“Your ordered drink is here~.”
I was surrounded by current female high school students and was being asked questions similar to a survey when Ji-yeon came to my rescue.
As she placed what looked like a convincing iced Americano down, she glanced at the female students crowding around me and raised her eyebrows in annoyance.
“Hey, aren’t you all leaving?”
As Ji-yeon waved her hand like swatting away a swarm of flies, the female students reluctantly stepped away from me.
“Ugh, Ji-yeon is here. It’s over for us.”
“Let’s go, let’s go.”
“It was fun! Let’s talk again next time, unnie!”
I exhaled at last.
“Ugh…”
I felt drained.
I tilted my neck for a moment and waved my arms to stretch.
In my past life, I wasn’t someone who had any connections with women.
Though I had been interacting more with women recently, I had never encountered anyone with such high energy.
The only one who somewhat resembled that was Ryu-a, who dragged me around with her puppy-like demeanor, but even she would become a relative novice in this setting.
“Ugh, you must be tired. Drink this.”
Ji-yeon offered me the drink she had just brought.
An iced Americano in the middle of winter; she really knows something.
“Ah…”
The bitter yet savory taste of the coffee lingered in my mouth.
The refreshing chill from the ice was an added bonus.
My younger sibling has come to understand my tastes precisely.
The notion of drinking iced beverages in winter is just a fake madness.
What’s wrong with drinking iced coffee in winter? Iced drinks are delicious.
Those who can’t handle heat are the true crazies.
Seeing someone sip on hot coffee or tea in the middle of summer makes me feel faint.
“You used to avoid bitter beverages. You’re drinking it well now.”
“…Did I?”
“You always drank sweet drinks when we went to cafés.”
Blueberry smoothies, java chip frappuccinos, sweet potato lattes, among others.
It seemed that the previous owner of this body, Ji-eun, had a taste completely at odds with her appearance.
“Ah, this level of bitterness isn’t bad at all.”
That’s true.
It’s not espresso; the Americano served at cafés is diluted black coffee extracted from beans.
If someone finds this watered-down coffee bitter, they probably haven’t tasted the bitter side of life yet.
“This coffee is… life is bitter, Ji-yeon. As you go through life, this coffee is really on the sweeter side.”
When I shared that realization, Ji-yeon’s expression shifted like she’d seen something unsightly.
“Unnie… that was so cringeworthy just now.”
“Kek.”
I couldn’t believe what she had just said, causing the Americano to nearly come back up.
Cringeworthy?
I didn’t impose my beliefs, I just shared my thoughts, and yet cringeworthy?
Moreover, I’m not that old.
My life as Ji-eun, the thirty-year-old in my past life, is now almost a year old…
If calculated roughly, I was around thirty.
These days, thirty doesn’t even feel like thirty, does it?
I’m often referred to as in my twenties because I’m bundled together with the twenties.
I’m perfectly fine with that. Not a worry at all!
“Um, I’m sorry, unnie. I’ll take back what I just said.”
But seeing Ji-yeon’s expression, it looked like she wasn’t cancelling the Ji-eun cringeworthy theory.
Maybe she thought I was hurt.
Well, it didn’t really matter.
The weather was nice, and the iced Americano was delicious.
“Are all the boys out having fun?”
I said that while sipping my coffee and chatting with Ji-yeon.
The influx of customers had started to wane.
Only a few female students, including Ji-yeon, remained in the class.
This high school is co-ed, so where had the rest of the students gone?
“The number of people running the booth is sufficient… Usually, everyone wants to roam around, so we planned to switch shifts soon.”
I nodded in understanding and inquired about it.
“If you have a boyfriend, bring him to me. I want to see what kind of guy he is.”
It’s a dangerous world.
For someone like me, who considers humans the scariest beings, such worries were inevitable.
However, if I could talk to them, I could somewhat gauge their character, so I brought it up.
Besides, there are things that only another guy can see about a guy.
Though I’m no longer a man, having been one in the past, my gaze shouldn’t be easily evaded.
But Ji-yeon just smiled as if hearing something funny.
“I don’t have someone like that. Unless I have someone I like, I won’t date.”
“You must have received quite a few confessions, though.”
“That’s… how did you know?”
Ji-yeon tilted her head in curiosity.
