It wouldn't be quite long until he finished up his business with his clients. One after one, the ones who lived on the other side of the Earth, had just finished uploading to the platform. Knowing everybody else, everyone feels on edge when their clients don't upload on time. Well, at least Manager does...

Manager Wajishu groans, walking sluggishly as she coddled Tae. "Help me," she pleaded.

"Ahh!!" Tae jumps slightly, only to be pushed down by her and slowly hitting his forehead against his keyboard. "Ms. Wajishu!!!" Tae muffled underneath. "Up!! Up!! Please! I can't breathe!"

Wajishu shook her head and smiled, "ah, you can learn how to evolve."

And of course, Manager had to hear all of this after finishing his work. Sighing, as usual, he stood and leaned over to see the man-child Tae being squished by Wajishu.

Manager and Wajishu stared at each other for a few seconds and soon looked away. Both agreeing this was for the right cause.

"Well," Manager states as he pushes his chair back and dusting off his pants, "I'm going off to lunch."

Lunch. As soon as Tae heard that word, the strength against Wajishu surpassed her's. Breaking away from her clutches, Tae stood up quickly and grabbed his jacket and wallet.

"I'm coming with you!!" he demanded and powered walked away to the elevator.

Unbelievable, Wajishu held her arms tight around herself, neither shocked or surprised.

"...you two share lunch together?"

Manager shrugs and picks up his coat and wallet. "It's our little date," he covers his mouth, yawning, only to be seen by Wajishu that he was only covering a smirk. "We'll be back at 1:30, see you."

"See you too," she sighs, hands at her hips as she watched Manager go after Tae.

...

"Let's eat!" Tae smiles, breaking off his chopsticks and pulling the noddles through. "This is better than the food I ate at home this morning..."

Slightly worried about Tae, Manager shakes it off and bites on the tuna stuffed rice ball. '...today I feel worried...' he thought to himself, taking another bite in.

Tae nudges Manager's elbow, pointing with his eyes outside of the convenience store "look."

Manager stops his chew and looks.

All eyes were staring at a middle-aged woman in black leggings, a fur coat, and a white blouse. Taking off her clip, her bun falls apart. Wavy brunette hair falls perfectly down as she whips her hair down and up. Only finishing it up with her hand sliding her hair behind her right ear.

Both men turn to each other, having the same thoughts.

"Why is she wearing a fur coat..." Tae mumbles, "I don't get fashion."

Continuing his chew, Manager looks away and shaking his head. "It's 30 degrees Celsius..."

"Hey," Tae turns his body to face Manager, "whatever happened to you and that lady? You know, the one who had a lot of parrots in her apartment?"

"Hmm," Manager swallows his chew, "ah...I wasn't able to make time to plan another date with her. I apologized to her and she was understanding since she was in the same situation as me."

Tae groans and places down his chopsticks. Knowing Tae, well, it's Tae. The 'relationship' expert.

"You don't need to go out of your way to explain to them why you're not interested." Tae turns his body away and leans against the table, looking away. "I don't get why you would do that, it's just gonna make things more awkward for you and parrot girl."

"Sofia turned you down again and tried to explain to why she's not interested for the third time, right?" and as always, Manager knew why Tae felt the need to say meaningless things that hurts others.

Tae was always the type of guy who...well, in easier terms, he blames others for his problems. Manager knew that from situations that he was involved in with Tae or other colleagues were in with Tae. Everyone knows at least. Even Sofia.

Manager places down his rice ball and faces Tae. Sighing under his breath, Manager rubs Tae's shoulder. "Sofia is Sofia. If she's not interested, then she's not interested. It's better than leading you on, Tae."

"I would rather be led on," he picks up his chopsticks and swirls it in his bowl of noodles, "I...I don't like being told that I'm not likable."

Manager takes off his hand off of Tae's shoulder, going back in for his rice ball. "How did your date go?"

Tae rolls his eyes back, smiling annoyingly and swaying his body side to side. "It was just a one-night stand. Ugh, she was just looking for fun and told me that she wasn't looking for anything serious. Why are women like this? Now I don't want to eat..." Tae exhales heavily and pushes his bowl away from him. "It's always like this..."

It wasn't always like this. Ever since Sofia and Tae had gotten along with each other on a deeper level, Manager could tell Tae was changing slowly into someone else than the person who he was. It was never like this.

Manager swallows and leans against the table, pushing the sad bowl of noodles back in front of Tae. "Just eat, I know you'll complain about not eating a good meal back at home."

"Alright..." Tae groans longingly, looking down at the noodles and back at Manager, "...it's hard to find someone nowadays in this day of age. Everyone is either emotionally unavailable or they're taken. T A K E N !"

"It doesn't matter if someone is taken or not ready," Manager states and touches lips with his rice ball, "it's not something they want from you and you're looking for that in the wrong people, Tae."

He was right. Tae acknowledged that for sure. Respected that, honestly. Nodding sadly to the words Manager had said, Tae looks outside of the convenience store and watched passers walk by. Manager followed along and watched, chewing his riceball again.

"Do you think I'll find love if I go back to Korea?" Tae chuckles with his mouth full of noodles.

Disgusted, Manager covers the side of his face with his hand and turns away. "Sure."

"Oh," Tae gulps down, "isn't that your cute client?"

"Hmm?" Manager looks.

