You know the adage “one step forward, two steps back”? This week felt like that — but in reverse. Our mask-wearing hero retreats once again, but it’s time for him to decide what matters most: staying safe (and unhappy) inside his comfort zone, or boldly pursuing what he truly loves.
EPISODES 5-6
Though shaken by Do-ha’s sleep-talking lie about killing someone, Sol-hee can’t ignore how miserable he looks. Thus, when she finds his front door ajar and him feverish on the floor, she hauls him up onto the bed and nurses him with a cold compress. Just as she turns to go, he grabs her arm and pulls it down to use as a pillow.
Sol-hee decides lying beside him for ten minutes can’t hurt… and next thing she knows, it’s morning. Do-ha only wakes up when Sol-hee gets tangled in the blanket and falls off the bed. She hastily explains what happened, only for him to coldly request that she ignore him from now on.
Do-ha tries to go back about his everyday life, but his hands shake so much at the piano that he can’t play. Though his psychiatrist advises he stop bottling up his emotions and instead find a way to express them, Do-ha isn’t ready for that yet. Instead, he withdraws from everyone again, including Deuk-chan.
Speaking of Deuk-chan, he finds himself, along with his company J Entertainment, in hot water as ghostwriters go public with plagiarism complaints. Most sensationally, one desperate ghostwriter poses as Do-ha to add credibility to their story — a claim only Do-ha himself can refute. Except, of course, Do-ha is nowhere to be found and doesn’t even know about the scandal.
Sol-hee finally finds him at the jazz bar, where he’s been working in the back since he still can’t play piano. He drops a plate when he sees her, and after arguing over who’s going to clean it up, they shift to arguing over his reluctance to do, well, much of anything. It’s quite cathartic, especially for Do-ha, and Sol-hee’s reminder that music is everything to him gives him the necessary push to stop wallowing and take action.
Do-ha tracks down his impersonator, listens to his story and apology, and then takes him to J Entertainment so he can not only apologize to everyone there, but also receive their apologies. Because while using Do-ha’s name was wrong, the ghostwriters were being exploited, and Deuk-chan was turning a blind eye.
Deuk-chan does apologize (though only to Do-ha). Sha-on also apologizes for her outburst, and Do-ha makes it unmistakably clear that he likes her as a singer and a friend — nothing more. Sha-on takes some time off work to sing sad karaoke and come to terms with the rejection.
That night, Do-ha invites Sol-hee to come watch him play at the jazz bar. When she arrives, he’s playing something slow and moody, but then he locks eyes with her and very deliberately removes his mask. As the lighting changes from cool tones to warm, the band strikes up a lively number to match the smiles that spread over their faces.
Afterwards, Do-ha takes Sol-hee out to a fancy restaurant to thank her for helping him break out of his reclusion. But he ends up worrying so much about who is or isn’t staring at them that he can’t enjoy it. So Sol-hee suggests they skip dessert and relocate to a bar, where everyone else will be too drunk to even notice they’re there.
She’s been swooning over him all evening, but now it’s his turn. As she gets increasingly drunk, she peppers him with questions, but continues to assure him he doesn’t have to answer any he doesn’t want to. The romantic vibes (replete with heart-shaped shrimp and cooing over his pretty hands) are cut short, though, when Sol-hee passes out into her tteokbokki.
Do-ha patiently (and rather adoringly) carries her home, buys her ice cream, and saves her comforter from getting covered in sauce. This all registers as a blur for Sol-hee, so when she halfway wakes up in bed and sees him remove his shirt (he’s examining the giant sauce stain on the back), she mumbles “I thought you were a good person” and slaps him.
She’s so mortified the next day that she decides to pretend she doesn’t remember, but her resolve goes out the window when he brings her hangover soup and supplements and is just so nice about it. He’s not at all mad about the slap, but he would like some help getting the tteokbokki sauce out of his shirt.
They do the most adorable little dance of hinting back and forth about who’s available when, until Sol-hee blurts out, “If you want to go on a date, just ask about a specific time!” She immediately walks back the word “date,” but they both know that’s exactly what it is. They go to a pub to watch the national soccer team play (how fitting!), and end up standing with some of the other neighborhood shopkeepers. Before long, everyone — including Do-ha — is so wrapped up in the match that they’re all hugging and holding hands.
Meanwhile, Sol-hee’s mom has been trying to con a rich widower. But the man’s daughter hires Sol-hee to test her father’s new girlfriend… and it works out about how we’d expect. Sol-hee does her job, disgusted that her mother continues to lie with her standing right there.
Once it’s over, her mom barges into the tarot café and starts throwing things. She says (truthfully, it would seem) that she wants to stop living like this, but in the screaming match that ensues she also continues to blame Sol-hee for all their family’s problems. Sol-hee, in turn, cries that she’d cut her own ears off if it would make her powers go away. Do-ha happens to overhear, and though Sol-hee fears her secret will destroy their relationship, she decides there’s no saving it now and confesses: she can hear lies.
There wasn’t a ton of time this week dedicated to side characters, but we did get a few hints about Do-ha’s ex (who once threw his keys into the water to stop him from going to Seoul), her brother (who’s tracking Do-ha down as we speak), and Kang-min (who suffered a family tragedy of some sort around the time he and Sol-hee broke up).
While some hints made me nervous (what’s actually going on in Deuk-chan’s head?), Do-ha’s journey of regression, internal wrestling, and breakthrough was so satisfying. I love so much that Sol-hee didn’t force him out of his shell — instead, she helped him rediscover his love for music in a way that encouraged him to step out of that shell all on his own. I could probably watch an entire show just about Do-ha and his relationship with the piano (though maybe that just means I need to re-watch Page Turner). But I also loved that him regaining confidence in music flowed naturally into confidence in other areas: being direct with Sha-on, standing up to Deuk-chan’s brother, and very slowly learning to go outside barefaced. And, of course, smiling all over the place.