Episode 2. Different from the Bud (2)
After finishing the self-photoshoot, Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon, the married couple, reviewed Kang Yera’s photos over and over again all day long.
This was because they had to select only the best-taken photos and send them to Kang Yera’s paternal grandparents and maternal grandparents.
“You said you’d send the photos, honey, right?”
Min Seung-yeon nodded her head vigorously at Kang Dae-oh’s question.
“You don’t have a good sense for choosing photos.”
“How petty, to win with facts……”
It was so true that Kang Dae-oh didn’t even have the will to refute it.
Even when they were dating, Min Seung-yeon was in charge of all the selfie photos.
“I need to choose the photos, do some editing, and then send them.”
“When it’s done, send them to me too. I’ll save them as my smartphone wallpaper.”
“Okay. More importantly, when are you going to work? Isn’t it about time to open the store?”
“I should go now.”
Even if it was early morning, and even if there were no customers, he had to keep the store door open.
This was because he never knew when or where people would come to Kang Dae-oh’s cafe.
Even the owner of the laundromat located across the street usually visited the cafe in the morning.
Over 90 percent of the menu was Americano.
Kang Dae-oh left home, drove his car, and headed to work as usual.
Around the time he opened the store and was tidying up the place.
“How about this place?”
“Hmm, the location isn’t bad.”
Men dressed in suits were seen carefully observing Kang Dae-oh’s cafe from a distance.
Were they customers? To think that, it was…
Their behavior was peculiar.
Rather than coming here to drink coffee, it strongly felt like they had come to see the store Kang Dae-oh was operating.
Just as he was about to go out and ask what brought them here.
The men quickly left.
‘What was that?’
He wanted to run in the direction the men had disappeared and chase after them.
But he couldn’t leave the store unattended with the door open.
Kang Dae-oh, who decided to dismiss it as a minor happening, picked up the mop again and began diligently cleaning the floor.
‘There are really a lot of strange people in the world.’
If he had to pick the strangest person he’d seen recently, it would definitely be……
‘My daughter, probably.’
An unintentional bitter smile formed on Kang Dae-oh’s lips.
As Kang Yera was born and grew rapidly, Kang Dae-oh’s little daughter experienced the biggest event of her life.
That was.
“Oh my goodness? Wow! She rolled over?”
The laundromat owner, who was watching the video of Kang Yera rolling over saved on Kang Dae-oh’s smartphone, rejoiced greatly as if it were his own child.
“How many months old did you say Yera is now?”
“She’s just over 100 days old.”
“That’s incredibly fast! My kids only started rolling over on their own when they were 5 months old. Why is Yera so fast?”
“I don’t know.”
It wasn’t just her rolling over that was fast.
Her babbling was like that too. She had already started sleeping through the night.
Kang Yera had already shown most of what is commonly called the ‘100-day miracle’ and then some.
“When I tell my acquaintances who got married and had kids earlier about Yera, they never believe me. They only barely believe it after I show them the evidence video like this.”
“Exactly. When I first heard from Kang-ssajang that Yera had already started rolling over, I told him not to talk nonsense.”
He, who had come to Kang Dae-oh’s cafe to catch his breath for a moment, escaping his wife’s eyes while working at the laundromat, learned about Kang Yera’s rapid growth.
This wasn’t all.
“She also seems to recognize people already. She clearly says ‘Eomma’ to my wife, and she specifically calls me ‘Appa’ and talks.”
“Huh…… The more I hear, the harder it is to believe. Yera, isn’t she a genius? You know, there’s a saying that a promising tree is different from its bud.”
“Well, I don’t know.”
Even though he said that, a flower of a smile was blooming on Kang Dae-oh’s face.
Since having a child, Kang Dae-oh had recently felt one thing particularly strongly.
That he felt better when his own child received praise than when he himself received praise.
As Kang Yera grew, Kang Dae-oh was also growing as a father with a child.
While he was diligently bragging about his daughter.
Ttalling-ttalling!
The small bells attached to the store door made a sound.
The men who opened the door and appeared. Their appearance looked quite familiar to Kang Dae-oh.
‘Those are the people who were loitering around the store in the morning last time, aren’t they?’
It had only been a few days, and their behavior had been so suspicious at the time that he remembered their faces clearly.
One of the men, who appeared to be in his mid-30s, looked alternately at Kang Dae-oh and the laundromat owner, then approached the laundromat owner and politely greeted him.
“Hello. Are you the owner of this cafe?”
The laundromat owner chuckled and pointed at Kang Dae-oh.
“The owner is over there. I’m the owner of the laundromat over there.”
“Ah, I see. My apologies.”
If the laundromat owner and Kang Dae-oh were together, it was easy to mistake them for the owner and a part-timer.
So Kang Dae-oh wasn’t particularly offended by the man’s mistake.
Because anyone can make mistakes.
“What brings you here?”
No matter how he looked at them, they didn’t seem like people who had simply come to drink beverages.
As Kang Dae-oh had suspected, the man handed him a business card and revealed his true purpose for coming.
“We came to offer you a good proposal, ssa-jang-nim.”
“A proposal?”
The man turned his gaze towards the business card he had just handed to Kang Dae-oh.
Kang Dae-oh’s eyes narrowed for a moment as he belatedly checked the business card.
Coffee specialty brand, ‘Tooset’.
It was a brand with a certain level of recognition among the famous cafe brands in South Korea.
The man mentioned his true purpose for visiting Kang Dae-oh.
“Ssa-jang-nim. Do you perhaps have any thoughts on becoming a franchise?”
