'Rents

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Just when it looks like the Bazile-Cassidy-No-Last-Name family is starting to meld together, Cate hears about gang violence at Lux's school and deigns to yank her out of there and transfer her to Cate's alma mater Westmonte. She does this, of course, without consulting anyone, least of all Lux herself. Lux takes umbrage at this because if she wanted to be treated like furniture, she could just go back to the foster system. She spends much of the episode sulking around with no small amount of encouragement from her be-neck-tatted boyfriend Bug to abscond with her savings (and anything else she can carry for pawning purposes).

Where her savings and the items for pawning do prove useful, however, is with Baze. He's having trouble making rent payments on his bar. The payments in question are owed to his phenomenally assy father. Things reach a breaking point after Cate announces her new Mom status on-air. Listeners on this Very Special Broadcast (in which Ryan takes it upon himself to announce the Baze-y Daddy) include Cate's sister and Pa Bazile's secretary. PB makes a unilateral decision that Baze is bringing over his new family for a tense and ill-fated dinner or else he's repo-ing the bar.

So the scene is set with Cate, Baze, and Lux already engaged in a power struggle. Now throw in Cate's boxed wino mom, her obliviously obnoxious shrink sister, Baze's silently judgy mother, and his aforementioned colossal prick of a dad. And what does that spell? Magic! Or the worst dinner party in the history of man, from insult A to insult Z. Some of the highlights: Baze and his dad have a Great Santini moment, Lux disowns the entire family, Cate calls her mom a drunk, and Lux rides off into the night on the back of Bug's hog.

In the end, Baze helps Cate realize that she should be looking through the eyes of Lux, so to speak. Instead of them forcing their disjointed lifestyles on Lux, they should try to find a way to fit into her life. And, in an unexpected twist, Lux doesn't ride on the back of Bug's bike all the way to Reno or Guadalajara or wherever the kids are going these days. She actually decides to stick it out, using her own money and some acquired from her new rich dupes… um, I mean friends from Westmonte to bail out Baze so his dad doesn't have to. She is rewarded when her worlds finally mingle. She brings Cate and Baze to Bug's enviably well-manicured rooftop, and the whole family (both new and old) has a good, old-fashioned weenie roast. And can't nobody be unhappy when there are hot weiners around. No sirree, Bob.

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Previously: Lux was a bastard child of two 16-year-olds named Cate and Baze. While Lux pinged around the foster system for 15 years and change, Cate and Baze spent that time mastering their own self-involvement, getting engaged to their coworkers (Cate), opening a bar (Baze), and perfecting their respective demeanors of uptight and overly relaxed. (Lux takes after Cate.) Lux re-entered the lovable cads' lives, bringing along with her a whole slew of issues and, oh boy, will there be plenty of time to sort out those issues. Lux has been returned to sender, courtesy of the Oregon state family court system.

Good morning, Portland! Lux and Baze have settled nicely into their getting-Lux-to-school routine as he hands her a coffee with two sugars, and she hands him a lightly toasted blueberry waffle. Meanwhile, Cate and Ryan remind their listeners that Cate has taken on the role of Mom. Baze and Lux are listening, which prompts Baze to wonder if people will start calling him Dad. Then he realizes that would take a lot more responsibility, sternness, and, apparently, hair. Back on the air, Cate thanks her listeners for being surprisingly supportive. Baze pulls up to school just as Lux's flame-headed friend Tasha is being harassed by some hoodlums. He offers to walk the girls up, but they say they can handle themselves. Then the bell rings, and yet more hoodlums make a run for it, followed by an armed guard. Baze looks on speechless as the girls make their way inside.

