Every show gets one house party episode. It’s a rule. Someone’s parents leave town, someone underestimates how many people are coming, and something gets broken. My Life With The Walter Boys gives us an episode like that, but we’re watching it and wishing it didn’t happen.
This one isn’t really about the party. It’s about a woman who walked out on her two sons three years ago and just pulled into the driveway in a VW van with presents. It’s about a boy who got the worst email of his life and still hasn’t said it out loud. It’s about a girl who wants one birthday that feels like it matters. And it’s about Alex Walter, who has spent his whole life being told he’s the good one, deciding — for one night — to see what it feels like to be somebody else.
It ends with three of them in the back of a sheriff’s vehicle. Let’s get into how we got there.
Skylar Jacobs, professional detective
Uncle Richard is out of town, so Jackie and Cole are at his place watering plants and generally handling things, and Cole is fairly confident about how this errand is going to end. I admire the bravado.
Sadly enough, he will be disappointed.
Jackie gets a text from Skylar asking if she needs help with Grace’s birthday.
Grace’s birthday.
Which she forgot.
Entirely.
So she says crap, tells Cole she has to go, and I have never watched a boy be denied so efficiently. I applaud the bluntness and I admire the focus. Because that is one thing both Jackie and Cole need.
Focus.
She meets Skylar in town and he suggests postponing, and she starts listing: she’s been buried with school and the town council and the teen center and the Chamber of Commerce –
And Cole, he says.
Yeah.
Oh my God, you had sex.
I think it is funny when someone can tell that a person has had sex by their face. That being said I respect the story telling moment, even though it makes me laugh. In this instance, Skylar Jacobs has never once in his life had a reasonable reaction to information.
He loves the drama.
He thinks that they should postpone, but that isn’t something Jackie is willing ot do.
Even when she should do it.
She looks at him like he’s lost his mind, but he hasn’t. He’s just correct. And she’s so nervous about the whole thing, and all she wants is for him to focus, please. I think we can all understand the want to be a good friend, but sometimes, you can’t do everything.
He’s giggling. He says they should postpone because Grace is expecting Type A Jackie, not I Just Had Sex Jackie.
She says she’ll figure it out. Of course she does. That’s her entire personality and also her entire problem.
Cole and Dylan, best boys
I didn’t really ever think that we’d get to the point where Cole and Dylan are close again. However I am upset that they are. Both of them needed to grow up and they definitely have.
Cole and Dylan are playing basketball – their girlfriends both busy. Dylan mentions Kiley’s always busy — but they’re good. He doesn’t have the same upbringing as Kiley, so he gets ther being occupied.
They talk Coles race and if he would do it again. Dylan was enamored with the race and the excitement. He offers to help with the pit crew, because he likes hanging around Cole, which is genuinely sweet.
It’s just Dylan doesn’t know a thing about cars.
Cole says he’s doing a barn find tomorrow — meaning there’s an old car sitting somewhere that he’s going to buy and resurrect. Dylan volunteers immediately.
These two are cutely, hopelessly in love with their respective girls and also a little bit in love with each other’s company, and I support this friendship completely.
JUST SAY NO TO BETSY
Over at the Hartfords’ – rodeo practice has ended and it’s still really weird for Alex. He’s had a good ride and is heading out when the guys stop him – hey Walter, you did great — time you became one of us.
Enter Betsy.
Betsy is a tattoo gun. No word on if they all have their tattoo licenses, but they all have a big H on their shoulder.
And Alex says no. Politely, kindly, but no. Tattoos aren’t his thing.
Reid keeps pushing, working the peer pressure angle, and Wilder — of all people — backs him up – if he doesn’t want it, he doesn’t want it.
You can see Alex worrying about what saying no will cost him socially. But listen to me, if you don’t want a tattoo, don’t get a tattoo. Trust me. Removal hurts significantly more than the original sin.
And that original sin is almost always wrong.
Remember this scene. It’s going to matter in about forty minutes of screen time and it’s going to hurt.
Danny and the thing he can’t say
Danny is in his room with Erin. He’s reading emails, and it’s obvious he wants to tell Erin about the Juilliard rejection and has no idea how to open his mouth.
Danny has nothing to be ashamed of. Though, we do get the disappointment and the sting of rejection.
She calls it – you obviously want to say something, so say it.
Boys and their big sighs. They can be more dramatic than girls.
