Shopping King Louis: Episode 10

by LollyPip

This show just continues to amaze me, the way it takes a well-used trope and flips it, completely surprising us over and over again. You never know what’s going to happen, or how Louis and Bok-shil will react when they hit a bump in the road. But one thing I believe in my heart — Louis and Bok-shil are meant to be together, and no matter what happens or what secrets are dug up, they’ll always find each other in the end.

EPISODE 10: “The Moonlight that Shines on my Heart”

On the day that Louis took Bok-shil to the beach, he had watched her, and thought that he didn’t want to hide his feelings from her. He’d said to her, “Bok-shil, I like you so much. When I think of you, my heart flutters.” He’d asked how much she likes him, but we don’t hear Bok-shil’s answer.

Louis sits with Butler Kim and talks about Bok-shil, saying how much he likes her. Butler Kim quips that Louis liked him a lot when they lived in France, and Louis jokes that Butler Kim isn’t his type, ha.

Curious about all the things he’s half-way-remembered, Louis asks if he had lots of friends, but Butler Kim says he was too overprotected to have many friends. Louis asks what he was good at and Butler Kim says he was the King of Shopping, which makes Louis smile. He asks about Koboshi, his dog, and Louis is saddened to hear that Koboshi passed away four years ago.

Butler Kim asks if Louis remembers his treasure box, the one he hid the penguin statue in when he was little. We see a flashback of Butler Kim looking for the music box, and he urges Louis, when he remembers where he hid it, to tell Butler Kim first.

He tucks Louis into bed, where Louis is adorably amazed at his “clapper” lights. Sobering, he asks if the car he was driving really was burned in the accident, and if that means that someone else died in his place. Butler Kim’s silence is all the answer he needs.

We see again Detective Joo-hyuk taking Bok-shil to the cemetery, and telling her that Bok-nam was the person who died in the crash that everyone thought killed Louis. She kneels at Louis’s grave, where her brother’s body lies, crying and saying how much she’s missed him, and promising to be good to him if he just comes back to her.

Louis goes to see Director Baek in private, curious why he pretended not to recognize him when he saw him that time in the building. Director Baek claims that since they all thought Louis was dead, he thought he was just someone who looked like him. He reminds Louis that he’s the one who found him, after all, and says that he’s no longer living as a poor man because of him. Louis doesn’t look convinced.

Ma-ri walks in, and Louis immediately remembers her from when she almost hit him with her car. She grabs him in an aggressive hug, wailing that she’s so glad he’s alive, and he asks if they were that close. Director Baek says they’ve been best friends since they were kids, but a flashback shows the truth, that Ma-ri was a little bully who would tease Louis for not having parents.

Louis is incredulous when Ma-ri says that they were more than friends, and that she was shocked when she saw him on the street. Then when she called him, he hung up on her and she was devastated. Louis remembers, but he says that he likes Bok-shil now, so she can stop lying about their relationship. HA.

In-sung and his mother take Louis’s diamond-encrusted undies to a jeweler to be appraised, and though the jeweler initially scoffs, he takes a look. He tells them the huge diamond is real, but only worth about a thousand dollars due to some scratches on the surface.

They’re thrilled anyway, and go looking around Bok-shil’s apartment for the other diamond, which has fallen off. They find a colored stone and get excited (and pfft, they think a green stone is a ruby), but it’s just a fake from the toy crown Louis likes to wear.

Joong-won worries about Bok-shil, since he learned that Bok-nam died in the crash. He runs into Louis looking for Bok-shil in the office, and tells him that she’s on a business trip. He asks Louis not to look for her, reminding Louis how he once told him that adults hide their pain so as not to cause more hurt to others.

Bok-shil sits in her apartment, recalling Joo-hyuk telling her that Bok-nam got involved with a gang, and stole Louis’s car and clothes. He’d been the one in the car when it was hit and burst into flames, and his body was burned beyond recognition. Bok-shil cries again, asking why Bok-nam would do such a terrible thing.

