Nam Ha-Neul and Yeo Jeong-Woo had just begun their adorable dating life when a lingering sense of doom hits Ha-Neul and she asks to end things.
Nam Ha-Neul worked and worked, through her school, and then college, to the medical school she worked as an anesthesiologist at.
Consequently, her health tanked to the point that after fainting mid-traffic due to her gastric issues, she thought the oncoming truck was a better fate than the one she suffers from currently.
She leaves the job and seeks a psychiatrist, finally, as she also stumbles upon Yeo Jeong-Woo, her academic rival during her school days.
Falling for her rival
Both are going through their lives’ worst slumps, but they find out eventually. Naturally, this makes both better equipped to comfort each other.
Once hardcore rivals, now turn to each other’s crushes, to eventual lovers.
They start dating and have a blast while dancing, playing video games, eating, drinking, watching movies, and a whole lot of other things.
After their first official date, Ha-Neul is hit with dread and a panic, triggered by a memory and recognition of a pattern in her life, that soon makes her visit her psychiatrist.
The pattern resurfaces
She talks to him about the dread and anxiety she has always felt when something happy happens to her.
She thinks it’s going to end soon. She says she thought she was recovering from her depression but now she has been afflicted by her mind once again.
Yeo Jeong-Woo, who goes to the same hospital for his PTSD issues on her advice and encouragement, listens in on Ha-Neul confessing she’s suffering from her issues still.
This breaks his heart a little since they just started dating and she was so happy of late.
This feels like a bit of a heartbreak, but he doesn’t know the exact cause of her sudden anxiety flare-up.
To understand the real reason, one has to rewind the clock on Ha-Neul’s life, way back to her school days.
Nam Ha-Neul’s past
One day, one very lucky and positive day when everything seemed to be happening in her favor, Ha-Neul received the greatest whiplash.
The day ended with her witnessing her father, a long-time patient teetering on the edge of mortality, finally give in and pass away.
Later in life, when she was working under Min Kyung-Min at the University Hospital, he helped her ceaselessly. This made her begin to rely on him.
Their dynamic even gave rise to rumors about them being in a relationship. However, the truth couldn’t be further away.
While Nam Ha-Neul thinks she is being helped by Kyung-Min, he only uses her for his ends.
The dissertation that gets him the promotion as he becomes a professor, was written by Ha-Neul.
For her efforts, she gets her credit omitted by him, and when she confronts him about it, he says all others have done the same, makes false promises of helping her, and says it’s her problem.
This pattern of whenever she finds things going smoothly in her life, only for life to throw a diabolical curve ball at her, has become all too familiar to her.
The dread creeps in
That is why when she meets Yeo Jeong-Woo, starts hanging out with him, falling for him, and ultimately dating him, she is hit by that dread again.
However, the moment the dread of the pattern recognition hits her isn’t brought on by itself. It happens when Kyung-Min leaves his wedding invitation at Jeong-Woo’s door.
She is reminded of the great injustice he subjected her to.
She also hears about his wedding from a former colleague of hers, who expresses discontent at how he used her dissertation to become a professor.
Not only that but now, just after a year of becoming a professor, he’s about to quit to start working at his wife’s CEO father’s pharmaceutical company.
He’s giving his position to Dr. Woo, instead of Nam Ha-Neul, who deserves that and so much more.
Ha-Neul decides to pay him a visit at his farewell lunch, and throws alcohol on his face, asking him to try and live an honest life.
The breakup
Later, as she drinks more by herself, she receives a call from her friend Lee Hong-Ran.
She learns that Jeong-Woo refuses to resume working because he wants to spend more time with her, who he thinks would feel more dejected if he finds work before she does.
This makes her more miserable, as she doesn’t want him to suffer for her issues.
She was alright for a moment, having forgotten her troubles thanks to Jeong-Woo’s company.
And yet the past and her own psyche return with a whiplash of emotional turmoil.
She believes she’s not ready to date anyone, and she tells all of this to Jeong-Woo when he walks up to a broken Ha-Neul, drenched by the pouring rain, with an umbrella.
He asks if she can struggle by her side and go through the pain together, but she feels having him suffer for her problems is just the worst.
He hands her the umbrella anyway and tells her she doesn’t have to date him, or even like him. This is his way of telling her he’ll continue to help her and wait for her.
And so as Nam Ha-Neul and Yeo Jeong-Woo have broken up for now, they’re not going to be far away from each other for long, as the two know and understand the importance of being there for each other.
Also Read: Nam Ha-Neul’s rock bottom in Doctor Slump explained