Meanwhile, Cate asks her audience, "It's parenting, how hard can it be? I mean, every dummy is doing it." Ryan takes a call, who lights into Cate for not revealing her dirty little 16-year-old secret sooner. Turns out, it's Cate's sister Abbie. She wonders if Cate's told their mom yet. Cate sidesteps that question, so Abbie turns to the paternity of the darling little bastard. It seems Cate led her to believe she got knocked up by the school mascot. Ryan spills that it was Baze, and Abbie is shocked to realize that Cate had sex with her high school crush. Abbie is a split-second away from going ballistic when Cate cuts to commercial. Ryan snarks that Abbie -- who may be even more high-strung than Cate if such a thing is possible -- is actually a therapist. He calls Cate out for hooking up with her sister's crush, but Cate points out that everyone had a crush on Baze. He was the quintessential popular quarterback, after all. Cate takes issue with her sister calling her on-air and taking her to task for being a selfish parent. She says she hasn't had a chance to prove herself since she's only had Lux a week. As she talks, Ryan gets an alert that Lux's high school has been locked down due to gang violence. Ryan covers for Cate as she runs out of the station.

Across town, Lux is shooting soda into her mouth direct from the fountain. Cate calls her cell phone, relieved that she's safe. Lux acts all nonchalant, says stuff like this happens all the time... just usually with less blood. Not a comfort, Lux! As Lux talks on the phone, a man enters the bar. She tells him they're closed, but he keeps heading in. She and Cate hang up briefly, wherein Cate approaches the principal at her own former high school, Westmonte. Even though Cate was valedictorian in '94, the principle only remembers her as "Abbie's sister." Ouch. Cate wants to talk to her about enrolling a new student (Lux, presumably) to start the day. The principal welcomes her in. Meanwhile, Lux has an unnecessarily vague exchange with the strange man. He's looking for Baze. Baze isn't in. The man leaves. On the way out the door, he says he's Baze's father. Lux looks stressed.

Elsewhere, Baze is wolfing down food at his parents' house while his mother folds the laundry. She says she hears Baze's dad, and Baze literally rips the half-folded jeans out of his mom's hands in an effort to bolt. Alas, he fails to make his exit before his father enters the room. Baze's dad asks if there's anything Baze might want to tell them about. Baze hems and haws about how he's late on the rent, but dad zeroes in on the Lux-colored elephant in the room. He says his secretary caught Cate's radio show this morning. This is news to Baze's mom, too. Did I mention Baze's dad has popped a beer. I'm assuming it's still about 9 AM. Nice. So Baze fills the 'rents in on the details. Then dad asks whether Baze even knew Cate was pregnant. He lies that he didn't. Then he tries to lighten the mood by reminding them they always said they wanted grandkids. Dad laughs, but it's less "I'm laughing because that joke was funny" and more "I'm laughing because your life is the joke, ya fuck-up!" He says Baze can't even pay rent, so how can he raise a child. Baze says he'll figure it out. Dad demands Lux and Cate join the whole Bazile family for dinner the night. Baze says he's not into that idea, but dad says Baze no longer has the privilege of having an opinion. He's certain he'll have to bail him out like he has with everything else, including the bar. By this point, Baze has lost most of his fight. Then dad issues the knock-out judgment: "Here's a fact: You act like a kid, we'll treat you like one." Then he says he'll take back the bar if Baze doesn't show up to family with his illegitimate daughter and the bitch he knocked up in tow. Man, this dude seriously took "Prick Acting 101." He's a pro! Not a pro? These crappy new credits. It's like how somewhere in Season 3 or 4 of Felicity they replaced the awesome opening song with that crappy emo rock one. Except this show never even had the awesome breathy title song. Just this sad little guitar-plucking song about a "beautiful tree." Note to The CW, I think we'll take silence.

Cate arrives home that night, and Lux is pissed to find out that she's transferring to Westmonte. She mainly doesn't want to leave Tasha, that ring-thievin' hag. Lux feels some responsibility to make sure Tasha stays in school, even though that hussy was happy to drop out and live the life of a crack denizen with her grotty boyfriend about ten seconds before. Cate insists she's just doing what's best for Lux. Lux continues to bitch about how she'll never see Tasha now that they're across town from one another. So Cate pulls out a spiffy new phone all wrapped up pretty in a bow. Lux says Tasha can only talk on the pay phone at Sunnyvale, so it won't be much use. Cate cops to her actual motive -- so Lux can stay in touch with her. She's plugged in Ryan and Baze's numbers for good measure, too. Lux warily takes the gift and sulks up to her room. Cate's phone chimes. In record time, it's her first text from Lux: "I don't want to go to Westmonte." And grateful, too!

