Episode Report Card Keckler: B- | 6 USERS: B+ YOU GRADE IT Pretty Sad Woman
By Keckler | Season 3 | Episode 11 | Aired on 01.29.2007
Max silently reads Ulysses as Cheliondy paints his toenails. You know, I love my husband, but I don't really want to touch his feet. I just don't get the obsession some girls have with painting their boyfriends' toenails. Cheliondy looks up at the silent Max and asks if he's okay. Max lies through his pink toenails that he is, hedging that he has to have the book read by Tuesday. Cheliondy understands. However, Max, much like Bilbo, can't let sleeping dragons lie, and tells Cheliondy that he saw a dragon on her purse the first time they met: "Guess you're a friend of dragons." Cheliondy nods sadly: "I like dragons." Dumb and Dumber -- formerly known as Bred and Frian -- walk in, sniggering, and warn that their suspicious R.A. is sniffing around since he saw Cheliondy's bags. Cheliondy thanks them for letting her hang out while she looks for a place to live and gets a job. Max goes back to reading. Dumb tells Cheliondy, "I might actually know of a job." Yeah, this is going nowhere good. See, Dumb's older brother needs a stripper for his bachelor party, so, you know...? Cheliondy looks crestfallen. God, no wonder Dumb and Dumber are overly familiar with a hooker search engine. "Hey, dudes, that's my girl you're talking to!" Max reminds them loudly. Cheliondy tells Dumb and Dumber that she's retired. Dumb realizes his mistake, sort of apologizes, and the two idiots snigger their way back out of the room. Cheliondy looks down at her lap until Max asks if she minds his asking her a question. Dude, don't do it. DON'T DO IT! He does it: he asks if she was lying at the airport about leaving her contact information at his hotel. She was. But she really wishes she had left it. Max looks down in disappointment and says he needs to take a walk. Cheliondy sits alone in his dorm room and cries.
Some days later, Max finds Veronica at the library to pay her for her extensive services. Veronica rather gauchely asks, "How's tricks?," and then apologizes. Max admits that things suck, and that Cheliondy left. Veronica looks rather incensed. "The upside? I actually got a note this time," says Max, like he's the wronged party. "She said it wasn't going to work out." Veronica is incensed: "You bought her out of prostitution and she left you?" Right, because she should have stayed around with a guy who couldn't get over her past even though he knew full well what she did when he started on his mission to get her out of hooker hock. Please, Veronica, you saw the look on Max's face in the caf. You should have known he wasn't going to be able to deal with Cheliondy, warts and all. Just like you probably can't Compound W away Logan's. Veronica begs Max to say that he doesn't want her to find Cheliondy again. No, Max thinks Cheliondy is right, and quotes from her note: "'The day we met was one of the best of my life. I fell for you that day, but you didn't know what I was then and now you do, and it shows in the way you look at me. It shows in the way you touch me, but I'll never regret it. You made me realize what I was missing. Love, Wendy.'" Veronica has the grace to look sad, but tells Max, "Ten thousand [dollars] is a lot to pay for a life lesson." Stop harping on the money, Veronica! I mean, really, look at it this way: as you pointed out earlier, Max doesn't exactly get his money by saving puppies and kittens. To some degree, his money is already tainted. It's almost poetic justice that what Max's money touches turns to dross. Sort of like the curse in Pirates Of The Caribbean. Max says that Cheliondy is going to pay him back, but Veronica tells him not to get his hopes up. Is Veronica being such a downer because her relationship with Logan is so shaky? Can she still not get over the image of Logan and a hooker even though he denied any such activity? Max bangs a pillowy mailer on the desk and announces that Cheliondy already paid him a grand. Aghast, Veronica looks inside and sees that her fee is all in singles. "She made some good money last night," says Max. "Hope you don't mind getting your money in vertically folded singles." Max is all put-upon that Cheliondy is dancing again. And maybe he should be -- I mean, he did shell out money to get her out of that sort of life -- but it's not really him I feel sorry for. Clearly, without Max, Cheliondy doesn't have anyone in her life to keep her on the straight path to redemption. There's no Hector Elizondo telling her how to dress and which forks to use. Veronica, however, sighs and slings a sympathetic arm around Max's shoulder.