She Was Pretty: Episode 4

by LollyPip

Secrets only get harder to tell the longer you keep them, as Hye-jin and Ha-ri are finding out. The pressure starts to get to them, leading to uncharacteristic behavior from both of the best friends. And as we start to learn more about all of our main players, it starts to seem as though the ladies may not be the only ones keeping very old, very serious secrets.

EPISODE 4 RECAP

Sung-joon sees Hye-rin in the cafe and smiles, seeing how much she resembles the Hye-jin he remembers. The real Hye-jin comes in looking for her wayward sister, sees the two of them meeting, and hurriedly rushes out. She watches from behind a sign as Sung-joon tells Hye-rin that he knows her sister.

She makes her escape and calls Sung-joon, hoping to get him out of there before Hye-rin says anything to give away Hye-jin’s true identity. Her story that Chief Editor Kim wants to talk to him works, and after he leaves she scurries in to confront her sister.

Luckily Hye-jin got there fast enough, and Hye-rin didn’t tell Sung-joon anything personal about her, such as where she really works. She tosses some money at Hye-rin for food and rushes back to work.

Sung-joon scares the daylights out of Chief Editor Kim, who didn’t really call for him, and Hye-jin has to quickly apologize to Sung-joon for her “mistake.” Chief Editor Kim notices that Hye-jin still looks unkempt, and asks her to try to look a little more Most-like.

Sung-joon is frustrated by the messy reports he’s given by the team, and he decides that from now on, the three-minute rule applies to project proposals as well. What’s this guy’s obsession with three minutes?? He shoots down anyone who tries to defend their current system, until Shin-hyuk asks how he expects anyone to offer honest opinions in this kind of environment. That’s what I’m sayin’.

Sung-joon barks that if he wants to be comfortable, he can stay home. He throws out all of the proposals and asks Reporter Cha if she’s contacted James Taylor for the collaboration, insulting her when she says she hasn’t been able to reach him. He takes the project from her and sails out, and Hye-jin wonders what happened to Sung-joon in America to make him like this.

Sung-joon must be more unsettled than he’s letting on, because he listens to “Close To You” in the car later that day. He notices that the sky is particularly beautiful today and takes a picture, while at the office, Hye-jin notices the same pretty sky outside the building window.

She pulls out her own phone, but her shot gets photobombed by Shin-hyuk, hee. He watches her take pictures of the sky and smiles at her, and remembers seeing her on the bus recently. He’d smiled at her then, too, watching her head loll as she fought sleep. He’d seen her give up her seat to the elderly ajumma, and the expression on his face is a mixture of amusement and admiration. So cute.

Back at the office, Shin-hyuk watches Hye-jin take pictures of the sky and repeats her words as he studies her face, “That’s right. It’s pretty.” Oh ~swoon~.

Ha-ri sees a family celebrating a birthday in her hotel, and remembers when her own mother was alive and her family was happy. She ignores a call from her father, still upset over his slap the other night, but she smiles when Sung-joon texts her the picture of the beautiful sky.

That night she asks her date if he noticed the sky today, but he’s annoyed that she interrupted his groping. She admits that those kinds of girly things aren’t like her and disappoints him by leaving without allowing any skinship.

Hye-jin scolds her for her short skirt, but Ha-ri says it’s her body, her life, and she’ll do what makes her happy. Sing it, sister. Later Hye-jin tells her about Hye-rin’s near slip-up with Sung-joon, and she’s confused when Ha-ri seems more upset at the idea of being caught than she is herself.

The girls play listlessly on the playground while Hye-jin natters on and on about hiding from Sung-joon, and how she’d be so humiliated if he knew that the person who he looks down on is his old friend. Ha-ri asks what she thinks would have happened if she’d just gone and met him herself that first night.

Hye-jin isn’t sure, but she does know that it would have been awkward if they’d met, then found out they were working together. She admits it’s probably better this way, still thinking that Sung-joon thinks she’s gone. Ha-ri starts to tell her that she’s seen Sung-joon again but Hye-jin cuts her off — he doesn’t like her anyway, so it’s probably best to stop thinking about him so much.

