My Company Is Black

#028

Hwi-kyung was facing a challenge from his very first day at work.

“Oh my, you must be Hwi-kyung who’s starting work today?”

“Ah, yes.”

“I’m Yoon Marcia, the housekeeper who’s been working here.”

“Yes, pleased to meet you.”

“My name’s a bit unusual, right? It’s because I’m Catholic.”

Yoon Marcia, the middle-aged woman who had been working as a housekeeper in Lee Gyo-ha’s home, was truly elegant. She was so elegant that she could simultaneously operate the vacuum cleaner, boil laundry, and clean teacups.

Not only that, but she also ordered food to Gyo-ha’s taste to keep the refrigerator stocked, and she quickly figured out which side dishes Gyo-ha liked, using three induction cooktops at once to fill the side dish containers.

“Is there anything I can help with…?”

“No, no. Just sit here and have some tea with me.”

While transferring stir-fried fish cakes into a container, Marcia began brewing powdered green tea in an expensive tea set. All of this was done simultaneously. Hwi-kyung was truly confused by everything.

Insufficient condition: You witness an incredible work environment.

Insufficient condition: Your direct supervisor is an amazing veteran.

Insufficient condition: The job is beyond what a new employee can handle.

In fact, until his encounter with Marcia, Hwi-kyung hadn’t thought much of housekeeping as a profession. Jung Hwi-kyung had always been a white-collar worker except for the sixth cycle, so he didn’t know much about manual labor.

People usually don’t understand how difficult other industries are until they experience the work firsthand. Just as the grass always seems greener on the other side, it’s natural to think only your own major and job are difficult. Since that’s all you’ve experienced, other people’s jobs seem easy.

Before he started regressing, hadn’t Hwi-kyung thought about a college classmate who wanted to become a YouTuber, “They’re trying to make easy money”?

But upon closer inspection, every profession is a thorny path. Housekeeping was no exception. Running a household is more complicated than a large-scale trade project. It’s not a job where effort is immediately visible.

Marcia, who had forcibly seated Hwi-kyung at the dining table when he tried to help, offered him a well-brewed cup of high-quality green tea. Although unsure what to do, Hwi-kyung sipped the tea she offered.

The premium green tea he tasted for the first time in his fourteenth cycle was quite good. While he had drunk plenty of good alcohol during his sales days, it had been a long time since he’d had good tea.

“It’s delicious, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Our young master spends money well on things like this.”

“…”

“He even gave me a separate card to buy whatever I want to eat. Ho ho, if I were 20 years younger, I might try to seduce our young master.”

Even while drinking tea, Marcia busily swept and cleaned the spacious kitchen. Watching Marcia’s skilled hands, Hwi-kyung felt a chill down his spine. If he had started the housekeeping job without her, he would surely have clumsily broken a few dishes.

It’s natural for a newcomer to make mistakes, but somehow, making mistakes in housework felt more critical than in office work. At least for Hwi-kyung, this kind of work was completely new.

He thought he knew how to manage most household chores from living alone, but Hwi-kyung didn’t even know how to brew green tea. Having only used tea bags, he didn’t know how to store loose leaf tea either.

How to clean a marble table, what to put under dining chair legs… he was clueless about everything. Marcia responded with a smile to Hwi-kyung’s attempts to ask questions, telling him there was no need to be so tense.

“Thanks to you, Hwi-kyung, I became a full-time employee.”

“Ah…”

“I’m so grateful. You see, even though we work for an office, we don’t get insurance and such even after working for years. The agency fees also increase every year.”

Housekeepers are usually not full-time employees. This was a fact Hwi-kyung knew. Even day laborers rarely had full-time positions. It was standard to pay a certain fee to an agency for job placement.

Marcia said she had been working as a housekeeper while paying regular fees to an agency specializing in wealthy households. Although she had been working for the BK Group for a long time, she was always anxious, not knowing when or for what reason she might be fired.

“But they say they can’t easily fire full-time employees.”

“…”

“I really… this is my first time being a full-time employee in my life.”

Hwi-kyung inadvertently looked down at Marcia’s hands. How many houses must she have worked in to become such a skilled housekeeper? Perhaps she had more experiences than Hwi-kyung, who had moved from company to company.

“So I’m really grateful to you, Hwi-kyung. The young master always treated us well, but now he says it’ll come out as a salary. It used to be paid per job…”

“You don’t need to thank me. I’m just an employee too.”

“No, no. The young master gave me a separate gift, asking me to take good care of you.”

“…”

“The drivers are all grateful to you too. They say they’ll get a pension even if they quit now.”

