Come Here and Hug Me: Episodes 19-20

by mary

It’s a good hour for romance as Jae-yi and Do-jin take a break from all the suffering to go on a date that’s been twelve years in the making. But don’t let the cuteness fool you. Blood is still spilled this week. Some of it is even kinda satisfying; it makes you wonder if there isn’t a tiny bit of Yoon Hee-jae hidden in your heart…

 
EPISODES 19-20 WEECAP

We open in the aftermath of Park Hee-young’s report. Moo-won reads the headlines linking Do-jin to his sister and tries but fails to contact Do-jin. He looks at Hyun-moo’s defaced Jae-yi posters again and chucks them across the room in frustration.

Do-jin can’t come to the phone because he’s busy listening to Jae-yi’s proposal. The one where she wants them to stop being sorry for the past and try chasing their own happiness for once. Thinking of how Dad and Hyun-moo almost killed her the two times they’ve been together, he turns down her offer, scared that being with her will hurt her even more.

Meanwhile, Lee Seung-woo (previously called Fanboy) introduces himself to Hyun-moo by attacking a drunk guy for him. Seung-woo giggles when Hyun-moo recognizes him as one of the staff members working around Jae-yi. He happily shares how he took over killing people when it was obvious Hyun-moo couldn’t, bragging that Dad trusted him with the task instead of Hyun-moo.

In a flashback, we see Seung-woo meeting Dad in prison during Bible study. (I really need to have words with that nun one of these days, if she’s still alive.) Dad took a liking to the eager apprentice who reminded him of Na-moo. He taught him how to “use” a hammer and presumably told him stories about the family. In return, Seung-woo promised to do some things for Dad when he’s released from prison.

Storytime is interrupted when the drunk ajusshi struggles to get up. Seung-woo laughs to find him alive and hits him once more, shocking Hyun-moo with the casualness of the murder. Seung-woo sounds like a delusional fanboy as he inserts himself in the family tree, calling Yoon Hee-jae Father and telling his big brother that he already met Mom and his cute little sister So-jin. Hyun-moo starts toward him at the mention of So-jin’s name but Seung-woo swings the hammer, spraying Hyun-moo with the now-dead ajusshi’s blood before saying goodbye. Hyun-moo shakes at the sight of the stranger’s blood and stumbles out of there.

Do-jin doesn’t last one night before he’s ripping out his IV and escaping to Jae-yi’s hotel. He takes back his answer and offers to spend one day just with her, something they couldn’t do for the past twelve years. Jae-yi agrees and they hug on it, probably the first hug that isn’t prompted by murderers or the nosy media.

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Let’s have one day

 
Speaking of nosy media, Park Hee-young sets her team to digging dirt on Do-jin, teaching her evil minions how news of the good-looking son dating one of his family’s victims can generate two weeks’ worth of content. When she reads news of Yoon Hee-jae getting 30 days of solitary confinement for attacking a guard, she easily figures out that the outburst was triggered by her documentary, making me wonder if she’d make a good prosecutor too, having a criminal’s mind and all.

Jae-yi’s manager is busy minimizing the damage the rumors are doing to her image but she’s floating on cloud nine with Do-jin’s promised date and calmly accepts the penalties. The source of her happiness is patiently recovering in the hospital, being pampered by his cop buddy Jong-hyun. In between cutting apples into hearts, Jong-hyun informs Do-jin that he’s been taken off both Jae-yi’s and the Hammer Attack cases since there’s now concrete evidence of both being linked to Hyun-moo. Jong-hyun saves him from a guilt trip by saying that he might not have known Yoon Na-moo, but he would’ve befriended and stayed friends with him back then. Which we all know is a death sentence. But it’s a sweet thought.

In an annoying segue, the cop sunbae that Do-jin saved is revealed to be one of Park Hee-young’s sources. He complains that Park hasn’t revealed Do-jin’s face to the public yet and even Park has to wonder why he’s being too mean to the nice Do-jin. The sunbae just shrugs that Do-jin’s the son of a murderer, as if he doesn’t count as a person anymore. I’m now retroactively glad this guy was stabbed.

Moo-won gets a call from a “Yoo Family Representative.” He addresses the other person as Father and assures him that the articles on Jae-yi are fake and he’ll sue everyone into silence.

