Chapter Text
*
-2023-
It’s not like any of this is what Chan imagined for himself.
Chan has always had simple dreams. Move to Korea, make music, fall in love, get a dog. 8 years after leaving Sydney, he’s still 1 for 4. Although now, with CEO Park staring him down, even that looks like it’s in flux.
“You’re seriously firing me?” Chan is incredulous.
“I am,” CEO Park says, waiting for Chan to offer a proper reaction like the ones he used to give as a teen struggling with adapting to being an Australian boy in a company full of old Korean people. It's why CEO Park had scooped Chan up in the first place – somehow finding potential in a scrappy intern with no interest in his global food empire.
Chan is older now though and slightly better at deciding how he feels before challenging his boss. He stares mutinously at his fingers in silence.
“I’m firing you,” CEO Park finally says, “because I need you.”
“I really don’t think–”
CEO Park waves a hand, cutting Chan off before he can start listing off protests. “I want you to take this money Channie.”
“Is this some sort of money laundering scheme?” Chan asks.
CEO Park snorts, “If my infant needed money laundered, maybe.”
Chan flushes. “I’m a PA, not a restauranteur,” he says with slightly more heat.
CEO Park looks pleased. “But you could be,” he says, “just the other day you say food was ‘kinda interesting’.”
“I said meal planning has been helping my gym schedule,” Chan protests, “not that I was interested in running a restaurant for you. Why on earth wouldn’t you pick someone with actual qualifications?”
CEO Park eyeballs him again. “Because I need someone who can run things smoothly, who understands people, who I can trust to run this damn project and keep it both secret and afloat.”
And there is it. Somehow, Bang Christopher Chan – 26, Personal Assistant by day, SoundCloud musician by night – has stumbled ass-first into a position where Park Jinyoung of all people keeps insisting that he’s capable of doing all sorts of wild shit.
*
-2020-
First, it was building CEO Park’s new wardrobe from scratch. Then, it was redesigning the entire main office layout to accommodate a department shuffle and, most recently, screening potential CFOs.
“I’m just your assistant,” Chan had wailed, “the hell do I know about finance?”
“I think you’re good at finding the right people,” CEO Park had said flippantly. “Look how well Sana has been doing here.”
“Picking an assistant for myself is not the same as finding someone to take charge of your company’s entire financial strategy.”
Chan still ends up choosing someone after several rounds of interviews – a kindly man in his 50s with sharp eyes and a wealth of experience. CEO Park approves of him almost immediately. The new CFO Seo had patted Chan on his way out of the office and said, “are you single? I have a son and daughter who could do with a sensible young man in their life.”
Seo Changbin does not, in fact, want to date Chan. However, they do start hanging out pretty often. Changbin joins the same gym as Chan, and they spend most evenings working out silently next to each other before walking two streets down for gukbap and smoothies. Changbin is thoughtful and incisive when it comes to life advice and always good for casual banter or inside jokes. It’s nice.
Chan doesn't have many friends in Korea (which happens when you work 10-hour days). His friendship with Changbin loosens the tight little knot of loneliness that gnaws at him in the stillness of his room late at night.
So, Chan lives his life. He dutifully clocks in at JYP Industries (“feeding the nation with quality food and beverages since 1972”), hangs out with the three friends he has in Korea, and works on growing his SoundCloud following in the hours that remain.
And now – now things are about to change.
*
-2023-
He sits across the desk from CEO Park’s ostentatious gold office chair and wonders what his mum would say. “It’s an experiment,” CEO Park hasn’t stopped talking, “I want to see how feasible this is. Food establishments supplied by JYP exclusively, set up on our food delivery network – imagine this all over the country – this could be big Chris, really big. And it all starts with one barbeque restaurant run by my favourite little Australian.”
“A barbeque restaurant?” Chan splutters, “I can’t run a barbeque restaurant.” He narrows his eyes, “no one will believe that I’ve got the funds to start a business anyhow.”
“Well, I don’t trust anyone else to do it,” CEO Park says as though it’s already been decided, and Chan has already signed the contract that’s sitting in front of him. “I need someone who can report to me frequently and won’t sell company secrets. Nothing more, nothing less.”
He reaches over the flips through the contract to the last page, “I’ll keep paying your salary. After two years if this doesn’t work out, you can come back, find a new job, whatever – I’ll handle it.”
And just like that, Chan is going to start and run his very own restaurant. He signs the contract.
*
When Chan gets home that night, he sits on the edge of his bed and really, really thinks about the future for the first time in a while.
