Prologue
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Of all the things that could have happened, Jiheon thought. He didn’t particularly think this was unlucky or unpleasant. He was simply surprised.
I mean, what were the odds of something this big happening on the day of the welcome party at my new job?
“The final Men’s 200-Meter Individual Medley is about to take place here at the Cairo Olympics Aquatic Stadium. One of our own, Gwon Jaekyung from South Korea, will be taking part in this event. Oh! The swimmers are coming in as we speak.”
The announcer was right. The athletes were making their entrance. The camera panned across eight figures as they stripped off their jackets from afar. Then it zoomed in on one swimmer heading to a center lane.
A face very familiar to people in Korea filled the large flat-screen TV on the wall of the bar. The few female customers seated at the bar cheered at once. There were some particularly loud screams, accompanied by stamping of feet, from a table full of college students.
“Judging from the cheering alone, it’s like he’s already won the gold medal,” one of the male students said.
“That’s right. Did Gwon Jaekyung set a new world record without us realizing it?”
“If he doesn’t get a medal today, it’s all on you girls.”
The female students didn’t seem bothered by the boys’ reactions.
“It’s all right. In my book, he’s already handsome enough to deserve a gold medal.”
“That’s right. Jaekyung would already have gotten twenty-four medals if the Olympics were about picking good-looking people.”
“He’d definitely be the MVP then.”
The people at the other tables laughed at this.
“The camera is lingering on Gwon Jaekyung for some reason,” came the voice of the announcer with a chuckle. There was a reason he sounded so pleased.
“Yes. He’s considered the top contender for the gold medal,” replied the sports commentator, kindly elaborating. He couldn’t seem to hide the pride in his voice, either.
“Gwon set a record in Asia in the preliminaries, coming in at first place... And Noah Kenny of Australia, who you can see on the screen now, was in second place. Now, Kenny set a personal best, upping his previous one by 0.4 seconds, no less, but he couldn’t quite match Jaekyung.”
“The two trained together in Australia, am I correct?” the announcer asked.
“That’s right. My boy Jaekyung has been training in Australia ever since the Asian Games two years ago. He has been training in the same aquatic center as Noah. The two swimmers are similar in age, and as far as we know, they are good friends.”
The commentator rambled about them being shaving mates, clearly trying to fill airtime. He sometimes seemed to forget that he was speaking in an official setting and kept referring to the athlete in an overly familiar tone, using informal terms like my boy and so on. He was intent on letting everyone know that he had coached Jaekyung. It made Jiheon laugh out loud.
The man had once been Jaekyung’s coach. There was no denying that. But that had only been for a year, back when Jaekyung was an elementary school student, and the man had been dismissed from his role. A school parent had complained about the coach often entering the pool while intoxicated. Jiheon himself remembered the man smelling of alcohol before. At first, when he was assigned to Jaekyung, he seemed motivated by the chance to coach someone talented. But a leopard can’t change its spots, and he eventually slipped back into his old habit of drinking and got caught.
And now here he was—dressed to the nines and claiming to have coached Jaekyung—doing commentary, of all things. It felt shameless of him to have accepted the role.
I suppose his swimming center will be flooded with inquiries from customers after this. He’s eager to sell his services in whatever way he can.
Jiheon smiled and raised his glass of beer. The announcer was reminding the viewers of the situation again.
“Now, we are here at the Cairo Olympics Aquatic Stadium, where the final of the Men’s 200-Meter Individual Medley is about to begin. From our country, we have Gwon, aiming for the gold. Mr. Lim Myungjin, can you brief us again about the men’s individual medley?”
“Of course. When it comes to competitive swimming, most people think about individual styles, such as freestyle, the butterfly, and so on. Well, the medley, as the name suggests, involves using all four styles.”
“That’s the butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, and freestyle, in that order?”
“Yes. It is essential to stick to that order. And this particular event, it’s two hundred meters.”
“So fifty meters for each style.”
“That’s right. Each professional swimmer actually specializes in a style. That is why athletes who focus on freestyle compete in freestyle events, and those who are about the backstroke only partake in backstroke events. In the medley, excelling at just one style isn’t enough. You need to know all four. It is technically the most demanding, and the stamina drain is through the roof. It’s a category that requires strength, stamina, technique, flexibility—all those things. It’s regarded even among professional swimmers as the most difficult category, and winning a medal in it obviously has a lot more meaning to the athletes as well.”
“Oh, so it’s a tough event,” muttered someone from the General Affairs Department, sitting across from Jiheon. He almost sounded as though this was the first time he had heard about the category at all.
Swimming wasn't exactly a popular sport in South Korea. Someone had won a medal in a single stroke category in the past, and there had been a brief surge of interest after that, but it had only been temporary. No Korean swimmer had ever won a medal in the individual medley at the Olympics. Sometimes, someone won a medal here and there in the Asian Games, but no Korean had ever gotten to the finals in the World Swimming Championship or the Olympics. Most of the people in Korea didn’t even know that the individual medley was a category of competitive swimming. It was a bit of a shock, still, to learn that the employee of a sports agency hadn’t been aware of it, either.
I suppose the General Affairs Department doesn’t really need to know that, Jiheon thought, picking up a rice puff to eat.