Episode Report Card Niki: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Losing You
By Niki | Season 3 | Episode 18 | Aired on 04.07.2002
After commercials, Lily's truck cruises up outside Zoe's school, which is cleverly named Bedford Middle School. Zoe's sitting by herself at a picnic table, looking more than a little glum. "That can't be her!" Babs exclaims. Lily says it is. "Oh, my god! She looks sixteen!" Babs grins. Zoe runs over to the truck and leans in the passenger window to kiss Babs hello, but Babs warns her off, saying she thinks she caught a bug on the plane. Zoe climbs into the back seat with Judy, or should I say, Ju-Ju. Lily asks Zoe how her day was. "Exquisite," Zoe says. Lily beams at the million-dollar word. "Grandma, are you going to be here for my birthday?" Zoe asks. Babs says she "wouldn't miss it for the world," then chides, "And I thought we decided on 'Bea.'" She grouses that "Grandma" makes her sound so old. Zoe looks like it's the first she's heard of this "Bea" business. Judy tries to give Zoe a supportive smile, but it comes out more like a smirk. She then makes eye contact with Lily in the rearview mirror, and tags off the sneer to her. Bea is blissfully unaware of the runaway smirk.
Cut to Booklovers, where Tiffany is jiggling Maddie on a couch as Bea and Zoe coo their admiration. Jake saunters in with, "Hey, Bea." He's clearly heard of her preference for the nickname. They embrace warmly, and Bea remarks that the baby is beautiful. Jake agrees that he's "surrounded by beauties, now." Because he wasn't before. He kisses Zoe, "Beauty #2," on the forehead, and asks how was school. "Scintillating," she drawls. Oh, Zoe is so precocious. Bea tells Tiffany that she looks tired, and Tiffany laughs that she is. She says that Maddie sleeps with her in the bed, and "it's like baby Valium." Bea is alarmed. "Aren't you afraid you're going to suffocate her?" she asks. With easy grace, Tiffany laughs that Maddie's fine. Lily blows in, carrying a shopping bag of baby clothes, which she must have left in the truck. She holds it out for Tiffany. Tiffany and Jake both thank her. Jake pulls Lily off-screen to ask her something. Maddie starts squalling, so Tiffany pulls her close to breastfeed her. Bea nearly pops a vessel. Watching Tiffany, she observes that things "sure are different now. You kids just have to do things your own way."
Soliloquy Bea drops by to tell us what things were like when she was raising a baby: "When I was pregnant, they didn't have all those books like they have today, describing everything so you know what to expect." And you had to walk fifteen miles uphill in the snow just to deliver the kid, right? Bea concludes, "But we got by, with a hope and a prayer, and a lick and a promise." And a thousand and one clichés. My own grandmother happens to know them all, god love her.