There’s no way I wouldn’t know.
For Ji-yeon, being confessed to by those around her was a given.
As if to find the answer, Ji-yeon muttered softly.
“Well… it must be more than me, not less. Unnie, you must have received your fair share of confessions too, right?”
Though I didn’t remember my school days, I could confidently say yes.
Even with my eyes closed, I could vividly picture the scene.
“Do you have someone you like? No?”
“Why is the topic always shifting this way?”
“Because I’m curious?”
Well… if we’re talking about school days, it’s all about studying or dating, isn’t it?
If Ji-yeon were a younger brother, our stories would include doing silly things with friends, but her chromosomes are not going to change from XX to XY.
On the study side, the words are quite distant from the youthful school life I imagine.
Also, kids these days seem to date rather easily.
“I don’t particularly like anyone—ah, there is one person, but they probably don’t even know I like them.”
Ji-yeon’s love life was still in progress.
The fact that it was a one-sided love was intriguing.
Most boys would likely fall for her with that face.
I couldn’t help but become curious about who that person was.
“He must be quite dense.”
“Exactly. He probably doesn’t even know I’m talking about him right now?”
It was during such a light-hearted conversation that shadows began to appear in the hallway beyond the window, followed by a noisy crowd.
“Class 3 is at the café.”
“Is the café ready?”
“Let’s grab something to drink.”
People began to flock into the café, which had been quiet with hardly any patrons.
Most seemed to be students, and a few staff members were mixed in, along with some outsiders like me.
“I have to go to work now. It will end soon, so wait here, okay?”
I nodded in response.
But suddenly, so many people coming in…
Had a big event just ended nearby?
I opened the lid of my already-finished Americano and crunched on the ice, observing the situation.
But something seemed amiss.
“What’s going on? Hye-jeong, where did they all go?”
“Well… Yeon-su went to the restroom because of a stomachache, and Hye-ji went out to meet her boyfriend at the main gate.”
“Of all times!”
At the worst possible moment, they had vanished, leaving them short-staffed just as the crowd arrived.
That said, it didn’t mean the friends who were originally here were at fault.
It was unreasonable to blame them for taking a quick breather when there was no one around.
Ji-yeon had brought me here just like that.
It was clearly a troublesome situation.
There were a lot of people, but not enough hands to help.
I couldn’t just sit still.
“Ugh… What to do.”
I approached Ji-yeon, who had asked the customers to wait a moment without taking any orders.
“I’ll help.”
“You’re going to help?”
“I can manage taking orders, handling the counter, and calling out orders.”
It was a small café booth set up inside the school.
It wasn’t like we were using a POS system, and calculations would just be done manually by writing on a list.
There was no reason I couldn’t do that.
“Thank you so much, unnie!”
Hye-jeong, who was making drinks in the kitchen, lit up with joy.
“Please, I’m counting on you.”
“Ah, leave it to me.”
Resigned to the situation, Ji-yeon handed me an apron and a baker’s hat.
As I tightened the apron and stepped up to the counter.
“Vanilla latte and chocolate shake… Hey, what will you drink?”
“Do you have a recommended menu here?”
“Warm Americano with chocolate chunk cookies, chamomile tea, and can I get your number as well?”
It felt like being a part-time worker, but not quite a typical one.
But it was still a job that involved interacting with people.
Interacting with a large, unspecified number of people is always mentally exhausting.
“Whoa, she’s really pretty.”
“Go and talk to her.”
“How about rock-paper-scissors for who gets her number?”
“Do you have a boyfriend?”
Such forward advances seem cute only once or twice.
If they keep coming, it gets tiring.
Kids these days are so relentless and have no brakes.
“Unnie, do you have an Instagram?”
The continuous influx of people showed interest in me, regardless of gender.
Whether it was romantic interest or innocent curiosity, everyone seemed quite curious about the outsider in their class who appeared suddenly.
The friends who had left came back, and that sped up the turnover.
Even so, I couldn’t back out now due to the shortage of help.
“Soon, it will be time for the shift change, so let’s hang in there a little longer.”
“Why are so many people coming in…”
“Someone posted on the school community that a really pretty person is at our café.”
My face flushed instantly.
So high schools have community boards now.
The thought that my news was spreading in real-time felt really strange.
