Chapter Text
Prologue
You’ve heard its story, right? In 1968, Charles Manson claimed that the songs from The Beatles’ White Album were cryptic messages meant for him and him alone, of specified instructions that prophesied a certain doom. Which we all know by eventuality; such manifestation of delusion unfortunately had become the basis of a heinous tragedy. He had called it Helter Skelter. Taken from one of the songs’ title in the White Album.
It’s Monday. While on my commute to work today, I read an overblown pseudo-psychological analysis of Charles Manson and the Tate-LaBianca murder case. It was contained in a two-pages Op-Ed about retro murder cases in this week’s edition of a yuppy magazine, which I had found lying ownerless at one of the metro seats next to me.
The author –suspiciously named Serna Monsach, which I believed to be an anagram of Charles Manson— had been rather sympathetic towards Manson. I cringed reading Serna Monsach’s hopeless attempt to narrate an article that portrayed the infamous murderer as a more ‘likeable’ character, along the lines of:
“Manson was a frightful victim of an oppressive social-caste system”,
Or,
“In an unjust society, where a man’s never given a chance to show his potential, even the most pious of a man can turn unhinged in dire conditions.”
That was stupid, I thought, romanticizing a cold-blooded homicidal maniac. I tossed the magazine right in the first trash bin I found at my destination station, so no one had to exert an energy trying to tolerate that kind of mass-produced bullshit.
I thought I’d gotten rid of it off my minf, but it seemed to me that the article had not entirely left my system as I kept thinking about it throughout the day. At lunch, I was staring at my fried rice, while trying to ignore the notification ding-dongs! that wouldn’t leave my phone alone (‘6 new e-mails from Nakamoto Yuta: ‘[RE:] REVISION NEEDED ASAP: Q3 Sales Report’), I began to realize why the article’s ill-advised thoughts had gotten me captive.
Because right in time, exactly after the lightning bolt of realization struck my nerves, I saw Park Rose from the Luxe Product Division walked across our office’s canteen with bloodshot eyes. Her herd of cheerleaders (her co-workers from the Luxe, we call them that because if this was high school, they would be it) trailed her obediently, with soft shoulder-taps and the cliché ‘You’ll be fine’ followed suit.
Interesting, so I thought.
I threw my glance to the other side of the canteen and saw Im Nayeon standing in front of the vending machine, with her sardonic smile plastered all over her moon-shaped face and her arms folded indignantly, it was fascinating to see her stare followed the trail of Rose until she disappeared out of the canteen.
If you look from surface basis, you wouldn’t find any sound answer that could explain the look Nayeon just threw at Rose. They had never worked together, they were not from the same clique, they never had any meaningful interaction, nor did they give a damn about each other (but later in this story, I might revise the last assumption).
Nayeon was the embodiment of the quote ‘You can’t choose where your talents lay’ – because she seemed too lively and too nice to be our office’s Financial Checker. Each job comes with a stereotype, and she was so far removed from hers.
I used to think that she was in the Product Design team because she looked so chic and dynamic. I used to bet that she was a Cosmopolitan-cocktail kind of girl. Until one day I paid visit to the Finance Department for a paperwork clearance, and found myself witnessing her basically murdering a squeaking junior with her expressionless interrogation, deliberately taking place at an open corner of the department for everyone to see. Terrorizing this girl on the verge of tears, about ‘numbers that don’t add up’, with, ‘Where did you even learn to count? Blues Clues?’
Turned out, she wasn’t a Cosmopolitan, she was a single malt. She scared the shit out of me and I oddly admired her.
On the other hand, Rose was a Long Island Iced Tea. She was so much of a teen royalty that seemed to defy the nature of aging. She was vivacious, and I loved her hair, they just fall all over the right place. She liked to throw a smile that seemed too genuine for a courtesy smile. When you walk past through her in the toilet, and she'd smile at you - she’d make you feel as if you had been best friend for years. She wore her heart on her sleeve – proven by the semi-public cry-out I just witnessed.
Two women of different poles, incised in an unfortunate event. What did they do? Then, I did not know that much. But later in this story I learned that their shared mistake was the sin of interpretation. They took an image of a man and created a narrative in their own heads that eventually led them to actions they both had regretted.
It’s like they were listening to Helter Skelter, and maybe it was the guitar riffs (that soft, luscious dark brown hair), the booms in the bass (that deep, alluring voice), or the enthralling lyrics (that ensnaring plump lower lips) – that led them to believe in things that did not exist.
Only in this scenario, it wasn’t The Beatles songs from White Album, it was a personification of bewitching spells.
Rose and Nayeon were so different, but later I found out they had one thing in common: Jung Jaehyun.
And he was the Helter Skelter.
***
We all worked in an office building called Euphrasia Tower. Which supposedly incarnate the tranquility of Euphrates River of the mythic ancient civilization. Who knew? The place had grown to live up to its name – the promised tranquility and supposedly source of a harmonious life – which turned out to be a complete myth.
Alike to many societies of a civilization, our office had social classes. It was deduced intrinsically, by archetypes that became identities, and identities that became a sorting hat on its own. I’ll start with the most known stereotype: The Mass Product Division is full of women who were good at everything. They have babies at home well-fed, peaking careers with average age below 35, and successful husbands well-endowed.
