"Two dashes if sugar frosting and... Ta-da!" Eunjung added the final touches to her fresh batch of cupcakes and beamed proudly to herself as she admired her handiwork. It had been a tough day in the kitchen and she finally had the time to take a breather and just do what she loved without any added stress. Her desserts had been well-received by the prince and princess of Monaco, and the Japanese tourists apparently loved the cupcakes too, so all in all it had been a pretty good day.
"These are not bad!" a garbled voice came from behind her, giving her a jump.
She whirled around to find a tall, lanky figure leaning against the door frame, a half-eaten red velvet cupcake in his hand.
"That's only for VIPs," she deadpanned, narrowing her eyes at the intruder.
Chanyeol laughed, walking over and ruffling her hair affectionately. "Quit being such a spoilsport! It's not like it's the first time I've nicked your food. But seriously, these cupcakes are the bomb." He cheerily popped the remainder of the cupcake into his mouth, making a satisfied burp after he swallowed it down.
Eunjung wiped the cross look off her face and smiled. It had been a while since she had seen Chanyeol, since time was scarce ever since she started working under the boss from hell, so his appearance here was not an unwelcome sight.
"What are you doing here? What if someone sees you!" she suddenly exclaimed, reminded of the fact that they were still in dangerous territory. At any minute someone could just waltz into the kitchen and see them there and rumours would no doubt start flying about the "secret" relationship between the personal assistant of Global Group's chairman and the most unimportant member of the hotel's kitchen. If D.O. walked in, he would probably also accuse her of flirting at the workplace and consider it strike two.
Chanyeol shrugged and replied, "Just doing the usual rounds of the hotel. How's work? Has anyone been giving you any trouble?" He picked up another cupcake and popped it into his mouth.
"No," she lied, choosing to leave out her problems with D.O., "and get your hands off my cupcakes! We could still sell these."
"What? Sell these leftovers? I honestly don't think the restaurant is going to put any of these out. This is a six-star establishment, we don't sell leftovers. If you did, then I would seriously need to run some investigations."
Eunjung scowled. "Whatever. Just don't touch my cupcakes," she said as she quickly snatched back the third cupcake that Chanyeol had picked up, before proceeding to remove the tray of ten or more cupcakes from his reach. "Are you done with your spotcheck?"
Chanyeol nodded and smiled. "What time do you knock off work? Do you want to go grab something to eat?"
"You just ate two cupcakes..."
"So what? It's almost dinnertime. Those were just appetisers," Chanyeol grinned and replied. He walked over and undid the apron strings from round Eunjung's neck and hung it up on the hooks. "As the PA of the boss, I know for sure that the hotel restaurant closes right about now, so you should be free to go. You've had a tiring day, you deserve a break! Come on, let's go get some black bean noodles from our favourite roadside stall."
Eunjung sighed. Chanyeol was right, it was already past the time she was allowed to knock off work, so there was nothing to stop her from leaving (unless D.O. walked in right now and demanded she do overtime).
Chanyeol is right, I deserve a break, she thought to herself with determination.
Screw D.O. and what his penchant for overtime work. She had been slave driven by him enough over the past few days and she wasn't about to continue to be his slave. Pushing any last thoughts of her anal boss out of her mind, she let herself be herded out of the kitchen by Chanyeol, glad that the stress of the royal visit had finally come to a close.
#
The next morning, Eunjung hopped off her bike and whistled a cheery tune as she made her way through the back door of the hotel and trotted down the corridors to the kitchen. To her surprise, when she rounded the corner into the kitchen, the entire place was empty.
There was not a single soul to be seen.
"Strange... where is everyone?" she mumbled to herself. She took a quick glance at her watch to make sure that she hadn't gotten the time wrong and showed up for work an hour or two earlier than the usual reporting time. There was no discrepancy there. "Why's there no one around?"
Eunjung made one round round the entire kitchen, checking even the employees changing room. There was no one anywhere.
Just then, she heard a scurrying of footsteps coming from the corridor, and someone burst into the changing room.
"There you are!" Misoon exclaimed when she realised who it was. The expression on her face told Eunjung that something wasn't quite right around here.
"Where's everyone?" Eunjung asked curiously.
Misoon grabbed something from her own locker before grabbing Eunjung by the hand and dragging her along. "What are we going to do, Eunjung? Everyone's so solemn and the atmosphere is so tense, the manager has been trying to settle everything but the Japanese group just refuses to settle--" Misoon kept blabbering on and on the entire way, and Eunjung was only managing to register bits and pieces of what she was being told.
