Episode Report Card Sars: D | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Hurricane
By Sars | Season 1 | Episode 5 | Aired on 02.16.1998
TaMAHra's porch. Teardrop-shaped wind chimes. TaMAHra cleans up the porch as Pacey appears, sans Deputy Doug, and when TaMAHra asks, "Where's your brother?" Pacey says with a sneaky grin, "I circled back," and TaMAHra says, "It's late, Pacey," but Pacey has one more "if" question for her: "If you could do any one thing in your life again, what would it be?" TaMAHra says drolly that she wouldn't have married an abusive fat stockbroker, and turns the question on Pacey, who says, "I'd be older, so I could tell the world about this wonderful woman who I am rapidly falling in love with." Golly, what realistic dialogue for a fifteen-year-old. Except for the "realistic" part. TaMAHra sort of blanches as Pacey goes on to ask if she thought her flirting with Deputy Doug -- whom he actually calls "Deputy Doug" -- would make him jealous, and TaMAHra mock-objects, "Flirting? I don't flirt," and Pacey comes up behind her and rubs her arms, murmuring, "Because if you did, it's exceedingly unnecessary." Anyhow. Pacey hugs her and admits, "I'm already jealous -- of every guy who's ever been in your field of vision, who's known the smell of your hair, who's held your body against his." TaMAHra looks sad and says, "We're getting sloppy, Pacey. You know we're going to have to end this, it's getting too dangerous," and Pacey reverts to average-fifteen-year-old mode by snorting, "Tell me that isn't a turn-on." TaMAHra rolls her eyes and says, "Oh, Pacey," and breaks away from him to go inside, and Pacey says, "Wait, I -- just one more question," and as TaMAHra gives him a resigned look, he asks, "If you could do any one thing right now, what would it be?" and TaMAHra tries not to smile, and she gives him The Look Of Cheesy Lust and pulls him into the house by his shirt front. Whatever.
The SUV Of Mopery drives up the driveway, over and around fallen tree branches, and pulls in. The Flash unbuckles his seatbelt and heaves a sigh before getting out of the car and walking up the front steps, and when he sees the Faithless Hussy sitting on the front porch, he pauses, pectoral muscles puffed out. The Faithless Hussy gives him a hurt look. The Flash sits down on the top step with a grunt. Neither of them says anything for a long time. Finally The Flash asks, "So why'd you do it?" The Faithless Hussy, in the same grim tone of voice in which she informed him of her infidelity, says, "Get ready, Mitch, because if you think it can't get worse, it can. My reason is preposterous. I have no reason. No, I woke up one day, Mitch, and I realized my life was perfect. Everything I ever wanted from the time I was six had been realized. I discovered perfection obtained is a discomforting state, and I got restless." Gale argues this angle as though she actually deserves his sympathy, and it really gets on my nerves when people who have committed a wrong try to rewrite history to make themselves the victims, but in any case, she leans forward and asks, "What do you do when everything is right, when everything is just the way you've always wanted it to be? I have the perfect home, a career, the most gifted child [no comment]...a husband who stimulates me, mind, body, and soul every day of my life," and throughout this harangue The Flash looks like he has a toothache. His wife goes on, "And I guess that left me feeling empty not wanting, and I just wanted to want again. So I set out to achieve it. And boy, did I succeed." She looks pained: "Because I want now. I want back everything that I've lost. Mitch, I'm so sorry." The Flash shushes her: "Let's just sit here, all right? I don't want to talk anymore." He fights tears, closing his eyes and leaning his head back on the porch doorjamb as Gale starts crying and whispers, "Okay." You almost have to admire the lengths to which the writers have stretched this subplot, considering how bleak things looked for the Leerys at the end of this episode.