He just looks at her. There’s so much fear in it. She says she’s frustrated because she can see him holding something. It’s something that I don’t necessarily get because Erin would do anything for him.
He’s gotta get out of his own way.
And right before he can get a word out — noise outside.
He looks out the window and there’s a VW van pulling up the drive, and he says, “Oh my God, I can’t believe that’s Aunt Hannah.”
Danny Walter, saved by an aunt. Cursed by an aunt. I’ll circle back.
Hannah Walter, returning
Everybody pours outside. It’s George’s little sister.
It’s also Lee and Isaac’s mother.
She abandoned them.
We don’t like her.
Both of those boys are standing there looking absolutely bewildered, because she hasn’t been around in three years. There are hugs and a return – shuffling Hannah inside.
Lee asks Katherine if anyone knew she was coming. Katherine says she had no clue.
Nobody knows why she’s back. But she brought presents – geodes to be exact.
You can see the fear on Lee and Isaac — that specific bracing you do around a parent who has already proven what they’re capable of. And then she announces she’s moving back. She’s staying. She asks if she can stay at the house until she buys her own place, and George and Katherine of course say yes, because that’s who they are.
Family always comes first with the Walkers.
And then Jackie blows through asking Katherine where the party boxes are, introduces herself to Hannah, and when Hannah tries to hand her a present, says sorry — deadline — and disappears upstairs.
Jackie Howard, absolutely uninterested in your family reunion, she has a birthday to save. Honestly? Iconic. This is a Jackie we’ve never known.
Alex almost opens up
Jackie’s upstairs digging through boxes when Alex comes up and asks what she’s doing. She tells him, and then he tells her about the tattoo thing.
And she asks the right question – did you want to? She’s referring to the tattoo, obviously.
And you can feel how badly he wants to talk about it, and how completely he does not know how to talk to her anymore after everything these two have been through. So he shuts it down.
You know what, it’s all good. I don’t know why I was thinking about it.
That’s the tragedy of Alex in one exchange. He came upstairs to say something true, and the only person he’s ever been able to say true things to is the girl he can no longer say them to.
If he’d finished that sentence, the end of this episode might not have happened.
Alex Walter – getting in his own way since birth.
The story of three years ago
In their bedroom, Katherine stares out the window and says she wishes Hannah would just come inside. George tells her she has to give her space — because it’s Hannah, and that’s how Hannah works.
But Katherine’s afraid. What if she gets Lee and Isaac’s hopes up again and then vanishes like she did three years ago? Katherine would kill her.
And then we get the detail that gutted me (I am very sensitive). Three years ago, Hannah sent Isaac and Lee to the store for supplies to make ornaments. And by the time they got back, she was gone.
She sent her children on an errand so she could leave.
Katherine can’t watch that happen again. And George says he doesn’t disagree — but then he says the thing that makes him the moral center of this show – his parents never knew what to do with Hannah. He doesn’t know what to do with Hannah. But the one thing his parents did do was make sure she knew that no matter what, she could always come home.
And that matters. It matters enormously. Everyone deserves one door that stays unlocked. No matter how old they get.
Katherine says she just doesn’t want Lee or Isaac to feel that way again, and George promises he won’t let it happen. He’ll talk to her.
We’ll circle back to that too.
what she actually wants
It’s Grace’s birthday and Jackie’s entire plan is cupcakes at The Lark.
And Grace — gently, but honestly — says she thought it would be more than this. Which is fair. This birthday is definitely I just had sex Jackie.
Jackie got her a whole set of Jane Austen novels, which is a thoughtful, perfect gift for who Grace is. But Grace wanted a party. She wants to be popular. She wants one day that feels big and loud and exciting, the way birthdays are supposed to feel when you’re seventeen.
So Jackie asks, “if you could do anything, what would it be?”
We all know that answer. If Grace is anything. she is transparent.
And Grace says it — let’s put the Jackie and Cole effect to use. A party. Beer. Food. Lots of people. Popular people.
Okay, Jackie says. You’re going to have the best birthday ever. I’ll take care of it.
And here’s what I love about this – Grace has spent this entire season absorbing Jackie’s crises, covering for her, extracting nosy boys from fence lines so Jackie can cry in peace. She has earned one selfish request.
It just may be one that Jackie regrets.
The barn find and a shopping list
Dylan and Cole go get the car, and it looks like a genuine piece of junk — but they talk the guy down from 800 to 450. It’s going to need serious bodywork, and the whole project is going to come down to increasing airflow. Dylan’s in.
