Episode Report Card Niki: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT If You Love Something, Let It Run Free
By Niki | Season 2 | Episode 18 | Aired on 04.03.2001
Cut to Jessie and Rick at a sports store, where Jessie's trying on new shoes. Her friend Marney bumps into them, and Jessie asks what she's doing there. Marney holds up a pullover and says she's getting new fleece for the ski trip. "Gotta have that fleece!" Rick says with an idiotic grin. I don't know. Maybe Billy's hoping for a gig with Old Navy? Marney asks if Jessie's going on the trip, and Jessie says an uncomfortable, "Uh, I don't know yet," boring her eyes into the back of Rick's head. Rick senses the look and flinches. Marney leaves, and Jessie flops down next to Rick on the bench, staring at him intently. He sighs and looks at her, knowing what's coming. "I promise I'll take care of myself," Jessie pleads. "Jess," he says reluctantly. "I promise!" she insists. Rick says she needs to show them that. "You always take her side," Jessie mutters, sulking. Rick says that he's not taking sides. Jessie complains that Karen treats her "like a baby." Rick defends Karen, saying that she's worried about Jessie, and that she's trying to do the right thing. Jessie begs, "You could talk to her." Rick sighs, "I am with her on this." Jessie's face falls. "Who is this strange new man with a backbone?" she wonders. "And what has he done with my father?" Rick tells her that when Jessie shows them that she can take care of herself, she'll get all of her freedoms back. He holds out the shoebox and says that they'd better get going, or they'll be late. Jessie just gets up and sullenly walks away, pointedly ignoring the box. Rick sighs again, thinking how hard it is to be a parent who actually says no. I hope he didn't buy those shoes after that little snit fit.
Dr. Wise-Ass's arm reaches out for a glass of water on the table next to his chair. Jessie sits across from him, arms folded, looking petulant. She smiles a tiny, antagonizing smile at him, rolls her eyes, and sighs loudly. He just looks back at her, a pleasant, patient look on his face. It's a standoff, folks. I notice that Dr. Wise-Ass got rid of that super-loud clock he had. It's totally quiet in the office. Jessie finally breaks the silence, suggesting that he make phone calls or do paperwork, or whatever else he has to work on. He declines and says that this is her time. "Okay," she says, smirking and looking into her lap, knowing that she will beat him. She turns her head toward the window so she doesn't have to keep staring at him.
Grace is clapping her hands and barking orders. Looks like the book fair is underway. Judy hands Jessie a stack of books and asks her to set them up. She pulls the next pile out of a box and exclaims at the sight of one, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. She passes a copy to Jessie, asking if she's ever read it, and saying that "it's great." Judy thumbs through it affectionately, and adds that she "must have read this four times in high school. She explains that it's about these "people in a southern town, kind of...outsiders." She says that the book "saved" her from herself. Jessie asks what she means. "I had a lotta problems in high school," Judy says with a wry smile. "What, like drugs?" Jessie asks, looking worried. Judy blinks a few times, thinking it over, and says, "Well, I was...bulimic." Jessie is stunned. Judy elaborates, saying that she used to feel like she "was allergic to high school," and she'd wonder why no one else seemed to "feel it." It made her "feel like [she] was allergic to everything. And [she] didn't want to keep anything in [her] body." Jessie listens thoughtfully, staring off at something, and feeling Judy's words resonate. She looks back at Judy, earnestly studying her face. "You know what I figured out?" Judy asks. "I finally learned that all these people who pretend to be fine -- they're not." The camera cuts over to a group of kids with Panty Queen in the middle, holding court with a copy of Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul. She looks as if she's mocking it. Too late, P.Q. I still hate you. Judy continues, "They just have other ways they deal with it: they drink, or they act obnoxious, or they, you know, do anything to be popular." Judy and Jessie stare at our cases in point, and then look at one another, somehow empowered, somehow wiser. Judy hands a copy of the book to Jessie and says she wants her to have it. "Really?" Jessie asks. "Yeeeah," Judy says, smiling warmly. Judy rocks. Love me some Judy. So does Jessie, it seems. Good, she needs a role model.