Monday rolled around and Kim Dokja was back on the subway train, dreading when he would arrive at his destination.
He wasn't exactly in the best possible mindset to be starting his first day at work. He just kept thinking of how unqualified he was for the role and how the hell did his life get here, seriously?
He was wearing the new suit Yoo Joonghyuk had bought for him. . .He had taken all of Sunday to wear it out. He had the shirt on for a few hours as he sat at home, threw it in the washer, ironed, folded it up a couple of times, and put it in the washer again and got it dried and pressed again. There wasn't a lot he could do for the coat, it was dry-clean only and Kim Dokja thought it was incredibly impractical.
He didn't want to look all too excited for his new job with a sparkling new suit. He didn't want to give the impression of a greenhorn. He was taking a leadership role, something he had zero confidence in, so he had to at least dress the part. He had to look like he had to dress this way frequently.
He was still carrying his old messenger bag instead of the new one that Yoo Joonghyuk got him, because that was yet another part of the impression he wanted to give out.
A little lighthearted, the cool unbothered type, like, 'Oh, the bag's a little old, but whatever, I've been using it for years, never had a problem with it'. . . Hopefully, it would work.
But if people did talk a lot about it, he would start using the new bag after he got his first paycheque so that it would look like he bought it with his salary, instead of it having been gifted to him.
The shoes he was wearing were the new pair though. . .One of the new pairs that he had been given, to be precise. He didn't know Yoo Joonghyuk would go buy the three pairs that Uriel had brought to the finals when they had been choosing. Kim Dokja thought he was just going home with the black leather oxfords that won the selection.
He didn't even have any place to keep all of those things in his apartment. His tiny closet wouldn't fit all those nice clothes and he had no choice but to leave them in their boxes, sitting in his bedroom.
Maybe he should consider moving out. Not now, but when he had enough saved up.
His current salary was the highest amount he had ever received in his entire life. It wasn't enough to rent a new place, but he didn't have to worry about paying his monthly rent or getting his food now. With the salary now, he could actually start saving up, instead of living paycheque to paycheque.
Kim Dokja wasn't used to saving money. He was used to cutting costs, he had a lot of practice in spending as little as possible, but he didn't have any practice when it came to saving. He never had a lot to save.
He felt like a scammer, stepping off the train and walking towards his new workplace.
He was already mentally prepared to get kicked out within the week. His CV was still out there on those job search platforms, though Yoo Joonghyuk had told him to take it down; Kim Dokja was just going to say that he forgot about it.
It was the biggest building Kim Dokja had ever entered as an employee and he had worked at factories before.
Kim Dokja blinked up at the skyrise building, the glass windows glinting in the morning sunlight of early April and he let out a sigh.
He walked towards the doors, every inch of his body wanting to turn around and go back.
What was he doing? Seriously, what the fuck was he doing?
Kim Dokja informed the receptionist and he was asked to wait for a few minutes.
It truly was just a few minutes and someone from HR came to fetch Kim Dokja. Kim Dokja was still trying to remember if he had stuttered when he spoke to the receptionist or not.
Kim Dokja tried his best to retain the directions. He sort of wanted to just note it down on his phone for future reference.
He got an ID card at the HR's office, and was given an introduction brochure he already had at home because Yoo Joonghyuk had given him one and then he was taken to where he would be working.
Kim Dokja stared at his face on the ID card in the elevator, waiting to arrive at their floor.
He remembered Uriel making him stand in front of a white wall at Yoo Joongyuk's place, wearing one of Yoo Joonghyuk's large coats over his shirt for the time being and having this picture taken.
It was perhaps the only professional photograph of him where he was smiling.
It wasn't a wide, toothy grin or anything; it was just the slightest upward quirk of his lips. But he was smiling. And that was a little strange to see on an ID card.
He slipped the tag around his neck and flipped the card so that the front was facing him, hiding it from view.
No hopes, he had no hopes for the future, he had zero expectations about what his introduction to his team was going to be like. Kim Dokja was putting himself in a zoned-out state to deal with all of this better.
The team had their own space on the third floor with the Production Planning Department, and the workers in their cubicles were staring hard at their computer screens, clearly trying to act as if they weren't too curious about the new arrivals.
"And this is your office," the person who had been showing Kim Dokja around said.