I don’t understand any of the car speak and I won’t even pretend like I do.
Jackie calls Cole, who she knows can help with this. She tells him that they need to throw Grace a party. A big one.
Cole’s answer is immediate — we’ll have it at Richard’s.
Jackie’s not sure Richard would be okay with that. And Cole says, he’ll never know. We just don’t say anything.
Serious red flags going off here. This is not going to end well.
Cole. Buddy. Nothing in the history of television has ever gone unnoticed by an uncle. Never in the history of television has a house party gone undiscovered. But sure, whatever you say Cole.
She says divide and conquer, she’ll send a shopping list, and to invite lots of people. He says he’s got it. He hangs up and he knows that the car has to wait, because they need to go shopping, because they need to throw Grace a party — and Dylan says, remind me who this is again?
There must be an astonishing number of people in this very small town because everyone knows everyone in small towns.
Hannah in the barn, and the dream she gave up
George shows Hannah the barn rebuild and tells her how they lost everything in there — but the pillar survived, the one with all their heights marked on it.
Generations of this family, on one post.
And she’s delighted by it, and then he asks the hard thing, “I need to know you’re going to be around this time. That you’re not going to desert them again.”
He tells her that she can’t blame Lee for being cautious.
She doesn’t answer.
She looks around instead — oh, you rebuilt the loft. Yeah. And he waits.
And what she finally says isn’t a promise. It’s a confession.
She always wanted to travel the world. She used to spend whole days up there dreaming about all the places she could go, all the people she could be. And then she met Mike, and she got pregnant, and he enlisted because they’d run out of money, and she ended up on a military base.
Her entire life happened to her before she got to choose any of it.
And George hugs his sister, because she needs it, and because he’s the only person who she knows she can rely on.
Then he says what she needs to hear even if she doesn’t want to – these are two kids. Their feelings are real. Their hearts are on the line.
She looks at him like she knows and I don’t think she does. Not really. Her kids are suffering and they still don’t understand why she left, and she says there were a lot of reasons. But does she understand that she owes those kids answers?
She says she knows what she did. She says she’s going to talk to them, and to Katherine.
I want to believe her. BUT, I want to point out that wanting to believe a person is different from being able to.
Alex qualifies
Alex is riding qualifiers at the Hartfords’ and draws a horse called Mayday. Wilder gives him some advice — actual, useful advice — and Alex rides a full eight seconds.
He’s thrilled. The guys are thrilled. He’s in.
And he wants so badly to fit in that it’s frightening, because every good thing this crowd gives him has a price tag stapled to it. I just don’t think it is worth it.
The cake
Dylan and Cole go pick up Grace’s cake, having invited essentially everybody in town.
And the cake says Happy 7th Birthday Gracie.
Dylan does not understand why Cole is stressing about it. And it is unbearably sweet that Cole cares this much about what Jackie will think — everything has to be right — so he marches the cake back inside to be fixed. This is a new Cole and I think that it is great that we’re seeing him grow.
Dylan’s a little put off, but he’d do the same thing for Kiley in a heartbeat. Some things have to be done a certain way. Meanwhile Jackie is already three hours into stressing about a party she’s throwing for someone else.
Katherine and Hannah in the kitchen
Katherine comes into the kitchen and Hannah is making a pineapple upside-down cake, which is exactly the kind of thing you do when you’d like to avoid a conversation with your hands full.
Katherine doesn’t avoid conversations, so she tells her she’s there to talk. That George said she wanted to talk.
Katherine doesn’t mince words and tells her the truth – she’s afraid Hannah won’t care again. That the boys need more than this. And she’s especially worried about Lee, who is so sensitive.
Then she gives her the book.
The last time Hannah disappeared, Lee wrote something. And Katherine found it in the garbage and kept it. She held onto it for three years, waiting for a day like this.
Katherine is honest. She lets her know that she’s been mad. They need more than this.
She reiterates that Hannah can’t keep disappearing and they need to know if she’s going to stay.
Hannah talks about how she split herself into yoga classes and meditation, a silent retreat, a wellness center, whole weeks of walking around not speaking, trying to figure out what she needs.
Hannah wants to be a good parent. She simply doesn’t know how to be one. She knows she has to earn her way back into her children’s lives, and she has no map for it.
