Episode Report Card Sara M: C- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT A Sphincter Says What?
By Sara M | Season 9 | Episode 11 | Aired on 11.28.2004
After Martin leaves, Ruthie appears in the kitchen and says she needs to talk to RevCam "alone." They move to the dining room and she says she has "guilty knowledge" about Martin. "How guilty?" asks RevCam. Ewwww. Before Ruthie can tell him, the doorbell rings and RevCam leaves to answer it, because Annie is apparently incapable of doing so. I guess she's just exhausted from those three times she had to run up the stairs today.
Mac is at the door, and no sooner does RevCam open it than Mac is inside the house and pacing around the foyer, all "something's wrong with Martin!" He tells RevCam about Martin's bad grades and baseball and fighting and says that he can't get Mac to tell him what's wrong, so RevCam will have to do it. If he doesn't, Coach will label Martin as a "disciplinary case" and then no college baseball team will want him, which I find very hard to believe considering that Martin is supposedly good enough to play for the major leagues. I think that behavior problems or no, most colleges would gladly take Martin for that. Ruthie strolls into the conversation and says that she knows what Martin's problem is, and even though she just said she needed to talk to RevCam about it alone and not in front of Annie, she will now say it in front of Mac. "Martin's dad's tour of duty got extended. Apparently it's been happening to a lot of soldiers in Iraq." Wait, what? Martin's dad is in IRAQ?! This I did not know. Ruthie continues that she "accidentally" saw an email from Martin's dad when she stood in front of his computer and stared at it. Mac says that Martin told him that his dad would be coming home early next year, but he didn't tell anyone except Mac because he didn't want to jinx it. "His dad won't be home early next year," says Ruthie. "It doesn't look that way," says RevCam. Thanks for clearing that up, guys.
Martin overheard the last part of the conversation as he came downstairs. He asks who won't be coming home early next year, and RevCam totally sells Ruthie out when he tells Martin that Ruthie told him. Needless to say, Martin is kind of pissed that Ruthie read his private email, even going so far as to say it's "unbelievable," when in fact it is totally believable. These are the Camdens we're talking about. Assuming they know what "email" is, it's perfectly reasonable to guess that they spend their days reading other people's. RevCam says he wants to talk to Martin, who asks if it's because his "former best friend" told on him about his grades and baseball, or because the "family spy" read his email. RevCam asks Martin why he didn't anyone about his dad, and Martin says that it seems to him that he doesn't need to tell anybody anything because he has Ruthie to do it for him. He storms away. Mac looks like he's about to cry as RevCam consoles him. He leaves the house, and RevCam heads upstairs.
He finds Martin scowling in his bed. Martin says he doesn't want to talk. "You can't help me," he tells RevCam. Hee! You know that that's like the worst insult one can give RevCam. Oh, and then! Martin says that the only reason why RevCam even wants to talk is because is to make himself feel better. "You need to help, and it's killing you that you can't help me," Martin says. And he's probably right. RevCam tries to bring up how his father was a Marine too, but Martin interrupts him to say that it isn't the same because The Colonel was around a lot, and even when he wasn't, RevCam had his mother around. Martin tells RevCam to leave him alone, and RevCam leaves.