Can We Love? - Episode 11 (Recap)

I'm not sure I've ever seen a man as much in love as Oh Kyung-soo and all the signs point in one direction. He is so giddy with joy when she is near him, and even giddier when she is in his house! I hear some bells ringing! But just when we thought we're safe, we're not ... Let's not talk about the preview just yet, because that's not what's happening in this episode, but since we've all seen it, we also know that happy-time is over soon. Poor Jung-wan ... I hope luck comes her way sooner rather than later. By the way, how many episodes does this drama have?

Episode 11

Back to the hot kisses on the couch! They’re getting more serious, these two, but then, her phone rings. It’s her son! Gawww, Oh Kyung-soo is so frustrated about this (almost) coitus, which is constantly interruptus... Jung-wan lies that she is in a meeting (nice one, ahjumma :), but she tells Oh-boy that she needs to return to Seoul quickly „after finishing the meeting“. She promised her son to help him with something. They continue with the kissing but it’s just not meant to be... enter Snotty Brat! Hahaha, this is funny (though not really for our two lovers …). She is of course delighted to find out her „oppa“ is in that kind of relationship with this Ahjumma and she advises them to get married quickly! That would solve all her problems. Wouldn’t Han Joon-mo start chasing her again immediately if he found out? And off she goes again, extremely happy. Poor delusional girl …

 

What else can Kyung-soo and Jung-wan do now? Have a real meeting. He likes her script ... but only about two scenes in it. Oh no! He tells her to try again, it’s too boring, and there are not enough surprises. On their way back to Seoul, in his car, she is silent – until he suggests they stop at a motel. She laughs and that was the point of him saying it – at least that’s what he claims. I am pretty sure he was half or even entirely serious, hehe. He asks whether she is mad at him for the harsh criticism earlier, but that’s not it: she wants to learn as much as possible from him while working with him, so she needs him to be as harsh as possible.

Sun-mi has a friendly houseguest and she makes him a peppermint tea. He commends her for her nice house, but she admits to having a housekeeper: He should know that she isn’t good at housework and can’t cook well either. He? Completely fine with it – he thinks that studied men and women should both work. He would never expect a woman like her to do the housework alone. Wow, he is such a nice guy ... he likes her tea AND he likes how she smells. Then, a bit abruptly, he says he will be going. He is very happy though because things have gone entirely according to his plan. He always has one, and today, the plan was: have dinner with her, bring up marriage, have tea with her. But there is one more thing on the list ... but it’s not what everybody thinks. No, he wants to meet with her friends!

Alright then, Sun-mi gets her friends together for the new-man-meeting at a restaurant. That’s such a weird thing to do … but Sun-mi is really into it. She sits there, smiling quite satisfied … until Ji-hyun shows her bitchy side. I’m not sure she does it intentionally or because she's that person that always puts her foot into things that embarrass other people? Both friends approve of him (of course, cause he is almost perfect!), but Ji-hyun also voices what we are all thinking: what is his flaw? Why does he not have a woman yet? And … why would a man as great as him want a woman that is about to be turning 40?

Afterwards, Sun-mi and Jung-wan drink coffee together. It hurts me to see Jung-wan so relieved that Sun-mi is talking to her again ... she really did nothing wrong. Sun-mi seems to be okay with the Oh-situation now: she is not a fool and will go after a man who has no feelings for her. But. Here it comes. She has a meeting with Oh Kyung-soo next ... and it is SO NOT OKAY! He is very happy with her costume designs and extremely nice to her (as always). During that very short meeting, Sun-mi realizes that she is not okay. It actually looks like she is in love with him.

When she is at the cinema with Kim Young-ho, Sun-mi has flashbacks to when she was there with Oh-boy. The same thing happens when they are in the car afterwards. Young-ho parks the car at a very nice spot with great view of Seoul. It's his "healing place", where he comes when he is stressed. He puts on some music, and after hesitating slightly, he leans over to kiss her. She immediately thinks back to the time when she kissed the passed-out Oh - and bolts. More flashbacks of happy times with him follow while she runs away, crying.

Ji-hyun’s shitty life continues. Her husband Gyu-shik confronts her with a photo of her meeting with Ahn Do-young in the coffee shop. Of course, she immediately starts lying again. I don’t think she knows anything else. She can’t lie about not knowing him at all, but she pretends to only have met him a few times back in college, and she claims that it was him, Ahn, that pressed for a meeting after seeing her at her husband’s side. She didn’t even remember who he was. She even says she thought about reporting him to the police. Seriously, woman. That’s just low. Of course, Guy-shik doesn’t believe her, but he doesn’t let her know. Yet.

