Episode Report Card Niki: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Pressure Cooker
By Niki | Season 2 | Episode 4 | Aired on 11.20.2000
Later that night, we're in Rick's apartment as Eli wheels in his bike. Rick is cooking dinner, a feat that seems to be fairly rare. He and Eli make some small talk, and they manage to keep it pleasant even after Eli says he may not be eating with them because he might be going out with his friends. We then see Rick pop his head into Jessie's room, where she's crashed out on the bed listening to Nine Inch Nails on her walkman. He tells her that dinner's almost ready. She says okay and rolls over. Rick hangs back a second, touches her shoulder, then asks if she isn't hungry. She says she doesn't know. He points out that she hasn't been hungry very much lately, and she argues that she's hungry "all the time." Rick parks it on her bed, and Jessie carefully keeps her back to him. He softly mentions that he gets the feeling she hasn't been eating lately. She turns her face even farther away from him, looking upset. He suggests that sometimes people don't eat when they're upset. She quickly protests that she's not upset. Rick stammers around the awkward question of whether Jessie's "trying to lose weight, or something." Facing him now, she says she's not; she doesn't even really think about her weight. Rick's holding back tears, and tries to let her know that all the pressure people put on girls is a bad thing. She interrupts him to ask if she can just listen to her walkman. She has tears in her eyes, too. Rick makes for the door then decides to take one more stab at it. He starts to bring up the discussion again, but Jessie spins around with full-on tears in her eyes and snaps, "Huh?" End of discussion. We see Jessie fighting to swallow back her tears.
When dinner is finished, Jessie tells Rick that it was really good, and Eli seconds the motion. Rick quietly says that Eli should stick around more often. The phone rings and the kids run off to fight over answering it. Rick calls after them that he told them to clear the table. Stepping up to do it himself, he notices that Jessie's food is basically untouched. Peg notices, too, and tells Rick that it's very common. "Whatever," he says. He starts clearing the table, and she follows him to the kitchen. She explains that "it's easy for her now" to see all the mistakes being made -- she just couldn't see it when she was the one making them. Rick tries to head off the conversation, but Peg won't have it. She reminds him that his father was all closed off, too, and tells Rick that everyone can see what's going on inside him. He begs her again to stop. She warns him that if he doesn't "come out of that shell, no one will benefit." Rick shakes his head stubbornly while she talks then cuts her off. She still won't stop. She tells him that she has "to tell the truth." "No, you have to tell your truth," Rick snaps. He tells her he doesn't want everything he does and says to be analyzed by her and held up to her own ideals for measurement. She tells him that she knows it hurts. "No, it pisses me off, Mom!" Rick shouts. He defends his father and says that he's sorry if Pops made Peg sad, but that he is fine. He says he can't help it if he doesn't measure up to Peg's ideas of what he should be. She assures him that he's a "wonderful man," and he's afraid to let out his feelings because some of them aren't "pretty" or "nice" and he's worried about the way people will react to them. She tells him that his kids need him, just as he needed his father, and begs him not to hide from them. Rick has nothing to say. He moves away from her to the sink. Peg looks sad.