Yokai Come to the Countryside Café

Chapter 51: Elementary School Debut Ceremony (4)

7:10 a.m. Even before the alarm went off, my eyes opened on their own.

It was thanks to getting up early lately to send Ria to school.

Had it been about a month?

Of course, Ria, who was mature for her age, belonged to the category of children for whom getting ready for school was ridiculously easy.

She always woke up before me, washed by herself, and changed clothes just fine on her own.

All I had to do was prepare breakfast.

And even that breakfast was often something quick like toast or soy sauce egg rice that I could whip up in five minutes, using the excuse of eating simply.

The most troublesome part was the commute.

It was quite a feat to break through the packed roads during rush hour while trying to park the car at a spot close to the school gate and safe enough for Ria to get out. After all, the competitors were practically the parents of the entire student body.

But now, even that commute had become something irrelevant to me.

Because there was now a school bus. And its route passed right in front of our house.

Now, all that was left for me to do was finish breakfast and sip coffee while watching Ria board the bus—that concluded the school drop-off routine.

At first, I didn’t realize what a blessing this entire process was.

Isn’t happiness said to be relative?

You only recognize how fortunate you are when you witness someone else’s misfortune.

And I witnessed that misfortune every morning.

From the very day I was added to the parents' group chat for Class 1-1.

"Subin’s Mom: (photo)

Subin’s Mom: Ugh, I sent her to her room to change clothes and found her asleep on the bed! I'm losing it!

Siha’s Mom: Siha apparently left his indoor shoes at the school playground. He doesn't even remember where. Do you think I can find them?

Doyoon’s Mom: The custodians usually put all lost items in the lost-and-found box.

Siha’s Mom: I should go right away. Thank you!

Bora’s Mom: Today, my kid kept crying, saying she didn’t want to go to school. I want to cry too! ㅠㅠ

……. "

There were 20 people in the group chat.

On average, 3 to 4 incidents popped up in the group every morning.

Nearly 20% of parents in a class experienced some kind of school-related “event” daily. Like a game of Russian roulette, everyone hoped it wouldn’t be their turn today.

Raising a child in South Korea—if not Ria—required this level of determination.

Of course, it's not that I had nothing to do while being more relaxed compared to other parents. I had gained one more task now that Ria’s school commute was off my plate.

Our café’s expansion construction had finally begun.

“Hey, hey, don’t y’all wanna work? We start at 7, and you’re dragging in here at ten past? What? Your car broke down? Come on now, I can smell the booze stench all the way over here and you’re telling me your car broke down?”

“Ah, cut the nagging already. Get to work quick. Didn’t we say Yongman needs this done right?”

Just in time, I could hear the voices of the workers arriving outside.

Dragging my stiff body, I went downstairs to boil some water in the kettle.

“Good morning!”

“You could’ve slept in today. Why did you wake up so early?”

“My eyes just opened on their own!”

–Beeeeep.

“You even turned on the water.”

“Heh-heh.”

The loud hiss from the industrial coffee pot told me exactly what Ria had been doing since she woke up early.

“It’s dangerous, so from now on, let me do it, okay?”

“Okay!”

Instead of glass cups, I laid out a tray full of paper cups.

Then, once the coffee—made quite strong—had dissolved properly in each cup, I picked up the tray and headed to the construction site.

Although the construction site was right next to our café building, carrying the tray required a pretty roundabout route.

I had asked them not to come until the construction was over to avoid getting caught like last time, but that persistent Sanyi kept showing up and punching the timecard.

Honestly, she’s no help at all.

Cursing Sanyi in my mind, I arrived at the site, where the work was already in full swing.

“Please have some coffee.”

“Oh my, bringing us this... Choi-Pro! Call everyone over and grab a cup of coffee! It’s from the building owner.”

“Thanks a lot. This café’s coffee tastes way better than what that Park guy made when his café went bust.”

Offering a cup of coffee to the workers who came to the construction site every morning was my way of expressing gratitude for taking on such a demanding project.

While I was at it, I also got to hear the proud progress updates from the one they called Choi-Pro.

“Look at this floor. The foreman even paid the concrete truck driver for a wash so the concrete would come out tight. If it were another site, they’d bring in water-mixed concrete, and no matter how well you stick in the vibrator, it would harden all crumbly. But here, we manage it right.”

“Thank you for being so thorough.”

“No need to thank us! Yongman emphasized it multiple times. Of course, we gotta do it properly.”

I barely understood half of what he was saying. I just assumed, from context, that they were building it more solidly than other places.

“Oh, right. Did Yongman leave okay?”

“Yes, I saw him off. He really didn’t want to go.”

“Well, staying in Korea was out of the question, but living all the way in Mongolia—I just don’t get it. You think he’s got some girl there he’s sweet on?”

“Ha-ha, who knows?”

Yongman didn’t have much time granted to him.

He said he wanted to stay until it was completed, but since he had only come under the excuse of helping carry luggage, I eventually loaded him into the car and sent him back a week later.

His expression as he returned to the Heavenly Realm was like that of a prisoner being dragged to a labor camp. It made me question if I had done the right thing by sending him there at all.

