Saturday morning LEET prep was a rude awakening after Friday's fancy dinners.
I showed up at 9 AM with coffee and determination, still slightly exhausted from performing sophistication for business executives. Professor Jung took one look at me and raised an eyebrow.
"Late night, Ms. Han?"
"Networking events. Plural."
"Ah. The real world calling." She handed out practice tests. "Well, the LEET doesn't care about your social calendar. Speed drills. Thirty questions, twenty minutes. Go."
I bent over my test booklet, and everything else fell away. Just me, the questions, and the ticking clock.
Finished all thirty with two minutes to spare. Got twenty-eight right.
"Much better," Professor Jung said during review. "You're learning to trust your instincts. Keep this momentum."
After class, Su-Jin caught up with me. "You look fancy. Did you do something different with your makeup?"
"Learned some techniques yesterday. Yoo-Na's doing, mostly."
"Well, it looks good. You have that 'I just had an Important Adult Evening' glow."
"Is that a thing?"
"It is now. Lunch?"
"Can't, sorry. I promised Bok-Jin I'd help him with his business strategy project."
She grinned. "Look at you, being a supportive girlfriend. It's very cute."
"Shut up."
"Never."
I met Bok-Jin at a coffee shop near campus—the kind with mismatched furniture and decent wifi where students could camp out for hours without guilt.
He was already there, laptop open, surrounded by papers and looking slightly desperate.
"Okay, what's the crisis?" I asked, sliding into the seat across from him.
"Market analysis project. I have to present a five-year growth strategy for a hypothetical company, and my professor tore apart my last draft."
"What kind of company?"
"Sustainable fashion brand. Small-scale, trying to expand."
"And your professor's issue?"
"Says my growth projections are 'unrealistically optimistic' and my risk assessment is 'insufficient.'" He pushed his laptop toward me. "Can you look at this with fresh eyes? Tell me if I'm delusional?"
I scanned his presentation. The projections were ambitious but not ridiculous. The problem was he'd focused entirely on best-case scenarios without accounting for complications.
"Okay, you're not delusional. But you are optimistic to the point of naivety."
"Ouch."
"You want me to be nice or helpful?"
"Helpful. Obviously."
"You need to add contingency planning. What happens if suppliers raise prices? What if a competitor launches first? What if consumer trends shift? Right now you're banking on everything going perfectly."
"But that makes the presentation less exciting."
"It makes the presentation realistic. Investors don't want exciting—they want viable. Show them you've thought about problems before they happen."
He made notes, nodding. "Okay. That makes sense. What else?"
We spent the next hour tearing apart his presentation and rebuilding it stronger. I didn't know much about business strategy, but I knew how to identify weak arguments and shore up evidence.
"You're really good at this," he said around noon, stretching. "The analytical breakdown thing."
"It's the same skill as legal analysis. Find the holes, plug them with better reasoning."
"Still. Thank you. I'd be spiraling without you."
"You'd be fine. You're smart."
"Smart and spiraling aren't mutually exclusive." He closed his laptop. "Okay, enough business talk. How are you feeling? After yesterday?"
"Tired. Accomplished? I don't know. It's weird being evaluated by that many adults in one day."
"You handled it incredibly well. My father mentioned you this morning."
I sat up straighter. "He did? What did he say?"
"He said, 'Your girlfriend seems intelligent. Well-spoken.' Which, coming from him, is basically a glowing recommendation."
"That's it? 'Seems intelligent'?"
"That's more than he said about the last three people I dated. Usually he just ignores them completely."
"I'm not sure 'better than being ignored' is a ringing endorsement."
"It's a start. With my father, everything is incremental." He reached across the table and took my hand. "But honestly? I don't care what he thinks. You impressed me, and that's what matters."
"You're biased."
"Extremely biased. Also correct."
My phone buzzed. Min-Ji.
Min-Ji: Emergency roommate meeting. Yoo-Na is having a crisis. Come home ASAP.
I showed Bok-Jin the text. "Roommate emergency. I should go."
"Of course. Go. Text me later?"
"Yeah." I kissed him quickly. "Good luck with the business strategy revision."
"Good luck with whatever chaos is happening at your apartment."
I got home to find Min-Ji and Yoo-Na on the couch, a bottle of soju already open at noon.
"Okay, what's the emergency?" I asked.
"My father," Yoo-Na said, "has decided I should do a summer internship at his company. Not at a marketing firm or a brand I'm interested in—at his company. In the family business division."
"And you don't want to?"
"I want to build my own career, not be 'Kang Dae-Jung's daughter working in daddy's company.' But if I say no, it's disrespectful. If I say yes, I'm admitting I can't make it on my own."