The morning, Lux has dusted off her ragamuffin-y best outfit (seriously, do you need this much knit?) for her first day at the new school. An emo retool of "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" plays as Baze and Math give Lux a tour of the amazingly posh facilities, where Math apparently works (teaching Spanish, I bet). Lux rolls her eyes at all of the preps she passes in the sparkling hallway. Then she sees the trophy case and gets a glimpse of QB Baze just months before his sperm found a home in Cate's uterus. As you might expect, things were less pleasant for Math back in the day. While Baze was scoring the winning touchdown, Math was getting bullied. Lux goes to get her schedule, and Baze turns from reminiscing to stressing about his dad's ultimatum. Math tells him to do something to fix things, and Baze snarks back that he'll just pull out the DeLorean and the condoms and head back to the '90s. Math gives him a pep talk in earnest. He tells Baze to give his father a reason to be proud of him. He's sure that, if Baze takes Lux and Cate over and shows his father how he's getting his life together, dad will cut him some slack.

Moments later, Baze has gone. Math offers to stick with Lux a little longer. She claims she's fine, but her face says otherwise when she turns around to behold the prissy princess (wearing pink and purple! actual colors found outside of the gutter! the horror!) at the lunch table. She bucks up, sits down, and tries to talk to them. She takes a calculated risk, asking them if they're going to "that party." They go for it, talking about getting a birthday gift some kid named Jones. Lux pushes it by trying to give them advice on this tough cookie named Jones. They point-blank ask if Lux knows Jones, and she deflects, saying she thinks she's met one of them before. She tosses out some random places all teens go (movie theater, bowling alley, ice rink) before the girl skeptically says she used to take skating lessons. Another girl chimes in that she used to take skating lessons, too, and cocky Lux is all, "You weren't there." Ha! Lux says she's been off at boarding school at California, but she got kicked out after she got caught doing it with her boyfriend on the lab table. The skating girl is practically salivating, but the one that Lux blew off tells her to buzz off with her life story. She summons the other girl, and they leave. The skating girl stays behind and assures Lux that the other girl is a bit of a bitch before offering Lux one of her chips. Well then... she didn't exactly tell Lux to wear pink on Wednesday, but it's a start.

That afternoon, as Cate waits to pick up Lux at school, her phone rings. It's Baze, and he's pretty much frantic by now that he hasn't been able to get in touch with her all day. She's all, "Welcome to my world." In any case, they're both at school to pick up Lux, and they're both getting mighty territorial. Baze demands Cate and Lux come to dinner at his parents' house. She snaps that he didn't give her enough notice, and she's planned a dinner with Lux and Ryan. He shoots back to ask why Cate took Lux out of her old school and brought her here, and Cate says to get her away from criminals and gang members. She points to some dude riding up on a motorcycle: "People like that." As anyone could have seen coming a mile away, it's Lux's boyfriend. She walks up to him, and they start making out. Cate smacks Baze out of his stupor, and they march over to break it up. Cate goes from zero to screech in about 0.2 seconds, while Baze adopts his best stern father tone. Lux sniffs that they were just hanging out. Baze shoots back, "That's what you call 'hanging out?' Letting some random guy suffocate you with his mouth?" Heh. Lux says it's not a random guy, and Cate realizes that this is Bug the boyfriend she's heard at least a little bit about. Baze gets all Uncle Buck on Cate, noting that a boyfriend named Bug should have raised some concerns. Lux reiterates that no one needs to be concerned about her hanging out with her boyfriend. Furthermore, she has her own plans to have dinner with him. Cate nixes that in favor of her own dinner. Baze barely gets a whimper in about his own mandatory dinner before Cate starts yapping about being "knee-deep in ingredients" and yanking Lux into her car. As she drags Lux off, Baze asks what he should do about dinner with his parents. Cate snarks he can take Bug.