Kim Dokja, who'd only had a tiny cubicle as his workstation this entire time, sometimes without a proper divide on the table, now had a whole office to himself.
Kim Dokja wanted to run away.
Sure, it was an office with glass walls, easily see-through, but the existence of the walls itself put him in a separate position from the rest of his team, who were probably a lot better than him.
Was Kim Dokja a leader? No, he wasn't. He was a pushover through and through, as his friends called him. He'd always been, and he was aware of it too. This was such a bad idea. Why did a team leader even have an office? Couldn't he just sit with the others?
That office chair and desk looked very intimidating. The computer he had was a bit too large, he didn't think he'd be able to use it at all. He'd much rather stick to a tiny screen, really.
"Shall we go meet the team now?"
Kim Dokja let his bag's strap fall from his shoulders and into his hand before placing it on the desk and straightening his back, like that was what had been holding his true powers back.
It hadn't been. There was nothing to hold back. If anything, Kim Dokja was leaving the bag behind in the office as an anchor, something to make sure he wouldn't actually run away.
"Yes," he nodded and walked out of the little office behind the HR representative.
"Please, pay attention, everyone," the man said brightly once he reached the front of the large room. Everyone turned their heads to look and Kim Dokja really just wanted to melt into the floor.
Yoo Joonghyuk, that son of a bitch, what had he roped him into?
"Meet your new Team leader, Kim Dokja-ssi."
He really wanted to run away.
Kim Dokja tried smiling, but he wasn't sure if it worked. He had to remind himself that he wasn't occupying a role where he had to give a ninety-degree bow, just a polite bend of his body or head would do.
"It's nice to meet you all," Kim Dokja said. "I'm Dokja. . .It's my name, Kim Dokja. My father named me such because he wanted me to grow up to be a strong and independent person. Ah, I am also an only child."
That was the only interesting thing about him really. The number of times he had used the same thing as an introductory icebreaker had him learning those words by heart.
Did his voice break? Were they all laughing at him? He had no fucking clue. He was just cursing out that fucking CEO in his head at the moment.
"I look forward to working with all of you," he braved on. "Please don't hesitate to approach me if you are having any issues."
Could he say that, as a new person in all this mess? He didn't know! He was just saying whatever came to his mouth.
"Similarly, please let me know if I am not doing well, and guide me in the areas I am lacking. Let's get along."
His new team introduced themselves to him. A team of around twenty people and Kim Dokja, who was taking a leadership position for the first time, had to handle this? Where's the exit?
Yoo Joonghyuk, that dumbass bastard. He should have never listened to him, he should have never fucking listened to him.
His first day, luckily, didn't involve much. He spent all morning in his office, which might as well have been non-existent because he could feel people looking at him.
He pretended he didn't notice a thing and putting on a calm face, signed in to the gigantic monitor with his new company email, and did the same thing on his laptop as well. Then he read through the welcome emails he had received, and joined the little chat they had with the team members, sent out a hello message and tried to get his head around just what exactly his role entailed.
He didn't know why his number one fear last night was this whole thing ending up as an elaborate prank. He had wondered what he would do if it turned out all this was just done to scam him.
But now that it was real, he had other fears coming to haunt him.
He abated these anxious thoughts by cursing out Yoo Joonghyuk wonderfully in his mind.
Stupid CEO, he didn't know what the fuck he was saying. Dumbass son of a bitch, he shouldn't have listened to him. Smooth fucker, said he could manage this and Kim Dokja believed him, like hell he could. That asshole, the next time Kim Dokja met him he was giving him a piece of his mind. How was he even leading this place? The whole company was going to end up collapsing if such a lunatic ran it.
There was a knock at his door in the afternoon and Jeong Yunhee informed him that it was lunch break now and that everyone wanted to give him a welcome at the cafeteria.
Kim Dokja didn't have a lot to do on the first day anyway, so he locked his computers, grabbed his phone and set off.
One thing he was sort of looking forward to was probably the lunch provided by the company. It wasn't a shitty place like Minosoft or any of the previous establishments he had worked at, so that was great. It was part of their compensation, so now he didn't have to worry about his lunches.
It came as a little surprise when all his coworkers were actually nice. . .Was it something that came with holding a position of power? Or were his past workplaces all just crap.