Having worked in construction before, Hwi-kyung could easily imagine their working conditions. Although they probably earned several times more than others in the same industry due to working for the BK Group, they were still institutionally unstable.

Gyo-ha had been in America, so he probably didn’t have the capacity to care about these people. Originally, Gyo-ha hadn’t directly hired them to improve their working conditions. This was merely a means to prevent Hwi-kyung’s forced regression.

But Marcia was moved by this ‘means’. Full-time employment, what’s so special about that? She said she had boasted about this to her family. Mom’s getting a monthly salary now? Now I get bonuses and won’t be easily fired…

“Well, I’m… also an employee, so I’ll work hard.”

“Sure. I’ll teach you many life hacks. I’m a complete housewife expert, you know.”

It’s just this…

Hwi-kyung felt oddly emotional, just like when Kang Moon-chul had told him it was fortunate he was there. He was merely trying to avoid the worst by any means necessary, but the people who were already in that worst situation saw Hwi-kyung as a new hope.

It felt strange. After all, Hwi-kyung hadn’t directly helped them at all. All of this was part of the welfare provided by Gyo-ha’s wealth and the BK Group. Hwi-kyung had done nothing except regress with Gyo-ha as baggage.

“Oh, the young master is here.”

The intercom announced that a household vehicle had entered. So even vehicle entry is controlled in such a nice home… Hwi-kyung stood up, newly realizing how vastly different Gyo-ha’s officetel was from the villa where he lived.

Just a few minutes after clearing the teacups, Gyo-ha returned home with a slightly gaunt face. He looked more tired than when he was working as an executive director at BK International.

Hwi-kyung took Gyo-ha’s jacket instead of Marcia.

“Hwi-kyung.”

“Yes?”

“Don’t be surprised when you hear this.”

“What is it now…?”

“My father wants to have a meal with you.”

“What?”

“My sister also wants to see your face… I mean, meet you.”

The expensive jacket Hwi-kyung had been holding fell to the floor. He saw Marcia, who had been watching the two contentedly from nearby, exclaim “Oh my!” and rush over, but Hwi-kyung didn’t pick up the jacket.

Insufficient condition: The employer’s family requests a private meeting.

Insufficient condition: You have been forcibly invited to a family dinner with your employer’s family.

This guy, what did he do to cause this on the very first day of the job?

* * *

Needless to say, Jung Hwi-kyung had never directly met Lee Baek-gyeong or Lee Jung-hye.

Even in the twelfth cycle, when Hwi-kyung was flying high at BK International, Lee Baek-gyeong and Lee Jung-hye were people he had no occasion to meet. One was the group chairman, and the other was the vice president who held multiple subsidiaries of the group.

Moreover, Lee Jung-hye wasn’t a parachuted executive like Lee Gyo-ha. She was a true career woman who had proven her abilities after joining as an employee right out of university and earned her position as vice president.

Hadn’t Lee Jung-hye even married in a way befitting a chaebol, to the second son of another huge group? Lee Jung-hye was truly the kind of person you’d only read about in biographies of great figures (entirely according to Jung Hwi-kyung’s standards). Her aura was no joke even when seen from afar, so a personal dinner meeting? He’d be lucky if he didn’t choke.

“So… you said you love me?”

“Yes.”

“Why on earth?”

“Because I thought no one would believe me if I denied it there.”

“…”

“Honestly, I couldn’t think of a plausible reason for establishing a corporation for a man I’d never met before.”

It wasn’t wrong. This was Hwi-kyung’s second biggest worry after a tax audit. Even for a chaebol with money to burn, it would be stranger to let the youngest son mess around and formally employ several workers without doing anything about it.

Moreover, Lee Gyo-ha was just in the position of a beloved youngest child, without having achieved anything business-wise like Lee Jung-hye. He had been a successful businessman in the twelfth cycle, but now he was just an immature young master.

“Isn’t it better this way? We were misunderstood as lovers last time anyway.”

“…”

“Let’s pretend for now? It’s better to say we’re lovers than to say we’re regressors, right?”

But even if Hwi-kyung understood all the circumstances, it didn’t mean he could understand Gyo-ha saying such things. How can he be so casual about this? Sometimes, Hwi-kyung felt like Gyo-ha was an alien.

“Gyo-ha… doesn’t this bother you at all?”

“What?”

“Being misunderstood like this by people, saying you love someone you don’t even like…”

“Ah. Of course, I care about it too.”

“…”

“But it’s you, Hwi-kyung, right? I think it’s okay.”

…What’s really up with this guy?

Hwi-kyung was truly confused.