Episode Report Card Niki: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT If You Love Something, Let It Run Free
By Niki | Season 2 | Episode 18 | Aired on 04.03.2001
Cut to Lily carting a laundry basket through the kitchen, with the cordless tucked under her chin. She tells whoever's on the line not to "make it too late, they still have homework to do." She clicks off as she reaches the dining room and glances up to see Judy coming through the front door. She's got a stack of order forms for Grace for the book fair. Lily folds a towel and says that Jake took Grace to buy new ski clothes for the trip. Dude, I thought Jake was courting bankruptcy. How is he paying for all of this ski stuff? Judy rhymes off the joys of skiing: "New boots, new clothes..." Lily says she heard someone describe skiing once as "standing in a cold shower tearing up hundred dollar bills." Exactly. See my point above. Lily asks if Judy is free on Thursday to go look at some places for the wedding. Judy clenches. She mutters that it's a bad week, and that she's really busy. "So I've heard," Lily says, a tiny edge creeping into her voice. Judy asks what that means. Lily tries to make her voice light, but fails, as she says, "Rick said you called [raising her voice yet another octave] Karen about Jessie." Judy looks uncomfortable and focuses on folding a towel. Lily continues, "I didn't realize you knew her so well." Judy's towel is suddenly very interesting. She mutters, "Yeah, from the bookstore." Lily asks if they're friends. "Well," Judy hedges, still avoiding looking at Lily. Lily answers her own question, "Well, I mean you're obviously close enough to call her." Remembering Karen's sub-zero phone manner, Judy pshaws, "I don't know how close we are." Lily: "Close enough to discuss her daughter with her. Instead of calling Rick, with whom you actually have a relationship." Her voice has turned accusatory. Judy digests this and looks almost amused, wondering, "Is that what we have?" Lily asks what she's talking about. Judy says, "I wouldn't say we have a relationship." Lily is agape. She stares uncomprehendingly at Judy for a second, then looks down, forcing out an indulgent laugh. She says, in small words, and nice and slow, "Judy, I'm marrying him. You're about to be his sister-in-law." Judy smiles that if Lily broke up with him tomorrow, Judy'd probably never see him again. Lily looks like she can't believe this -- how could anyone not want to see big, wonderful Rick again? She purses her lips, exhales loudly, and moves a step closer to Judy, asking, "What exactly is the problem?" Judy says that there isn't one. Lily tells her to come on. Hi, Lily? Quit trying to bully Judy into liking Rick. She's a big girl. And you are too. Just reminding you, because you seem to have forgotten. Anyway, Judy says it "honestly didn't occur to [her] to call Rick about" Jessie. Lily, shocked, asks why not. Judy says they're just "not very connected yet." She adds that Lily "can't just expect two people --" "I'm not expecting anything," Lily interrupts. Oh, please. "You're not?" Judy asks, unconvinced. "Oh, Judy," Lily snits, moving further down the table. Judy changes the subject, asking whether Jessie's all right. Remember her, Lily? Your soon-to-be stepdaughter? The one whose problems with an eating disorder pale in comparison to the fact that Judy didn't call Rick? Yeah, her. Lily says that she seems to be. She presses her lips together and angrily folds a towel. "Good," Judy says, with eight hundred pounds of sincerity behind it. She says she'll check her schedule and get back to Lily about Thursday. "Okay," Lily says, emotionless. "That would be good." Sometimes I could just shake her.
Cut to Grace hanging a book-fair banner in a hallway at school. Apparently, she's in charge of things, as she gives orders to the other kids helping to set up. She strides over to a table where Judy's drawing big signs. "That looks good," Grace says, tapping Judy's work. "Oh, thank you, boss," Judy teases. Grace walks past Panty Queen, who's perched on a table just waving a marker back and forth. Grace asks what she's doing, and P.Q. answers that she's waiting for Greg: "He said he absolutely had to talk to me. Why are guys such drama kings?" Grace is entirely unimpressed and uninterested. She turns away just as Jessie approaches. Grace leads Jessie over to Judy and asks if she'd mind helping with the signs. It might be my imagination, but I think that Grace gives Judy a look over Jessie's shoulder before she leaves them alone. Judy breaks the ice by asking what position Jessie plays. Jessie talks a little soccer until the camera cuts to the doorway, where some jock type in a basketball uniform has just entered. "Here we go," says P.Q. with inflated importance as she shoves off the table. Judy watches Jessie watching the two of them talking. "Do you know Kimberly?" she asks. Aha! So P.Q. has a name. Not that I care. Panty Queen, by the way, is wearing a cute widdle pink baby tee, giving me just one more reason to hate her. Jessie says, "Sort of." Judy throws out a testing "she seems nice." Jessie doesn't respond. Judy adds, "Of course, when I was your age, girls like her were my worst nightmare." Mine too, Judy. And they still are. Jessie can't believe it, but Judy insists she was "this completely gawky, awkward type." Jessie is shocked and grins. Judy says that high school for her was "a disaster" and that she "got hives" just walking in there today. Jessie laughs and colors a bit more of the sign. Judy sneaks a glance at her and says, "The problem is, when you're in it, you can't see." Jessie asks what. "That all this stuff isn't real. You know, who's popular, who's pretty, who gets mean when they're scared...When you're eighteen, you know, this is over. All of it. And everything's different." Word, Judy. I wish more adults would tell kids that, instead of making them think that high school is the high point of existence. How sad would it be to peak in high school? Actually, I know the answer to that, having come from a small town where all the people who thought they ruled in high school have never left. The town, and that mentality. And the group of friends they had. And the boyfriends and girlfriends they had. Now, they just spice things up by screwing around with one another's spouses and, once in a while, an outsider. Sad? Dude, don't even get me started. Judy looks over at the young lovers again, and sardonically begins a commentary on P.Q.'s predictable body language. She and Jessie laugh over the accuracy of it. Judy rocks.