Episode Report Card Niki: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Sex, Lies, and Bugaboos
By Niki | Season 1 | Episode 4 | Aired on 10.11.1999
Meanwhile, the Mock Trial is underway. The teacher asks, "Would the prosecuting attorney please remove her gum?" Everyone giggles, and we get a lovely shot of Jennifer mid-way through slapping her jaws around the offending wad. Grace rolls her eyes and marinates in her bitter juices. As the teacher drones on about the trial's ground rules, Eli pops into the doorway and silently beckons Jennifer to join him in the hallway. She smiles flirtatiously in return. Grace spots the covert action and she doesn't like it one bit. Eli takes off, and Jennifer turns to follow the sound of the pacing teacher's voice. Her smile fades as she catches sight of Grace's sour face. Grace sends her an unequivocally evil eye before looking away. Jennifer registers it with a puzzled expression.
Cut to Judge Judy giving some defendant the gears over Beanie Babies. Grace is watching the proceedings on the small kitchen TV at Manning Manor. Judy interrupts by placing a book on the table in front of her. "A legal dictionary?" Grace asks. "From when I was a paralegal," Judy answers. Lily wanders in, and Judy explains that she just brought Grace a law book. "What for?" Grace asks. Lily and Judy answer together, "Mock Trial." Grace turns back to the TV with the announcement that she's not doing it. Why, then, would she inflict Judge Doody on herself? The ladies want to know why not, but Grace insists that she'd rather not discuss it. Judy whips out Rick's scarf and lays it across Lily's shoulders. "What's that?" Grace wants to know. They inform her that it's a scarf and skip the gory details regarding how it came to be in Judy's possession. Grace accusingly says that she's never seen it before, and Lily fibs her way out of the kitchen. Judy snuggles in next to Grace, asking what happened with Mock Trial. Grace says, "Nothing happened. I didn't want to do it anyway." Then she grits, "The prosecuting attorney is, like, a total slut." Judy stops stroking Grace's hair and, thinking of her own dating patterns, defensively asks what that's supposed to mean. Disgusted, Grace answers, "It means...it means...What do you think it means? Everybody knows what it means." It means that Grace needs to haul ass over to Tomato Nation to read Sars's fine essay. And then she needs to read it again.
Lily, meanwhile, is having a fit of ecstasy on her bed, wantonly rolling around and inhaling Rick's scarf. She's like my cat with his catnip blanket, except that he's funny and she's just making me uncomfortable. Judy stumbles onto this scene, head down and muttering about her concern for Grace's bitchy, repressed attitude. Breathless, Lily makes it clear she's barely listening. She noisily licks her lips and announces that she "wants to go over there, right now." She whips the scarf off her neck like she's a burlesque dancer with a feather boa and mutters a guttural "I wanna return his scarf...." Judy's eyes nearly drop out of her head.