My Heart Belongs To Daddy

Previouslies! Little Big P was mad that Lynette's MIA on the home-front. Carlos could go to the slammer for eight years if the gay-bashing charge sticks. Bree detected that she loves George. Susan told Zana to stay away from Julie, and also it turned out that Zana is Mike's son.

MAVO: "The residents of the Fairview county jail looked forward to every Tuesday. That was the day that Gabrielle Solis came to visit her husband." In flashback, we see Gabby walking through an exposed, chain-linked corridor that goes directly through the prison yard. Which seems...insane. So, like, anyone who comes to visit a prisoner has to walk through the fucking Thunderdome? Also: these are some hard, hard criminals for a county jail in sleepy little Fairview. Though I guess if Wisteria Lane is any example, Fairview is probably the crime capital of the world. MAVO: "The inmates went out of their way to give her compliments, whether she wanted them or not." Still in flashback, we see Gabby wearing a series of ridiculous outfits as she walks down the corridor of taunts and tongues again and again. MAVO: "With each visit, these accolades became increasingly inventive." From beyond the fence, the prisoners act out funny little pantomimes for Gabby, like "Finger-Lick Your Goods," "My Ass Is Like a Genie's Lamp: All It Needs Is a Little Rub (Here, Let Me Show You)," and everyone's favorite "Ride 'Em, Cowboy," where the cowboy is the inmate, and his horse, one presumes, is Gabby. MAVO: "Still, Gabrielle wasn't flattered. In fact, Gabrielle started to dread this...special attention." So she says! MAVO: "Until one day, when..." Once again, Gabby is cat-walking through the prison yard. She is wearing a truly Steel Magnolian outfit: a wide-brimmed sunhat with an eccentric cluster of white, black, and red flowers; a fitted top with matching cropped, puffed-sleeve bolero jacket (both in a pattern of bright red embroidered with white daisies); a black-and-white striped belt; and a tight, red skirt with thigh-slit. The outfit...how shall I put this? It isn't exactly the wisest choice for someone who is "dreading special attention"...unless, I don't know, maybe this is how Gabby chooses to take back the night?

Gabby is walking the gauntlet alongside Carlos's lawyer, asking him about the possibility of a conjugal visit with Carlos. Lawyer: "With all due respect, Mrs. Solis, let's just get through the discovery phase first." Gabby doesn't think she can wait that long, but the lawyer points out, with barely harnessed irritation, that he is trying to get her husband out of jail: "You want me to just stop everything so you can have a booty call?" By the way, how involved a procedure is it to request conjugal visits for a client? So involved that it would require sidelining the whole case? Gabby: "Excuse me. We are husband and wife. We make love. It is a very sacred covenant." The lawyer gives a dismissive little "hmph." Gabby: "Okay, look, all we need is twenty minutes." Ha! The lawyer tells her that his "no" means "no." Gabby: "You work for me; you will make it happen." The lawyer tells her she can't make him do anything: "I am not your maid...or your gardener." Gabby: SLAP! The lawyer tells Gabby he could have her arrested for that. Gabby: "Really? How about for this?" SLAP again! By now, all the prisoners are hooting in appreciation of the "Gabby v. Lawyer" show. The lawyer shrilly accuses Gabby of being a "crazy bitch" (wow, he seems a little...tightly wound?), and one of the prisoners, a red-faced mustachioed gentleman, pokes the lawyer through the fence with a broom handle, demanding, "Apologize to the lady!" The lawyer turns and tells Mustache that he has made a big mistake: this lawyer just happens to play golf with the warden! But while the lawyer's back is turned, another prisoner, also with a mustache, pokes the lawyer through the fence with his own broomstick. Mustachioed Prisoner #2: "You heard him: apologize!" The lawyer tells the "fellas" that he's just trying to do his job, and that this is all Gabby's fault: "If she weren't so damned horny..." The lawyer's tirade is silenced when a handful of dirt hits his face. And then all the other prisoners start hitting the lawyer with their broomsticks, and then they grab hold of his tie and use it to pull his face into the fence over and over as they chant "apologize...apologize!" A prison guard shoots a teargas canister into the yard, and Gabby delivers a delicate cough. MAVO: "At that moment it occurred to Gabrielle: this was the nicest compliment she had ever received." What? Surely Gabby has received "nicer" compliments than creepy sexual harassers assaulting a lawyer on her behalf? This is such a weird scene. Also? This is absolutely the last time Fairview County lets the prisoners rehearse for the big Bedknobs And Broomsticks show out in the yard. And credits!