A knock on the door reveals Jung-ran and Grandma, here to see Bok-shil. Grandma recognizes Bok-shil right away from the time they met in Busan, and realizes that the “friend” Bok-shil spoke about then, was her own grandson Louis.

She thanks Bok-shil sincerely for taking care of Louis, but Bok-shil admits that it was her brother’s fault that Louis went through all that in the first place. At Grandma’s kind demurral, tears spring to Bok-shil’s eyes, and she says that she feels it’s so unfair that her brother died but she’s the one who has to apologize.

She insists that Bok-nam was a good boy, and Grandma pulls her into a comforting hug. She says that she knows the pain of losing your family, and tells Bok-shil to cry as much as she needs to. Bok-shil lowers her head to Grandma’s lap, and sobs.

Later, Grandma gently tells Bok-shil that it’s best if she stops seeing Louis. Seeing him will remind her of her brother, and it will hurt Louis to know that he’s causing her pain. Bok-shil says that she understands, and that she’s been too happy with Louis, unaware of her brother’s death.

Director Baek goes home that evening and announces that he’s going to let Ma-ri marry Louis. He tells Jae-sook to make it happen, then changes his mind and orders her to do nothing, not one tiny thing. HA, he’s finally figuring out how she operates.

Bok-shil takes only a small bag of her clothing, and leaves to go back to her hometown. She leaves a note for In-sung and his mother, and another on Joong-won’s desk at the office, along with her resignation letter. She asks them not to tell Louis where she is, and just sends him a short text saying that she’s going on a trip, then leaves her phone behind.

Louis is despondent, and refuses to eat because he misses Bok-shil so badly. Jung-ran says that she must be shocked that he turned out to be a chaebol, and advises him to give her time to get used to the idea. Louis doesn’t like it, but since he knows Bok-shil would want him to eat, he eventually caves.

Jae-sook invites Joong-won’s mom Young-ae for tea, and finally tells her that she’s married to the president of Gold Group. Young-ae is stunned, since her son is the director of Goldline. At that, Jae-sook says that her daughter works under him, and Young-ae realizes she’s talking about Ma-ri, who she thinks is dating Joong-won. She very nearly screams with excitement.

Jae-sook says that Director Baek wants Ma-ri to marry Louis, but she wants her daughter to marry for love. Young-ae offers up her son, and Jae-sook agrees.

Young-ae fans the flames by mentioning how Jae-sook’s husband disrespects her, especially the way he yelled at her for not finding out how Detective Joo-hyuk found her bookstore. The women decide to fix that problem, and head to the police station with edible bribes.

Joo-hyuk is unnerved at the way the ladies openly ogle him, but he sits to talk with Jae-sook. She’s so overwhelmed by his gorgeousness that she can barely speak, but she manages to thank him for finding Louis and ask how he found her bookstore. Joo-hyuk tells her about Louis’s memory notebook before she gets twitterpated all over again.

Bok-shil makes her way home, and seems bolstered by the familiar humble surroundings. She cleans up the house and finds a container left open, and wonders if someone came to the house.

Louis is miserable when Bok-shil doesn’t answer his calls, and he wonders if something more than a trip is going on. He’s not eating or sleeping, and Butler Kim is worried, so he takes Louis to Bok-shil’s apartment. Louis finds the place just as he left it, but he finds Bok-shil’s phone abandoned on a shelf.

He drags In-sung out and demands answers. He knows that In-sung knows where Bok-shil is, and whines until In-sung tells him. Louis runs back to the car, sure that Bok-shil wouldn’t just leave him for no reason, but Butler Kim stops him and offers to drive him to Bok-shil.

Bok-shil comes back from a hike to find someone sitting on her porch. HA, it’s Joong-won, looking ridiculously out-of-place. He says he came to buy wild ginseng, and imperiously demands to be fed. Bok-shil brings him a simple meal, but he refuses to eat unless she sits and eats with him.

