Warning: There will be no goddamn nudity this week.
Prevously, on Blue, Lt. Abner (Baldwin's old boss) told Fancy that he didn't think Baldwin "was ready to look out at the world through [his] window." Fancy didn't really know what that meant either.
Fancy walks into a noisy (but not too gritty) NYC coffee shop. He walks over to the booth where Lt. Abner is sitting and says, "Morning." Lt. Abner looks up and says, "When are you ever going to call me 'Joe'?" Fancy sits down with a small smile and says, "I used to when we were cops." Lt. Abner says, "Well, when are you going to call me 'Joe' again?" Fancy smiles and says "Joe." Lt. Abner holds up his coffee and says, "Joe. Coffee. Joe." Sure, and that's a napkin holder, and over there is silverware. Fancy starts to look perturbed, but Lt. Abner continues speaking. "Got your messages. I had to get things settled in my head It's the uncertainty that draws you in...the unclarity." Fancy shakes his head to get rid of the "unclarity" and says, as lightly as possible, "You're talking to a country boy, Joe. You need to talk down to me...make sure I get your meaning." Translation: What the hell are you talking about? Lt. Abner continues being super-obtuse: "Our differences are a product of our sameness. I only called you a go-along-to-get-along-Negro because of them." Fancy takes a deep breath and comes out with it: "I'm worried about you. What are your plans? Your intentions?" And are you nuttier than or as nutty as a fruitcake? Lt. Abner says, "I filed my retirement papers yesterday. I'm going to take a vacation. Trinidad, Tobago." Fancy looks at him real hard until Lt. Abner says, "You want to see my flight number?" Fancy shoots back, "You got it?" Lt. Abner throws some money on the table and prepares to leave: "Tell Baldwin goodbye for me. Tell him he's in good hands. You'll convey my message for me?" Fancy's still sitting there, completely bamboozled: "Yeah, I'll tell him. Be well." Lt. Abner says, "Take care." YOU take care, Lt. Abner!
Woosh! That's the subway/credits/theme song roaring toward you. Bloosh! That's a noise I made up that sounds like a subway if a keyboard had a subway sound programmed into it.
Right off the bat, we see a dead body lying on the floor in as bar. It seems like a cool bar, though. I'd go on nights when dead bodies aren't there. Sip cruises in and says, "I'll see if they've got Jerry Vale on the jukebox." Whoa. I'VE never even heard of Jerry Vale! Who the hell is Jerry Vale? Sip, I beg you, get into the seventies, at LEAST. This fifties shit is killing me. We learn that the DOA is Patrick Muldoon ["not the one who's dating Denise Richards and used to be on Melrose Place, I assume" -- Wing Chun] (Happy belated St. Paddy's Day, everyone!) and his name, along with that of David Lorenz, is on the liquor license. Ricky hands the gun to a uniformed cop for processing, and Sip charges over to the sap who found the body. He's a grizzled-looking bartender in a red vest, cleaning bottles. The guy is totally expressionless and uncommunicative until Sip raises his voice and threatens to bring him downtown to get his Ghouliani on. The bartender snaps, "At present I am minding my own business! There's my other boss -- ask him." Sip shoots the bartender an evil look and goes to talk to the other boss, who's sunk into a chair, stunned at seeing his partner dead on the floor: "Oh, Jesus. That's my partner, dead on the floor." See? "He had such zest. Your loss, not knowing Pat." Um, okay.
Ricky is talking to two waitresses in boob-enhancing costumes the St. Pauli girl would kill to get her, um, hands on. One booby-waitress describes her now-dead boss as being "a great guy, for a maniac." Ricky, good cop to the hilt, says "Whoa, give me an image. You mean like hangliding?" The other booby-waitress says, "Maybe some bimbo had a grip on his parachute...or something else." Now there's an image. Medavoy comes out of the office with Pat's "black book...there's a lot of female names in there." Wow, a whorish bar owner -- I never! David suggests they look for an Angela Zorelli in there; she formerly went out with Dino the Rat. Ricky tells Sip, sotto voce, "The DOA banged everything that moved," and David rushes to deny it: "He just had enormous zest." I didn't know "zest" was synonymous with "lust." Sip asks that they bring in the "ball-breaking bartender, just to ruin his morning." Nice. As all the Blue cops leave, Ricky catches a uniform getting the digits from a third booby-waitress, and busts his gig with, "Your wife called, she needs you to bring home milk for the baby." The booby-waitress rolls her eyes. You are not alone, honey. Men! They see some boobs and go nuts.