Back at the house, Cate frenziedly runs after Lux, who is dragging Bug into the attic just ask Cate dragged her away from school. Before Cate can stop them, Lux has shut the pull-up door and snapped up the cord. All Ryan can do is stand in the swirl of dust asking, "Did that guy have a spider web on his neck?" Awesome. Seconds later, Baze charges in. He and Ryan exchange a look that is equal parts trying-to-be-manly and flummoxed.

Upstairs, Bug says Cate is really overbearing, and that's not how Lux's new life was supposed to be. He says she's gotten to know her parents, and maybe that's enough. In the breath, he reminds of a plan she tentatively made to go down to Mexico with him, Tasha, and Tasha's boyfriend whose name I can't be bothered to remember. Lux laughs it off because none of them speak Spanish. Bug says they can go anywhere and hide out until she's 18. She's impressed he would leave Portland for her, but she wonders how four of them could possibly live on her life savings. Bug says he and the other boyfriend have some ways to make money, plus they can pawn stuff from Cate's house to make ends meet. You notice how all of this rests on Lux's shoulders, more specifically on stealing shit from the family that just took her in? Why does the youngest, and arguably most naive, of the four of them have to pay the way? I call bullshit. And so does Lux when Bug suggests they pawn the bong lamp that Baze gave her. She says that one actually means something to her. Bug gets back to the subject at hand. He says he wants to do whatever it takes for them to be together. Lux says they already are together. They kiss and start taking off clothes.

Downstairs, Baze wonders what he has to do to convince Cate to come to his parents' house. She says she's already made up her mind and wouldn't want to go to dinner with judgmental, elitist, uptight people like the Baziles. Baze points out that she is exactly like them and half-jokingly asks how Ryan puts up with her. Noticing that it's his turn to speak, Ryan asks if something is burning. Cate turns to the oven and freaks as she pulls out a smoking pan. Baze nearly thinks he's won, but Cate tells him she's still not going. He finally comes clean that his dad has threatened to pull the bar because he thinks they can't handle raising a kid. Cate takes major offense that his parents have already passed judgment on her without meeting her. Oh, it's on! As icing on the cake, Ryan plays mediator, telling Cate she should go. His reasons are threefold: 1.) Prove Baze's parents wrong by showing them how responsible she is; 2.) Prove Baze's parents right by showing them that he is, therefore, less responsible but she still can handle it, and 3.) Get Lux, Bug, and their hormones out of the Attic of Iniquity. Not all that much iniquity, though, as Lux and Bug both still have their shirts on when the guys scream up for Lux to come down so they can leave for dinner. She asks if she can bring Bug. All together now: "No!"

Some time later, The Odd Trio are all prettied up as they arrive at the Baziles' home. Lux is annoyed she couldn't bring Bug, but Cate says that's not the best first impression to leave. Lux snarks that Cate's overly formal prom (and, might I add, Rachel Zoe Lite fur shoulder shawl) dress isn't working, either. But it's too late to change as Baze's parents meet the gang out on the driveway. Mrs. Bazile greets Lux with open arms (and visible bra, whoa sexy grandma sweater!). Mr. Bazile stands back like a pompous prick. Just as Baze introduces Cate to his mom, they hear tires squeak in the background. Pan across the driveway to find Cate's sister Abbie and her mom running up the drive -- wine box in hand! Now those are my kind of dinner guests. Lux, not so much. Even the street urchin finds these people a little déclassé. Needles to say, Cate is mortified. Commercials.

We return to the family meet-and-greet. As the Baziles take Lux inside, Cate bitch-faces at her mom and sister about why they're there. Abbie wastes not a moment before trying to create sparks with Baze. Except he doesn't even remember her name. Heh. Clearly stressed, he starts inside hoping the ladies will follow. Nope! Cate's mom takes her aside to say how relieved she is that Cate lost her virginity to the QB instead of the mascot. Methinks the Baziles should pull up a chair for Cate's mortification. It ain't going nowheres. Cate zips up her mother's jacket and asks her to tone it down just for one night. Mom huffs her box of white zin into the house as Abbie snits at Cate for sleeping with Baze behind her back. What about that whole "he just thought your name was Annie?" thing, asks Cate. "He was being discreet," insists Abbie. Uh huh.