"That's a terrible position to be in," I said.
"It gets worse. He also mentioned that Lee Min-Woo's father asked if I'd be willing to 'collaborate' with Min-Woo on a joint project. Which is code for 'our fathers want us to work together so we'll eventually date and merge companies.'"
"Oh god."
"Exactly." She poured another shot. "I'm twenty-two years old and my father is already planning business alliances through my romantic life."
Min-Ji and I exchanged looks.
"What does your gut say?" Min-Ji asked. "About the internship?"
"My gut says take a different internship and deal with the fallout. But my brain says that's career suicide. My father has connections everywhere. If I openly defy him, he could make things difficult."
"He'd sabotage your career?" I asked.
"Not sabotage. Just... not help. And in that world, not being helped is the same as being blocked." She slumped back against the couch. "I hate this. I hate that my career is tangled up with family politics and business deals and strategic relationships."
"So what are you going to do?" I asked.
"I don't know yet. Maybe I take the internship, do well enough that he can't complain, but make it clear I'm not staying long-term. Show him I'm capable but also independent."
"That's a political tightrope," Min-Ji said.
"My entire life is a political tightrope." Yoo-Na looked at me. "How do you do it? Stay sane while navigating Bok-Jin's world?"
"I don't know if I am staying sane. I just show up and try not to embarrass myself."
"You do more than that. Last night you held your own with my father's business partners. That's not easy."
"I mostly just asked questions and tried not to use the wrong fork."
"That's more than most people manage their first time." She poured me a shot of soju. "Come on. Day drinking. It's noon on Saturday. We've earned it."
"I have LEET practice tomorrow."
"One shot won't kill your LEET score."
She had a point.
We spent the afternoon doing absolutely nothing productive—watching terrible dramas, eating too much delivery food, complaining about our respective struggles. Min-Ji talked about her brutal vet school schedule. Yoo-Na ranted about family pressure. I admitted that Friday's networking events had left me feeling like an imposter despite evidence to the contrary.
"You're not an imposter," Min-Ji said firmly. "You're just operating in a world that's designed to make people like you feel like imposters."
"That's very philosophical."
"I'm a little drunk. I get philosophical when I'm drunk."
Around 5 PM, Yoo-Na's phone rang. She looked at the caller ID and grimaced.
"It's my father. I should take this."
She went to her room, and Min-Ji and I looked at each other.
"She's going to say yes to the internship," Min-Ji predicted. "She always does what her father wants, even when she doesn't want to."
"Can you blame her? He controls her entire future."
"No, I don't blame her. I just wish she'd realize she has more power than she thinks."
Yoo-Na came back ten minutes later looking resigned.
"Let me guess," I said. "Internship accepted?"
"Internship accepted. Starting in June, right after finals." She flopped back onto the couch. "He also 'suggested' I have dinner with Min-Woo next week. To 'discuss the joint project.'"
"That's basically a setup date," Min-Ji said.
"I know. I tried to decline, but he framed it as business networking, so now I can't say no without seeming unprofessional."
"Want me to come as a buffer?" I offered. "I can pretend I'm interested in the project and third-wheel aggressively."
She laughed despite herself. "That's actually tempting. But no, I'll handle it. I'll just make it very clear that I'm not interested in anything beyond professional collaboration."
"Good luck. Min-Woo seems persistent."
"All these chaebol sons are persistent. It's the entitlement." She looked at me. "Present boyfriend excluded, obviously."
"Bok-Jin's different."
"He is. You got one of the good ones."
My phone buzzed. Speaking of.
Bok-Jin: Finished revising the presentation. It's so much better. You're a genius.
Me: I'm really not. Just good at finding holes in arguments.
Bok-Jin: Which is a genius skill. What are you doing tonight?
Me: Day drinking with roommates and watching bad dramas. Very sophisticated.
Bok-Jin: That sounds perfect. Enjoy. Love you.
Me: Love you too.
I set my phone down and found both roommates watching me with identical knowing expressions.
"What?" I asked.
"You're smiling at your phone again," Min-Ji said.
"It's cute," Yoo-Na added. "Disgusting, but cute."
"I'm allowed to smile at my boyfriend."
"You are. We're just observing." Min-Ji refilled our soju glasses. "Okay, new topic. We need to plan something fun. Something that isn't studying or networking or dealing with family drama."
"Like what?" I asked.
"I don't know. Karaoke? A day trip somewhere? Getting extremely drunk and making questionable decisions?"
"We're already working on the drunk part," Yoo-Na pointed out.
"This is moderate drinking. I'm talking about truly questionable decision-making levels of drunk."
"Maybe let's not," I said. "I have LEET in two months. Questionable decisions should probably wait."
