Gretchen: Ladies, was Saturday not incredible?
Carol: It was a wonderful day. You can thank me for that!
Gretchen: I’m the one who planned it!
Carol: Wow. You really are delusional.
Gretchen: Back me up here, Massachusetts.
Sarita: It was Carol’s idea to plan a more elaborate celebration -
Carol: See! She knows the truth. Thanks, Sarita.
Sarita: - but Gretchen did put a lot of time into planning it.
Gretchen: Thank you!
Carol: You should be called Switzerland, not Massachusetts, trying to play both sides…
Gretchen: I think Switzerland, quite famously, plays no sides.
Sarita: Anyway, I think you both had a hand in making the Fourth special, and that’s what really matters.
Gretchen: Jeanne tried her hardest to ruin it, because she refuses to let me get a win.
Carol: How’d she try to ruin it?
Gretchen: She came up to me and talked to me.
Esther: That bitch!
Gretchen: Esther! I’ve never heard you speak like that.
Esther: I really can’t stand Jeanne Rivero. I think she’s practically Satan in the flesh.
Gretchen: Oh, I forgot you worked for her for a brief time.
Esther: You ever watch The Devil Wears Prada?
Gretchen: Of course!
Esther: She made Meryl Streep’s character look like a loving, cuddly boss in comparison.
Gretchen: I like to think I’m a very nice boss.
Carol: You just tried to pick. Fight with me for credit over throwing a 4th of July party.
Gretchen: I refuse to be dragged back into your petty games, Carol.
Carol: Petty games?
Gretchen: Yes.
Carol: I wasn’t the one being petty!
Sarita: Both of you, shut up!
Gretchen: Who are you to tell us t-
Sarita: I’m a human with ears. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to hear this petty bickering.
Carol: I wasn’t being pet-
Sarita: You were.
Samantha: Is this a bad time?
Sarita: No, never a bad time, Lieutenant Governor Pratt!
Samantha: Well, I just wanted to thank you for a great day on Saturday. Mom and I had so much fun. I didn’t get to tell you in person, though, since you were all so busy.
Gretchen: I appreciate you not being rude and butting in. If only Jeanne had the same self-restraint!
Samantha: I saw her charge up to you. She is such a drama queen!
Gretchen: Speaking of drama queens, Carol…
Carol: Don’t even.
Gretchen: I’m just saying, you’ve got a flair for the dramatic.
Samantha: You know, Carol, a great way to get back at her would be to endorse me!
Carol: I don’t think I could betray Carrie like that. She’s the one who recruited me to run.
Samantha: Oh, really?
Carol: Did you not know?
Samantha: No, I just figured Gretchen encouraged you to run. This is fascinating!
Carol: I don’t think it’s that interesting. It’s natural she’d want someone in her prospective predecessor’s administration to serve in hers, just to make for a smooth transition.
Samantha: But it sort of indicates that she’s desperate to attach herself to Gretchen, no? As if the endorsement weren’t enough, now she wants to run alongside Gretchen’s own chief of staff. She barely has any identity of her own, she’s just trying to be Gretchen 2.0.
Gretchen: Well, that sounds swell to me.
Samantha: I think I can use this in an ad!
Carol: I feel like I have erred.
Gretchen: Oh, come on! Who among us hasn’t tanked our running mate accidentally? Say, Pratt?
Samantha: I was a great running mate for you.
Gretchen: You’ve always been a comedian.
Samantha: I added a lot to the ticket!
Gretchen: Yes, a lot of headaches, a lot of worries that you may leave me with a Republican lieutenant governor who might plot to kill me…
Samantha: I was never at risk of losing!
Sarita: What actually does bring you here, madam lieutenant governor?
Samantha: Just catching up with the gals! We’re all still pals, no?
Gretchen: Of course! That being said, we were hard at work before your arrival.
Samantha: Weren’t you just talking about the Fourth of July celebrations? That doesn’t seem like work.
Gretchen: It is, though. We still have to pay vendors and such, and figure out who deserves bonuses. All of that.
Samantha: Oh. I see. That’s odd.
Gretchen: Our state has strange laws, you’ll get familiarized with them if you become governor.
Samantha: If?
Gretchen: We’ve all seen the polling, dear.
Samantha: My polling is fantastic.
