Chapter 18

Chapter 18: The Flusteration

Nivritti looked around for who would answer the woman’s call. A tall, bespectacled, serious-looking man stood up. “Choi-ssi send you?” he asked, indifferently.

“Yes, sir, from the script department,” replied Nivritti.

“Come with me,” he signalled her to follow him.

They both exited the room and enter another room that said “INVENTORY” on the door. They both went inside where an old woman was sitting, playing games on her phone. Her face screamed that she was bored out of her wits.

Without looking away from her phone she asked, “new girl?” She was sure that Nivritti would not understand Korean.

“Yes,” replied Mr Park.

“New laptop?” the woman inquired again and looked up. Nivritti bowed down to her, but she received no reply.

.....

“Yes.”

“Go ahead.”

She went back to her games. Mr Park made Nivritti sign a couple of papers, scanned her ID and handed her a laptop bag. It had a high-end, encrypted laptop, two pen drives, one hard drive, a portable charger, a charging cable, a USB cable, a manual and a piece of paper that had the password of the laptop printed on it.

“You will have to return it, if and when you leave your job,” stated Mr Park mechanically. There was no emotion in his voice.

“And what if I take it with me?” teased Nivritti.

“We will file a civil case against you,” answered Mr Park, seriously.

“What? I was just kidding,” replied Nivritti.

“But we are not, this is K&Q property. You can’t take it or buy it. Just use it and return it when you leave the job,” clarified Mr Park.

“Ookaay!! I won’t kid anymore. Anyways thank you.”

“Hmm...” there was not even a smirk on Mr Park’s face. His mechanical voice was accompanied by an emotionless face.

“Right!” Nivritti rolled her eyes and left the IT department.

She came back to her department and placed the laptop bag on her seat. Chung-Ho just looked at her and asked in signals whether she got her laptop. She showed him the bag to which he nodded and went back to his work.

Nivritti closed her system, pushed the monitor into a corner and made way for her laptop. She used the password on the paper to login to the system. She again typed in her credentials and her desktop flashed before her.

She took out the folder that had every detail of the proposal on it and started typing the proposal. She had to elaborate on every point and add a few points to it. This was going to take her time.

She was in deep her thoughts and typing when Him-Chan entered the script department. A few people noticed him and bowed down to him. He returned the gestures and went to the copy room. After spending a few minutes inside he went near Nivritti and stood next to her cubicle. But her concentration was on her work. She never noticed that someone came and stood next to her.

“Ahem...” Him-Chan cleared his throat to attract her attention, but she paid no heed. “Excuse me! Ritti!”

She looked up after hearing her name. “Ohh, Mr Joh,” she immediately stood up and greeted him.

“Mr Joh?” he teased.

“Sorry, JH,” she understood what he was trying to convey.

He smiled. “Good! Now, one schedule as ordered.” He placed the schedule on her table.

“Thank you,” she smiled at him, picked up the schedule and started scanning it. without realising that Him-Chan was still standing next to her cubicle she sat down in her seat. When she finished looking at the schedule with awe and shock she looked up and saw that he was standing next to her looking closely at her.

“I am sorry, do you need something?” she asked politely.

“Ahem... copy of that schedule,” he said, sheepishly.

“This is the original?” asked Nivritti, shocked.

“Yes, it’s Kyungsoo Hyung’s copy,” he smiled awkwardly.

Surprised, she stood up and asked, “Why didn’t you make a copy?” She knew her next question was slightly stupid, so she asked, graciously, “do you know how to make a copy?”

“Of course,” he paused “but don’t know how to fix a paper jam in a photocopy machine.”

Nivritti could not help herself after his explanation and started laughing. She smiled brightly after hearing the sweet whining of Him-Chan which made his heart flutter. His heartbeat suddenly raced, and he could feel his heart jumping out of his chest.

“What pretty smile,” was all he could think.

She beamed at him and said, “please follow me.” She grabbed the schedule and walked toward the copy room. Him-Chan silently followed her, his heart still thumping in his chest.

They entered the room and Nivritti asked, “Which machine?”

Him-Chan pointed out a copy machine in the sea of copy machines. “That one.”

“Yeah, that one is stubborn,” informed Nivritti. She looked at the machine. The copier was displaying the message “paper jammed” on the display screen.

