My Secret Romance

Chapter 10: Tender Farewell

like we saw at the end of episode 9, Yoo Mi’s talk with Hyun Tae encourages her to dive fully into her feelings for Director Cha. Then she’s walking somewhere, when she finds Announcer Hye Ri, completely drunk. Concerned, Miss Yoo Mi stops to check on the announcer but she just starts babbling. As she overheard the nutritionist conversation with Director Cha, she knows about the one night stand and starts telling Yoo Mi she should act like a one night stand only and stop overstepping her place. In her drunk bluntness she even brings up Yoo Mi’s mother’s past, and the nutritionist has nothing to say.

 
 

Still fairly drunk, Hey Ri stops by Director Cha’s house, to confront him and complain because he has no regard for her feelings. Her 10 years of devotion are nothing to him. She asks how important Yoo Mi is to him, and he declares the young woman changed his world. That only finishes breaking the announcer’s heart.

The next morning, Chairman Cha decides to take things in his hands and goes to see Dong Goo, trying to get a strand of hair for a DNA exam, but the biological mother shows up and starts making a scene, with all her due right, because a strange man is touching her son. The man doesn’t not explain himself well so the argument escalates. Yoo Mi shows and tries to understand what’s going on, and then Director Cha also arrives at the scene. Director Cha is about to confess he knows everything, how Dong Goo is his son, when Yoo Mi’s mother claims the kid is her son. Both Chairman Cha and his son are shocked, but finally the misunderstanding is cleared up.

Yoo Mi realises then that everything Director Cha did for her was because he thought Dong Goo was his son, so obviously she feels heartbroken, and the man does not say anything to rectify her assumptions. When he is going to say something, Yoo Mi rejects him and walks away.

Father and son talk later and when Chairman Cha threatens Yoo Mi, Jin Wook steps up and forbids him to touch her, he won’t allow it like how it happened with his mother long ago. When Director Cha drives home, he recalls how Yoo Mi assumed that all that time it was just her the one falling in love. Meanwhile, she’s remembering every single moment when Jin Wook was kind to her, feeling like a fool for believing him.

The next day when the other workers prepare a sweet snack and ask Yoo Mi to deliver it to Director Cha, it’s so uncomfortable for her that another one has to go. Director Cha is obviously disappointed, but he does not do anything else.

Things get worse because in her heartbreak, Announcer Hye Ri can’t control her emotions and ends up crying her eyes out in broadcast, which explodes in a serious of rumours involving Jin Wook and even dragging Yoo Mi. With her past experience and how sensitive she is to gossips, this scandal hits her hard.

Director Cha is worried about her and can’t reach her. At the end of the day he sees her looking depressed at the bus stop and recklessly wants to go for her, but I advise him to be patient and careful, in her current state she most likely will only pull away from him. He listens.

 
 

Hyun Tae proves once again to be a good friend, because instead of asking Yoo Mi what’s wrong, he just helps her to release some stress with games and company. While she’s with him, the young woman smiles again and seems to free her mind for a bit. Her mother also has a bit of compassion with her and just tells her to get rid of bad men like Jin Wook who has left her alone in this hard time.

As promised, Hyun Tae appears in Hye Ri show and it goes smoothly. He compares travelling solo with dating, and his explanation makes sense. At the end, he advises the announcer to try travelling solo because she’s old enough to stop crushing on someone and try dating.

At the company when Yoo Mi and Jin Wook face each other, they stop and stare at each other longingly, but ultimately she decides to end this and walks past him. And that’s how it ends for them.

Later, Yoo Mi asks her superior for a transfer due to personal reasons. This time it seems to go well. Jin Wook sees her but doesn’t approach her, he contacts her later when she’s walking around saying goodbye, recalling the different moments there since the first day.

When the two meet in his car, he apologises for not contacting her before, but she disregards this and instead tells him it’s for the best and she’s transferring. Obviously, he tries to hold on to her, not wanting another important woman to walk out on him. But Yoo Mi is set and won’t change her mind, so she says her goodbye and exits the car, not without her heart breaking. With every step she takes, her expression shows more and more pain. Jin Wook is left in the car, with a lost and broken expression, channeling his frustration and pain in to the car.

 
The epilogue shows some more thoughts of the two leads, mirrored with a song, that just express the depth of their love and hurt from parting ways.

I'll be back for the next recap, so it's a short farewell.