Di and Kirky stride into a hospital and find a doctor to lead them to Shanice, who says she was raped. The doctor is all stern and concerned as she tells the very battered-looking Shanice, "You ready to talk to them?" Shanice is all fired up as she holds out her arm and says, "I wrote his name on my arm in case he killed me: Paul!" Di turns to the doctor and says, "You know that if you stay here you could be called as a witness." The doctor looks even more stern then before as she says, "I just want to make sure Shanice isn't shamed or intimidated." Shanice says, "I want it to be known. He raped me. He beat me. He chained me to a radiator all night." Di asks, "Did you know Paul?" The doctor leaps in: "What does her having a prior relationship with the perpetrator have to do with her being raped now?" Di, losing patience, says, "Nothing, Doc! Just like your prior relationship with cops doesn't excuse you from interfering with our work now." Kirky gets Paul's number from Shanice and says, "We're gonna check him out." Shanice, practically freaking, asks, "Does that mean you're going to wait on talking to Paul?" Di shoots her a look like, I've had enough of people telling me what to do, and says no. Shanice says, all wrathful, "And if he resists arrest and you have to bust his nose, that's okay too." Di and Kirky do a slight double take, say okay and leave. One nose-busting, coming right up.
Back at the stationhouse, Di and Kirky walk into Fancy's office with the info on their rape case. Kirky says, "She could have been raped. Her kit was positive and she had a hell of a shiner." Di, still fussy, says, "It was hard to get a read on it with her doctor running interference." Then they say that they think Greg and Baldwin should interview Paul the Rapist as well. Okay!
In front of John's desk, the reticent bartender is cooling his heels. Fancy tells Greg and Baldwin about their upcoming rape interview, and Sip asks how the bartender's doing. Greg calls him "sulky." Sip goes, "Sulky, huh?" Ricky, ever sarcastic (and we love him for it), goes, "Don't most people come in here doing cartwheels and carrying on?" Hee! Then Fancy corrals Baldwin and drags him off to speak to him privately. Ooh!
Fancy, super-serious, says, "I want you to call Joe Abner. He said he's going to take a vacation." Baldwin says, "The last time he was in here it seemed like he could use one." Fancy couldn't look more concerned as he continues with, "He said 'bye,'" and Baldwin says, "Say 'bye' back." Don't you get it, Baldwin? Things are bad! Fancy says patiently, "Call him. Keep him talking. See how he seems." Baldwin just stands there like a huge, attractive man until Fancy says, "Do it now," and Baldwin hops to it.
I am so SICK of those VW ads with the Nick Drake song. It's selling a CAR, not a mood. What's , a freaking Valium ad with a Belle and Sebastian song? If so, please kill me now.
Ricky and Sip are interviewing the Reticent Bartender. He says that Pat, the DOA, "liked to chase tail," and that he "witnessed Pat and Angela doing it on top of the bar." Lovely! Then he asks if Dino "The Rat" could be covered from reaching out to whack Pat since he's already plea-bargained a sentence. Ricky says that plea-bargain just covers crimes already committed, not new crimes. The reticent bartender suggests they look at Dino, the "cheese-eating scumbag." See? It's good to open up!
Baldwin is calling Lt. Abner's house, with Fancy perched on his desk awaiting results. Baldwin hangs up without having spoken to anyone. Fancy says, "I know he has a machine, I've left messages." Baldwin goes, "Yeah, and if he has a dog, it's driving him crazy." Well, if he has a dog, you should TALK TO IT! That's what machines are for! All my friends leave my dog little messages when they call. For all I know, when I'm out he calls them back! It's like driving by a bunch of cows; if you don't stick your head out the window and yell "moo" at them, you probably don't have a pulse. So, say "woof" or "good doggie" then time you're calling someone who lives with a dog. I bet David Milch loves dogs. Anyways, Fancy says he's gong to go by Lt. Abner's house to check on him.
Paul (the Rapist) comes into the station house. He leans on John's desk (and John is rocking a totally excellent orange turtleneck) and says something about getting a call because his car was in an accident. Di and Kirky roll up and he tells them TWICE that he knows his car wasn't in any accident. I bet he doesn't need to buy any real estate in Florida either, but don't let that stop anyone from trying! Paul falls for things. So Di and Kirky lead him to an interrogation room to start busting his nose.