“If you're curious, try writing a letter. If you write one, the building owner over here said they’d send it for you.”

“Enough of that! What letter? That’s embarrassing. That rascal just had to go somewhere where the phone doesn’t even work, making everyone worry. Oh, and the coffee was good. We’ll toss the cups ourselves, so you, building owner, go back inside—it’s hot out.”

“Then, I’ll leave them in your care.”

When I returned with the empty tray, Ria had already finished getting ready for school.

“I haven’t even made breakfast yet. You’re already dressed?”

“The bus might come early.”

Did she already understand that missing the bus would begin a race through hell?

Ria was fully prepared for her first ride on the bus.

“Then shall we eat quickly? How about rice balls?”

“Yes! I’ll help too!”

“No need. I’ll make it in no time, so just have a seat.”

Rice balls, nothing more.

An ultra-simple menu needing only tuna, mayonnaise, and seaweed flakes.

Coincidentally, the leftover rice from yesterday was just enough for two.

Now all I had to do was mix it…

– Ding.

“We’re here!”

“Ugh, so messy outside with the construction.”

“We’re here too! The ritual ended earlier than expected today.”

“She told me a cleansing ritual loses effectiveness if it drags on and yet…”

“Hey, I didn’t lie!”

No wonder the rice portion was just right.

Resigned to the noise outside, I scooped out the rice and started washing a new batch.

…Wait a second! Today’s not the weekend.

Since Ria was going to school, their excuse of watching over her no longer applied.

“Why did you all come so early when it’s not even business hours?”

“Ahem.”

“Oh my, must’ve been a mistake.”

“I’ve always come at odd hours!”

Though they all made plausible excuses, none dared to meet my eyes.

They were all too busy snapping pictures of Ria wearing her backpack.

– Snap. Snap.

“Lift the bag a bit higher.”

“Like this?”

“That’s it! Oh, what about your indoor shoes bag?”

“I keep my indoor shoes at school!”

“What a shame! That would’ve made it perfect.”

Right.

I had always dropped her off, and Saerin’s Mom had always picked her up after school, so they had never actually seen Ria leave for school.

That’s why they had all gathered on the first day the school bus came.

“I already sent you all the pictures from the entrance ceremony. Why are you here taking more photos this early in the morning?”

“You call those pictures? You took them on some outdated phone, all blurry and useless, tsk.”

The photo session, born from long-held frustration, continued all the way until Ria barely made it onto the school bus after eating her delayed breakfast.

“I’m off!”

“Take care.”

“Be careful on your way!”

And so, the yellow school bus drove off down the road.

– Ketalk.

A photo arrived.

It was a picture taken by Ria.

In the photo, we were all waving at her from the bus.

“Oh my?”

“Snrk, looks like Ria took a better photo than you did.”

“Waaah! I’m not in it!”

“That’s because you can’t use transformation magic! Hey! Stop wiping your snot on my clothes!”

Today, for some reason, it had been a rowdy morning—on par with any other parent in the group chat.

“But really, what’s with the weather? All these clouds made the photo come out gloomy.”

“Right? It’s been sunny all week.”

Dark clouds had rolled in so thickly, even the photo turned out dark.

There hadn’t been any forecast of rain.

“Ahem, Chief Son, where do they serve good black bean noodles these days?”

“Are you referring to Chinese restaurants?”

“No, not restaurants—those places that deliver, serve dry-style noodles with a fried egg on top, you know what I mean.”

“I’ll look into it.”

“Please do. I tried one yesterday based on a YouTube video, but it was awful. Since it’s my first time eating black bean noodles, I’d prefer a place that sticks to the basics, don’t you think?”

Chief Son barely managed to suppress the smile creeping up at the CEO’s sudden request for black bean noodle recommendations.

Normally, the CEO was a person steeped in elitism.

She didn’t go around speaking harshly or acting arrogantly, but her subtle air of looking down on others became especially pronounced when conversing with other parents.

She wasn’t part of a chaebol family, but she had studied abroad at Harvard with financial support from her affluent household, then founded an IT company and grew it into a strong mid-sized firm with over 20 billion won in annual revenue.

A success built on both background and capability.

Thus, her world was always one of invisible classes and social ranks—be it by birth or earned through talent.

But recently, since one particular child started riding in her car frequently, her demeanor had changed completely.

“A child from a single-parent household living in a café under construction. Conditions that should make her detest the child as a friend of her daughter—yet she liked her.”

She had even gone to a large supermarket, not a fancy restaurant, to eat with the child, and once practiced the gonggi game secretly in the back seat.

But above all, the biggest change was the tone of voice—now filled with requests and gratitude rather than commands.

Even when speaking to him, the Chief of Staff—though in reality no more than a chauffeur—or taking calls from subordinate employees like now.

“Yes, this is CEO Jeong Sohyeon of SL Software.”

(Ceo-nim, we have a problem!)

“What happened?”

(The audit team from Daecheon Group just contacted us. They’re coming to the company right now to verify something!)

“Ch-Chief Son…”

“I’ll hurry.”