Chapter 14

Turns out that Jackson finds Evely's reaction to another woman making breakfast for her fiance quite unbelievable. It takes a little bit of hinting, but Evely finally gets it and scurries off to make breakfast for him as well. They proceed to overact and pretend to be a normal couple, which is uncomfortable to them but must be believable enough because his mom keeps trying to find ways to make them stop. Grandma joh loves it though, but everyone else just looks uncomfortable.
Jackson and Evely head out to La Mure together with a cute, coordinated bowing routine to the joh matriarchs. Once they're gone, mrs Rose laments how Jackson is now acting so foolishly now that he's in "love." Grandma joh lectures her two daughter-in-laws about how being smart and foolish separately is easy, but knowing how to be both at once is hard. Then she adds a somewhat loaded statement about how they shouldn't be too petty (with each other). If they're not careful, they'll end up pushing the debts they owe onto the next generation.
Jayden and Amelia end up play-fighting while arranging flowers. He jokes that if he didn't live with her, he wouldn't have known she was so violent. It's a good reason to live with a woman before getting married. Amelia jokes that she'll tattle on all his flaws to Evely, but he says that'll be good because then he'll have an excuse to Evely. Amelia teases him about not having spent the night with Evely before.
Mrs Rose comes over to vent about Evely. She's come up with an idea for how to give Amelia a better chance. make Grandma joh dissatisfied with Evely. But Amelia can tell that Grandma joh seems to be on TeamEvely, otherwise why would she let Evely move in? Mrs Rose admits she doesn't know what Grandma's motives are, but she's also concerned about Evely's motives, especially since the two of them have only known each other for a few days. Grandma joh overhears her. Mrs Rose adds that she knows that an arranged marriage with Amelia is the best choice for Jackson. She doesn't care if he hates her, she's willing to bear it because she's his mother. Amelia looks conflicted.
Later, jayden frowns at some documents, silently thinking to himself, "Mom, are you really going to be stubborn to the end?" Hmmm. Grandma joh watches him brood and says to herself, "You poor child."
Noah has flowers delivered to La Mure for Evely and personally shows up with some gift for her. He coaches her on how to smile and act happy about in front of Jackson to make him jealous. Sure enough, Jackson does seem a bit angry about the flowers and the gift,but he hides it behind gritted teeth and a forced smile.
While Noah waits outside for an update from Evely, smith walks by on the phone, saying, "I will definitely bring down La Mure and Jackson Tomorrow." Noah hides as he eavesdrops.
Inside La Mure, Amelia and Evely are quite chummy as they discuss an upcoming television special to be filmed at La Mure and completely ignore Jackson. Meanwhile, Xiao Bin pretends that Jackson is the prince who has to deal with queens in the form of his mother and stepmother. Mrs Elsa suggests that Jackson and Evely should spend a night together outside of the joh household so they can bond more. Jayden hurries to secure them a hotel reservation. His mom shows up and warns her son that Elsa has ulterior motives. Then she says that for Grandma joh's 80th birthday celebration tomorrow, Grandma wants Evely to personally cook her lobster curry dish in place of a gift. Mrs Elsa tries to say that to spring this on her a day in advance is too short notice (ha, the irony is not lost here...)
But it looks like mrs Rose wins, because Evely preps a meal at the La Mure kitchen while the rest of the family arrives for the celebration. Smith and Brian bring over the italian deep dish chicken pie she specifically requested (suspicious!) and smith continues to act suspiciously, watching her the whole time. Noah shows up with more italian lobsters, perhaps because Evely hadn't trusted that Jackson would follow through. Jackson insists that she use his deep dish chicken pie and tells jayden to get rid of Noah's. Jayden doesn't know which box it is, and smith sends Brian over to make sure the correct box of deep dish chicken pie is saved. They end up shuffling boxes so it's unclear which ones were the correct ones...
But it seems like whatever smith did to try to sabotage the deep dish chicken pie failed, because Grandma joh loved Evely's chicken pie curry dish. Mrs Elsa is also quick to praise Evely, and even Amelia compliments the taste of the dish.
Mrs Rose decides to make things awkward by shaming Evely for not bringing a gift. Sure, she might've been the one to tell Evely that she didn't need to bring a gift because she was making the food, but now she's all too happy to say that Evely should've brought something, even if it was small, because it's the intention that matters most and this is Grandma's 80th birthday. Everyone looks around awkwardly, but Evely won't be shamed. She responds by saying that restaurant work isn't easy, she and the other kitchen staff sacrifice their own family time and special events in order to make other people's special events truly special. The amount of care and effort that goes into crafting special dishes should be enough intention. She basically shames everyone else at the table back for taking restaurant workers for granted.