Once inside the interrogation room, Di and Kirky drop the bomb that there is in fact nothing wrong with Paul's car, and, that the land deed he holds is a fake. It's about Shanice. Paul starts groaning, "Oh hell. That bitch is lucky I'm not filing a complaint about her stealing my neck chain." Di loses it and screams, "Try not calling her a bitch Paul. It makes us think you've got anger toward women." Yeah! Paul clams up and says, "I wanna talk to men detectives." Di snorts and Kirky tells her to take it easy. Di says, "I don't have to listen to that crap." You said it! Then Paul says that not only does he want to talk to a male detective, he wants to talk to an African-American. Di snorts again and says, "Oh, he only talks to a brother." Kirky just says, "We'll see," and they leave Paul to hang out with the big chip on his shoulder.
Ricky and Sip are hanging out with Angela, or She Who Gets Banged on Top of a Bar. She's drinking Naya. ["Hey, that water's Canadian. And I'm Canadian. Shout-out?" -- Wing Chun] Don't you want to drink what Angela drinks? She's saying she was "Home. All night," and Sip says he knows Pat "threw a hump into [her] on top of the bar." Ricky suggests that Dino may have pushed to button on Pat, and Sip chimes in that Angela, what with her "throwing humps into [Pat] in quasi-public places" might have given Dino reason to reach out from jail. Angela drinks her water with her pinky fully extended (classy! Especially while wearing knee-high boots) and says, "Well, with him ratting everyone out, who's gonna answer a button he pushed? Do not throw any more despair into that man. The Dino of today is not the Dino of the past. I visit him every two weeks. He doesn't even ask to see my tits anymore!" Ricky makes a face, and so do I. This episode is laden with boobies. Mary, are you out there?
As Sip and Ricky exit the interrogation room, Sip starts ranting about the case. "We're never gonna solve the homicide -- just interview one character after another who's been screwed up by that asshole, Pat. This is one case where the true perpetrator is the DOA." Ricky mentions that Dino must be nuts to "turn down a look at [Angela's] tits." Way to be lame, Ricky. Don't you see enough of Mary's tits? Hell, we ALL do.
Greg and Baldwin go to have a chat with Paul. Paul gives Baldwin a pound but disses Greg with a weak handshake. I hate Paul. Paul goes on to say that he did not rape Shanice, because he's "been hitting that thing for three months." Greg casually asks how Shanice got that black eye. Oh, "That was on account of her stealing my neck chain. That's got my St. Christopher on it. My moms gave me that." Greg calmly says, "So you hit her to get it back?" Paul says that after he and Shanice did it, he broke up with her and she went "psycho," so he had to beat her off himself. He cuffed her -- his brother is a corrections officer -- and left her a "warm blanket, some water, and a cup to pee in." Then, first thing in the morning, he let her free. Oh, well, that makes sense, if you're a huge asshole. Baldwin swallows his bile and says there's still these rape charges. THEN, as if Paul wasn't repulsive enough, he says he has PROOF he didn't rape Shanice. A tape. He tapes himself having sex! He's got a whole rig set up in his closet. Why? To "protect myself. Look at what happened to Tyson! Bitches come after your nest egg." RIGHT -- men don't commit crimes against women, and all us women are scheming, plotting bitches trying to sabotage men. Oh, I hate Paul. So, his brother can get the tape down here. Baldwin says, "Give him a call," and Paul , not missing a beat, says, "Give me the horn." Baldwin looks at Paul like, I hate you. Yay Baldwin.
The super lets Fancy into Lt. Abner's apartment. He goes down the hall. Nothing. Nothing in the bedroom either. He pokes his head into the bathroom, and there's Lt. Abner, lying in the tub. He's shot himself. Fancy checks for a pulse, finds none, and slumps against the wall, devastated.
Oh boy, Billy Crystal is hosting the Oscars, again. I'm really looking forward to the musical parody of Boys Don't Cry. Hint: Use The Cure song!
Dino (the Rat) is waiting to be interviewed. He looks really familiar -- Hey! It's That Guy! From Scorsese movies, I think. Anyways, Ricky and Sip introduce themselves to him and he dully says, 'Delighted." They say, "We'll talk down here," and he goes, "Swell." Dino's bummed.
