Your POV:

The 2 minutes felt like forever, they all told me to relax and be myself and that would do, but who wouldn't get this nervous especially if you were someone who doesn't talk to people easily like me. "Don't worry Sara, you'll nail it" Em said as she patted my shoulder lightly, then continued "there is a reason for all of this, don't worry you're kinda accepted already but you have to go through the procedure" to make me more at ease.

Em accompanied me to the office and knocked on the door then we heard a voice saying "come in" behind that door. So Em started "she's here" "you can sit on the chair" their manager said while looking at me straight in the eyes for seconds. "I gotta go" Em said which made me shift my head her way, she then gave me a crumpled her fist and mouthed ‘fighting’ to me, this made me smile a bit and feel more at ease now.

As soon as Em left us and closed the door behind her, before the atmosphere could turn back to being cold the manager looked at me again and started “Hi”, “Hello” I said with a small bow, “did you come prepared with your CV?” “Yes mam” I answered and handed the white envelope to her, “Let’s see what we have here. So your name is Sara, your almost 20 in Korean age, so you speak English and other languages as well interesting, this will give you advantage at this shop” I started to see the light of hope coming from her “I’m not fluent in the languages but I can make conversations and . “Now let’s see your experience, wow worked in several places. An outlet, a salon as well, some restaurants this won’t help you here but good to know, in a fashion house, and helped with some runways and fashion shows” “these are things we look for in this field of work and with your experience you can be a full time employee not a part-timer but it seems that you don’t stay too long in a job” she said with a sweet smile “the reason for having so many jobs is that I traveled a lot due to my father’s job so I wasn’t able to try to get a job after graduation so I’m continuing my part times thingy till I find the place for me” I replied. “You even won a designing contest few years ago, and I can see from your style that you have good taste” “Thank you mam” “maybe this is the place for you or it might be close enough to it”.

“If you haven’t noticed yet the employees here wear their casual clothes, we respect independence and style here so we just have the apron as a uniform” “yes, I have noticed that and I liked it”. Things were going great in this, ‘I think I’ll get this job’ but just as I was thinking about being accepted suddenly she started talking again “but you still haven’t passed this interview” I looked at her confused, she was just complementing me and telling me how much I’m suited for this job but now she’s telling me it’s not in the bag yet, “I don’t understand” ‘was this what Em was telling me about earlier!

“I need to confirm things first. May I look at your phone?” I handed her the phone and she opened it to see the lock screen which displayed a picture that I’ve taken that showed a side view of half a bicycle that is parked by a pole while being drenched by the rain with an umbrella on top, I’ve taken that photo recently and I like to change my wallpaper whenever I take something interesting. Going back to my phone in her hand, she played the song that I was listening to in the way there and Love Me Like You Do by Ellie Goulding was hearable though the room. ‘They sure have a weird way of interviewing people’ she paused the song again “I apologize if I intruded your privacy, but this is part of our procedure I need to know some things about you”

“What do you think of K-pop?” she asked out of the blue, “Well I like the music and the performances look interesting but I’m not that crazy about it although I do enjoy it”. “What will you do if you saw an idol close to you?” “If I saw them avoiding contact with people I’d respect their privacy and won’t do anything, but if they looked my way I’ll smile to them and if they reacted I would support them and tell them to keep doing what they enjoy and do their best” “You won’t take pictures of them?” she asked sarcastically so I answered “I really enjoy taking pictures of beautiful scenery but I won’t bother someone and burden him to take a picture, and idols don’t usually like for their pictures to be taken in public so I won’t” she seemed pleased with my answer.

 “The thing about this shop is that a lot of our customers are K-pop idols, so we want them to have some privacy as you said and feel welcomed without being bothered by fans” I was surprised by what she said, she didn’t mind my change of expression and continued saying “The reason why our shop is hard to find and to know about is to provide these things for our customers, so the ones who usually come to us are our regular customers and they know about our rules that forbid costumers to stalk someone or these kind of things, that’s why our shop needs to be unique and with good employees to provide the best for our welcomed costumers”.

She stood up and offered me her hand to shake, so when I realized it I shot up and shook her hand gratefully as she said “welcome to our shop, you are now one of us” “ooh thank you mam I really appreciate it and like it here” “you can call me what you like, some call me boss and others Choi eonni so you are free to call me what you feel comfortable with” “yes mam- .. I mean boss” “you can come in after two days and I’ll assign someone to tell you what you’ll do and help you decide on your shift, but now you can go get your lunch, I guess you haven’t eaten yet since I was able to hear your stomach growling” she looked at me playfully, but I felt really embarrassed and immediately apologized “it ok dear don’t worry. I look forward to see you working here with us Sara” “Me too”

So the interview went well actually great, I went out of the room. As I turned the door knob and it creaked slightly, all eyes were on me ‘wow words spread fast now even the costumers seems to know what’s going on’. Em excused herself from the costumer that she was handling and hurried my way and Bora right behind her “So … How did thing go? What did she say? Are you accepted? When will you start working?” “Waah one question at a time Em, she might be overwhelmed herself” Bora tried to calm her down a bit but I just chuckled as I imagined how I’ll enjoy my stay here and how welcomed they made me feel of our very first meeting “I’m in” I just said and with that I found four arms warped around me “I CAN’T BELIEVE IT YOU’RE ACCEPTED SARAAAA” “lower your voice Em you don’t want to make us all deaf” “its ok, and didn’t you say yourself that I’ll get accepted? ” I asked that to Em “so why are you surprised now huh?!” I said with a smirk on my face.

People in the shop started to congratulate me, and other employees came to me and welcomed me as they introduced themselves. “Welcome to the squad on of my new coworkers said as he patted my shoulders” “thank you” I said when I made eye contact with him, these two words was all that I could say to all of them that time, other than the smiling of course.

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