- Adam Rove: You didn't have to heave an eraser at me.
- Joan Girardi: [brushing chalk out of his hair] Oh... Adam, look...
- [laughing]
- Joan Girardi: I-I know 19th century Europe can be kind of a snooze, but you were snoring, you know, like the Three Stooges with the little "whee" at the end.
- Grace Polk: Dude, my English teacher wants us to be able to draw on everything we read this semester. Who remembers January? Did we even have one this year?
- Joan Girardi: Well, I can't use a calculator on my math final. That's civilized. Do they want us to ride horses to school, too? Maybe kill our own food?
- Sergeant Toni Williams: [at a robbery scene] He says they took everything.
- Will Girardi: So, the cleaner gets taken to the cleaners. The irony. That's what I love about the job.
- Will Girardi: Mr. Petrov, do you have any employees who might've been... angry with you?
- Mr. Petrov: Well, only one woman works for me. Has since 1978. I was fresh with her once, during the Clinton years.
- Will Girardi: I don't think this was her.
- Will Girardi: Last month, that gift shop on the next block was hit.
- [pointing to the alarm system]
- Will Girardi: Isn't that the same security company?
- Sergeant Toni Williams: Yeah.
- Will Girardi: And we have a vehicle ID. Why do they even bother to commit crimes when there are cops like us?
- Coach Carol Keady: Cardiovascular exercise increases blood flow to the brain, thereby increasing your chances for higher grades on your finals.
- Friedman: Then how come the football team can't spell?
- Coach Carol Keady: Mr. Friedman, you're flailing. It's unattractive.
- Rich Woman God: That didn't go very well, did it?
- Joan Girardi: Isn't this a little over the top, even for you?
- Rich Woman God: What you tried to give Adam wasn't a gift, Joan. It was an attempt to avoid giving, just like your Internet search. Giving isn't about things.
- Joan Girardi: Oh, you're gonna lecture me on materialism? That rock on your finger could end world hunger.
- Rich Woman God: Just carbon. Same element that makes up the graphite in your pencils. People have endowed it with value. It might just as easily have gone the other way around.
- Joan Girardi: $50,000 pencils?
- Rich Woman God: [indicating her ring] Why not? They do more than this.
- Joan Girardi: Okay, let's swap. Your ring for my Ticonderoga.
- Rich Woman God: A gift is an offering, a selfless act that adds something to someone's life, something that they need, and only the two of you can decide the value of that gift.
- Joan Girardi: He won't give me any hints.
- Rich Woman God: They're everywhere, Joan. You should know that by now. Find out what he needs, Joan.
- Will Girardi: There he is.
- Kevin Girardi: Dad, hi.
- Will Girardi: Didn't think I'd run into you so soon. How do you like it?
- Kevin Girardi: There's so much on the docket the other reporters just ignore.
- Will Girardi: Well, it's mostly routine stuff.
- Kevin Girardi: I don't think it should be.
- Will Girardi: That's why we have youth.
- Will Girardi: [reading Kevin's article] "Ben Pollack's bail-free release and pending plea bargain are further proof that Arcadia's judicial system is more interested in protecting criminals than their victims."
- Sergeant Toni Williams: I thought he was just doing docket reports like the other guys.
- Will Girardi: He was.
- Sergeant Toni Williams: So, getting a feature run. This is a big deal. You must be a proud papa.
- Will Girardi: Proud? My kid body-slams the entire county judicial system. We'll have to wear armor to the courthouse.
- Sergeant Toni Williams: Kevin's a good writer. The way he spins it even made me think twice.
- Will Girardi: Only he forgot to mention that Pollack's a first-time offender.
- Sergeant Toni Williams: Who pulled two jobs and stole five grand.
- Will Girardi: Both on the 14th of the month. His child support was due on the 15th. The guy's been out of work for a year. He was about to lose his kid. That doesn't mean anything?
- Joan Girardi: Great. You have a locker now. What do you keep in there, wrath?
- Cute Boy God: So, are you gonna walk away from him just when you're starting to get close?
- Joan Girardi: I need some time to think, okay? I don't like what you're asking me to do.
- Cute Boy God: I just asked you to get to know him better.
- Joan Girardi: I did. It's turning out to be really weird.
- Cute Boy God: Intimacy is never easy, Joan.
- Will Girardi: You couldn't give me a heads-up?
- Kevin Girardi: I didn't think they'd print it, but Rebecca thought it was a new take on the system, so...
- Will Girardi: You killed the guy's plea bargain.