MAVO narrates as we see a series of Fairview dads returning home from work. "There was one thing all the fathers on Wisteria Lane had in common: they could return home from a hard day's work to the family they'd left behind, and not feel at all guilty about the precious moments they had missed. Sadly, the same could not be said for the working mothers." This seems like a rather facile summary of the great sex divide (I personally know fathers who come home feeling guilty over the precious moments they've missed with their kids, for instance), but I guess to some degree this is still true? ["Hence the value of day care: neither parent knows what the kids do all day, and both can feel equally guilty or not about it, and resolve that no moments are precious but those that occur in their presence!" -- Wing Chun] Anyway, Lynette comes home from work, dashes into the house, and tiptoes into a darkened room to find Little Big P in bed with an umbrella. He's flanked by a set of bunkbeds, so maybe they haven't sold the twins for food money after all (or they have sold the kids and they're still looking for a buyer for the bunkbeds). Lynette pulls the blanket up over P and the umbrella, kisses her palm, and pats his head.

Downstairs Mr. Mom Tom apologizes: "I held dinner for as long as I could; it just got too late for them." Lynette: "You couldn't have given them coffee or something? I just feel like I'm missing out on their lives entirely." Tom, by the way, has new devil-may-care stubble on his cheeks, which is the source much heat on the discussion boards and also in my pants. Lynette cracks open a beer and starts eating from a plate of spaghetti that's sitting on the table. Tom: "Ooh, don't eat that! That's been sitting out for hours. That's for Mrs. Mulberry." He pulls Lynette's plate out of the oven, and explains that Mrs. Mulberry is P's new imaginary friend -- sort of a British nanny type: "I think he really locked in to the whole Mary Poppins thing." Hence the umbrella in bed. Apparently, Mrs. Mulberry arrived about a week ago. Lynette: "You don't find it odd that Parker's new nanny arrived right when I went back to work." Tom thinks it's no biggie; kids have imaginary friends! That's what they do! Lynette: "I'll agree with you to a point, when they're flying kangaroos or giant robots...not surrogate mommies!" Tom admits that, yes, it seems as though P is having some trouble adjusting to Lynette's going back to work. And apparently so is Lynette! Tom: "Don't be so sensitive." Lynette: "At the risk of sounding too sensitive? How come [Mrs. Mulberry] gets a bigger portion?" Lynette points at the plates, and indeed Mrs. Mulberry's plate is heaped at least twice as high as Lynette's. Wah-wah!

Meanwhile, Susan and Mike are standing out in front of Susan's house. They've just had themselves a dinner date, as evidenced by Susan's foil swan. Mike leans in for a wet one, and then he turns to go. Susan is saddened to discover that one kiss is all she gets. Mike: "You're the one who said you wanted things to be 'casual' between us." Susan concurs, but says that it doesn't mean they have to act like "brother and sister": "I mean, you bought me ribs." She dances the foil swan in front of Mike's face (and considering the chubbiness of her foil swan, and the continued stick-buggery of her form, I'm guessing Susan didn't do much eating on tonight's date, or over the six months). "I have gratitude to express!" Susan yanks Mike in for another kiss. Mike pulls back again, regarding his continued uncomfiness with the "casual thing," which he finds to be "weird." Susan insists that it's totally not weird; rather, they're just going to pretend things are like they were before -- back when they were "just dating" -- just until they get the whole "Zach thing resolved." Susan: "You know, we'll just be easy about it; no commitments. Except, of course, neither of us is allowed to date anybody else." Mike says he understands why Susan doesn't like Zana, but that Zana is part of "the package" that is Mike, and either Susan accepts the whole package, or she doesn't. They exchange a long, sad look, and then Mike walks away. Faced with the ugly truth of what her sacrifice for Julie's safety really means (i.e. no sex for Susan), Susan trots after Mike (and the way she trots is truly goofy, with lots of odd arm-flapping): "Mike, wait! I accept!" After all, Zana is Mike's son, and Susan has Julie, and Mike's totally accepted Julie: "I mean, granted, she's been the model child so far, but she's almost fifteen; she's going to turn on me any minute, and you better be there to help me when it gets ugly." Julie is only fourteen? Mike agrees that he will be there for Susan when Julie finally rebels, and they smile at each other. And then Susan gives Mike a strange sort of awkward kiss, and turns to go into her house, but then Mike reminds her that, technically, they don't have to be "casual" anymore. Susan: "I can be naked in twenty seconds, and that includes travel time." She grabs Mike and they run off to his house.