In the room, Dino asks, "Is it hot in here? It very well could be me. Upstate you freeze your balls off." Sip asks if he's been busy testifying and Dino says, "Endless." Sip goes, "Well, you're such an eloquent witness," and Dino takes offense: "What do you mean? Where are you going with that?" Sip saves himself by saying, "We don't got twelve grades between us, but when I say 'eloquent' I mean 'John Kennedy.'" Dino goes, "Oh -- what you can do for your country," and is soothed. Yeah, he hung out at Pat's bar, "with a certain someone." "Who?" "WHY?" Oy. Ricky asks, "You got a policy on Angela fraternizing?" Dino does not. "No feelings about that?" Dino gets into eloquent mode and says, "Do I look like stone? Do I look like a Greek statue? I'm also going through a real down time with my relationship abilities...I think it has something to do with what they're feeding me upstate. The Dino you may have heard about is not the Dino before you know." Ricky goes, "Who is?"
Sip and Ricky leave the interrogation room, no closer to solving the case than they were before. Ricky says Dino is "completely unrelated" to the murder. Sip adds, "In a deep depression too." Ricky tells Dino's guards that they "should cut out the saltpeter they're feeding him upstate." Sure, a prison full of horny mobsters is just what we all need.
In the coffee room, Baldwin hands over a videotape to Di and Kirky: "Paul's brother thinks he's an asshole too. When he gave me the tape he said, 'What trouble is my brother in now?' He doesn't even know what's on the tape." Kirky says, "We don't know what's on the tape either, Baldwin." So they pop it in and start watching. What, no popcorn? The tape begins with Shanice talking and Paul looking into his open closet door with a smirk. Shanice is mad because Paul forgot to pick her up some wine coolers. But she giggles and takes her shirt off and lies down on the bed anyway. Paul lowers himself on top of her, and Baldwin leaves the room. Kirky says, "Hard to call that resistance," and she and Di continue to watch.
Greg comes over to Baldwin and asks about the video. The screening is in half an hour, Greg, keep your pants on. Baldwin looks super-uncomfortable, and Greg asks if he wants to wait until "the girls are done watching" before they watch. Oh no, let's all watch the amateur porn together! After work maybe you and the girls would like to come over and watch the Pamela and Tommy Lee video? Baldwin explodes: "I'd be more comfortable not watching white people watch black people have sex!" Why, do you not want to give away any trade secrets or something? Are you working on a video of your own? Please say yes. Then he says, "That may be a personal problem I need to work out on my own." Greg just takes this in and says, "I wonder where the boss is?"
A lady with curly blonde hair walks in. She's worried about her husband, David Lorenz. She thinks he may be in danger. The danger? She's about to rat him out to the cops. Sip and Ricky take her over to their desk and she basically comes out with it: Her husband found phone records of her and Pat calling each other when David wasn't around, and he concluded that they were having an affair. She's crying as she says, "He had a gun! It's my fault. I broke his heart! He was so sorrowful that Pat had died...it's my only hope that David didn't BOO HOO HOO!" I am REALLY not liking how this episode is turning out. The difference between men and women's sexuality is inadvertently to blame for both these crimes! Goddammit. Sip leaves (in disgust?) and Ricky says, "Thanks." The lady continues burying her husband and says stupidly, "He really was so sorrowful...isn't that a reason for cautious optimism?"
Ricky goes to join Sip in the locker room for this week's Ally McBeal segment. Sip is ranting, "That woman wouldn't know the truth if it jumped out of a mailbox at her. Selfish bastard, this Pat. Charm only lasts a while, then you're revealed for the selfish drunken bastard that you ARE!" At that Sip points at himself in the mirror. He identifies with a lot of rats, doesn't he?
Di and Kirky are talking to Shanice. The case doesn't look good because she lied about being raped. Shanice is angry, and says, "He gave me that neck chain, and he gave me this black eye getting over on me. No tape is gonna show different. I wanna see this tape." Kirky says that will only upset her. Shanice is like, "You've seen it?" Um, yeah, the whole OFFICE has. Hope that's okay. No DA will prosecute because of what's on the tape. Kirky adds, "But that doesn't mean we don't have sympathy to your situation." Shanice finally gets it and says, "Maybe because it happened to me means it doesn't matter to you." Ouch.