"What exactly is going on..." her voice trailed off as they entered the main dining area, where it looked as though most of the kitchen staff were already gathered, all with looks of dread on their faces.
"Look who finally decides to show up," she heard a snarky voice say from amidst the crowd of faces.
"Ah, Eunjung, you're here. Take a seat," chief pattisiere Dok said calmly, giving her a fatherly pat on the back as he pulled up an empty chair for her. Misoon also took her seat next to Eunjung, her cold and clammy hand still tightly grasping onto Eunjung's.
"Did something happen?" Eunjung asked the chief pattisiere, not quite understanding why everyone seemed to be looking at her with unfriendly auras emanating from their eyes.
"Let's just wait and see alright? The manager is filling in the head chef with the details of the situation now, they should be out shortly."
Fifteen awkward minutes later, Manager Kim and D.O. came marching out from the manager's office, the former looking decidedly worried and stressed, while the latter simply had his brows furrowed as usual. Manager Kim's eyes fell on Eunjung, and he shook his head slightly before opening his mouth to speak.
"Alright, apologies for gathering all of you here like this. As most of you already know, we will be suspending restaurant service for one day in light of yesterday's... incident. For those of you who are unaware, last night, the crown prince and princess of Monaco both reported bouts of diarrhoea and the hotel had to call in the doctors in the middle of the night to tend to them. They have both been diagnosed with food poisoning, and although the source of the food poisoning is unknown, the coincidental timing of their food poisoning and that of the Japanese tour group has led us to believe that both groups ate something in common that resulted in this unfortunate situation..." he paused, his eyes once again darting toward Eunjung, "... after our investigation, we have found that the only thing that both parties ate in common were the vegan red velvet cupcakes... made by Eunjung."
Eunjung's jaw dropped in horror at the realisation of what she had just heard.
Now she realised why everyone was giving her accusatory looks. Everyone believed that she was the cause of the food poisoning. Not only had the Japanese tourists suffered from food poisoning, so had the crown prince and princess of Monaco, VIPs at their hotel. If it was true that the cause of the poisoning were her cupcakes, then she would be kicked out of the door before she could even say a single word.
"Maybe it wasn't Eunjung's cupcakes..." she heard Misoon say quietly from beside her.
"Why didn't you check the cupcakes before you served them to the guests!"
"Did someone set you up to this? Why are you trying to ruin our restaurant!"
"Are you trying to put all of us out of a job?!"
"Who let a newbie like you prepare the desserts anyway!"
The minute that sentence left the lips of one of the irate kitchen staff, the room fell silent and all eyes shifted over to the head chef. D.O.'s expression had stiffened and his lips hardened in a thin line. Even the lady who had made the angry accusation immediately realised that she had said something wrong and bowed her head apologetically. Everyone knew that the one who made that decision was D.O. and if they wanted Eunjung to take the blame, then they were pointing the dagger at their head chef's neck was well.
Eunjung was the only one in the entire room who hadn't realised the thunder that had appeared in D.O.'s face, because she was too overwhelmed by the voices shouting at her a couple of seconds ago. All she wanted to do now was to hide in her shell where she would be safe from all these angry voices, people who were shouting at her as though she had murdered someone. She felt as though she had murdered someone, even though she hadn't.
Was it really my desserts? Did I make all those people fall ill?
The seeds of self-doubt began to sow themselves in her mind and all of a sudden, she wasn't sure anymore. She wasn't sure if she had accidentally mixed the wrong ingredient in, or if she had accidentally let a touch of detergent slip into the mixing bowl while she was washing up her other utensils, or if she had forgotten to wash her hands after she took a toilet break. The more she thought about it, the more she became convinced that it was her fault.
"I'm sorry..." she mumbled, the tears beginning to roll down her cheeks.
"Don't say sorry!" an angry voice snapped loudly, giving everyone in the room a jump. The voice belonged to D.O., and was the first thing he had said to the staff ever since he arrived this morning. Everyone looked at one another warily, not quite sure what provoked his sudden outburst. Eunjung looked up at him in surprise, her tears immediately ceasing, lest he scold her for crying too.
"Don't apologise for something that isn't your fault," came his response, his tone softening a little this time.
"But they fell sick because of my cupcakes..." Eunjung began quietly.
D.O. ignored her and looked around the room. "Everybody listen clearly, I am only going to say this once. The food poisoning was not caused by Eunjung's cupcakes. I will not tolerate anyone who accuses a colleague of something like this ever again. If I hear any of you mentioning any word of this again, I will fire you immediately, is that understood?"