We all wanted to be them, we’d sacrifice black goat and headless chicken for a stint at being them. But being Park Jihyo, was the ultimate goal. She was the Head of Division, she’d stroll the office with such radiance and warm presence that’d make you feel like you were welcomed and nurtured, as if you had two mums. On good days, she’d oftentimes pass around boxes of ice cream to the employees, because aside from other essential goods (bleach, toothpaste, diapers, anything you can see on supermarket’s shelves basically) that the Mass Product Division sells at millions quantity every day, they also sell ice-cream. Imagine how amazing was that.
Then there’s the small but significant team of Luxe Product Division. They manage and sell things you cannot afford, basically. They were all so Hellenic – polished, lavish, cultured – all the qualities some chicklit authors would be dying to pour into their main characters. And they always smell so florally, as if they take petal-soaked bath in-between coffee breaks. What they were paid to do was to strategize how to sell expensive products through cocktail get-togethers of The One-Percenter, and how to make it interesting enough for their customers to post it on their Instagram amidst posts of their Cartier diamonds and pictures of their daughters’ harp recital. Make no mistake, it takes a lot of observation and an endless debutante’s mentality to nail that job. That wasn’t easy.
Then there’s the Sales Division. The Sales Team members were known as a mix of brute and cavemen-like characteristics. If The Luxe was Hellen of Troy, than the Sales Team was Charles Darwin’s missing link. What they do is they make sure the ice cream that Park Jihyo would like to sell gets delivered to the stores on-time, which makes the Sales Team quite well-connected —with the retailers, the distributors, the truck drivers – similar to The Luxe, but without the daydream.
What to say about the Sales Team? The men were impetuous, loudmouthed and painfully soiled. The women—well, no one ever thought of the women of the Sales Team. I am them. We’re a passable ornament. A negligible variable. I’ve tried to look past through my vanity and thought of the gratifying benefit from being invisible: You get to be anywhere and knowing everything without anyone giving a shit about you.
There’s something particularly comforting at the thought of being invisible. You get to be whoever you’d like to be without having to weigh much of a consequence. But you know I couldn’t help but often wondered how it’d be like to have a bit of leverage on someone’s attention, and I kept thinking about the 33rd floor. I’d be lying if I said I never fantasized of walking into the 33rd floor with all eyes on me, like I mattered more than the figures in my sales report.
Well, let me tell you about the 33rd floor.
There were plenty other divisions in this building, but nothing’d struck as important as what goes on the 33rd floor. Every final Wednesday of the month, the DMC –Divisional Management Committee— that comprised of all Head of Divisions, few Directors and a President Director, would meet up there for Status Meeting. They take turn to present about the business status of their respective division; whether a team’s eyeing up for their annual bonus with their targets reached, or some profit loss that would be polished and presented as “fluctuation”.
Status Meeting had always made everyone nervous. It was rumored that once Park Jihyo had fallen severely sick after a Status Meeting that required her to lay-off half of her division following an unprecedented deep loss, or when Nakamoto Yuta initiated a veto on the sacking-off of one of the present DMC members, following a disastrous marketing campaign that person had made.
(Gosh.)
So every final Wednesday of the month, someone would take turn to observe the 33rd floor and scavenge the leftover of the Status Meeting—whether it was the expressions as the DMC left the room, or whether there was any indication of fist fight (never happened – but we’d hoped so). Bottom line, It’d just make us feel better if someone spotted the DMC members leaving 33rd floor and heading for a good lunch at nearby restaurant (it’d mean everything was fine).
We’d receive the illicit chain-mail afterwards: [33rd clear. Heading for Portobello] – which means everyone can enjoy a relaxed lunch because nothing’s about to happen, or [33rd clear. Suh’s on steam] – which means the Product Design Division under Suh Johnny will have to, uhm, prepare for a beating. But that’s not just it, there would be a following chain-mail with more curated addressee list (comprised of mostly women or any gender that has fully functional eyes), with message: [#JungUpdates: Dark grey suit with black shirt. Hell freezes over. Status: OK].
Maybe the point of the chain-mail was not what happened in the 33rd room, or a some-minutes heads-up before somebody got to know that they were getting fired. What mattered was the slightly more secretive message that followed suit afterwards. The #JungUpdates.
Maybe, for some of us, the main point was the shared feeling of giddiness as we all basked in the collective admiration towards Jung Jaehyun. It made one felt less alone. Maybe it was the solidarity of taking aid from facing the truth that we could never have someone like him – the way he carried himself, walking on the back of the line as the other DMC members marched forward, as if he was captivated by his own racing mind. Then Johnny and Yuta who would fetch him as if he was a catch that was getting away, and how they’d part split the rest of the group for a smoke on the rooftop. The three of them – the wolfpack.
They never spoke quietly, or seeming to be secretive. It was always an open gesture, but none of us ever had enough audacity to slide into their conversations. We all wanted to be them, and nothing was stopping us but our dire fear of our own inadequacies – seemingly accentuated by being up-close with someone like Jung Jaehyun, even though maybe whatever we fear for wasn’t really there.
Like a Helter Skelter.