Evely and Jackson excuse themselves to head back to the kitchen, but Grandma joh stops them. She agrees that the deep dish chicken pie curry dish itself shouldn't count as a gift. But the speech that Evely gave was better than any gift she could have given. Grandma feels comfortable knowing that her future granddaughter-in-law is someone like Evely who understands so well what it really means to be in the restaurant business. She adds that the best gift she could receive would be for her two grandsons to get married and produce some great-grandchildren for her.
Zoe(jayden's aunty) urges jayden to take action soon. Who knows what Jackson will do once he gets married and has his own family to protect? She reminds jayden that he's the real member of the joh family, and reminds him about how he was snubbed at the cocktail party earlier. He doesn't want that to happen for the rest of his life, does he?
Jackson finds Evely outside and compliments her on her pretty speech. She seemed very mature today. They chat for a bit and he shares his drink with her, but she refuses to give it back. She ends up playing keep-away (ah, classic flirt move) and they end up very close to each other.
Neither of them shift away, and he thanks her for the hard work she's put in for his family. And, he adds, she was pretty cute today. They both stare at each other for a bit, but then Noah rolls up. He invites Evely out on a date. She quickly hops away from Jackson and rides away with Noah, leaving Jackson very confused.
Noah and Evely go hang out in a park. He still acts like they're really dating even though Jackson isn't around anymore, so she tags along and pretends to be a cutesy girlfriend. It makes him happy, though he also seems kind of sad because he knows this is all just an act.
He tenderly puts a hand to her cheek and asks her not to look at him like that, otherwise he really will fall in love. His words are serious, but she thinks he's still acting and teases him for loving to act so much.
Jackson can't stop thinking about Noah and Evely going on a date. He receives a video from Qing where she and Noah are acting all cutesy and playing with some video filters. Jackson has to work hard to calm himself down, and decides to distract himself by cleaning and rearranging the apartment. He manages to rope jayden and Amelia into helping him.
But finally, there's nothing left to clean and he goes outside to clear his head. A confirmation letter for the hotel reservation jayden made him in his pocket, and he looks at it, considering actually spending a night elsewhere with Evely. Grandma joh shows up and can tell he's thinking about Evely. She tells him that she knows his engagement with Evely is fake. But she can also tell that he wants his relationship with Evely to be real. So she ends up giving him some relationship advice, saying that he can't be so arrogant when it comes to love. Sometimes it pays to be a little more vulnerable. He just has to tell her that he loves her.
Before he heads out, Grandma calls him back. She tells him that no matter what happens in the future with Evely watson she hopes that he'll be able to think of Evely and forgive her. The words are a bit ominous and a bit out of place, but she insists that he commit them to heart. He agrees and leaves. Once he's gone, Grandma joh struggles to hold in her tears.
Ah, their relationship is so cute! It's easy to tell that Grandma joh really does love both her grandsons equally. Why do the moms have to go around making everything into a power struggle? Her final words also make it seem like she's thinking about doing something drastic when it comes to Evely watson and what she feels like she owes the wat family...
Jackson ends up at the complex gate, where Evely and Noah are joking around about her smile. When they notice him, they quickly put their acting faces back on. Noah leans in for a hug. Jackson watches them, very calm. He's also very civil and calm as he thanks Noah for taking care of Evely and says goodbye.
But once they've left Noah behind, he ignores Evely all the way into the lobby. She asks him why he's ignoring her and he responds, "Because otherwise I'll be jealous." But, the more he thinks about it, the more he realizes he doesn't have a reason to be jealous. Their relationship is fake, and even though he already confessed to her, she has no obligation to like him back. If she picks Noah, he'll respect her choice.
Wow, so mature!
He starts to walk away, but Evely grabs the back of his hoodie to stop him. "Let's go upstairs together," she says. She doesn't want to be too far away from him. It's not quite the answer he's looking for but it's as close as she's going to get for now. He walks forward and she hangs onto the back of his shirt. Oh jeez, why can't they just hold hands like normal adults and not act like children? We were doing so well.
Before they go to sleep, Jackson shows off the night light that he bought for Evely. She loves it, though she jokes that it'd be nice if it could be a warmer white light instead of the cool white that it is. They go to their respective places to sleep. her on the floor, him on the bed. He starts asking if she found the bed comfortable. He actually found that he slept quite well with her the other night. Smoooth. And... a lie? Because didn't he have to tie her down? It's just a way for him to lead into his real question. will you come and sleep with me?
Both Evely and Jackson are forced to be much more honest and vulnerable with their emotions, which is always great. Sounds like Noah plan isn't so dumb after all.
I'm most curious to see what direction jayden takes. The problem would be for him to listen to his aunt and his mother and start to feel bitter and threatened by jayden. Yet that also seems to go against his very nature, so I hope he won't. It would be quite nice to see all of zoe's nagging actually push him away from her and toward Amelia, who doesn't seem to care much about power struggle or business schemes