As Shanice leaves the office, she pauses to look at Baldwin. He guiltily looks away and Shanice, violated even more, runs out. Di and Kirky come out, like, whew: "That's a lousy one. The boyfriend is definitely supposed to be a collar." Baldwin says, "Anyways," for the first time, and asks if they should let Paul go now. No, they say, let him twist in the wind for a while. Di says, "Maybe he'll catch the flu from the draft in there. Oh, and if we did anything to piss you off, we're sorry." Baldwin says, "You can tell I'm pissed just from me sitting here breathing in and out? I just need some work thickening up my skin." Kirky jokes and says she always tries to soften hers. Diane doesn't say anything about Ultima II cosmetics but just says, "Anyways."
Fancy calls Baldwin into his office. There's no way to dress up the facts about it: "He shot himself. In the bathtub. If he had had family I would have moved him, made it look like he was cleaning his gun, but there's no pension to protect." Baldwin is choking with emotion as he says, "You did everything you could." Fancy disagrees: "Here's an interesting point: If he had been white I would have called Early Intervention." Baldwin is almost crying as he says, "Why'd you say that?" Fancy says, "I was more comfortable with him killing himself than him thinking I was trying to cost him his job." Then, totally off-topic, "How's your case?" Baldwin pulls himself up and suppresses the tears as he says, "She filed the wrong complaint. The sex was consensual. The doc writing up the rape complaint makes her not credible." Fancy sits behind his desk and says, "Lots of times, a precinct house is not about justice. It's about people getting what they deserve. Victims and skels." His lip is curling a little as he says it. Baldwin says, "You want me to let him go with a warning?" Fancy's lip curls again as he says, "That guy beat his girlfriend and chained her to a radiator. You let him off with a good warning." Baldwin goes to leave, and then says, "I'm sorry." Fancy says, "I'm sorry for you too, Baldwin." After Baldwin leaves Fancy closes all the blinds in his office and sinks into a chair.
Sip and Ricky bring David into the interrogation room. After denying it for a while ("I loved Pat!" "I think you loved him and you murdered him!"), David confesses. Sip advises him to say that he didn't bring the gun with him. David thanks him for the tip. Another crime solved by a person walking in off the street!
Baldwin goes into the pokey where Paul (Not a Rapist but a Huge Asshole) is hanging out: "I've had all of this cell I need." Others think differently, Paul. Baldwin hands over the envelope of Paul's stupid belongings. Paul asks, "That video set you straight? See, here's my St. Christopher's." Great, Paul. Baldwin says that if Shanice filed a complaint for being beaten and chained to a radiator they would follow up on that for sure, and WHAM, Baldwin slams his hand down on Paul's shoulder. Paul winces and says, "Easy there, brother!" Baldwin recites the laundry list of Paul's wrongdoings while still squeezing his shoulder and says, "You've got a problem, Paul." Paul, squirming like the weasel he is, says, "You keep this up and I'm going to get myself a lawyer." Baldwin THROWS him up against the cage and yells, "You want a lawyer? You want a lawyer?" Then he RIPS A PHONE BOOK in half and throws one half at Paul and says, "You look in one half, I'll look in the other. Now you walk yourself out. AND YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!" GO BALDWIN!
It's the end of the day. Ricky comes out and gets on the phone, ordering a DA to hear David's confession. Baldwin tells Di he talked to Paul. Di is glad. Sip says he needs to get "dopey Dave" a root beer. Ricky hangs up the phone and says, "Abner's dead. He ate his gun." The office stops. The blinds are still down in Fancy's office, and Sip asks Baldwin if he wants to go give him some company. Baldwin says he thinks if the boss wanted company he wouldn't have the blinds down, and Sip says, "You never met a guy so complicated that he had the blinds down signaling he wanted company?" Baldwin hasn't, and Sip goes, "Don't take that tone like it's out of the realm of possibility."
Fancy comes out of his office and says, "I guess you've all heard Lt. Abner's passed." Yeah, they heard. Sip says he's sorry: "Not that he'd want to see my name featured in the guest book." Oh that Sip, always thinking of other people's feelings. Fancy says goodnight and leaves. Baldwin chases him down the stairs, puppy-like, until Fancy stops him and says, "I don't have any answers for you. I can't tell you why he died." Oh Fancy, I wish you had all the answers too. Fancy tries to change the subject and says, "So you gave that guy a talking-to?" Yeah, Baldwin told him a thing or two, all right. They go down the stairs together and Sip walks out and looks after them. Wistfully? Nah -- but wishing he could be like them. Maybe not black like them, but you know what I mean.