The next morning Hye-jin recalls Chief Editor Kim’s request to be “more Most-like,” wondering exactly what she means by that. She takes some time to try a few new things with her hair, but when she gets to work and runs into Sung-joon, he asks if she’s playing a joke. Damn, he’s so mean.

Okay, to be fair, when we see how much makeup she’s slathered on I can see his point, but the hair isn’t so bad. Not any worse than her usual frizzy mop.

Jun-woo yells in excitement that Sung-joon got the meeting with James Taylor. It’s only for an hour at the airport between flights, so Reporter Cha mutters that he’ll never get him to agree to collaborate in that small amount of time — just as Sung-joon walks in. Awkward. He barks at her to let him handle it.

He says that he’ll need a driver to the airport later so he can review on the way, and everyone hunkers down and hides. Shin-hyuk whispers to Hye-jin that she’s got a hole in her shirt, and when she raises her arm to look, it looks like she’s volunteering to drive, HA.

He actually had a reason to do it — the way she’s so nervous around Sung-joon, he thought it would help them get closer so she could relax. But when Sung-joon realizes who’s driving he’s not at all happy to see her.

He settles in to read while Hye-jin drives, and the silence makes her nervous. He ignores her weird attempts at small-talk, he finally asking her to stop talking so he can concentrate. The problem is, he concentrates so hard that he doesn’t hear her ask if they’re going to Incheon Airport, so she just assumes and heads that way.

It’s the wrong airport, of course — they should be going to Gimpo. And once you’re on the road to Incheon it’s very difficult to turn around, and there’s only one place they can get off the road, so Sung-joon urges Hye-jin to drive fast. Naturally, they hit traffic.

Sung-joon calls Reporter Cha to meet James Taylor at the Gimpo airport, but she’s gone to an event. He tells the office to send whoever can get there fastest, but falters when Hye-jin jumps out of the car and appears to be buying food from a streetside vendor.

But instead she practically drags him out of the car, grabs his wallet out of his pants, and gives a man on a scooter some money. She plunks Sung-joon onto the scooter and screams at them to GOGOGO, and she’ll meet him at the airport when he’s finished. That was pretty quick thinking.

Hye-jin arrives at the Gimpo airport just as Sung-joon is leaving, but he’s on the phone and ignores her when she asks if he got here in time. He tells the person on the phone that the meeting was successful, causing Hye-jin to bounce with excitement.

Despite Hye-jin’s save and the fact that it’s not her fault they went the wrong way, Sung-joon starts to berate her, asking if she’ll take responsibility if the project fails. He’s yelling by the time he’s finished and refuses to listen when she tries to say that she asked him where to go. He snarls that people who work hard but have no accomplishments are pathetic. Like her.

Fed up, Hye-jin gets her things out of Sung-joon’s car and says she’ll find her own way back to the office. But she stops him and offers to tell him the kind of person she hates the most — people who don’t listen to others and who look down on those who aren’t as skilled as they are. Like him.

She says that she asked him several times which airport to go to, and it was him who didn’t listen or answer her. She tells him this wouldn’t have happened if he didn’t ignore and belittle her at every turn. Good girl.

Ha-ri’s father comes to see her at work, and she looks wary but joins him for dinner. He apologizes for the slap, but when his wife calls Ha-ri notices that he doesn’t say he’s with her. Dad says that Ha-ri should apologize to her stepmother but she interrupts him — she was taught that the person who was wrong first should apologize. Dad says that Ha-ri should make the first move, and that’s enough to make Ha-ri stand and leave.

After work Hye-jin texts Ha-ri to meet for drinks, and sighs at the pouring rain. She watches as Sung-joon also leaves but jerks back out of the rain, and they both stand awkwardly, reluctant to step out into the downpour.

Hye-jin finally opens her umbrella, and it’s the same one that Sung-joon bought for Ha-ri/Hye-jin the night they met. It’s very distinctive, with a print of the Renoir painting “Dance in the Country” that reminds him of Hye-jin. Ha-ri had given it to Hye-jin, its rightful owner, and she only realizes that she’s using the umbrella from Sung-joon after she walks out into the rain. She turns back, but he’s already gone back inside.

