Episode Report Card Deborah: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT "Until A Little Light Gets Through"
By Deborah | Season 2 | Episode 9 | Aired on 11.18.2004
Joan's giving her deposition, saying they'd all gone to Kevin's game ("we won") and that some guy named Richard Gould flirted with her. She says she and Luke watched TV when they got home and the doorbell rang.
Cut back to that night; Helen is screaming and Will comes running: "What? What is it?" Now that was a much better, much more convincing cry of pain. He sees the cops at the door and Helen collapsing against the wall. Will embraces her and the camera lurches around, and we see Joan and Luke standing there, looking horrified and stunned, respectively.
Joan narrates over the family's drive to the hospital, saying it seemed really long: "I remember thinking, this is the moment when my whole life changes. It's like everything before this, and everything after. I remember praying, but I don't know who I was praying to. I didn't believe in God. I was bargaining, telling him all the things I'd do if he let Kevin live. Then I looked at my brother Luke. He was counting on his fingers. You have to understand: he's a math genius, and he was counting on his fingers. That's how screwed up he was. But I didn't feel sorry for him. I wanted to kill him, because I knew he was counting the days until his stupid birthday. He'd been talking about this dumb kite, like that was something to get excited about."
The court reporter interrupts to clarify something: "He wanted a what for his birthday?" Joan: "A kite." Court Reporter: "And his birthday was when?" Joan says it's ten days after Kevin's accident: November 19. Joan looks up at the stenographer, and she just looks back at Joan exactly the way Mrs. LandingGod does. I like it when the avatars are able to convincingly replicate certain expressions, moods, and gestures of other avatars. The lawyers are just lost in their notes or maybe time stops, or something, because they take absolutely no notice of what follows. Joan looks at the court reporter and says, "Oh, my God." Court Reporter God just keeps smiling meaningfully at Joan, who realizes, "You weren't talking about the present. You were talking about…the present." Joan glances quickly at the lawyers, but they are absorbed in their notes, and totally oblivious. Joan: "Unless it was both. I bet you it was both, because that's what you do…" Court Reporter just keeps smiling; she doesn't confirm or deny anything with her expression, but she turns back to her machine and announces, "I'm back on the record." Kroner turns to Joan, who's almost imperceptibly sneering in God's general direction. He kind of gives her a look, and she slouches down in her seat.