And I think all of us watching are quietly certain she’s not going to stay. Katherine’s hoping she does, for the boys’ sake, and terrified she will and then won’t.
We’d all like to believe in her. But she’s been an absent parent to those boys, and belief is exactly the thing she’s already spent.
The party begins, and Cole takes photographs
Jackie and Cole set up, and Cole photographs everything — so that if anything gets moved, they can put it back exactly, and Richard will never know.
Cole Walter, criminal mastermind, documentarian, boyfriend of the year.
Though this party plan is a walking red flag.
Jackie’s worried about Alex and the pressure the Hartford boys are putting on him, so Cole offers to text him again if it’ll make her feel better. She says yes, thank you, that would be great.
Oh, Jackie. That text.
The party starts strong. Then Alex makes his one stupid decision of the night — well, his first — and brings the rodeo crowd.
Dylan’s holding court pretending to know everything about cars. Cole’s circulating, checking on people, making sure it all runs, because he knows how much this matters to Jackie.
But Grace – well, she’s having fun.
Cole sees the older guys walk in and he starts quietly freaking out. He tells Alex it probably wasn’t the best idea to bring them — especially since they’re looking at fifteen, sixteen, seventeen-year-old girls like they’re edible.
Alex says why is famous last words, “they’re harmless.”
Red Flag. I repeat red flag.
I would love to believe that they are harmless, but I do not believe that. I can smell the fight from here.
Grace gets her night
Jackie’s actually enjoying herself and telling Cole they should both enjoy themselves too.
And Grace is having the time of her life, and I want that on record, because whatever happens later, she got the party. She got the night. She asked for something for herself and her friend delivered.
You know who is not having the time of their lives? Alex. Wilder is holding forth about how they’re going to win state this year. Alex is trying so hard to belong.
And then Alex sees Cole and Jackie dancing. Bad decisions, incoming.
He decides he’s going to get the tattoo.
The H. From Betsy. At a party. Drunk.
Alex, no.
And the reason is the worst part – he watched his brother slow-dance with the girl he loved, and he needed somewhere to belong so badly that he chose a permanent mark from people who don’t actually care about him.
Alex Walter is an idiot.
Danny and Erin, and a proposal on the lawn
Meanwhile, outside, Danny finally tells Erin: he didn’t get into Juilliard.
You didn’t tell me, she says.
Yes, we’ve already established that Erin.
She does the thing that makes her wonderful — she tells him how she sees him. That he’s going to have this great life. That he’s going to do all these incredible things.
And Danny says, “if we’re going to have a great future, why don’t we just get married?”
Most unromantic thing ever said.
She thinks he’s joking.
But he’s not.
So they decide to get engaged.
I don’t think it’s the smartest decision. I don’t think it’s going to go well. A boy who just lost the future he’d planned reaching for the nearest permanent thing is not the same as a boy who’s ready to be a husband.
But God, I understand it. And here we are.
It all comes apart
Somebody breaks a table, so party over and they clear everybody out.
Jackie and Cole are cleaning up, there’s shouting outside. She’s hoping that Richard will understand.
Alex is out there getting a tattoo. Drunk, hurting, surrounded by men who think this is funny.
Cole and Jackie come running out trying to stop him — and it turns into a fight. Both Cole and Alex end up brawling with Reid and Wilder.
Sheriff shows up. Cowboys take off. Because of course they do. They roll in, they wind up two teenagers, they throw punches, and they leave.
Which leaves Cole and Alex standing in Richard’s yard, drunk, bleeding, when the cops arrive.
And that’s how Jackie, Cole, and Alex end up in the back of the sheriff’s vehicle. Arrested.
The thing about this episode
Every single disaster tonight came from someone not saying a true thing out loud.
Alex didn’t finish his sentence upstairs. Danny sat on his rejection until it came out as a marriage proposal. Hannah couldn’t say yes, I’ll stay. Grace had to work up the nerve to admit she wanted a party. Jackie handled instead of asking for help. Cole hid a whole party from his uncle instead of asking.
This family communicates in gestures — cakes, presents, photographs of furniture placement, a book pulled out of the garbage and kept for three years. They will do anything for each other except say the sentence.
And now George and Katherine are going to get a phone call at midnight about three of their kids in a squad car, with Hannah asleep down the hall and an engagement nobody knows about yet.
Silver Falls, I am not okay, and I’ll see you next episode.