Afterwards, Ji-hyun is called to the MILDragon. Not for the first time, we see how mortified Ji-hyun is in front of her. Not without a reason, too: the MILDragon makes her take something out of the cupboard. It’s a bank account booklet. She is to take that and leave the house - forever. MILDragon always knew it would end like this, so she prepared it as soon as Ji-hyun entered their household. Ji-hyun falls on her knees and starts begging for forgiveness like there is no tomorrow. She does get one more chance when she promises that she'll leave on her own if something like this happens again.

We all know that the next disaster is brewing already. Or two, in fact. Sera is quite devastated about the news that Andrew’s parents refused to sign the adoption papers. Still trusting her father, she implores him to please go and meet with Andrew’s parents, to convince them differently. Ouch. If only you knew ... not much later, she does know. Seriously, secrets and lies … you have no chance in this show! Don’t even try! Later, she asks her father for more spending money – and gets it. This is not good.

Her other daughter is also distressed. Yoo-Kyung is quite worried about her (birth) father (whom she calls "Ahjussi"), because he doesn't answer her calls or texts. Ji-hyun tells her to not meet with him again, but Yoo-kyung refuses to listen. I like this girl. She actually goes to Ahn Do-young’s company to ask him directly what is wrong. She cries quite heart-breakingly because she thinks he is rejecting her, or is a burden to him, despite his assurances that he did it for her parents. He is greatly moved by her tears and takes her to his house. He shows her a chair he has started to make right after he met her for the first time. It is almost completed. He wants her to know that she is not a burden to him, quite the opposite. Doesn’t she know his heart? “I do … appa”, she answers and I am surprised that Ahn doesn’t burst into tears, because I just did.

Later, a panicked brother calls Ji-hyun, his daughter is missing! When she calls Yoo-kyung’s mobile, Do-young picks up … she is at his place, deeply asleep. He suggest that he can just bring her to school tomorrow, but hell no! Ji-hyun rushes over to pick her up. Only there’s a tracker in her car, and her husband is alerted she is on the move. When he calls her to ask where she is, she lies that she is at home. Bummer. He leaves immediately after the call, following her.

At Ahn Do-young’s home, Ahn tells Ji-hyun that he felt so sorry for his daughter’s tears. Can't he just meet her in secret from time to time? He is no longer confident he can go without her. Just when she says he absolutely can't, her husband starts banging on the door, demanding to be let in. Do-young opens the door and Gyu-shik punches him in the face immediately. He screams at them to explain what they are doing, while Ji-hyun cries that it is not what he is thinking. Suddenly, Yoo-kyung sits up and asks what is going on. It takes Gyu-shik only a few moments to assess the situation – and I think he puts two and two together.

The Moon Eun-Joo – Kim Sun-mi war goes into the next round. Moon storms into the office and is nasty to Hana, who came back because of her credit card debt. She is in tears, but Puppy listens to her, full of understanding. Hm. The way she looks at him … and indeed. They are at a restaurant afterwards and Hana gets pretty straight to the point: she wants to date him! After he drunk dials Sun-mi and asks for her “permission” to date someone else, he goes back to Hana and kisses her. And the boy knows how to kiss, we all know that … have fun with your rebound, Puppy!

Oh Kyung-soo takes Tae-geuk out on another bonding-trip. He gives him a camera and instructs him how to take pictures. Tae-geuk gets into it immediately, snapping away happily. Oh-boy is very pleased about the success of his idea. Completely immersed, Tae-geuk isn’t aware of a fast approaching delivery bike racing his way. Oh-boy runs over and pushes Tae-geuk out of harms way just in time. He falls on his shoulder, but he pretends that it’s okay in front of the boy.

At the doctor's, the verdict is a twisted shoulder: He is to wear a support and take a rest. He is quite in a lot of pain, but he keeps pretending he is fine to Jung-wan on the phone. Only, she knows him so well by now, she realized he was lying because he always talks much faster when he is. She goes to his house (and says she missed him, to his great delight!) and calls him out on his lie. She starts preparing a meal for him for the next day, seeing how handicapped he really is. He is so in love ... he watches her make a sandwich for him and says he never knew how beautiful it is to see a woman from behind, who is making food for someone else.

Her unenthusiastic response tips him off that something is wrong with her. She doesn’t tell, but it’s Tae-geuk Appa again, the bastard, who went to the mart and told her that he will have Tae-geuk move in with him if she happened to marry Oh Kyung-soo. She pulls herself together and starts doing what is expected of her: what? He likes her back? Isn’t her front beautiful as well? She comes closer and closer to prove it, but when he wants to sweep her into his arms for some more smooching, the pain in his shoulder makes him cringe. Since he really is quite hurt, she decides to spend the next day with him. She will come and work on her scenario at his place.

