Crash Course in Romance: Episodes 5-6 » Dramabeans MGG

Crash Course in Romance: Episodes 5-6

by mistyisles

Secrets are the name of the game this week. Everybody has one (at least), some bigger and heavier than others. While some of those secrets are starting to creep out into the open, others are shared in close confidence to forge new bonds of trust — or be used as ammunition.

 
EPISODES 5-6 WEECAP

Chi-yeol’s offer to tutor Hae-yi comes with three conditions. First, since he can’t legally accept payment (not even free food), he’ll hire Haeng-sun to cook for him twice daily. Second, he gets to set the schedule, and they’ll meet at her house. Third, and most importantly, no one outside of immediate family members can know. Haeng-sun doesn’t understand why he’d value her food equal to his precious time, but happily accepts his terms.

Despite an awkward first session, wherein Haeng-sun’s efforts to be friendly and welcoming just annoy him, they start off strong — until news of Young-min’s death pulls the rug out from under everyone. Though hagwon classes are initially canceled for the day, Su-hee rallies the moms to insist a day off would do their children more harm than good. Chi-yeol, wracked by guilt, does his best to stay upbeat, even as it’s painfully obvious his students are struggling to concentrate.

Worse, the incident inspires his dedicated hate blogger, “ChiYeolSucks,” to dig up the traumatic story from Chi-yeol’s past. It blows over quickly, but not before slamming Chi-yeol with a new, more intense wave of guilt and depression, and we finally learn what happened back then.

As a young teacher, Chi-yeol had been tutoring a student named Su-hyun. Unbeknownst to any of them, the principal had used Chi-yeol’s friendship with fellow teacher JEON JONG-RYEOL (Kim Da-hwin) — now a teacher at Hae-yi’s school — as a connection point through which to procure leaked exam papers for Su-hyun’s mother. Chi-yeol was fired for confronting the principal about it, and Su-hyun committed suicide soon after. Though Chi-yeol later heard about a boy who was suspected of pushing his mother off the roof, he didn’t know until now that the boy was Su-hyun’s brother.

The same detective from back then is ready to close Young-min’s case as a suicide, but his new, younger partner isn’t convinced. The partner’s investigation leads to an alley where someone has been killing stray cats with familiar-looking metal pellets. He spots Sun-jae’s brother, HEE-JAE (Kim Tae-jung), hanging around the alley, but Hee-jae shakes him off.

So why does Hee-jae sneak around in a dark hoodie when he’s not hiding out in his room? Because everyone thinks he’s studying abroad in a prestigious university. Seo-jin put so much pressure on him that he snapped on the day of the college entrance exam and locked himself in his room, and he’s been the family secret ever since. The show definitely wants us to believe he’s the pellet-shooting murderer, but for Sun-jae’s sake, I really hope he was just feeding those cats, not using them for target practice.

Murder mysteries aside, however, this week has our leads growing closer now that they’re fully in each other’s orbits. On one occasion, when Jae-woo gets mistaken for stalking a café worker (her waffles were an important part of his morning routine), Chi-yeol gives Haeng-sun a ride to the police station and witnesses her throwing all pride aside to protect her brother and get the charges dropped. Later, he sits with her while she drinks at a convenience store, eventually agreeing to help finish the bottle. After which he promptly falls asleep.

Haeng-sun can only drag his dead weight so far before she drops him in a puddle, so the next morning he wakes up in her house wearing flowery pajama pants. And wouldn’t you know it, he’s in such a hurry to leave that Haeng-sun has to run after him with the belt he forgot… and they come face to face with both Young-joo and Dong-hee. Oops.

While Young-joo sulks over not being considered “family” enough to be let in on the secret, Dong-hee frets that Chi-yeol will be found out. And he’s got a point — Chi-yeol isn’t very careful about printing extra All Care materials for Hae-yi.

Still, the tutoring continues, as does Haeng-sun’s cooking for Chi-yeol. She also gets a peek inside his inner struggles when she delivers brunch one morning — it needs immediate refrigeration, so she rings his doorbell until he groggily answers and waves her inside — and spots his sleeping pills. He’s so sleep-deprived, in fact, that in the middle of opening the door to let her out he collapses on her shoulder, and she has to help him back into bed.

And fate itself seems to be getting involved, because when Haeng-sun, Jae-woo, and Hae-yi go camping for the weekend, they end up at the same campsite as Chi-yeol. Chi-yeol rolls his eyes and tries to focus on fishing while they offer to share their ramyun. Eventually, however, his and Haeng-sun’s bickering gives way to a touching heart-to-heart about how life, unlike math, doesn’t have clear answers — but, in life and in handball, one can learn to adapt and grow through trial and error.

Then Haeng-sun tries to teach him some relaxation exercises, but it ends with her being (accidentally) pushed into a bucket of water and him apologizing while hiding behind Hae-yi. Though Chi-yeol grumbles and calls her “over-the-top,” he catches himself grinning about it later, and they both leave the weekend obsessing over the song she had playing in the background.

Meanwhile, Hae-yi begins tutoring Geon-hu (whose academic knowledge is truly abysmal), much to Sun-jae’s jealous dismay. To Sun-jae’s credit, he recognizes that he’s being childish even as the smallest interactions between Hae-yi and Geon-hu fill him with annoyance.

And speaking of jealousy, Su-ah snoops through Hae-yi’s belongings and finds the materials from Chi-yeol. Sun-jae quickly lies that he gave them to her, and warns Hae-yi about the incident without pressing for an explanation. Later, after Sun-jae tells Hae-yi about Hee-jae, she tells him about Chi-yeol tutoring her — that way they’re each keeping the other’s secret.

But Hae-yi’s secret might not stay that way much longer, because one evening Su-ah and Su-hee spot Chi-yeol heading into Haeng-sun’s house.

Haeng-sun continues to be a breath of fresh air amidst a stifling group of moms with not just unreasonable but impossible standards for their kids. I get the impression she set her own education aside early on, either for handball or for Hae-yi (or both). But while she wants Hae-yi to succeed academically, she also understands the importance of taking certain nights off for family Chicken Day and of stepping back to process a tragedy.

I don’t know long it will take her to realize she’s developing feelings — or which of them will pick up on it first — but I think it’s telling that looking for ways to brighten Chi-yeol’s day or help him get better rest has already become second nature to her. And that he does sometimes seem to have an easier time falling asleep (with or without the involvement of alcohol) after being around her.

 
RELATED POSTS