She stops at a pojangmacha to wait for Ha-ri, but Ha-ri is swimming laps at the gym. She stops in the middle of the pool and slowly sinks to the bottom, curled into a tiny ball of hurt. On her way out she runs into Sung-joon who just joined the same gym, but she’s in no mood to talk. She starts to walk to her car, but Sung-joon pulls up and asks her to hang out a while. She tries to decline but he begs, so she finally relents.

Shin-hyuk apparently loves the rain, skipping through puddles and singing on his way home. He spots Hye-jin at the pojangmacha and joins her. She’s pretty drunk and attacks him for getting her stuck with the driving duty today.

Ha-ri notices a set of rackets in Sung-joon’s car, and he takes her to a grassy area to play. She tries again to tell him she’s not in the mood to hang out but he doesn’t listen, so she hits the ball with him.

Ha-ri drops the ball several times and complains that she’s at a disadvantage in her short skirt, so Sung-joon wraps his jacket around her waist. His close proximity seems to affect her, but he doesn’t make any other moves and they continue playing.

Later, Sung-joon mentions that he met her younger sister. Ha-ri plays along and even agrees to go out to dinner some time, the three of them, but the reminder that she’s not the real Hye-jin deflates her mood again.

Sung-joon finally asks why she was crying earlier — he could tell from her face. Ha-ri says it was nothing important, but when they see a happy little family walk by, Ha-ri asks what Sung-joon remembers most about his mother. He says he remembers her cutting his fingernails, which he still struggles with since he’s left-handed.

Ha-ri says softly that it must have been difficult not to have his mother, especially when he was young. He says that it helped that a nice girl named Kim Hye-jin was with him at that time. He smiles at the memory, but Ha-ri looks guilty.

Hye-jin is well and truly drunk by now, and she slurs to Shin-hyuk that she’s drinking because of that crazy Sung-joon. She stomps on the umbrella he gave her and vows to “tell him everything,” which prompts Shin-hyuk to note that she talks like she’s known him a long time. Hye-jin hollers that she does know him, but she passes out before she can say how.

Dying of curiosity, Shin-hyuk follows her as she staggers home, bellowing about Sung-joon all the way. She dumps out her entire purse on the ground looking for her phone, determined to call him right now and tell him the truth.

When Sung-joon takes her back to her car, Ha-ri tries one more time to come clean, but she ends up fibbing that she’s engaged. His face falls when she says she can’t see him anymore, but he suddenly asks when she’s taking him out for dinner, since she lost a bet on their game. Ugh, he doesn’t ever listen. After he leaves Ha-ri tells herself that she can just tell him the truth next time, but it seems to be getting harder for her to justify delaying it.

Hye-jin finds her phone and drunk dials Sung-joon, and she slurs at him in banmal while Shin-hyuk tries to keep her from falling over. He really should take her phone away, but he’s curious to hear what kind of past she has with their boss. She yells down the phone to Sung-joon that she’s Kim Hye-jin… THE Kim Hye-jin. He’s so shocked he has to pull over, and tells her to repeat that.

Hye-jin has the hangover from hell in the morning, and she doesn’t remember a thing from the night before. Ha-ri tells her that she came home making a loud scene and that she threw up all over Shin-hyuk, who took her all the way home. Ha-ri hadn’t quite seen his face as she’s wrestled with the flailing Hye-jin.

Hye-jin heads to work still feeling awful and takes a call from her mother, who tells her they’re having a little party to celebrate her employment. When Hye-jin hangs up and sees her call history, she’s horrified to see that she called Sung-joon last night. She suddenly remembers telling him that she’s the true Kim Hye-jin, and when Shin-hyuk walks past her, she asks him if she really called their boss last night.

He says that he does remember something, but he assures her that she didn’t say all that much. We see that she’d just yelled her name several times, which didn’t sound like much to Shin-hyuk, but he took her phone away when she started slinging insults. He’s still curious and digs for information, but now that she’s sober Hye-jin just tells him that she did it because Sung-joon is so mean.

