, “Oh, I just do beauty stuff!” It was a bit flustering for him to bring up his own channel, considering the contrast in content. Taeryung was all about skincare and makeup..

Minjin’s was about gaming. Much more manlier than his own content, Taeryung thought.

“Hey, that’s cool too!” Junhyuk nods before turning away, facing nobody in particular, “I only know chunks about him because of my friend.”

It’s Yohan who quietly whips his phone out as the conversation carries on, opening the streaming app and inputting ‘Doogi’ into the search bar.

His eyes nearly pop out when he sees the number indicated underneath the channel name.

Holy crap.

Yohan mutters to himself, "He's got millions subscribed.."

This catches Taeryung's attention, jaw dropping, "He's that popular?"

Yohan absentmindedly clicks on a video while in his state of shock, scrolling down to see the comments.

Lots of foreign fans, he notes.

Junhyuk huffs, lowering his voice so as to not let the owner hear, “My friend can’t get over Doogi’s good looks.. It’s annoying.”

Definitely how he garnered a bunch of fans, Yohan nods to himself.

Chatter continued among the new hires, never running out of things to say as they slowly got to know each other.

Some of them had already noticed that he was finished setting up, cutting their conversation to a stop and paying attention to him.

He stiffens up at the unfamiliar attentiveness, chuckling to himself, “I just realized some of you guys may not know who I actually am.” He straightens up, “I’m Minjin! Some of you may know me from YouTube, but I’m also the owner of this café! No need for formalities, though. We’re all friends here.”

But little did he know that everybody was already informed of his identity.

Yeah, he definitely should’ve formally introduced himself first.

“We’re here to get to know each other!”

This triggered some people’s fight or flight response. Jihoon fidgets, Hanyeon cringes.

“Just a little favour before I officially start the video,” Minjin scans the space in front of him, “Can you guys put the tables together and face the camera?”

Instantly, there’s a scramble of chairs and tables scraping against the floor. The kids discuss amongst themselves as they position themselves strategically, taller people sit slightly behind while the shorter people are up front right behind the tables. In no time at all, they’ve managed to squeeze in.

Minjin dashes to the camera to take a quick peek into the frame, and with a smile and a nod, he drags a chair along and sits right beside Subin. He looks along the makeshift long table, “Everybody ready and comfy?”

The newbies nod, albeit understandably nervous. They all muster up the best smiles they could.

“Hi, guys! Minjin again, and today I’ve finally gathered the children!” He starts the video right off the bat, drumming his hands against the table. He turns to look at them, “You guys know what you’re here for right?”

“Introductions!” yelled Eunjae, “Icebreakers!” Taeryung cheered.

Minjin claps his hands together, “Yup!” He grins, “But it wouldn’t be fun if we just spoke about ourselves, right? So..”

“Let’s play a game!”

author's note: hey, yall. guess who decided to show her hag again in aff? me! things have been quiet around here lately, or maybe it's just me.. still, whoever's out here and active, hope you enjoyed! didn't want to bombard you guys with a long chapter after a long time updating, hah ha  a.