Once everyone's inside, Baze tries to play up Cate's success with her job. Ideally, this would prompt Lux to tell the Baziles how she listened to Cate all her life before finding out that Cate was actually her mother. But Lux is not in a "plays well with others" kind of mood tonight, so she shrugs off the cue. Cate's mom either got a head start on the box o' wine before dinner or is a cheap date. Either way she laughs about how she never listens to Cate before she gets a little handsy with Lux. Baze's mom says she prefers radio shows with a stronger moral fiber. Abbie tries to be a team player by asking Baze about the bar, but it only gives his dad an opening to shit talk his own son in front of the whole extended family. Good times. Baze changes the subject, saying Lux transferred to Westmonte. Mrs. Bazile asks if Lux has made some new friends, and Lux continues to be a real peach by saying that she already had friends, and Cate is keeping her from seeing them.

At which point Baze takes Cate and Lux to another room for a family powwow. Seriously, he has them huddle. He tells them to save the cat fights for later, but Cate feels like she's the put-upon one. She asks what she did. Lux launches into her ready-made rant about how her social life was just dandy before (minus the homelessness and friend who would steal from you without thinking twice) and that, after a life spent in foster homes where no one cared about what she thought, she hoped her real family would give her opinions some consideration. Instead of telling her to tamp the brat factor down and shut the eff up for another two hours, Cate listens. So Lux twists the knife further. She says she's not going to sit quietly and pretend that these strangers are her family because "they're not." Then she adds, "You're not." Lux concludes her dramatic monologue by turning around to walk out. At which point she discovers that everyone in the house has heard her little hissy fit. Way to go, punk.

And yet they still have dinner! Many awkward glasses of wine later, Abbie takes it upon her therapist self to stage an intervention. Rule No. 1 of an intervention: We don't come from a place of judgment, we come from a place of love. Abbie interprets this rule to mean that it's perfectly okay to call Cate and Baze morons. Mrs. Bazile steps in with a gentler touch, saying the families have some concerns. Cate's mom chips in that they're not ready to be parents. And her wine glass is literally filled to the brim. Amazing. Cate throws it in her mom's face that she's a drunk who's been married four times. Mr. Bazile throws dirt onto the pile with his officiousness and judgy wudginess, driving Lux to a blatant and desperate attempt to extract herself from the table by offering to get some water. And I quote, "You can never over hydrate!" Then she runs out. So they all go back and forth for a while about how ill-suited Cate and Baze are suited to parenting. Somewhere along the way Cate's mom generously offers to help out with Lux, and things gets personal when Mrs. Bazile insinuates -- then outright says -- Cate's mom was a shitty parent. Cate jumps to her mom's defense by pointing out that the Baziles produced Baze. In his greatest moment of self-delusion yet, Mr. Bazile self-importantly proclaims that he and his are the only people in the room qualified to be parents. He starts rattling off why everyone in the room besides him sucks, hitting the pinnacle by accusing Cate of not telling Baze she was pregnant. She looks at Baze with hurt in her eyes, and he comes clean that he actually knew.

Not content to leave his son down in the dirt, Mr. Bazile takes this as proof Baze didn't actually grow up and announces he's taking the bar. Baze finally lets out 32 years of building resentment. He dresses his dad down for never believing him. He says he lied 16 years ago, and he lied yesterday, because he was scared and didn't want to disappoint his dad. Now he knows there was never another option. He says the only reason he came to this forsaken dinner was to regain his only means of supporting his child, which is what dad's do -- except Mr. Bazile never supported him. Mr. Bazile shoots back that he supported Baze every day of his life, but Baze says he didn't do it in the one way he needed. He supported him financially but most of the time just made him feel worthless. Oooooh, and then he gets riled up. He rips off his (clip-on) tie and undoes his top button. He says that he wanted to become a dad to Lux because he didn't want to turn his back on her -- "the way that you..." He trails off. So his dad starts barking at him all the accusations that he totally knows he deserves but figures if he says them meanly enough they'll just sound like Baze is whining. He really gets off on it, but his tirade is interrupted when Cate hears the roar of a motorcycle in the driveway. She and Baze run off, leaving the two families to share a delightful dessert service.

