Episode Report Card Niki: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Experience Is The Teacher
By Niki | Season 3 | Episode 17 | Aired on 03.31.2002
We open in Creepitri's classroom, where he's scrawling something on the board and asking why John Gardner bothered writing Grendel, which is a retelling of Beowulf from the monster's perspective. Grace slowly raises her hand, confident no one else will. Alexa, sitting behind her, nearly gives herself a hernia throwing her arm up. Creepitri calls on Alexa, and Grace looks a little miffed. She grits her teeth as Alexa suggests that maybe Gardner "just liked Grendel...maybe he just sort of identified with, you know --" Creepitri interrupts that he doesn't know, and is about to ask her to clarify her response when Grace butts in to say that Gardner "felt like a monster." Creepitri smiles faintly and praises, "Exactly." Alexa gripes that she was, you know, about to say exactly that, but Creepitri cut her off. He apologizes, but not really, saying it may have seemed as though he was cutting her off. His explanation is cut short by the bell. As the classroom bursts into action, Creepitri warns them all that, despite his earlier promise that there'd be no more pop quizzes, there will be.
Grace makes her way to Creepitri's desk. Creepitri hands her an old, hardcover book with a clumsy, "Oh, um, here." Alexa's eyes threaten to scorch a hole in the cover. Grace accepts the book shyly, while Creepitri casts a furtive glance in Alexa's direction, conscious that he's being watched. Grace starts to say something about tonight, but Creepitri cuts her off, loudly saying, "Yes, Alexa?" Alexa strides up to his desk and tries to think of a reason for hanging around eavesdropping. She says she was just wondering whether he's still accepting stories for extra credit. He is. Grace stares uncomfortably at his desk, waiting for Alexa to leave. Instead, Creepitri does. Alexa asks Grace what the book is. Grace mutters that it's just something he said she could borrow. "So, you're going to his house tonight?" Alexa demands. Grace tries to convince her that she goes there a lot, but it's not a "big deal." She chalks it up to the Gay/Straight Alliance. "Oh, so maybe I'll come tonight," Alexa says belligerently. Grace hems that that "probably wouldn't work" because there's a group of them going to see a movie, and there's a limited number of tickets. Grace tries to walk away, but Alexa's on her like stink on a monkey, demanding to know who's going. She's behaving rather territorially. Grace says it's "just a bunch of people" and adds that it's been planned for a while. "Sorry," she says, squirming away and not sounding sorry at all. Alexa stares after her with narrowed eyes. She whips out her decoder ring and translates Grace's message: "b-u-l-l-s-h-i-t."