A guard is showing Gabby and Carlos into their conjugal sex trailer. He's explaining the rules: they have forty-five minutes, and a guard is going to call every fifteen minutes to confirm that Carlos is still there. Gabby tries to hustle the guard out, saying that she understands: "You interrupt our lovemaking to answer the phone and you call off the dogs." She closes the door behind the guard and to discover that Carlos has already stripped down to his underwear. This trailer reminds me of the portables we used to use for band practice in junior high, so I'm experiencing a kind of viscerally repulsive "spit-valve" memory when Gabby straddle-jumps on Carlos and they together fall back onto the twin bed.

Cut to Carlos and Gabby's clothes all over the floor and the couple doing some post-coital cuddling. Gabby asks if he thinks they're going to make it. Carlos: "We just did...you want to go again?" Gabby is not amused. She's talking about their RELATIONSHIP: "Carlos, you're going to be a father, and when you get out of here, you're going to need to get a job, make an honest living, for me and our child." Carlos tells her that he's learned his lesson, and that when he gets out of there, everything is going to be different: "We're going to start over with a new life, and a great family, and nothing is going to get in the way of that." And with that firm statement of confident happiness, I'm 100% positive that Carlos has jinxed away any possibility of happiness with Gabby. Nice going! Gabby kisses him lovingly, and then Carlos says, "Hey, so, you never told me -- how's the new lawyer? You like him?" OH my god, Carlos jinxing himself and then invoking the person who'll be doing that jinxing, in bed, with Gabby! Gabby looks a little thrown, and is struggling to answer/fiddling with her wedding ring when the phone rings. It's the guards, calling to check up on them! Carlos confirms that, yes, he's still in the sex portable, and then he hangs up and turns back to Gabby. Gabby tells him that's enough chitchat; they only have thirty minutes left and she wants to make the most of it, i.e. SEX!

Susan is back at the park for wayward teens. She's carrying a really cute vintage-looking clutch! And there's Zana, sitting on a bench! And here I was thinking Zana would have to be an idiot to return to the same exact park. Is he trying to get caught? Wait, maybe he's trying to get caught. He's also picking his foot, which apparently he damaged in the Ice Cream Incident. Susan sneaks up on him, and then asks him to please not run away. Lucky for Susan, Zana can't run on said damaged foot. Susan says she just wants to talk to him, and she offers to buy him some food since he looks pretty hungry (and Susan would know!).

Cut to a diner: Zana is gobbling food, and Susan is watching him eat (not having ordered anything herself, of course). Zana: "My dad's alive? Where is he?" Susan doesn't know. Because really, he actually could be dead, gobbled up by vultures and roadrunners out there in the desert where Mike left him. Nonetheless, Susan swears that CreePaul is alive, and that Mike did not kill him. Zana wonders if maybe CreePaul's gone back to Utah, then says he just needs to get some money so he can find him -- I wonder why Zana is so fired up to find that man who drugged and lied to him? Susan: "You know what I think? I think you should come back with me." Zana understandably finds this somewhat confusing; to the best of his knowledge, there's no one in Fairview for him but police looking to arrest him for battering Felicia. Susan: "There are still people at home who care about you, and there's things that you need to know." But Susan can't say any more, except that Zana messed up a lot of people's lives! Operating in this vacuum, Zana concludes that it's Julie who wants to talk to him! Julie! This prompts a scary rant about how he knows that he "messed up her life," how he "really misses her," and how he "thinks about her all the time." Susan agrees that Julie's "a really special girl." Zana wonders if Julie's said anything about him: "Because if she has, then I might still have a chance with her!" Susan starts looking uncomfortable. Zana: "If I come back with you, then I-I-I can make it up to her!" Susan, looking very sad and worried: "Do you know what I think? I think you were right; I think you should try to find your father first." Zana is all, "Really?" And Susan goes on: "Now that you know he's okay, you should go to him; he'll want to take care of you. That's what parents do." Get it? She's actually talking about herself and Julie here! Susan busts out her cute clutch and asks Zana how much money he thinks he'll need to get to Utah. And while I can understand and even admire Susan's desire to keep Zana away from Julie, I wonder if (a) sending him out unsupervised, to return whenever and wherever he wants, is the best way to handle it; (b) if she trusts and loves Mike so much, why not let him give him the chance to at least try out his parenting skills on Zana (or maybe Susan's worried that she'll discover that Mike's protective streak doesn't extend to include Julie?); and (c) this isn't going to endear Susan to Mike, no, not at all, and you just know he's going to find out about it eventually. So? All in all, not the greatest plan.