Moments later, it's green screen mania as Baze and Cate drive around looking for Lux. They laugh that the attic was probably the better option compared to this shit show. Cate gets serious, saying screw their parents for raising them so poorly that they ended up all damaged and bad parent-y. She realizes she should have talked to Baze before transferring Lux. She had good intentions, but trying to make things better for Lux has only seemed to make them worse. Baze tells Cate to try to see things from her perspective. As much as they didn't like her school or friends, that was her life, her family. They need to stop trying to force their lives on her and start figuring out where they can fit in hers.

Back at Cate's, Lux and Bug are in the attic packing her things. She thinks it might actually be worse that her real parents have treated her like she was expendable. At least with foster parents, that's what she'd come to expect. Bug gives her some justification booshit about how they're the lucky ones and she's doing the right thing, mainly so he can get his hands on her savings and her cooter once they're far, far away. She tells him he should go before Cate gets home but to pick her up in the morning where they can sneak off toward the horizon.

The morning, Lux meets up with the pastel girl from school on the farce that she's found the perfect birthday gift for Jones. She pulls out Baze's bong lamp and makes up some story about how it was Jerry Garcia's, so it's a collector's item worth $1,000. She says she'll cut the girl a deal and sells it to her for $200. Au revoir, fair bong lamp. We hardly knew ye!

A bit later, Bug and Lux turn up to the Baziles abode as Mr. Bazile is leaving for work in his high-end car. Lux hands him an envelope with $3,200 -- the amount Baze owed him for the bar. Oh! Quite the red herring there, old Lux-y... Mr. Bazile snarks that she probably robbed a bank to get the money. She returns, "I'm no expert on parents, but I always thought they just wanted their kids to be happy." I would have gone with a more straightforward, "You're a colossal dickhead, sir." But I guess that's just my style. Mr. Bazile claims he does want Baze to be happy. Lux turns around and calls his crap, saying he really wants Baze to be him and the only reason he stopped believing in Baze was because he finally realized that he hadn't created an exact replica of himself. She finishes by saying that, even though she's only known Baze for a few weeks, she knows he's twice the dad that Mr. Bazile is.

After that, Mr. Bazile heads over to the bar. Baze walks in and finds him. He sees him scoping out the place and cuts short his presumed gloating. Then Mr. Bazile says Lux brought over the money he owed him and that he must really trust her to give her that much money. In shock, Baze lets his dad believe that it was his money all along. Mr. Bazile says Baze can keep the bar as long as he keeps current with the rent. He adds that Lux is welcome by the manse any time she wants.

Over at Cate's, Cate comes into Lux's room to apologize for being an overbearing, sucky mom. She promises that all decisions from here on out will be made as a family, with Ryan and Baze, too. Lux acknowledges she hasn't been all that great of a kid, either. Cate proposes they have another family dinner, only this time with Lux's "family" (Tasha, Bug, the other one). She'll even order in to avoid disaster! Lux says she has a better idea. She takes them to the roof of Bug's apartment, where she was planning on living. Baze takes Lux aside for a moment and tells her he's going to pay her back because it's not her job to take care of him. She says, to the contrary, she was just supporting him. Parents do it, so kids can too. They agree on that, and Lux pulls Cate in to formally introduce them as her parents to her hobo family. Everyone hugs and smiles and admires spider web neck tats and roasts weiners. As you do.

week: Cate finds one of Lux's old letters to Santa in which she asked for a mom and dad. And it seems that was the only thing in the episode worth noting. Um, okay?

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