After the call, he’s assaulted by more memories from his parents’ murder: a young Moo-won was left for dead on the floor as the killer dropped the weapon and poured gasoline on the bodies. The killer jerked in surprise and turned around at a stabbing sound, which is where the memory ends.

In the present, Moo-won shakes the recollection away to visit Jae-yi. He warns her to avoid their family for a while as they’re eager to scold her for what’s happening. She wonders why he won’t pressure her to talk like everybody else, and he smiles sadly as he promises to protect her and wait for her to be ready, just like how their Mom and Dad waited for him.

Alarmed by the thought of their new foster-brother hanging around, Hyun-moo watches So-jin leave work, following her until she safely gets on the bus home. He also checks on Mom’s shop where Mom alternates between sitting dejectedly and running out to chase anyone dressed up like Hyun-moo. I don’t know how he stops himself from running over and hugging them when he looks that lonesome.

Just like that, we jump to a month later, at the end of Dad’s solitary confinement. His first visitor is Park Hee-young. She’s a bit miffed that she can’t find any dirt on Na-moo. Dad is still mad at her for telling the public that the police exaggerated his crimes to make his arrest look like a huge achievement. Park isn’t the least bit sorry for the lie since she’s the one who made Dad into this celebrity criminal when he’d otherwise be treated as common trash. Dad thinks it’s the other way around: his story is what shot her into fame when otherwise she’d be writing trashy gossip.

Park gets bored with the chicken-or-the-killer-egg debate. She’s just here to pick his brain about Na-moo and what happened that night. Dad is unwilling to talk, furious that she’s not the least bit scared of him. Park shelves the interview for another time and stands up to leave. But not before leaning in (yikes!) and whispering that he should accept that his era is over, his only role now is to rot in jail.

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Your era is over

 
Dad takes that as an invitation to strangle her. It takes three guards to finally pull him off. Not for nothing is Park the craziest lady in the business when she amusedly tells him that she’ll sue him for this attack so they can make headlines again, guessing that that’s what Dad really wanted anyway. But is it? Because Dad sounds just as amused when he tells her “Goodbye, Reporter Park,” and it doesn’t sound like the see-you-later kind.

On the sweeter end of the one-month time jump is Do-jin’s and Jae-yi’s date. Today they’re both just Nak-won and Na-moo: all the childhood sweetness minus the childhood tragedy. Nak-won shamelessly stares at Na-moo’s handsomeness as he self-consciously drives and chugs down a bottle of water in his nervousness. He spits it right back out when Nak-won guesses that he’s never dated anyone in the twelve years they’ve been apart. Just like in the past, she finds his shyness cute and stares at him some more. Heh. And just like in the past, the confident Nak-won is reduced to maidenly shyness when Na-moo beams a smile directly at her.

Their first stop is in a park with lots of trees. Nak-won tells him that it’s where she hung out when she missed him, because she’s surrounded by lots of trees (namoo). Na-moo thinks that she’s also his paradise (nakwon), but he doesn’t say it out loud. He just catches up to her and holds her hand.

Mom is still dodging reporters after the time jump. One of them is Han Ji-ho, the same reporter who tracked down Mom and So-jin in the island three years ago. She tells Mom she’ll write their side of the story and negate Park Hee-young’s work. I almost want to believe her, but then she needles Mom about the possibility of having Jae-yi as her daughter-in-law. So-jin rightfully dumps a basket of veggies on her head for an answer.

Moo-won arrives to question the family and shoos Han Ji-ho away, but not before she points him out as Jae-yi’s brother, startling Mom and So-jin. Moo-won asks them for Hyun-moo’s whereabouts or friends, showing the grainy CCTV shot of Seung-woo. They assure him that they have no idea where Hyun-moo is and they’ve been waiting for him to show up so they can make him surrender. Moo-won ignores their sincerity, unnecessarily reminding them that they’ll be charged as accomplices if they don’t report Hyun-moo right away.

Working separately, Do-jin’s team has also pegged Seung-woo as the only suspicious member of Jae-yi’s crew. They don’t know where he is yet. Maybe because he changed his costume and is currently outside Mom’s shop in a bright yellow shirt. No longer dressed like Hyun-moo, Mom doesn’t notice him lurking around and being creepy, but Reporter Han does–which means she’ll either die soon or she’ll end up exonerating Hyun-moo.