Sung-joon sees them bickering and remembers the call last night, but of course all he heard (because he doesn’t listen) was Hye-jin calling him names. He’s cornered in the Most office by Chief Editor Kim, and tries to decline a party celebrating his collaboration success with James Taylor, but she says that she has something important to tell him.

For some reason she specifically tells Jun-woo that he has to come, which makes So-ri think that he’s the secret chaebol. She decides to focus her gold-digging on him from now on.

Hye-jin is told to take some files to Sung-joon, and she gathers her courage and apologizes for last night. He just says that she made a drunken mistake, and that he’ll pretend that nothing happened. He adds curtly that they’ll forget the airport incident as well.

That morning his regular barista had told him that when he’s focusing on something, he doesn’t hear or see anything else. Now he remembers Hye-jin saying that she asked him multiple times which airport and he didn’t answer her.

At the party that night, Chief Editor Kim notices that Sung-joon isn’t drinking, but he says he has things to do and needs to leave soon. She insists he have one drink before he goes and, annoyed, he kills it in one shot and leaves.

Shin-hyuk follows Hye-jin out when she gets a call from Ha-ri, so they both witness Sung-joon collapse like a rag doll. Shin-hyuk piggybacks him to his hotel, complaining the entire way, and whines for water when Hye-jin just wants to get out of there. She’s surprised to see nothing but water in his fridge.

Shin-hyuk somehow ends up with Sung-joon’s card key but decides to give it back to him later. Hye-jin is concerned with seeing only water in the fridge, realizing that she’s never seen Sung-joon eat. Shin-hyuk bounces around her trying to get her attention, and Hye-jin finally blows up at him.

She wails that he jokes all day and even got her in trouble by joking around, and he looks chastened as he stammers that he thinks of her as a little sister. She firmly tells him that she does NOT think of him as an oppa, and Shin-hyuk apologizes. Okay, puppy Shin-hyuk is annoying, but kicked-puppy Shin-hyuk makes me want to give him a hug.

Hye-jin continues, telling him to go bother his own little sister and leave her alone. She begins to storm off, and a small voice says from behind her, “She died. When she was six years old.” Oof.

When Hye-jin turns back around, Shin-hyuk smiles and says it’s nothing, and turns to go. Hye-jin is desperate to apologize but she can’t find her phone, and remembers that she set it down up in Sung-joon’s kitchen. The key card is in Shin-hyuk’s pocket so Hye-jin is reduced to trying random key codes on Sung-joon’s door, with no luck.

She gets a sudden idea and tries the date for International Left-handers’ Day, and it works. She creeps in and quickly grabs her phone, but knocks the glass from Shin-hyuk’s water off the counter. Moving fast, she catches it in midair.

Ha-ri is working late, and a coworker notices that an MP3 player that was reported lost was never claimed. She decides to return it to the customer’s room herself. On the way to the customer’s room, Ha-ri sees a man in sloppy clothes shuffling down the hall. She assumes he’s homeless and hustles him out, but a coworker sees her and tells her to apologize immediately — this is the long-term guest from the room that Ha-ri was just heading to.

Ha-ri realizes her mistake, and we only now see the man’s face… it’s Shin-hyuk! He doesn’t hold her slip-up against her and just takes his MP3 player back, but before he goes he comments that her voice sounds familiar.

In voice-over, Hye-jin says that when two people first meet, an intersection is created between them. At some times, those intersections are hard to see clearly — you can’t predict that a person’s existence will make things more complicated in the future.

In Sung-joon’s suite, Hye-jin notices his framed puzzle of “Dance in the Country” with the one missing piece. She leans down to gently touch the puzzle, but Sung-joon suddenly comes up behind her and demands to know what she’s doing. In surprise, Hye-jin knocks the frame off the table, shattering it and the puzzle inside.

She whirls around to find Sung-joon standing very close, and she starts to step backwards — into the broken glass, with her bare feet. Sung-joon quickly grabs her and yanks her forward, right into his arms.