A bit of both, Kim Dokja concluded. While his past workplaces were horrible and everyone was as burnt out as he was, it also had something to do with him being the team leader in this case. People were bound to try and leave the best impressions. They said the first impression was the best impression.
It was nothing in the face of a juicy rumour, though. Kim Dokja was expecting they would find out about him soon and all this polite, lively chatter would vanish along with it.
The lunch was good. The food was great.
"Teamjangnim, what are you doing that for?" Lee Harin said curiously on their trudge back to the elevator after a nice lunch.
"Please, you can speak to me comfortably," Kim Dokja said. "And this," he held up his phone a little. "I tend to get lost in new places. I'm a little bad with directions, so I'm taking a note of it."
He wasn't expecting to be spoken to. That was the only reason he had taken his phone out and started typing in it. He thought they were going to leave him behind, but they were walking slowly, waiting for him to catch up every time he fell back.
Not everyone in the team was friendly with each other, he had noticed. They had their own little friend groups, which was understandable. As long as they were on good terms with each other, Kim Dokja had no problem. They were free to do as they wanted, it didn't matter to him.
A crowded elevator opened up in front of them and luckily, the passengers in it exited, allowing their large group to troop in.
Kim Dokja found himself plastered to a corner. He didn't mind. He liked tiny corners.
Then his phone rang, and he would have ignored it, but the person standing right next to him noticed and yelled out the elevator to quiet down because Kim Teamjangnim was getting a call.
Kim Dokja was going to kill somebody, most probably himself.
"Hello," he said, answering the call after muttering a quick thanks to everyone.
He was very fucking sure that everyone was now listening in on his conversation.
"Hello, Dokja-ssi," Yoo Joonghyuk's voice said into his ear and oh, how Kim Dokja wished he could snap at the man right now.
But he was at the workplace, with his team members and the person on the other line of the phone was their boss.
Fuck this, he was going to jump off the bridge and into the Han River.
"You didn't call or send a text after you arrived," Yoo Joonghyuk was saying. "You have arrived, haven't you?"
"Yes," Kim Dokja said, speaking in the way he usually spoke to Yoo Joonghyuk. Except, he wasn't going to use the man's name out loud.
"I didn't think you'd wanted me to do that," he said.
"Of course, we wanted you to, Dokja-yah!" Uriel hijacked the call.
"Ah, I'll keep that in mind for next time," Kim Dokja said.
"Are you at lunch? Did you have lunch?"
"Yes, I'm just going back after lunch," Kim Dokja held in a sigh.
"Was it to your taste, Dokja-ssi?" Yoo Joonghyuk asked.
"Yes, it was quite nice," Kim Dokja said, really trying his hardest not to sigh.
It would have been a lot easier to talk in private, but with so many eyes and ears open, he was feeling a little antsy.
"It's not as good as your cooking though," he added.
"Of course," Yoo Joonghyuk sounded a little pleased.
So, he'd surely leave him alone now, wouldn't he?
"How are you finding everything?" his CEO asked.
Kim Dokja wanted to go home.
"It's not too bad as of now," Kim Dokja said. "I'll have to see how things go. . .I have a lot of things to say to you, however."
Yoo Joonghyuk laughed and Kim Dokja wanted to know where the CEO's office was, he wanted to go give the man a punch.
"If it works for you, we can go to my place together after work," Yoo Joonghyuk said.
"Unfortunately that won't do," Kim Dokja replied immediately. "I'm taking the subway."
"Why not? We could save on the travel time," Yoo Joonghyuk said like he didn't fucking see the problem here.
"I'm saving plenty by taking the subway—"
"No, it's a waste of time. It takes around an hour to reach home for you on the subway and it takes less than half an hour by car."
"It's my precious reading time," Kim Dokja said. "I'm being productive."
"You said there wasn't anything good to read."
The sigh Kim Dokja had been fighting to hold in slipped out of his lips.
"I'll head to your place straight after work, is that fine?" Kim Dokja said, avoiding using Yoo Joonghyuk's name. "And I'll stay over for dinner as well. Let's talk then."
He always stayed over for dinner these days, they didn't let him go otherwise.
"Good," said Yoo Joonghyuk. "It would be better to talk somewhere we are comfortable. . .Are you sure you want to take the public transport?"
"Yes, I'm perfectly fine with my commute," Kim Dokja said firmly.