"But they all ate the cupcakes..." one of the accusers said, although a little more hesitantly than before. Everyone knew that their head chef had a volatile temperament, and none of them wanted to anger him.
"I ate the cupcakes too, but I'm fine," came D.O.'s curt reply. "It wasn't the cupcakes. Whatever the cause, we'll get to the bottom of it soon. Since the hotel has made the decision to close the restaurant for the day, then so be it. Take the day off." With that, the case was closed as far as he was concerned. D.O. turned on his heels and stormed back into the kitchen, with the manager trailing behind him.
When they were gone, the rest of the staff began to file out one by one, some still grumbling over the disruption caused by this incident. Besides Misoon, none of them bothered talking to Eunjung, even though D.O. had more or less cleared her from any suspicion by admitting that he had also eaten the cupcakes.
"I knew it couldn't be you! You're such a good pattisiere, you couldn't have made any mistakes," Misoon said happily when everyone else was gone, leaving the two of them behind.
"Thanks Misoon..." Eunjung mumbled, still not quite convinced. She tried to recall the events of yesterday, and according to her memory, D.O. had not tasted the batch of cupcakes she had made for the royal VIPs or for the Japanese tourists either.
Unless he ate the leftovers that I left behind in the kitchen? Yes, that must be it. He must have eaten some of the leftover cupcakes...
That was the only explanation for how he could have eaten the cupcakes without her knowing.
"I hope they find the culprit soon though. It seems like the matter has been blown up to pretty big proportions... Manager Kim and head chef D.O. will probably have a huge headache for the next couple of days," Misoon said ruefully.
"Is it really bad?"
Misoon nodded. "I heard that headquarters is already on the case, since it involves VIP guests. The foreign office also sent officers down this morning to check on the situation since it's meant to be a diplomatic visit--" she suddenly lowered her voice as though what she was about to share was top secret, "-- I also heard that they fired Operations Manager Lee this morning."
"What? Why?" Eunjung asked in surprise. Operations Manager Lee oversaw all the hotel's daily operations and was pretty much one of the hotel's key personnel. She was a pleasant lady who walked around in stillettos and sharp suits most of the time and was well-liked by all the staff in the hotel. Eunjung had only seen her a couple of times, but it was enough for her to take a liking to the lady.
"This is an accident of epic proportions! If it isn't handled well, it could lead to a diplomatic crisis! If anything goes wrong at the hotel, the first ones on the chopping block are the managers, since they are the ones who are supposed to be running the place. That's why Manager Kim looks so frightened, he's afraid that his head will be the next to roll."
"Oh..." Eunjung replied, feeling rather sorry for their operations manager. She was completely innocent in the entire scheme of things, yet she still had to take the blame because the repercussions of the matter were far too serious. "Who's going to fill the job of Operations Manager then?"
Misoon shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine..."
#
"Did you really eat those cupcakes?" Manager Kim asked as he chased after D.O. back into the kitchen.
D.O. frowned and replied, "I said I did, didn't I?"
"Even if you did, why did you say that? The higher ups are pressing for us to find the culprit behind the food poisoning case, someone needs to take the rap, or else the both of us--"
"Enough!" D.O. semi-shouted, banging his hands down on the metal kitchenette. Manager Kim jumped a step backwards, startled by the sudden outburst. "I won't have you push one of our own onto the chopping block as a scapegoat. There was a reason behind the food poisoning and I will get to the bottom of this. If the culprit isn't found and someone has to answer for it, then I will. Don't worry about it."
"That's easy for you to say... Your father owns the bloody place..." Manager Kim mumbled under his breath, making sure that his words weren't audible. He sighed and folded his arms, saying, "Alright, alright. Suit yourself. The headquarters are sending in a new Operations Manager to take over from Manager Lee and I'm quite certain his first task on the job will be to put an end to this hullabaloo. He should be arriving anytime now and he'll probably want to speak to us."
D.O. shook his head, not at all pleased with all this unnecessary manpower movements. The last thing the hotel needed was to have its stalwart Operations Manager replaced by some newcomer who barely knew how the place operated. He made a mental note to tell Chanyeol to tell his father not to let his cronies up at the headquarters behave in such a reactive manner, which didn't solve any problems and only created more of them.
"Who's the new guy?" he asked out of curiosity, wondering which of the old fogeys from headquarters would have been sent down to clean up the mess.
"His name is Oh Sehun, and rumour is that he's only about your age!" Manager Kim said with a flourish, looking rather pleased with knowing this piece of information.
"Oh Sehun?" D.O. raised his eyebrows. "Never heard of him before."