- Kevin Girardi: What's the problem? It's your collar. I thought you'd be happy.
- Will Girardi: Why would I be happy ruining a man's life?
- Kevin Girardi: Come on. What the ADA and the public defender agreed to? Felony reduced to misdemeanor, one year of probation. No jail time. Pollack doesn't deserve to walk.
- Will Girardi: Oh, so three days in the courthouse and now you know the whole system.
- Kevin Girardi: I did my research on the percentages of repeat offenders who got plea bargains...
- Will Girardi: Then you know that I was part of the deal. It was carefully designed to help the guy, and now Pollack is going to jail for two years, and he'll never get custody of his kid again because of your damn article.
- Kevin Girardi: Hey, I'm a reporter. All I did was present the facts.
- Will Girardi: His life is a fact. Decent people screw up. It's not so black and white.
- Kevin Girardi: No? I screwed up. I didn't get to make a deal. Where's my deal?
- Will Girardi: Well, I'm sorry. That excuse doesn't work this time.
- Grace Polk: I think this whole gift-giving thing is just a merchandising ploy to keep the capitalist machine moving.
- Luke Girardi: I don't know.
- Grace Polk: You got Glynis something? You guys were together, what, three weeks?
- Luke Girardi: I thought about it... getting her Richard Feynman's lectures on physics, but i-it just seems so...
- Grace Polk: Lame?
- Luke Girardi: Yeah.
- Rich Woman God: So, you know what to give him.
- Joan Girardi: Do you know what I was planning on doing when I went up there?
- Rich Woman God: I know everything.
- Joan Girardi: Then how could you let it go that far? I'm sure you've seen the... latest polls on teenage sex.
- Rich Woman God: You're always faced with difficult decisions. I can't make your choices for you. I'm really committed to that free will thing.
- Joan Girardi: That's a cop-out, if you ask me.
- Rich Woman God: If you hadn't gone in there, you wouldn't have found out what Adam needs.
- Joan Girardi: Adam needs to have faith in himself. That's your department, isn't it?
- Rich Woman God: No. It's yours. Faith is believing when there's no rational reason to believe, like your seeing me. Who would believe that's rational? Yet you know that it's true. You're the one who has the faith, Joan. Find a way to give a little to Adam.
- Helen Girardi: I thought you were studying.
- Will Girardi: You don't have any school books. So-so what were you doing in a hotel room with Adam and no books?
- Joan Girardi: Do we really have to go there?
- Will Girardi: We're already there.
- Joan Girardi: Do you really think...
- Helen Girardi: What do you think we think?
- Will Girardi: Of course we think. What would you think?
- Joan Girardi: Well, is this a real conversation or an Abbott and Costello routine?
- Will Girardi: Answer the question.
- [she moves to respond]
- Will Girardi: No, wait. Don't.
- Helen Girardi: Look, honey, we know you and Adam are close, right?
- Joan Girardi: Yes. I-I love him.
- Will Girardi: You love him?
- Joan Girardi: Yes.
- Helen Girardi: You were alone with Adam in a hotel room, and you love him.
- Will Girardi: And he was shampooing the rug. I'm a cop, Joan. This is when I start reading you your rights.
- Will Girardi: Who won?
- Helen Girardi: We did. She thought about it, but she didn't sleep with him.
- Will Girardi: And we believe that?
- Helen Girardi: What choice do we have?
- Will Girardi: Well, we could tell her that she can't... see him anymore.
- Helen Girardi: Ah, the "West Side Story" strategy. Yeah, that always turns out great.
- Will Girardi: Well, she thought about it. Aren't we supposed to do something?
- Helen Girardi: We've already done it.
- Will Girardi: And w-what was that, exactly?
- Helen Girardi: Been her parents.
- Will Girardi: So basically, you're saying we go on faith that we've raised her right.
- Helen Girardi: Yeah.
- Will Girardi: You're asking an awful lot, Helen.
- Adam Rove: I thought maybe you weren't gonna make it again.
- Joan Girardi: [handing him a framed photograph] I was finishing this. For you. Rodin. He was a sculptor like you. He had to support his family by being a bricklayer. And this is his, um, his girlfriend Rose. His house in Paris is a museum now. It's filled with... all the stuff that he made.
- Adam Rove: I'm not Rodin, Jane.
- Joan Girardi: No. You're Adam Rove. And you have what you asked for. Something real that you can hold in your hands. And it doesn't have to make sense, you know? We don't. That doesn't mean it's not real.