In any case, Seung-woo being noticed is good news for our lovers who are currently walking in an almost deserted beach. It’s one of the few places where they can have peace. But it’s hard to get that peace when they’re so jumpy, they mistake an innocent couple taking pictures of the shore for taking secret pictures of Jae-yi. Na-moo jumps in front of her to shield her from the camera, which is also an excellent excuse for them to get close. He looks like he wants to stay for more hugs but Nak-won awkwardly breaks away. Which, why?

That night, Park Hee-young airs evidence of Dad’s covered up injuries from the night he was caught. She also points out the lack of any other weapon on the crime scene, surmising that what Dad wrote in his autobiography–stopping the killings and surrendering for his son’s sake–is a lie. Park shares her theory that Dad tried to kill his son to save himself, and Na-moo in turn tried to kill his Dad to save himself. Poor Hyun-moo listens to all of this, remembering the times when Dad shut him up for calling Na-moo a traitor.

Na-moo and Nak-won are oblivious to this recent update as they enter an amusement park. It’s their last stop for the day. Nak-won’s smile shrinks as Na-moo shakes his head at ride after scary ride until he finally nods at the boring carousel. Aww… but Nak-won can’t stay mad for long when Na-moo looks so happy just to be there with her.

He steps aside to answer Jong-hyun’s call just as a few girls recognize Jae-yi the celebrity and take pictures. She scuttles off to hide in a corner, seeing and unseen by Na-moo who runs around in a panic after returning to find her gone. When Nak-won finally steps out in the open, Na-moo hugs her tight, looking so shaken at the few seconds she went missing.

Park Hee-young comes home, satisfied after a day of the Devil’s work. Hyun-moo greets her in the parking lot, asking if she’s Reporter Park. The next thing we know, she’s lying on the floor of her scheming room. The wall is splattered with blood. Someone who looks veeery much like Hyun-moo is standing over her and hitting Na-moo’s pictures with a bloody hammer.

The mood is more subdued during Na-moo’s and Nak-won’s drive home. Nak-won kills the mood further by calling him Do-jin again. She puts on a brave face as she tells him that Do-jin is a good name too. Na-moo can’t take it. He pulls over so they can sit inside the car and watch the dashboard’s clock count down to midnight. Na-moo starts to say something when the clock beeps twelve o’clock, ending their date. But–omo! Na-moo leans in for a kiss anyway.

 
COMMENTS

So is it a goodbye kiss or a screw-the-world, let’s-be-together kiss?

I want to hope it’s the latter because we’ve already gotten a year’s supply of soulful staring from this show. Just like how a glimpse of friendship pushed Na-moo into defying Dad, maybe this date with Jae-yi will push Do-jin into the offensive when it comes to their relationship.

Besides, I’m not even sure why they should bother caring what people think. Maybe it’s just the sight of Park Hee-young’s possibly dead body, but suddenly, I don’t feel the importance of hiding how much our leads like each other anymore. Jae-yi’s career is already on the rocks after Park’s rumor. As for the people whose opinions actually matter–like Mom, So-jin, and Moo-won–I’m confident it will range from silent support to grumpy acquiescence to whatever makes Do-jin and Jae-yi happy. Park can have her two weeks of fame and deal with Dad’s wrath if she wants to.

Speaking of, this is probably the Mom in me speaking but I refuse to believe Hyun-moo attacked Reporter Park. He’s always used a claw hammer in the past (another clue that he’s not part of Dad’s inner circle) while Dad and Seung-woo use a club hammer. The same one used by Park’s attacker. For all his posturing and threats that he’ll kill every other person he meets, Hyun-moo is too traumatized after seeing someone actually die in front of him. I find it hard to believe that watching an episode of Park’s rumor mill drove him to murder.

Or, hey, maybe Park isn’t dead. Hyun-moo has a track record of not killing people. And story-wise, I don’t want her to die yet. Not when she’s the only one who can poke at Dad’s insecurities like that. Besides, death is too easy an end for her. She’ll die a respected journalist. I want her to “die” the same death as her victims: by living in a world that keeps judging you, unable to defend yourself from the lies and forever hoping that people forget you so you can pick up what’s left of your broken life and move on. Then when you’re starting to feel better, someone thrusts you in the spotlight again. For funsies. What can I say? She makes me want to go on a Bible study with Yoon Hee-jae.

 
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