When last we left our grumpy and sunshine, grumpy tried to dump sunshine.
But Sunshine is done being dumped
Ju Yeong takes Do Hoe on a date that ends in his bed (in a sweet way). Ju Yeong covers him carefully as he sleeps, then stares at him and cries.
The next day, Ju Yeong takes Do Hoe to finish the paperwork to sell the gym to someone else. He’d only been interested in buying it because he worried Do Hoe would regret selling it.
On their way home they stop at a cafe. Ju Yeong has been acting funny about the glove compartment and Do Hoe finds his multiple failed college entrance exam results inside. He confronts Ju Yeong, pretending he took the exam multiple times for fun.
Flashback to a day ago! Ju Yeong was busy
Ju Yeong found those exam results and put everything together. Do Hoe never went to college. His life is a lie.
He confronts Hyeon Ho for his part in the mess, nearly punching him. Hyeon Ho reveals that Do Hoe is being sued by the mother who is abusing her son, she knows he didn’t go to that college. He wants to help Do Hoe keep lying and hiding, and wants Ju Yeong to stay out of it.
To scare Ju Yeong away, Hyeon Ho reveals he told Do Hoe the police were at his house before the college entrance exams. Do Hoe went in without a word. Ju Yeong knows and doesn’t care. He tells Hyeon Ho that Do Hoe never hit anyone, so they are completely different.
Back in the present, Ju Yeong tries to fix things
He plays dumb so Do Hoe can keep pretending. But he’s crying and Do Hoe wants him to call him names, not cry. He can’t outright tell Ju Yeong to leave him, but he leaves.
Ju Yeong follows. He blames himself for ruining Do Hoe’s life and doesn’t want to leave him anymore. He asks Do Hoe not to abandon him. He’ll be by his side until he can’t stand him.
Do Hoe breaks and says nothing is Ju Yeong’s fault. He didn’t want to be like his Dad, and lying about graduating from a prestigious university got people to like him immediately. But now he doesn’t know what to do.
Ju Yeong knows what to do. He leads Do Hoe into the gym and tears things off the wall. Do Hoe watches passively. Then he picks up a broken punishment stick. He stares in the mirror, sees his dad and himself, and hits the mirror.
After, they burn things outside. Do Hoe looks lighter. In good Asian drama style, Do Hoe is hungry and wants Ju Yeong to cook for him.
Do Hoe still has problems
Hyeon Ho, the lawyer, wants to leverage the mother’s abuse of her son to keep her quiet about Do Hoe. But Do Hoe wants to report her to the police, even though it means exposing himself.
Back at Ju Yeong’s, Do Hoe gets to be the little spoon in bed. Aww. He’s so soft. He asks Ju Yeong if he thinks parents can change. Ju Yeong says maybe, but minors can’t do anything alone. Yes, exactly, thank you.
Do Hoe doesn’t know how to sleep properly because he never has. Yeah, we saw the pills and booze.
The next day, Do Hoe and Ju Yeong see the poor kid being abused and stop it. Do Hoe sees himself in the kid, and calls the police.
Do Hoe loses his job and faces his legal troubles
He won’t meet Hyeon Ho in person but with Ju Yeong’s support, takes a phone call. Hyeon Ho thought he had a weapon against Ju Yeong, and he would leave when he realized Do Hoe ignored the abuse. Instead, Ju Yeong was worried about Do Hoe.
Hyeon Ho wonders if he could have done something different to get Do Hoe to love him. He bullied him because he liked him. Gross. He wanted some kind of reaction from Do Hoe, but never got one. Instead, Do Hoe cried in front of Ju Yeong.
Do Hoe explains that he knew Ju Yeong was being abused before Hyeon Ho told him. He’s bad at taking care of himself and couldn’t take care of Hyeon Ho too. But having him as a friend helped him survive.
Hyeon Ho gets flustered and cries. Eventually, he gets a reduced sentence for Do Hoe. Prison time is mentioned but I’m guessing it’s a suspended sentence because we don’t see Do Hoe serve any time.
Do Hoe and Ju Yeong start over
Do Hoe wants to take the college entrance exam again, to prove something to himself. Maybe he’ll succeed with Ju Yeong by his side. Ju Yeong promises he’ll like him no matter what.
Do Hoe is still Doe Hoe, and suggests they live apart so Ju Yeong isn’t supporting him. Ju Yeong tells him to knock it off. Do Hoe gives in easily, admits he’s a loser with too much pride, and asks Ju Yeong not to abandon him.
On a trip back to Do Hoe’s home, they remember the past. Do Hoe apologizes and says if things had gotten better he would have looked for Ju Yeong. But Ju Yeong found him first. On the way back Do Hoe reaches for Ju Yeong’s hand and thanks him for being his family. My heart.
We end with Do Hoe going through Ju Yeong’s old messages on some message board. He smiles and cries as he sees questions Ju Yeong asks about him, and understands how much Ju Yeong has always loved him.
That was a GREAT ending
Hyeon Ho got off easy for someone who was also a bully. He was abused too but as Ju Yeong pointed out, Do Hoe never hit anyone, Hyeon Ho is different. That said, I’m glad Ju Yeong never punched him.
I’m glad Do Hoe’s father died. Ju Yeong was too nice to him, but Ju Yeong is an adopted son whose adoptive parents rejected him. Maybe to him, an abusive father was better than none. Maybe Do Hoe’s father kept him connected to Do Hoe. Either way, he showed no hesitation in helping Do Hoe tear the place down. Do Hoe was always first in his mind.
Ju Yeong’s guilt over Do Hoe’s exam failures confused me. I think he feels his hiding the abuse forced Do Hoe to live that lie too. Do Hoe couldn’t get over what he had to do and got stuck. At least that’s how Ju Yeong feels, I don’t think Do Hoe agrees.
The show’s biggest success is that I loved it despite the breakup/time skip, my most hated trope. Because it was an important part of the story, not something foisted on me in the last episodes to create conflict.
I believe Do Hoe when he said he wanted to see Ju Yeong if things improved. That hope probably kept him going. When things didn’t improve, he moved to the neighborhood they’d dreamed of living in together, even though he risked exposing himself. He must have been desperate, subconsciously, to get back to Ju Yeong.
Ju Yeong is a knight in shining armor. He had his sad past, and his history of abandonment had to make Do Hoe’s leaving him that much harder, but he was so strong. Do Hoe needed rescuing. Ju Yeong wanted to rescue him.
And once he rescued him, Ju Yeong, and us, got a nice amount of soft, sweet Do Hoe as a reward.
(I have a few more general thoughts on the series, but I will save them for the final general review.)
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