Before she does that the next day, she has something else to do … she meets her ex-husband at the café. He seems quite happy that she called him first, but that happiness is short-lived. She is totally fed up with him. How long does he want to torment her, using Tae-geuk as an excuse? She needs to tell him this: Tae-geuk wants them together because he thinks he is someone who doesn't make his mother cry. Not because he wants to live with his dad - because he doesn't want his mother to cry. He thinks that ex-husband is trying hard, and things will be better the second time around. But no: it was always him that gave her a hard time. And he still is: he is making her suffer. To his credit, what she tells him completely floors him and he just sits there, shocked, as she leaves.

Oh Kyung-soo has been expecting her eagerly already – and he has a favor to ask: she is to shave him. The woman he likes shaving him? It’s always been a dream of his.

Jung-wan types away on her laptop afterwards, but he is not doing so well … the closeness confuses him, he cannot work. When she refuses to take a break with him, he just puts his head on her lap. And he says, pleased, that he never knew how beautiful it is when someone else is in the house. Jung-wan isn’t in the right mood, though … when he says how nice she is, she says she is not; she believes she is an egoist. But Kyung-soo just hugs her, long, and tells her she is the most precious and special person to him - not matter what is happening in her life to make her so gloomy.

Later, she is in the taxi, on her way home. As soon as she gets off the phone with Oh (awww, missing her already?), the phone rings again. It’s Tae-geuk appa’s phone, but an ahjumma is talking. She goes there and finds him passed out on a table. She wakes him and we hear that he didn’t get the job he thought was his. He is completely down, calling himself useless. He doesn’t deserve her, he doesn’t deserve to be Tae-geuk’s appa. And he cries. Somebody smack this guy to his senses!

More ugliness in the Moon-Sun-mi confrontation. Moon hampers Sun-mi’s construction and Sun-mi calls people and tells that Moon's financial situation isn't so great. When she comes down from her office, satisfied, she sees Hana, all happy, kissing someone through the phone. She immediately realizes it must be Puppy she is dating. She tells Hana that they look good together … and she seems okay with it, even though she pause a little, wondering?, when she walks out. She has a meeting with her sweet blind-date next. She also constantly touches her forehead and doesn’t seem to be feeling to well. Oh shit. Kim Young-ho is very sorry for being so hasty – and he promises to go at her speed now. Because he was amazed at how much he liked her, he was over-eager. But … no. She says he is a very good person; but sorry, she likes someone else. Noooooooooooo!

Comments

Shall we all admit now we have seen the preview? Damn. She's really doing it! I don't know how I feel about it. I guess better than I thought I would, because I'm not angry right now. I guess it helps that Sun-mi really seems to be in love with Kyung-soo (sort of, at least), which of course doesn't absolve her, but it makes it a bit less calculating and a bit more sad for her.

Last week, I thought she had seen the light, but no! It's a shame for Mr Sweet, he really doesn't ignite anybody's panties. And I cannot blame her for having the hots for Oh-boy - but how does she still not get that he is taken?? Completely off the market! Back off, you loony! That said, we all assume that the baby is Puppy's (including her, I'm sure) ... but the thought of having this (rather immature though very sweet) boy in my life wouldn't overjoy me either. I also trust this drama will move over this issue as quickly as it has moved over the others. Or am I too optimistic? I'm just thinking a paternity test will work wonders.

As for the rest ... I still dislike Ji-hyun a lot, I guess I just cannot stand the falseness, the egoism, the cowardice. But I don't dislike her enough to wish bad things upon her - so I hope she can overcome her current crisis. Maybe, just maybe, the life she is now leading is too much of a lie; maybe she cannot continue in it without damaging herself and everybody around her. Breaking free of everything is the solution for her. She can still be a good (or even better!) mother to her two daughters.

Her husband: Very, very bad move with Sera. Imagine how you'd feel after your father tells you all these sweet things to your face and goes and stabs you in the back right after. But while I find that aspects of him despicable, I cannot find fault with his jealousy. It really, really looks like she is cheating on him! And then, I must wonder ... what would be worse, catching your wife cheating, or finding out she has a child with someone else?

Finally, Han Joon-Mo. Sad, sad loser. Pitiful, yes, but too full of self-pity. I cannot like this guy, and can't even feel sorry for him. He doesn't get what he wants (in this case, the professorship) and he goes and mopes about it, calling himself worthless? Well, I'm not surprised you didn't get the job, weakling. I just hope he doesn't manage to occupy more of Jung-wan's time with his depressing self. Just marry the Snotty Brat. She'll be happy and you too, cause you'll get your professorship then.