Carol: Is it possible that they’re lying to you to spare your feelings?
Samantha: I know that’s what you guys have to do for Gretchen, but I trust my team to not do the same to me.
Gretchen: You do what now?
Later that day…
Gretchen: Oh my god, Anthony.
Anthony: What’s up?
Gretchen: I just realized it’s July 6th.
Anthony: I’m gonna need more information.
Gretchen: My mom’s birthday is in two days. She would’ve been eighty-seven.
Anthony: How did I forget? She always made sure to remind us every Fourth that her birthday as coming up and we better not disappoint her again.
Gretchen: Well, she wasn’t here to remind us this year. And we were otherwise preoccupied with it being the 250th anniversary of independence.
Anthony: I so wish she were here so I could ask her what it was like when everyone learned of the Declaration of Independence.
Gretchen: And I wish she were here because the slap she’d give you upside the head would be so funny.
Anthony: Not for me!
Gretchen: It’s not meant to be funny for you.
Anthony: You okay?
Gretchen: What do I mean? I’m joking around!
Anthony: You are, but I can also feel the sadness in your voice.
Gretchen: Well, it’s hard for that date to roll around without her being here. I miss her.
Anthony: We all do.
Gretchen: You do?
Anthony: In my own way, yeah.
Gretchen: We would be getting ready for a party, I’d be buying her presents, I’d be ordering a cake, picking out a card. None of that’s happening this year. It’s tough, for all of it to just… end.
Anthony: I know exactly how you feel. When my dad died, it was really tough on me. We didn’t do everything together like you did for your mom, and I wasn’t in charge of planning his birthdays, but when that day rolled around, it wasn’t easy. It was a constant reminder of what I’d lost. So, I’m here for you.
Gretchen: I can’t believe I forgot it was coming up. I think that’s part of why I’m so upset. I’m embarrassed.
Anthony: This is not something to be embarrassed about. You lead a very busy life, some things are going to slip by you. You remembered before the day passed, that’s the important thing.
Christina: What are you guys talking about?
Anthony: Ah, nothing major.
Gretchen: We’re talking about your grandmother’s birthday coming up. It’s still hard for me to believe she won’t be here for it.
Christina: Wow, I forgot about that.
Anthony: See, Gretchen? Don’t give yourself a hard time about it. You’re not the only one who forgot.
Gretchen: If anyone should remember, it should be me. That’s all.
Toby: It is hard to believe you could forget. This is the time of year grandma yelled at you the most! The house is unnaturally quiet for early July.
Gretchen: Thank you, Toby.
Toby: One time I told my teacher that my grandma screams and yells at home and she implied she was going to call Child Protective Services until I told her that she was just screaming at you.
Christina: She had a way with words.
Anthony: So, what are we going to do for her birthday? I think we should do something special to honor her.
Christina: What if we plant a tree in her honor on the capitol grounds?
Gretchen: She would hate that, she’d call it corny.
Christina: She hated everything!
Gretchen: That’s very true. But she’d hate that an above-average amount.
Christina: Do you have any better ideas?
Gretchen: Admittedly, no.
Anthony: I have an idea. We take off work, and we have a party as usual, with your brother and sister, and were just celebrate her life.
Gretchen: Like a funeral?
Anthony: No, a real celebration. Not sad, not filled with tears. A happy party where we all share good memories. It’ll be nice!
Gretchen: It’s fairly short-notice, no? I’m sure Eddie is busy, and I know Mary is.
Anthony: They can take off. This is important for the family. And I’m going to plan it myself, so you don’t have to worry about any of it. It’s my gift to you.
Gretchen: That’s very sweet, honey. I don’t really have a job where I can just take off, though.
Anthony: Carol can handle it. It’s a good way for her to prove she’s up to being lieutenant governor, no?
Gretchen: Well, they’re different jobs. Mine involves doing things, lieutenant governor does not.
Christina: Why does anyone run for it then?
Gretchen: It’s always good to be prepared in case the governor dies or gets a better job out-of-state. Which I was hoping for, but we can’t always get what we want.
Toby: Do you think grandma would’ve been proud of you becoming vice president?
Gretchen: I, uh… I don’t know. There’s sort of a whole TV show about how much that job sucks, so I guess she would’ve had plenty of material for mocking me had I won it.