Kang Dae-oh, who finally returned home late after the sun had set a long time ago, let out a sigh full of exhaustion.
It felt as if heavy burdens named ‘fatigue’ were piled high on both his shoulders.
However, the moment he opened the front door and saw his daughter’s smiling face.
These burdens melted away like snow.
Min Seung-yeon, who came out to greet Kang Dae-oh holding Kang Yera in her arms, glared at her husband.
“Oh my. Honey. You’re not even thinking about looking at your wife. You’re only looking at the baby?”
“I was looking at both of you.”
“Lie.”
“Really.”
Although he flinched slightly inside, Kang Dae-oh still acted as if nothing was wrong.
Thanks to that, he only received a suspicious glance from his wife for a very brief moment, and then was able to pass it off safely.
“How was your day today?”
“What?”
Min Seung-yeon tilted her head at Kang Dae-oh’s question.
“Yera, I mean. I was curious if she was well-behaved.”
“Of course, she was well-behaved. But lately, it seems like she’s trying to sleep later.”
“Is that so? It’s already 9 o’clock. She’s still not sleeping?”
Kang Yera, lying on her back support cushion, blinked her large eyes several times.
It even looked like she was provoking them, as if saying, ‘Come on, try to put me to sleep?’
“She has a face that looks like she’ll never sleep.”
“Right?”
When the time came, she would naturally fall asleep.
But he couldn’t dare to guess when that time would be.
Even if Kang Yera had very mature and adult-like aspects compared to other babies, she was still a baby after all.
A baby is an unpredictable being, so one always needs to watch them carefully.
Nevertheless, Kang Dae-oh was relieved by Min Seung-yeon’s words that they had spent another peaceful day of childcare.
“……”
Min Seung-yeon, who had been silently gazing at her husband’s expression, asked him in return.
“Did something happen at the store?”
“Huh? Why suddenly?”
“No. It’s just that you have a face that looks like you’re thinking a lot more than usual. I just asked in case you met another difficult customer today.”
Was it because they were a married couple?
She quickly noticed even minor changes.
Kang Dae-oh decided to frankly tell his wife about what had happened today.
“Today, people working for Tooset came.”
“Tooset? Are you talking about the Tooset I know?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“Why from there?”
“They asked if I was thinking of selling the store. If not, they suggested signing a franchise agreement with them and operating under the Tooset brand.”
There were two options. But both of them ultimately led to handing over the store to Tooset.
“I’m not really inclined to sell it for money. If possible, I’m thinking of trying a franchise agreement.”
“Why?”
“Because operating under the Tooset name would probably be more effective in attracting customers than just being a neighborhood cafe.”
“Indeed…… Some of my friends do go only to Tooset, leaving closer cafes aside.”
It could be seen as the power of a famous cafe brand.
“What are the conditions?”
“They’re not incredibly good, but they’re not bad either.”
“So that’s why you’re deliberating?”
“Exactly.”
If they had simply offered Kang Dae-oh an enormous sum of money to hand over the store, he wouldn’t have had this dilemma.
Because he could just use that money to open his cafe somewhere else.
Min Seung-yeon first revealed her thoughts to Kang Dae-oh.
“I’ll follow whatever decision you make. It was like that when you first opened the cafe, right?”
“That’s right. You said the exact same thing back then too.”
Ultimately, it depended on Kang Dae-oh’s decision.
“A franchise agreement… would be good, right?”
“Have you made up your mind for that option?”
“Yeah. It seems so.”
Just as he was about to contact the phone number written on the business card he received today, since the topic came up.
Eung-ae! Eung-ae—!
Suddenly, Kang Yera started crying.
Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon were greatly flustered when the baby, who hardly ever cried when at home, suddenly let out a sharp cry.
Min Seung-yeon immediately sprang up from her seat and hugged Kang Yera.
“Yera! What’s wrong? Huh? Is there somewhere you’re uncomfortable?”
Is she hungry? Or a diaper issue?
But no matter how they looked, there was no reason for either to be a problem.
She had her formula 30 minutes ago.
Kang Dae-oh had changed her diaper 10 minutes before he came home.
She had also pooped twice today.
She also didn’t have a fever.
Before long, Kang Dae-oh realized that Kang Yera wasn’t really crying, but was fake crying.
Because.
“Yera, she’s not shedding a single tear?”
“Oh my, you’re right?”
It seemed like an action to forcibly fix Mom and Dad’s attention on herself.
Kang Dae-oh, who received Kang Yera from Min Seung-yeon, looked into his daughter’s eyes and asked.
“Yera, are you perhaps doing this because of what Dad just talked about?”
Kang Yera nodded her head.
“Dad, don’t do the franchise agreement?”
Nodding again.
Was it a coincidence, or was she truly understanding Kang Dae-oh’s words and responding? Min Seung-yeon, watching this, was utterly confused.
On the other hand, Kang Dae-oh kept having a strong feeling.
A feeling that he should listen to his daughter’s words.
Kang Dae-oh, who entrusted Kang Yera back to Min Seung-yeon, stared at the Tooset contact’s phone number displayed on his smartphone for a while.
Then he moved his hand.
[Do you want to delete the number?]
Kang Dae-oh, who hesitated for a long time.
His choice was.
[Yes]
He boldly deleted the Tooset contact’s phone number.
He couldn’t immediately tell if what his daughter indicated was truly the right answer.
But.
‘Somehow, if I don’t listen to Yera’s words, I feel like something big will happen……’
He decided to trust the assertion of his daughter, who was different from the bud.