Nivritti smiled and continued, “see it’s very easy. First switch off the machine, open this portion of the copier, see that’s the jammed paper, you take it out, adjust the paper tray and close the copier back up. Switch on and everything is ok.”

With extreme patience, she gave him the tutorial. But while switching on the copier, she unconsciously closed the side cover of the machine with her hips.

The sudden movement of her hips knocked the air out Him-Chan’s chest. His eyes widened and his jaw dropped. He had no idea if that move was intentional or not but one thing that he was sure of was that that move was sexy as hell.

After seeing her hip movement, it was getting difficult for Him-Chan to catch his breath. He wanted to get away from her or he had no idea what he would do.

But Nivritti continued on as if she did nothing, “and again, we look at the display, if there is no error message you can start copying again.”

Him-Chan tried taking in small puffs of air to breathe. He knew he had to look cool. So, he just nodded his head still trying to catch his breath.

But Nivritti noticed that something was wrong. “Are you ok? You look flustered.” She was absolutely clueless.

“Huh... Yeah, yeah. I am... finnee,” exaggerated Him-Chan.

“Okay! Are you sure?

“Yeah, yeah, I am sure,” said Him-Chan, embarrassed.

“If you say so.”

She turned around, made a few more copies of the schedule, kept three copies for her team and handed the original and the rest of the copies to Him-Chan.

“Thank... you,” he gulped.

“No, thank you,” she thanked him.

Without waiting for another second, Him-Chan ran away from there, leaving Nivritti confused.

“Did I say something to upset him? Maybe he was embarrassed as he had no idea what to do after paper gets stuck in the copier.” She shrugged and went back to her seat.

On the other hand, Him-Chan ran to the lift, closed the door, and caught his breath. He kept breathing and gulping and breathing again. Even when he reached his practice room, he was not calm. He was flustered and agitated. He had no idea why he was feeling like that.

“What the hell was that? That hip movement... shit!! Why can’t I breathe?” He used the papers in his hands to fan his face. His body was on fire. He could feel the heat emanating from his body. Before walking into the practice room, he ran to the washroom, washed his face, and calmed himself down.

He entered the practice room when Kyung-Soo questioned him, “did you give her the schedule?” Him-Chan just nodded.

“Was she working on the proposal?” inquired Korain.

“Hmm...” was the only syllable Him-Chan could speak out.

For the whole day he never spoke to anyone, he just kept thinking about Nivritti. No matter how much he tried throwing himself into his work, his mind would go back to her. He was fascinated with her smile, with her brain, with her angry avatar, her hip movement, her everything.

Nivritti kept working on her proposal. Chung-Ho came to her seat a few times to check on her progress. He gave her the rough estimate that he received from the finance department to include in her proposal. She left a few spaces for the idea that Korain was going to discuss with the IT department.

Lunchtime arrived, and she forgot all about her sim card. She was too involved in her work.

Abruptly Jae-Hwa tapped on her cubicle and asked, “Hey! What are you doing?”

Nivritti blinked a few times to ease the strain on her eyes. “What?”

“Did you forget?” asked Jae-Hwa.

“About what?” Nivritti asked back.

“You had to buy a new sim,” explained Jae-Hwa.

“Right! Sorry! I completely forgot,” Nivritti facepalmed.

“You are working nonstop since morning, you need to eat,” Jae-Hwa touched her laptop and shut the flap.

“Hey! Just let me finish this section, then we will leave,” pleaded Nivritti.

“No, come with me now,” she started pulling Nivritti.

“Jae-Hwa!”

“Ritti!” teased Jae-Hwa. “Come on.”

She smiled at the name Ritti. Her friends and family called her Ritti. She loved that name. “Okay fine, let’s go.”

They both took their purse and exited the building. After walking for ten minutes, Jae-Hwa took her to a store. She helped her in getting a good and cheap plan. The shop owner inserted the sim and did all the procedures for Nivritti. He instructed her further on what to do and how to get the sim started.

After asking a lot of questions to the shop owner, the two girls exited the shop and Jae-Hwa took her to a nearby café.

“Now you have to treat me,” said Jae-Hwa.

.....

“What?” shouted Nivritti, playfully.

“Your idea got approved, I want a party,” affirmed Jae-Hwa.

“Ha-ha, okay fine. Order whatever you want,” laughed Nivritti.

Jae-Hwa ordered the best rolls she could get in the café and happily sat down waiting for her order.