Augie…Again
Episode 9 of Love Life begins with a look back at past relationships and the fantasy of whether things would be better or not had we met previous partners at different times. Darby though, doesn’t have this issue given she’s decided to focus solely on living her life. Fate has a funny way of turning on us though, and two months after the incident with Sara Darby is invited to Thanks”jiming” for Thanksgiving where she meets Jim and his new partner. It turns out Sara did go to rehab after all but before she can get into that with Jim, she spies Augie Jeong from across the room talking in the kitchen. They inevitably gravitate toward one another and hit it off immediately, talking enthusiastically about their lives. That talking ends up lasting all night as Augie and Darby ride a taxi home together and inevitably make love. In the morning, Darby phones her Mother and tells her about everything but she warns about “putting spoiled milk back in the fridge”. Darby brushes these concerns away though and as Thanksgiving turns to Christmas, the two waste no time hooking up together. Things go great for a while but when Augie rescues a stray cat and criticizes Darby’s art pieces in the gallery, things hit a rough patch. Back home, a fire breaks out courtesy of the cat messing with the wires. In the wake of this, Darby starts to wonder whether things really were great with Augie or not. This leads her to Jim for advice, who actually understands how she’s feeling given he went through the same thing with Sara. Partway through talking, Jim contemplates whether Darby is pregnant…which, as it turns out, she is. This brings her over to Augie’s where she admits to how she’s feeling and he admits to feeling the same way. With the relief of this out in the open, and both on board with the break-up, Augie asks her what the good news is….which ends things on a cliffhanger. Old flames rarely work out again and Love Life’s penultimate episode of this first season captures the essence of this perfectly. What’s particularly interesting here though is how the double entendre of “love life” has been used across this season. The idea of loving your own life before loving someone else is something the show has captured beautifully. While it may not be the best drama of the year, there’s enough here to make for a compelling watch nonetheless, thanks in part to those themes running heavily through the show.