As they eat, Bok-shil asks why he’s really here, and Joong-won says that he came to check on her. He says that he knows all about Bok-nam, and tells her to eat even if it’s difficult. Bok-shil does, fighting tears,and she softly thanks him.

After lunch, Joong-won insists on helping her around the place so she can rest. He splits his trousers so Bok-shil gets him some ajumma pants, then has to fight the threatening gigglefit when she gets a look at him.

Joong-won is well-meaning but completely inept, and he manages to snap the handle off the water pump so he has to lug water up from the river. He can’t manage to chop wood or peel ginseng either, and though he brags about how smart he is, Bok-shil mutters that he’s as useless as Louis. The mention of Louis’s name stops them both short, and Joong-won quickly changes the subject.

Joong-won and Bok-shil’s absence has the Goldline office at loose ends, wondering how to handle the flood of complaints pouring in (about the issue Ma-ri overrode Bok-shil on before). Ma-ri lets Bok-shil take the blame for the complaints, but Mr. Lee narrows his eyes at her suspiciously.

Ma-ri accidentally kicks a bag under her desk — it’s the bag of Bok-shil’s clothes that she took from Joong-won’s place. She’d thrown it away when Joong-won rejected her, but she’d gone back to retrieve it.

She decides to take the clothes to Bok-shil’s as an excuse to talk to her, and runs into In-sung on the way. He tells her that Joong-won already came looking for Bok-shil, then Louis, and he offers to take her to Bok-shil himself as an excuse to spend more time with her.

Ma-ri is taken aback when In-sung opens the driver-side door for her, saying he doesn’t have a license. But she gets in without a word, and with a nervous glance at her odd passenger, they head off.

Joong-won struggles to light a fire, so Bok-shil deftly shows him how to do it. He helps her blow on the embers, and when they burst into flame, he pats Bok-shil’s head and praises her.

They suddenly hear a voice yell, “Stop!” and look up to see Louis standing there looking furious. He strides over and punches Joong-won dead in the face, then immediately realizes what he’s done and apologizes. He’s still angry, but he controls himself.

Louis asks Bok-shil how she could just leave without saying a word, but she only says she’s sorry. Joong-won watches Louis pout that he missed her, and he pulls Louis away to help make dinner. Louis goes, but he tells Bok-shil that he wants an answer later.

Joong-won tells Louis that they’ll stay tonight then go home tomorrow, but Louis says he won’t go without Bok-shil. Joong-won tells him that staying with her will hurt her, and Louis misunderstands that he’s worried that he’ll make Bok-shil do everything for him.

In-sung gets hungry on the drive, and he and Ma-ri stop to eat. She’s amazed at the sloppy way he eats, but she dig in gamely and actually enjoys the food. They polish off four meals between them, then Ma-ri is shocked again when In-sung hands her the bill. HAHA.

Back on the road, the food upsets In-sung’s stomach, and he tells Ma-ri that he urgently needs a restroom. She makes several attempts to pull over but keeps getting cut off, as In-sung’s distress grows. He yells for her to just pull over anywhere, then suddenly he stops yelling, and a horrible stench fills the car. Oh nooo.

At bedtime Louis flops down on Bok-shil’s bed, determined to sleep near her. Joong-won makes him come to their room, and Louis puts some pain patches on his back, taking pleasure in slapping them down hard. Louis grumbles crankily that Joong-won was the same way when he was sore from working.

Both men are convinced they’re the more manly one — until Louis spots a spider near the ceiling. He squeals and points it out, and they both shriek like little girls, hee. Okay, to be fair, that’s a honking huge spider.

Grandma realizes that both Louis and Butler Kim are gone, and sends Jung-ran after them. Jung-ran finds Butler Kim waiting for Louis in the little village near Bok-shil’s home, and threatens to kill him for not answering her calls. She screams that she’s been worried, then backs up and makes like she was talking about Louis. Yeah, right.

