Friends and future friends! I just saw that this drama is
supposed to be 12 episodes instead of 16 and that breaks my heart because I’m
loving it so much. Why do they do that to the good dramas? 12 episodes are
rarely enough to tell the story properly. Anyway, that just means we’re going to
have the savor the 12 episodes we have all the more so let’s not waste any more
time.
When we left off there was chaos at Sevit High. The cheerleading instructor and the moms of the
Baek Ho students were facing off. They wanted to fire her and she wanted to
quit, but then in walks agents from the Education Office who received a tip
that the school was rigging the cheerleading club just to make the students
look good and there was no cheering going on at all. Accurate, of course, but
the principal thinks quickly on her feet and tells the man that they are
preparing for the athletic competition at their school in a month during which
the Baek Ho cheerleading team will perform.
The moms, of course, don’t actually want their children to have to cheer
at all, but realize they are between a rock and a hard place. Soo Ah’s mom
corroborates the principal’s story and the other moms full in suit. The
agents from the Education office announce that they will be coming to watch the
performance along with all the higher ups in the education department.
At this point the cheerleading coach has an advantage as the
principal and parents now desperately need her. She agrees to stay on one
condition: they let her distribute the grades for the cheerleading club based
on participation. The principal is
absolutely furious at her gall, but has no choice but to agree. Day 1 of practice and Yeon Doo is concerned
because no practicing occurred at all. They sat in a room and did their
homework for the allotted time. When she asks the coach, the coach tells her that
the first step is getting to know each other which they will be working on
during the next session. The kids don’t like this ideas as they really want
nothing to do with each other.
As the coach leaves the homeroom teach and the wormy teacher
walk behind her and check out her body, but are disappointed when she turns
around and shows her face. Ah, come on
Homeroom teacher, I expected more of you than this! That’s so pervy and chauvinistic. Anyway, the
wormy teacher tells the Homeroom teacher the principal wants to see him. She tells him he needs to help with the
cheerleading club and then waves the fact that he has a contract renewal coming
up over his head. So the teacher
reluctantly agrees. It sucks that even he is being manipulated by the gutless
woman they call principal, but at the same time it’ll be nice to have him there
for the kids when he’s the only one on their side.
Outside, Yeon Doo and Dong Jae are walking and Yeon Doo
finds out that Dong Jae was kicked off the basketball team. She’s angry and feels guilty and tells him
she’ll go get him back on the team, but he tells her it’s fine and he seems to
mean it. She seems much more upset about him getting kicked off than he does. Something
tells me that this is going to give Dong Jae the perfect opportunity to join
the cheerleading club. Walking slightly behind them are Yeol and Ha Joon. Ha Joon asks Yeol if he really likes Yeon Doo
doesn’t it bother him that she’s always hanging out with Dong Jae.
Meanwhile, two of the guys from Real King are in the school
on the third floor and instead of mopping like they are supposed to, they are
having a swordfight with their mops.
Well, it gets a little out of control and one of the mops ends up going
through the window right above where Yeon Doo is standing. Yeon Doo, Dong Jae, Yeol, and Ha Joon all see
it coming. Dong Jae freezes, but Yeol’s
first instinct is to grab Yeon Doo and shield her with his body. The broken glass rains down on his back
instead of her face. How crazy is it
that Yeol’s first instinct is to protect her. This isn’t some fascinated
because she’s different crush; he’s got real and deep feelings for her. Yeol
goes to the hospital with Yeon Doo and the homeroom teacher and thankfully he
isn’t hurt too bad save a few cuts on his back.
Yeon Doo obviously feels a mixture of really horrible that he got her
because of her and really grateful because he saved her.
Dong Jae, on the other hand, is back at school sitting on the
floor in his room, rocking back and forth.
It is clear he wanted to be the one to save Yeon Doo, but his phobia of
physical contact stopped him. We see a
flashback to a little boy a playground that we assume is Dong Jae. He’s at the
top of a jungle gym and a little girl comes up and asks him to play and he
doesn’t want to. While he doesn’t exactly push her, he pulls his arm from her
grip strongly and she falls backward off the jungle gym. We then see the same
little girl lying in a hospital bed with a bandaged head and Dong Jae crying.
Back at the hospital, Yeol has used the excuse of going to
the bathroom to sneak out and spend the day cutting class and Yeon Doo followed
him out to make sure he was okay. She
thanks him for saving her and he in turn has her buy him food as an expression
of gratitude. But her gratitude wains as he makes her buy him ribs. After they
eat, they walk the street in the market together. They see a group of ladies dancing on a stage
and Yeol drags Yeon Doo over to watch.