Christina: Grandma was really one-of-a-kind.
Anthony: Thank god for that!
Gretchen: Anthony!
Anthony: I loved her, and I miss her. I’m glad there was only one of her. Imagine if there were another of her wandering around, but not related to you.
Gretchen: Don’t talk about my aunt Bethany like that!
Anthony: Well, she’s related to you.
Gretchen: Only sort of. Just by blood, really.
Anthony: I think you two are going to patch things up one day.
Gretchen: We’ll see about that.
The next night…
Anthony: Gretch, is that your phone ringing?
Gretchen: I can barely hear it, but probably.
Anthony: Maybe you should step out into the concourse. It’s quieter in there.
Gretchen: I don’t want to miss the team scoring!
Anthony: They haven’t scored in eight games!
Gretchen: I think this is the night it happens.
Anthony: I think delusion is a powerful thing.
Gretchen: All right, I’ll go in there.
Gretchen answers her phone.
Gretchen: Yup, what’s up?
Carol: Why is it so loud?
Gretchen: Oh, I’m at a baseball game.
Carol: A baseball game? Either you’re in Boston, or you’re cheering on a team managed by my strongest primary opponent.
Gretchen: As I’ve repeatedly told you, all you have to do to beat him is point out the strength of the roster he’s assembled. Imagine him doing that to Rhode Island! We’d be forced to become part of Connecticut by the end of his first term.
Carol: We both know lieutenant governor isn’t that powerful of a position.
Gretchen: But the average Rhode Islander doesn’t! And you can lie in political campaigns without consequence!
Carol: Anyway, we have more important things to discuss. Remember when you were screaming at Al Roker a few days ago for reporting about a hurricane that could send rain our way?
Gretchen: Yeah, he’s a total downer. I’ll be damned if anyone is going to ruin my night at the ballpark, except for possibly the Mets, who are just too darn good.
Carol: Are they?
Gretchen: The Oysters make them look like the ’98 Yankees.
Carol: They make any team look like that, they are historically bad. Speaking of historically bad, this hurricane.
Gretchen: Yeah, what about it?
Carol: It’s heading our way, it’s going to be the first hurricane to make landfall in Rhode Island in five years. It’s significantly more powerful than that storm it’s a category 3.
Gretchen: In English, please.
Carol: I know you have a personal day planned for tomorrow. It’s in the interest of both the state and you that you come in to work tomorrow. You may have to declare a state of emergency.
Gretchen: We’re doing a celebration for mom’s birthday tomorrow.
Carol: I understand that, I’m sorry to say this and be a Debbie Downer. We’re just in a pretty dire situation here.
Gretchen: How bad is this going to be?
Carol: No one really knows, but we have to prepare for it. It could be catastrophic, it could be an average storm. We just know it’s headed our way, very well may hit us, and we have to be ready.
Gretchen: Of course, my mother has to throw a wrench at my plans one last time from the great beyond.
Carol: Oh, I’m sure she’ll do it again, too. She was a very persistent woman.
Gretchen: Do I need to come in now? And how did you not know this when I was in the office two hours ago?
Carol: The forecast just changed.
Gretchen: Is that how hurricanes work?
Carol: They’re pretty famously unpredictable.
Gretchen: So, I ask again: do I need to come in now or not?
Carol: That’s your choice. Sarita and I are both here tracking all of this.
Carrie: And I’m here, too!
Gretchen: God, it’s like she’s already governor. Maybe I should just let her handle things.
Carol: No, we still need you for the official acts.
Gretchen: I’ll go tell Anthony I have to leave, then.
Carol: I’ll see you soon.
Gretchen: I can’t believe you always have to ruin my plans.
Carol: I apologize for orchestrating a hurricane. I won’t do it again.
Gretchen hangs up and returns to her seat.
Gretchen: Honey, I gotta go. There’s an urgent matter at the office.
Anthony: At this time?
Gretchen: There’s a hurricane approaching the state, Carol just told me. I have to go prepare for it. I think it might put a damper on tomorrow’s big party, too.
Anthony: Well that’s just the way Lucinda would like it, isn’t it?
Gretchen: I can’t help but feel like she has something to do with this.
What did you think of this episode of Raymond Island? Let us know in the comments! Raymond Island will return for season eight this fall!