Two redhead twins and Hidemi with a small container of yakisoba, bags in hand, and a bicycle with more bags. The two men inside leaned closer to the window to observe more. Or to stare.

"The yakisoba there is better," Hidemi covers her mouth as she chews, giving the container to Shishi to try. Shishi rolls his eyes and picks up the chopsticks from her hands and giving it a taste.

Shishi shakes his head, giving it back to Hidemi. "It's fine, I'll just never make you anymore for free."

"Hey!!" Hidemi laughs and closes the container.

Manager and Tae slide their elbows to touch on the table. Tae leans in, "Do you think that guy and her are dating?"

"Sure," Manager shrugs, agreeing to the cause of Tae's gossiping nature. They continued to stare.

Breaking up the bickering, Shisha gesture the two to move along.

"Okay, okay, okay, you two," Shisha sighs in relief on being able to break their bickering, "this is not bad when you're with Hidemo, Hidemi. But with you, Shishi," he points, "I cannot believe you're going on about how you make the best yakisoba when you leave out the vegetables...shame on you. Grandma would agree with me."

Shishi shakes his head and walks slightly ahead of Hidemi and Shisha down the street, "just hurry up and get the bike to the cafe. I wanna prep our dinner. Hidemi, are you coming?"

Hidemi shakes her head, "take the yakisoba, I'm going to go to the convenience store to get some food for my apartment."

"We'll meal prep for you, Hidemi!" Shisha spouts out. "Stop eating so much instant ramen."

"I'll be fine! Go ahead, I have the key to the back door of the cafe. I'll meet you guys there!" Hidemi waves goodbye to the twins and dusts her hands on her hands before opening the door of the store.

Manager and Tae quickly turn away and places their heads down.

"Did she noticed?" Tae quickly switching up to Korean.

"Nope," Manager spits out as well in Korean, "I don't know why I stared with you..."

"Oh, you loved it too."

The two sat up straight, taking a glance to look for Hidemi and going back to their lunch. And by that, that is Manager shoving down his half-eaten rice ball into his mouth. Followed by drinking half a bottle of his water.

"What are you doing-?!" Tae whispered loudly, again, in Korean.

Manager turns around and stands up, "I'm going to buy more food."

"But you have a small stomach?! I, I didn't know you could shove that down so fast?! We could be in an eating competition with your skills-"

Ignoring what he was saying, Manager grabs his garbage and threw it away, walking away from the impressed Tae. Still, it's very easy to impress Tae. He continued to spout nonsense as Manager walked around the store.

As the scene happened with the two managers, Hidemi, unknowingly unaware by their presence, walked throughout the store. Hearing Korean words being spouted through the quiet store, she simply ignored it to avoid eavesdropping.

'I still need to practice Korean...' she sighs to herself and stops at the freezer. Squatting down and pointing to find her drink.

Times like these, Hidemi only spoke English to herself when alone.

"AB Plus...strawberry yogurt...hmm," she leans her head to the side, "maybe I'll get..." she continued to mumble to herself. "Maybe I'll get one for Shisha and Shishi...but they don't like AB Plus. Don't they like...hmm, I think they - I hope they this one..." Hidemi rises up and reaches up for Bali-Five Kiwi pop sodas. "Hmm...they won't yell at me if I get them this..." She places it in her basket and reaches for another one.

"Excuse me, but can you hand me one as well?"

Her head turns, shocked by his English, and by memory, she knew it was the only one. "Manager? My god, you scared me..." she holds the drink close to her chest, exhaling and trying to process Manager standing before her. "Ah...is it your day off?"

Manager shakes his head, hands in his pocket and leans his head down. "No, I'm on my lunch break. I'll be going back to the office soon."

Idiotically, she should've known by his outfit. She smiles nervously, "ah, so how's work? Is it coming along?"

Odd enough too, Manager noticed a change of personality in her with him than with her friends.

He replied back softly, "My other clients made it in time to publish. It was a fast-paced morning today."

"Haha, I'm sure it was," her smile came off more genuine.

It warmed him a little, knowing she was feeling more relaxed. Manager cleared his voice again, "I do have a question to ask."

"Yeah...?"

"Can you hand me one too?" Manager takes his hand out.

Hidemi's eyes widen, "Oh shoot, sorry!" She hands it out to him hurriedly and bows, "I'm so sorry...."

"It's alright, you don't have to apologize," he switched back to Japanese. He hovers his hand over his mouth as he takes the bottle from her. "Thank you."

'He smiled...'

Manager bows and walks off, turning back to look at her, "I'll see you at the office in two days, okay? See you, Hidemi."

Waving goodbye, Hidemi stares in awe. She turns to the freezer and grabs another pop soda. Walking to the register where Manager had just finished paying for the drink.

Tae spots Hidemi and looks at Manager. "are you going to say hi to her?" he whispered.

Manager looks at Tae then back at Hidemi. Their eyes met.

"It's fine, we'll talk more on Wednesday," Manager nudges to Tae, "let's go."

Both men leave the store, walking out with Manager glancing at Hidemi once more.

Hidemi places her basket at the register. The cashier smiles and greets nicely at her.

"Did you find everything you were looking for?" she asked.

Hidemi nods, "yes, I did."

The cashier scans each item, taking one by one out of the basket and into a bag. Waiting for her to scan each item, her eyes went back outside of the window of the store.