Butler Kim physically blocks her from going to look for Louis, and when she knocks him down and scoots past him, he jumps up and grabs her in a backhug. He begs her to let Louis spend time with Bok-shil today.

Unnerved, Jung-ran asks him to let her go. Butler Kim refuses, saying that life is too short, and Jung-ran enjoys his embrace for just a moment. She throws him off and turns to face him, then beckons him closer. They share the weirdest kiss ever, as fireworks explode behind them.

That evening, Joong-won tells Louis that at times, everyone wants to hide from the world for a while. Louis says that he understands that feeling, and Joong-won tells him that Bok-shil is going through something like that right now.

Louis asks if it’s because he turned out to be the heir to Gold Group, but Joong-won says it’s not. Louis asks if Bok-shil will come back to him, but Joong-won doesn’t have an answer for that. He turns over and complains that he can’t sleep unless he’s in his own bed, but a few seconds later he’s snoring loudly.

Louis wonders out loud what will happen if that spider comes down from the ceiling, then squawks again when he sees that it’s not in its corner. It’s so cute when he does that.

Ma-ri sobs to her mother about In-sung, though she can’t even bring herself to say what he did in her car. In-sung is beside himself, and he says to his mother that he’s beginning to realize that he’s disgusting. She’s all, You’re just realizing that now?, and he goes to bed weeping and biting his fist in shame.

Bok-shil lies in bed, with Grandma’s words that being around Louis could hurt them both ringing in her head. She tosses and turns, but she can’t get to sleep.

In the morning she decides to end this once and for all, and tells Louis to disappear from her life. She says that she hates seeing his face and hearing his voice, and Louis looks at her like her words don’t make any sense to him.

He asks softly why she’s doing this, but Bok-shil just tells him not to come here again, and grabs her pack to leave. A loud, “No!” from Louis makes her stop, and he says in a sad voice, “I like you so much, Bok-shil. I want to see you and hear your voice every day. I want to be with you every day.”

His words nearly break her resolve, but Bok-shil steels herself and turns to face him. She says she’s over him so she doesn’t care how he feels, and that she’s already forgotten the moments they shared together. Somehow she manages to walk away from Louis, leaving him gasping for air.

Bok-shil walks all the way to the village before looking up. She sees a television in a shop window showing a news article on Louis’s reappearance, and all the little moments that she claimed to have forgotten rush to the forefront of her mind. She hears Louis saying her name over and over, and last, she thinks about him asking her on the beach how much she likes him.

Now she admits her true feelings, if only to herself: “Louis, even if you have nothing, if you don’t even have a name, I like you.”

Louis is subdued on teh ride back to Seoul, and he asks Joong-won if Bok-shil hated him from the beginning, or if it’s because his memory isn’t coming back so that he can’t help her find Bok-nam. Oh, that just breaks my heart. Joong-won asks if he wants to know the truth, and begins to tell Louis about Bok-nam.

But before he finishes, a motorcycle swerves close to the car, and Joong-won jerks the wheel to avoid hitting it. The motion slams Louis’s head into the car window, and images flood his mind — a group of riders on motorcycles surrounding his car, someone punching him, seeing Bok-nam standing over him as he lies on the ground.

In an instant he makes the connection from that face, to the face he’s been searching for for weeks. More memories rush back, of sitting in his car, Bok-nam in the driver’s seat. Handing Bok-nam his watch and wallet, then his clothes. Standing in the road while Bok-nam drives away.

We see the crash again, and the car bursting into flames, with Bok-nam trapped and unconscious inside. It’s unclear whether Louis actually witnessed this, but Louis understands what his sudden memories mean.

Dazed, he whispers, “Bok-nam died. He died instead of me, right?” His eyes plead with Joong-won to tell him it’s not true, but Joong-won doesn’t lie to him.