Chan used to have a clear vision for himself, or at least a clear vision of the future he wants: a dog like Berry, a job he loves, a person to share his life with. When he was younger, he could see it so clearly - him smiling at someone, walking their puppy by the river, his songs playing on the radio. He used to imagine building a family in Korea, putting down roots in an actual house, finding people he wants to invite over for drinks and games.
CEO Park has always been pragmatic even as Chan dreamed and dreamed without fruition until the future grew hazy and abstract. “If you want to really experience life, you’ve got to try as many things as possible to see what sticks. And I don’t just mean with jobs. With people too.”
And Chan – well, Chan sees what he means. Chan lives comfortably. He can afford the equipment to tinker with music, has more than enough to pay for a bougie gym membership and to help fund his sibling’s college tuition. Life is fine – good even, but Chan can’t tamp down on the dreams he has for more. More of what, he doesn’t quite know. But more than this.
So maybe when CEO Park first brings up firing him as part of this convoluted secret corporate restaurant experiment, Chan can’t help but wonder if this is going to be the spark that jolts him into action again.
*
-2015-
And Chan isn’t unfamiliar with action. 18 is the age to be making poorly thought-out decisions after all.
Chan had finished his finals in Australia before taking a partial scholarship to a tiny liberal arts college in Korea without consulting his parents. His appa was furious and Chan, in turn, had refused to fly home for Christmas that year. Sitting alone with his laptop, a whole lot of stubborn determination and not much else, Chan had decided he was going to become a musician. He was going to make music that mattered, and Seoul was where he would do it.
Chan spent countless hours trying to slip into the local music scene; going to clubs, joining local interest groups, making friends with underground rappers with nothing tangible to show for it and middling grades to top things off.
Seoul is large, noisy, and sometimes cruel. He walked for hours around the streets alone late at night, wondering if he’ll ever be able to call it home.
Chan camped in internet cafes practicing his Korean pronunciation (cultivating a Seoulite accent that at least stopped people from looking at him suspiciously all the time), set up a SoundCloud account and began posting music online. This at least got him a small following of teenagers and a few (unpaid) collaborations with other aspiring artists.
But, as with most other poorly thought out decisions, Chan never gets a lucky break big enough to justify the risk. 5 months after landing in Seoul, the aunt who’d offered him a temporary bed gently hints that it’s time for Chan to move out. His college tuition for the next semester is almost due, and Chan lives out of his suitcase in a hostel for 2 weeks as he applies for as many part-time jobs as possible.
The silver lining is that the stress drives Chan into hyper-focus when it comes to scraping together tuition fees and finding a place to stay. He rents a tiny room in a dingy apartment block, works waiting tables at his local snack bar, and picks up shifts doing sound-tech jobs for local gigs. He buckles down and focuses on his classes, spending hours in the library catching up on old lecture notes.
Nothing if not an overachiever, Chan drags his GPA kicking and screaming back up to the top of his cohort – and it’s this last part that becomes important. With a year left before graduation, Chan’s Media Studies Professor recommends him for an internship in the JYP Communications team.
It's here that Chan’s life shifts, wobbles, and wildly pivots.
*
-2023-
The first thing Chan does is google how to start a restaurant, followed closely by Kbbq places in Seoul, after which he throws himself on his bed and calls Changbin.
“This is going to fail. Do you know how many barbeque places there are in Seoul? Within a 5-kilometer radius of me right now?”
Changbin is less than sympathetic, “You'll be fine," he says, “you’ve got sugar daddy money behind you.” When Chan just groans, he adds with slightly more sympathy, “it’s not like you’ve got anything to lose.”
Changbin isn’t wrong, but Chan has already managed to lose his dreams of becoming a music producer – failing at his actual job would be almost as bad.
“I just want to get this right.”
“Well, get cracking then. Make yourself a list of things to do and show me later. Don’t forget it’s chest day today.”
And well, Chan knows how to make lists. Chan is a planner. He likes organising, delegating, perfecting optimal workflows, and burying himself in problems to be solved. As CEO Park’s Personal Assistant, he’s had the chance to learn in the shark tank itself, and Chan knows (at least in theory) the steps involved in starting a business. As it turns out, everything is a little harder in practice.
Chan is neck deep in paperwork for property viewings, payment arrangements, and bargaining with bulk goods suppliers when he remembers that he doesn’t have any help at all. He needs a manager – severs – a chef . Chan has always been a damned good assistant, but, he thinks numbly, maybe he’s not going to be the best leader.
“What you need, “Changbin says on the second panic call, " is a concept.”
"A concept.”
"And everything will fall in place after that.”