When they announce that the winner of the dance competition
can with a stereo, Yeon Doo runs up to stage to participate. She needs a new stereo
to replace Real King’s broken one. Yeol
acts embarrassed at first, but then smiles watching her dance. The announcer
sees Yeol in the audience and tells Yeon Doo that he’ll give her the prize
automatically if she does a couple dance with Yeol. So of course Yeon Doo goes
and grabs him and brings him on stage.
He’s reluctant at first, but soon they’re doing a silly dance together.
Afterward we see Yeon Doo carrying a giant rice cooker that says ‘3rd
place’. They get onto a bus to go back to school and Yeol takes the only empty
seat leaving Yeon Doo to stand with the rice cooker. To get him back she goes
and sets the rice cooker on his lap and stands away from him, leaving everyone
on the bus to look at him like he’s a jerk . The spot next to him opens up and
he has Yeon Doo comes sit next to him. On the way back to school, Yeon Doo falls asleep with her
head on his shoulder and Yeol with his head on hers. Yeol wakes up to find her
sleeping on him and smiles. He moves the
rice cooker to his lap and then rests his head on hers again and goes back to
sleep.
When they get back to school, Yeol is carrying the rice cooker for her
when they reach the entrance to find the Homeroom teacher waiting for them. He
seems more bewildered than angry and after asking them where they went and
getting no answers, he tells them to say they were at the hospital the whole
time. Dong Jae is waiting in front of the dorms for the two. Yeol
hands Yeon Doo the rice cooker and leaves, brushing Dong Jae off. Excitedly, Yeon Doo shows off her rice cooker
to Dong Jae and while she is doing this he notices that she has a bandage on
her hand, presumably from where she got cut by a glass shard. Yeon Doo is busy explaining the rice maker
when Dong Jae reaches out his hand to touch hers, but then pulls away.
Yeon Doo
goes back to her room and thinks about her day with Yeol with a big smile on
her face. It would seem that she has fallen for him as he’s fallen for
her. Thank God! I was worried she was
going to do that thing where she realizes she likes him and chastises
herself. Yeol is also in his room and
smiling over the day’s events when Ha Joon mentions that it’s the first he’s
ever seen him smile like that and it’s a good look for him.
The next day at cheerleading, Dong Jae shows up and
announces that he wants to join, which the coach has no problem with. What she
does have a problem with is the fact that the members of Real King and Baek Ho
still have not gotten to know each other.
So she puts them in a room together and makes them ask each other questions.
They start with simple ones like “who’s your favorite singer” to which one of
the members of Baek Ho answers “Apink”. Of course, how could he not, when Yeon
Doo is played by Eunji, the sparkling gem of Apink in my opinion.
But then Yeon Doo’s friend from Real King brings up Yeol’s
reputation with girls and asks who he’s dating. He responds that he does have a
girl that he wants to kiss. Yeon Doo
immediately turns so red that Dong Jae notices and says that they should go to
the nurse. She looks up at Yeol bashfully and he seems surprised and happy that
she’s blushing and gives her an adorable smile. Ha Joon takes note of this
interaction. Oh my gosh, how adorable is this scene? It’s almost too much to
handle.
In the principal’s office the principal and the wormy
teacher realize that the CCTV footage of Baek Ho and Real King and their
numerous fights was never deleted and in the hands of the TV reporter that is
investigating schools that are creating “specs” just to look good on kids’
resume, this footage would be disastrous. So the principal orders Wormy to
delete it. He deletes most of it and
gets to footage of Soo Ah standing alone at the school entrance and doesn’t see
anything incriminating so he leaves it. Then he leaves his desk for a break.
The coach has the members of Baek Ho and Real King team up
and then shows them a move that they are to learn together in which the guy
partner hoist the girl partner onto his shoulder and then she dismounts in a
very cheer-like fashion. Yeol and Yeon
Doo get paired up which is absolutely perfect, because now they’ll have an excuse
to get close to one another. But on the
flipside, Dong Jae gets paired with Soo Ah. Not only does he a phobia in which
he can’t even touch his best friend whom he adores, but now he’s going to be
forced to do this very physical trick with Satan incarnate. I have an inkling
that she might be kind to him and be the one to help him get over his phobia,
but I really hate this idea. I don’t want them bonding.
After practice, the homeroom teacher then has Yeon Doo and
Yeol in the teacher’s lounge filling out an incident report on what happened
with the broken window. Yeol is left alone in the room after Yeon Doo goes to
leave the bathroom and is curious when he sees the footage of Soo Ah up on
Wormy’s computer. He plays the video to see that it was Soo Ah picking up the
bloody towel when Ha Joon hurt himself.