Lynette sneaks into P's room, steals his umbrella, and then smooshes it into the very same garbage can she buried Mr. Rat in, the resting place of so many of her secrets...

...only when the garbageman arrives to empty the can, the umbrella slides free and pops open right in the middle of the street.

And here's where this scene completely departs from plausibility: rather than wait for her son's race to finish, Bree goes ahead and opens George's gift. The race gun goes off, and the swimmers are in the pool, but Andrew keeps bringing his head up to look over at his mom and George. Bree is thrilled to discover that George has given her the missing dessert plate! Remember? The one she babbled endlessly on about back at the sex-sound dinner? It is a truly thoughtful gift, and once again, I am sorry that George is so awful because he's a good match for Bree. Bree is very happy about the plate, and she gives George a big hug. George gives Andrew a nasty look over his shoulder and starts kissing Bree's...neck? cheek? Bree tries to push George away, but George keeps on kissing her side-face region. Andrew, who has stopped swimming, looks on from the pool. Bree keeps saying, "George, George, George," and then Andrew swims over, jumps from the pool, and dives on top of George, knocking everyone in the audience asunder. Bree is screaming, everybody's screaming. ["Won't someone think of the dessert plate?!" -- Wing Chun] Finally, the swim coach comes over and drags Andrew off George. Andrew: "Did you see him? He was kissing her!" Bree says that George is bleeding. Andrew: "That FREAK was kissing her!" Bree goes to collect her things, and when she's turned away, George gives Andrew a gloating little look. I know that Bree didn't see it, but didn't anyone in the entire rest of the crowd catch that? I don't know. I'm not believing this scene at all. George was totally forcing himself on Bree! And while attacking someone isn't exactly behavior worthy of a party, it's at least understandable why a boy might jump in and punch a man who was kissing his mother against her wishes.

And it's MAVO time! "The world is filled with good fathers. How do we recognize them? They're the ones who are missed so terribly that everything falls apart in their absence." Bree looks on with arms crossed as Andrew pack his bags (placing a photo of Rex right at the top of his suitcase): he's off to reprogramming camp! Even though it really is incredible that Bree or anyone else would judge Andrew -- a boy whose father died just FOUR WEEKS AGO and then who spotted his mother being pawed unwillingly by a creepy, waxen pharmacist -- as in need of reprogramming. "They're the ones who love us long before we've even arrived." Carlos is in bed in the conjugal cubby with Gabby, and he lovingly touches his wife's belly. "They're the ones who come looking for us when we can't find our way home." Mike is out canvassing the streets with Bongo and finds one of the Zana flyers blowing in the wind. Elsewhere, Tom walks in to find Lynette crying in bed. Lynette, through the tears and much hiccupping: "Because of me, my son's imaginary friend got crushed by a garbage truck. I am the worst person in the world." MAVO: "Yes. The world is filled with good fathers..." Tom tells Lynette that P is going to get over it in no time, and that when their son grows up, P and Lynette are going to laugh and laugh about the funny lies Lynette told her son when he was little. MAVO: "And the best are the ones who make the women in their lives..." Tom tells Lynette, "I promise," and then he hugs her tight and rubs her shoulder. MAVO: "...feel like good mothers."

week: Lynette gets drunk at a company gathering and dances provocatively atop a bar!