"Ugh, fine. Responsible Ji-Mang strikes again."
"Someone has to be responsible."
"That's depressing."
We settled back into the drama, and I felt something settle in my chest. This—sitting with my friends, complaining about life, having nothing and everything to do—this was what I needed. Balance between the fancy networking events and the ordinary moments.
Between who I was becoming and who I'd always been.
Sunday morning I showed up to the library at 1 PM for the full practice LEET test feeling slightly hungover but functional.
Su-Jin took one look at me and laughed. "Rough night?"
"Day drinking with roommates. Poor life choices were made."
"At least you're honest about it."
We settled into our study room—me, Su-Jin, Tae-Min, Min-Seo, and two other students from the LEET prep course. Professor Jung had sent us a full practice test with instructions to simulate real testing conditions.
"Three hours," Su-Jin said, setting up the timer. "No phones, no breaks except the scheduled five-minute break between sections. We're doing this for real."
"I'm going to die," Tae-Min said.
"We're all going to die," Min-Seo agreed. "But we're dying together."
"Very inspirational," I said.
Su-Jin started the timer. "Section one: Reading Comprehension. Thirty-five minutes. Begin."
I dove in.
The passages were dense—philosophy, science, legal theory, economics. I read quickly, marked key information, moved to questions. Trusted my instincts like Professor Jung had taught me.
Finished with three minutes to spare.
Logical reasoning was next. Twenty-eight questions, thirty minutes. Argument structures, logical fallacies, premise-conclusion relationships. My brain was warmed up now, finding patterns faster.
Finished all twenty-eight. Felt good about twenty-four of them.
Five-minute break. I stretched, drank water, tried not to think about how much more test was left.
Analytical reasoning—logic games. My weakness. Six games, thirty-five minutes.
I set up the first game, tested scenarios, eliminated answers. Moved to the second game. The third. The fourth.
Time was flying.
I finished the fifth game with four minutes left. Rushed through the sixth game, made educated guesses on two questions, then time was called.
Essay section last. Thirty minutes to construct an argument. The prompt was about whether universities should prioritize research or teaching.
I outlined quickly, wrote efficiently, hit my main points. When time was called, I had a complete essay that wasn't perfect but was coherent.
We all sat back, exhausted.
"That was brutal," Tae-Min said.
"Let's grade them," Su-Jin suggested. "Get it over with."
We swapped tests and went through the answer key. When I got my test back, my heart was pounding.
Reading Comprehension: 32/35 Logical Reasoning: 25/28 Analytical Reasoning: 22/30 Total: 156/180
The same score as last week. I hadn't improved.
"Don't panic," Su-Jin said, seeing my face. "156 is still good. And you finished everything this time—that's progress."
"But I need 165 minimum for SNU law school. I'm nine points away."
"You have two months. That's enough time to improve nine points."
"What if it's not?"
"Then we drill harder. We practice more. We figure out what's holding you back." She pointed at my analytical reasoning score. "That's your weakness. You need to do more logic games."
She was right. I knew she was right. But staring at that 156 felt like staring at evidence of my own limitations.
After we finished reviewing, the group made plans for a longer session next Saturday. More practice tests, more targeted drilling, more suffering.
I walked out of the library and found Bok-Jin waiting outside.
"Hey," he said, straightening when he saw me. "Thought you might want company walking home."
"How did you know I'd be here?"
"You mentioned practice test Sunday. I took a guess on timing." He fell into step beside me. "How'd it go?"
"Same score as last week. 156. I didn't improve at all."
"You finished all the sections this time, right?"
"Yeah."
"That's improvement. You're faster."
"But not more accurate."
"Ji-Mang—"
"I know. I know I'm being too hard on myself. But I have two months, and if I don't improve, I won't get into the law schools I want, and all this work will be for nothing."
He stopped walking and turned to face me. "First, it won't be for nothing. You're learning and growing and becoming better at critical thinking. That has value regardless of test scores. Second, you're going to improve. You always do. You're one of the most determined people I know."
"What if determination isn't enough?"
"Then we figure out what is. But we're not there yet. You've had one practice test at this score. That's not a pattern, it's a data point."
I took a breath. "You're very rational right now."
"One of us has to be. You're spiraling."
"I'm not spiraling—okay, I'm spiraling a little."
He pulled me into a hug right there on the sidewalk, and I let myself lean into him.
"You're going to be okay," he said quietly. "I promise."
"You can't promise that."
"Watch me."
We walked the rest of the way to my apartment hand in hand, and I felt the panic slowly recede. He was right—one test score wasn't a pattern. I had time. I had resources. I had people helping me.
I could do this.
I just had to keep working.