Yeol realizes that she was the one who took it to the principal to give
her ammo to blackmail Yeol into joining the cheerleading club.
Yeol immediately goes to find Soo Ah and confront her. He
tells her to be careful or she’s going to be sorry and to not mess with him or
Ha Joon again. Unfortunately, Ha Joon overhears the last
part of the conversation and demands Soo Ah tell him what it's about. When it comes time for bed check that night, Ha Joon is
missing and Yeol asks the homeroom teacher to cover for him. We see Ha Joon on the roof of the school,
running and preparing to jump off, but when he gets to the ledge he can’t do
it. Yeon Doo comforts Yeol saying she knows Ha Joon will be alright, because
she knows that Yeol wasn’t lying when he said that they were like brothers and
that he had to do cheerleading to protect him.
The next day, Yeol finds Ha Joon and Ha joon gets mad at him
for making the deal he did, telling Yeol that he already felt like dying and
this just made it worse. Yeol tells him
that he didn’t know what else to do. Ha Joon tells him that he’s only trying to
stay alive because of Yeol. So needless
to say Ha Joon is not a happy camper when it comes time for cheerleading
practice. He says he’s going to quit and
the members of Real King are offended by how he seems to look down on them all
and a fight breaks out.
The cheerleading coach gets the evidence of their fight on
photograph and uses it to punish them.
She gives them the option of physical punishment or penalty points. So
all the members of Baek Ho and Real King are forced to run calisthenics outside
in the rain. Afterward, the coach tells
them that they cannot clean up and instead must go and sit down and all eat
together. So the dirty, mud-caked
members of Real King and Baek Ho sit around a table, eating ramen together as
other students pass by and gawk. While they first eat their meal in silence,
they eventually realize how funny it is and start laughing together. It’s the first real bonding moment we see
between the two groups and it really warms my heart.
Cut to Yeon Doo’s mom and Yeol’s dad who are at the café run
by Yeon Doo’s mom. He is acting strange
so she sits him down and tells him to say what’s on his mind. He pulls out a
ring to propose with. Yeon Doo’s mom
says that she wants to keep it, but can’t.
Wow, a lot of thoughts on this small moment that make me both happy and
sad. On the one hand, they clearly care about each other so why can’t they be
together? But on the other hand if they got married, Yeol and Yeon Doo would be
step-siblings which destroys any chance of their romance. There’s no win-win solution when these
situations happen. I have to think, if the kids had any clue Yeon Doo would
want her mom to be happy, but Yeol would choose his own happiness.
The coach has the kids arrive at a location where they are
to practice where she has a meal prepared for them and tells them to start
without her since she hasn’t arrived.
They check the fridge to see if there are any beverages and find water
and what looks to be juice. So they bring the juice to the table to serve it
and it becomes clear quickly that it is not juice, but alcohol. But the kids,
in their cheeky thinking pretend to not know that it is alcohol so that when
the time comes they can claim they thought it was juice. They all then proceed
to drink great quantities of this “juice”.
If eating together was a great bonding experience, then getting drunk
together pretty much makes them family.
Drunkenly members of Real King attempt to teach members of
Baek Ho to dance while others are hanging all over each other giggling. Soo Ah, on the other hand, ends up upstairs
alone and bawling. Ha Joon happens upon her and she expresses how lonely she feels
with everyone against her wondering why she’s getting all the blame and
expressing that she’s having a hard time.
Ha Joon doesn’t say anything, but throws his handkerchief at her and
leaves. I think it’s interesting that he
recognizes that she’s a little pathetic and takes the time to listen to her,
but he still doesn’t want to be her friend.
Outside Yeon Doo is sitting at a table alone when Yeol comes
out and sits with her. She lays her head
on the table and tells him to do the same. They’re laying their next to each
other and smiling when Yeon Doo sits up, realizing the situation is familiar
and references the times she fell on him when he gave her the choice to just go
ahead with it since they were already in the position or to get up.
Yeol tells her that this time he’s going to
go ahead with it. He gently places his hand on her neck and then goes in for a
kiss. He’s mere inches away and that’s where our episode ends. Is that not an
unbelievably frustrating place to end? It makes me angry because if they haven’t
actually kissed yet and we have a cliffhanger, it seems possible that they’ll
be interrupted and I really, really don’t want that.
Anyway, I guess we have to wait until next week to find
out. In the meantime look out for the
drama club’s newest post tomorrow and if you’ve fallen behind on this series
feel free to catch up with all my recaps on the Cheer Up! Main page by clicking
below. It was fun, friends. I’ll see you
soon and don’t forget to Drama On!
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