COMMENTS

Shin-hyuk is still killing me, especially now that we’re learning a bit about him personally — this guy is just the sweetest thing. I love how he already likes Hye-jin so much, just exactly how she is. He seems to find her more endearing the quirkier she is, which is fantastic and wonderful because it means he sees who she is and appreciates her. He doesn’t need her to change in order to like her, not like SOME people, and I love how he seeks her out so often. It speaks highly of the person Shin-hyuk is under all that silliness and immaturity, though I’ll admit that that childlike, carefree air that he has about him is a big part of what makes him so adorable. Now I’m ready for Hye-jin to see it, and stop thinking of him just as that weird guy at work, which I hope this misunderstanding will accomplish. Ooooh crap, there it is — the Second Lead Syndrome. It’s got me.

I’m getting a little less tolerant of Sung-joon’s treatment of the Most team, who really seem like a talented and nice group of people. I know that his strategy is to push them hard to do their best because he believes they can, but it’s making me uncomfortable how abusive he can be (though I believe it’s supposed to, for reasons I’ll explain soon). Constructive criticism is one thing, and being a tough boss is sometimes necessary for the sake of success, but calling people names and refusing to even read their reports if it takes longer than three minutes isn’t the way to motivate people. I was willing to let him slide for a few episodes thinking that we’d see him relax a bit once he’d settled in at Most, but he really doesn’t seem to be getting any better. Shin-hyuk has a point and I’m glad he voiced it — how are they expected to feel comfortable enough to do their work in such an atmosphere?

But Sung-joon’s biggest fault, that’s already driving me crazy, seems to be that he doesn’t listen — not to his employees, not to Hye-jin, and not even to Ha-ri. She’s made several huge slip-ups that would make anyone wonder if this was really their childhood friend, and he’s just not hearing her. Even when she tried to tell him multiple times that she didn’t feel like hanging out, he ignored her wishes and did what he wanted anyway (and I don’t think it makes it better that she eventually relaxed and enjoyed herself — the lady said no, more than once, and he should have respected that). He didn’t listen when Hye-jin asked where she should drive him and it nearly caused a huge problem at work, then he didn’t listen when she tried to explain. He’s got a bad habit of ignoring people, even putting himself in danger by blocking out the world (he’s going to break his nose if he doesn’t stop walking into windows), and he’s not going to ever make a connection with anyone until he breaks that habit and starts to engage with others.

I’m starting to think, especially with the few little hints we’ve had, that something terrible happened to Sung-joon in America (not to mention possibly developing an eating disorder). We know he’s a sweet person deep down, because he was such an adorable little dude when he was a kid and seemed quite sensitive, so seeing him grow up to be this man who seems to have no compassion whatsoever just feels wrong. We see him soften around Ha-ri, so that side of him isn’t completely gone, but I’m guessing that he had something happen to him while he was away that made him put up all these walls. It sounds mean but I actually hope that’s the case, because he’d better have a damn good excuse for the way he treats his coworkers, and especially Hye-jin. I want him to be wounded, because without some really extenuating circumstance, if I see him being hateful to people much longer I’m going to have a hard time forgiving him later. He’s lucky that he does have that history with Hye-jin because I think that, by the time he realizes who she truly is and wants to make amends, that history is going to be the only reason she’s willing to give him the time of day.

I’ma bit disappointed that we have four episodes under our belt but our main couple still hasn’t done much besides yell at each other. They’ve spent more time with the second leads at this point, especially Sung-joon and Ha-ri. If I didn’t know better, I’d think the show was going in totally different directions with the pairings, and I hope that Sung-joon and Hye-rin’s relationship kicks in soon. Sung-joon does seem to be at least thinking about how he treats Hye-jin, which is good. But not much has happened plot-wise since the first episode, and we aren’t any closer to Sung-joon discovering the truth about Hye-jin and Ha-ri than we were three episodes ago. It’s to the show’s credit that I almost didn’t notice there’s been very little forward plot-movement, because whatever faults it may have, the show is just so darn cute that I’m enjoying it anyway. But as Shin-hyuk just learned, cute only gets you so far, so I hope that next week we start to see something actually happen to bring Sung-joon and Hye-jin together.

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