Louis starts to repeat Bok-shil’s name over and over, and he stumbles out of the car to slump against a wall. Grief overcomes him, and he sobs incoherently, fully understanding now why Bok-shil left him.

COMMENTS

Oh no, I was so hoping it was a mistake and that it wasn’t really Bok-nam who died in the crash. I suppose there’s always a tiny sliver of hope, since Dramaland rules state that nobody is truly dead until we see the body, and so far the scenes of Bok-nam dying in the car are purely speculation based on the few facts known by the characters. But as far as Louis knows, it was Bok-nam who he gave his watch and clothing to, and Bok-nam who was last seen driving the car so for now we have to work on the assumption that Bok-nam is really gone.

Once again, Shopping King Louis delivers its angst with an absolutely logical and understandable explanation. Yes, Bok-shil left Louis when she found out her brother died in his place, exactly as we all feared she would. But it’s not because she’s angry or blames him for Bok-nam’s death, and it’s certainly not because she has no more use for Louis in helping her find her brother. I think it’s partly because of what Grandma said, that seeing each other, with Bok-nam’s death between them, would be painful for both of them. But I also think it has to do with what Bok-shil told Grandma — that she’s lost her last remaining family member, and it’s utterly unfair that she lost him in a way that makes her feel guilty and responsible for what happened to Louis. Since we’re watching a drama, we know that there’s probably more to it, and that it’s possible that Bok-nam had a good reason for what he did. But as far as Bok-shil knows, her brother died a thief and a thug, and that his actions directly caused Louis’s accident and amnesia. She’s got to be feeling some pretty awful things right now, and stepping away from Louis makes complete sense.

How much do I love this show for tipping all of the expected drama tropes on their ears? Bok-shil is in no way falling prey to Noble Idiocy, because her reasons for sending Louis away are as selfish as they are selfless. And I fully expected Louis’s family to reject Bok-shil once they got Louis back, and to try to keep them apart. But instead, Grandma makes a special trip to thank Bok-shil for taking care of her Precious, and even comforted her in her grief of losing the only family she had left. I truly believe that Grandma asking Bok-shil to stay away from Louis was an act of love, as she didn’t want to see either of them in any more pain than necessary. She doesn’t know how Louis and Bok-shil love and need each other, more than even Bok-nam’s death can affect. As I’ve said before, it’s really refreshing to see a show that uses all of the same drama tropes we’ve seen so many times, but use them in a way that is not only interesting, but also makes complete narrative sense without branding anyone a villain.

I really have to commend the show for knowing where its strengths are, and playing them to the hilt. It would have made complete sense, twice now before this episode, to have Louis and Bok-shil separated by events out of their control. Yet each time they’re almost immediately drawn back to each other, so we never lose that magical thing that’s between them and keeps us all coming back for more. I really hope this continues, and that Bok-shil’s telling Louis to leave doesn’t last long, because it’s been proven twice now that the show doesn’t need to keep its main couple apart to give us plenty of dramatic tension. Major respect to rookie writer Oh Ji-young, for (so far) doing just about everything right.

And I have a feeling we haven’t even scratched the surface of the secrets in Louis’s past. There’s still the whole question of how he got amnesia in the first place, and the significance of the penguin music box. I want so much to unabashedly love Butler Kim, but I’m worried about his interest in the treasure box, and why he wants Louis to tell him first when he remembers where it is. We also still don’t know why Louis’s dog Koboshi keeps coming up in conversation, and how, as a child, Louis named his dog a name that sounds so much like “Go Bok-shil.” As we get closer to discovering the answers, I suspect that we’re about to be taken on a wild ride, with twists and turns we don’t even see coming. But I trust that the show won’t stop giving us all the crazy, sweet, and wonderfully entertaining moments that we’ve grown to love about Louis and Bok-shil’s wacky, insane, beautiful world.

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