Episode Report Card Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Ch...Ch...Ch...Changes
By Sars | Season 2 | Episode 21 | Aired on 05.18.1999
McPhee Manor. Mr. McPhee and Jack close a door behind them -- Mrs. McPhee's door, I imagine -- as Mr. McPhee says, "This'll be good for your mother, and Andie, and you -- put our family back together." Jack asks hesitantly, "What if -- um, what if you stayed? Moved here with us?" Mr. McPhee says he can't because of his business, but Jack overrules this as a reason: "Then start up a new one, or move it here, or take day trips, I don't care. If you really loved us, you'd stay." Mr. McPhee: "There's no one here to help Andie." That didn't seem to bother him when he shipped her and his even-more-out-of-control wife up to Capeside, but no matter; Jack says that Andie has Pacey, and the two of them have something special together. Mr. McPhee says he can only offer what he's offered. Jack says his father should offer Andie a choice. Mr. McPhee says he can't, that "it's best for everyone if we all leave," and as Jack rises from his chair in frustration, Mr. McPhee goes on to say that Andie and Mrs. McPhee need "serious medical attention, and you're certainly not gonna get the help you need here in Capeside." Oh, no -- don't tell me he believes gay people need "curing." Jack wants to know exactly what kind of help he needs, and Mr. McPhee submits diffidently, "If you could talk to someone about your problem…" Jack snarls, "You know what? Just don't even go there," and heads up the stairs, but Mr. McPhee says, "Just, just hear me out. I understand you're confused -- with these gay ideas." Jack retorts, "The only problem I have is the problem that you have with me [sic] being gay," and reminds his father that this isn't about either of them, but rather "about Andie and what's best for her." He again asks his father to give Andie the choice of whether to leave, and says that to take her away now, especially from Pacey, would be "damaging" to her. Mr. McPhee scoffs, "I hardly think a teen romance is the solution to her medical problems," and I have to agree with him on that, but Jack has a pretty good comeback himself: "Her solution will come [sic] from the people that love and care for her, and that's not your specialty, Dad." Jack runs up the stairs and leaves his father standing there.
In Andie's room, Andie obsessively strokes a stuffed dog as Pacey gripes about "passively awaiting our inevitable doom." Andie, typically, suggests that Pacey could start studying for finals, which Pacey blows off as ridiculous, as well he should. Pacey thinks they should take advantage of the night they know for sure they have left and go out on a romantic date -- "take you out to dinner, maybe a movie, some moonlight, a little romance" -- because the two of them need that. Yeah, like Mr. McPhee would let Andie out of the house. Andie doesn't know; she has a lot to do, she should really start packing, blah blah blah, but then she changes her mind and agrees to go. Pacey hugs her and says that they'll deal with tomorrow when it comes, "but tonight -- tonight will be magical." They canoodle, Pacey rubs Andie's eyebrows with his nose, and then he leaves and Andie slumps back down on her bed.