episode_0085

-Beep beep beep. Beep beep beep.

The loud alarm ringing by my head brought my consciousness to the surface for a moment.

“Ugh….”

The usual wake-up call. But for some reason, my motivation to get up is even lower than usual. It’s definite that I have low blood pressure. Otherwise, how could it be so difficult to wake up every morning?

Anyway, I got up and stared at the vanity in front of my bed, trying to piece together the fragmented memories one by one.

It’s already been 4 months. Due to TS syndrome, after becoming a woman, I have to force myself to get up every morning, struggling to wake up my groggy mind for about 5 minutes.

I needed this time to slowly recall the memories from the night before.

Of course, if the usual scenario of Dayoung waking me up on weak mornings unfolds, this time could be shortened forcibly.

Looking at my phone as the alarm goes off again, I realize I woke up an hour earlier than usual.

Normally, the kids go to school by 8:30, so I wake up around 7 to have breakfast and send them off. But today, I deliberately set my wake-up time to 6.

That’s because starting today, I will also be going to work.

Usually, office workers talk about their commute times as 9 to 6. Our company also ‘adapts’ to that schedule. It’s different in reality, but…

But work life doesn’t always go according to plan. If you want to achieve results like projects, new product development, etc., overtime and late-night work become part of the job, like eating rice.

Anyway, even though I can technically leave work at 6, to do so, I might have to give up promotions or other things, so looking back, my leaving time seems uncertain.

That’s why I needed to prepare dinner for the kids in advance and wake up an hour earlier than usual.

Thinking about it, the side dishes my mom packed yesterday should be enough for a while.

“Ugh… but I should make some side dishes for the weekend, right?”

From now on, I feel like I’m returning to a tight schedule, and I’m already getting tired. And I realize I haven’t uploaded anything on the YouTube channel I started for editing practice. If I’m going to do this, I need to make a plan on when to upload. Otherwise, I’ll keep getting pushed back by other things and end up not doing it at all.

“Ugh!”

Fully awake, I got out of bed and went to the kitchen to get dressed.

First, I checked if there was any rice in the rice cooker.

“Oh, I shouldn’t cook rice.”

After washing the rice and not cooking it, I checked the ingredients in the fridge and grabbed some slightly withered bean sprouts to make soup. Then I cooked the menu for breakfast, packed lunch in the lunchbox, and went to wake up the kids.

“Dayoung, wake up. You have to go to school.”

“Ugh… Mom? …What’s going on? You woke up early? Ugh~”

Dayoung, who got up and stretched as soon as I woke her up. She’s definitely a morning person.

“Starting today, I have to go to work. I need to prepare dinner for you guys, so I woke up early.”

“Oh~ I can just handle dinner on my own.”

“It’s fine. I feel more comfortable doing it. Anyway, hurry up and wash up. I’ve prepared breakfast.”

Then I went to wake up Davin.

“Davin, wake up. It’s morning.”

“Ugh… just 5 more minutes…”

“Get up quickly. You have to go to school.”

Davin is weak in the morning like I used to be. So it takes him a bit of time to get up.

-Swish

I kept shaking him until he finally got up with a frown on his face.

Sitting there blankly staring at the wall in front of me, it felt as if it was staring back at me.

“Hurry up and wake up. Let’s have breakfast.”

Still, the fact that she got up and sat down meant that she had at least woken up, so I left Da Bin’s room feeling relieved.

Considering the time it would take for Da Young to shower or for Da Bin to wake up, I also went into the master bathroom to shower and came out. The master bathroom was connected to the dressing room, so I came out wearing just my underwear and put on the clothes I had prepared yesterday. A white blouse with black bootcut pants.

The reflection in the mirror was truly that of a career woman. Although now my chest seemed a bit too big and looked flat.

After drying my hair and putting on makeup at the vanity, I came out to find Da Young and Da Bin already sitting at the dining table eating.

“Ugh, I don’t want to go to school.”

Da Young sighed deeply and said. Then she turned her eyes towards me and soon exclaimed.

“Wow… Mom, you really look like a fitting model like that. Honestly, with your looks, you could just quit your job and become a professional fitting model and succeed.”

“Really? But when I looked in the mirror, my chest looked too big and flat. Don’t fitting models usually use slim people?”

Continuing the conversation, I sat down at the table.

“Ah, that’s because fitting models are usually slim and chubby people, right? Mom is working out and dieting now, so her body looks good to anyone. Oh, by the way, when are you planning to take your body profile photos?”

“Next Saturday. Two weeks left.”

“When will you finish work today? Will you be able to finish work in time for your workout?”

After thinking for a moment at Da Bin’s question.

“Well? Won’t you finish by 10 o’clock at least? If not, you’ll have to postpone your PT session. Let’s see how work goes today.”

Although I haven’t been to the company yet, I heard from Manager Kwon that they are busy developing meal kits for delivery to universities these days. Due to inflation, the cost of meals at universities has increased, leading to a trend of self-service restaurants where people can cook their own meal kits.

Anyway, for these reasons, I don’t think it’s possible for them to finish work on time.

“I’ll roughly check in the evening and… let you know around 5 o’clock when I’ll finish.”

I was going to tell them to go work out first if they finish late, but then I realized that strictly speaking, our family is not receiving PT (Personal Training) but GT (Group Training), so it was also difficult to tell them to go work out first.

“Have you already told Mr. Yeongsoo?”

“I told him, but I don’t know when Mom will finish work.”

Da Young nodded at my words, finished her meal, and got up.

“Thank you for the meal.”

“I’ll give you a ride on the way to work, so get ready quickly.”

“Okay.”

After Da Young went into her room and waited for Da Bin to finish eating, cleaned up the table, I also went into my room to do my makeup and fix my hair.

As I finished getting ready for work and was about to leave the master bedroom, Da Young also came out of her room wearing her school uniform and carrying her bag.

“Are you ready?”

“Yeah. We can leave when you’re ready.”

“Hmm… Is that uniform fitting you? It looks a bit small.”

The length of the skirt in the uniform, well, there were a few who wore it shortened, but the top looked a bit tight. Especially around the chest area.

“Oh… I was going to say it was a bit small. I think I need to buy another set. It seems to have shrunk.”

Last time when we went to buy swimsuits, the cup size had increased, maybe because of her growth spurt.

“Okay, then Mom will give you the card to go to the uniform store and buy two sets.”

I took out my wallet from my bag and handed it to Da Young.

“Yeah, thank you, Mom.”

“Mom, I’m ready too.”

Just as Da Bin emerged from her room, ready for school, I let her know that I was ready and led the kids out of the house.

Da Young’s school was close enough to walk to, so she walked there every day. Da Bin’s school, on the other hand, was a bit too far to walk, so she usually took the bus to school.

I dropped Da Young off at school first and then dropped Da Bin off next.

“Have a good day at school.”

“Yes, Mom. Have a good day.”

After dropping off Da Bin, I drove towards the office.

It was about a 30-minute drive from our house. It was a reasonable distance for commuting by car. Some people didn’t have cars, but it was still a manageable distance to commute by public transportation.

Before we moved, some of my colleagues who lived nearby used to carpool with me occasionally, but after the move, there were fewer people living in the new city area, so carpooling was no longer an option.

Maybe it was because I had taken a break for 3 months, but the commute that I had been doing for over 7 years felt strangely unfamiliar. You might wonder why 7 years? Well, the company had expanded and relocated exactly 7 years ago.

As we arrived near the office, the building came into view at a glance. There were quite a few buildings of similar size around, so it was just that our company building caught my eye.

Anyway, I parked in the underground parking lot of the office building, took the elevator up to the 6th floor where our department was located.

As I stepped out of the elevator and walked down the familiar hallway, I opened the door to a spacious office divided by numerous partitions.

The current time was 8:50 a.m.

Although it was 10 minutes earlier than usual, there were only a few early birds among the employees, so the office was bustling.

I slowly made my way to my desk, feeling the eyes following me.

Finally, my steps came to a halt. A large nameplate on the partition read ‘Development Team 1’.

“Um… what brings you here…?”

Lost in thought, I absentmindedly stroked the nameplate when someone approached me and spoke.