FIC: Jury Duty (30 Rock, Ensemble, Gen)
Title: Jury Duty
Fandom: 30 Rock, Gen
Spoilers: None beyond the general premise of the show.
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Tracy has jury duty, Jenna discovers a new source of fame, Jack is on the verge of losing his job, and Liz tries to hold it all together.
Length: 7437 words.
Notes: Written for likeadeuce for the Yuletide 2007 challenge.
JURY DUTY
Liz has four messages when she gets in on Friday.
The first is from Tracy, and is accompanied by background noise so loud that Tracy only barely manages to overcome it with the focused projection of his voice. "Liz Lemon, I have some bad news. I have to go to jury duty at some securities court tomorrow so I won't be - hey! Hey, Fiona! Get over here!"
Sixty seconds of noise follow, mostly thumping music and occasional distant laughter, during which Liz Googles jury duty and securities and starts to figure out where Tracy's supposed to be.
The second is a message from Jack. "Lemon, we have a situation. Call me when you get in."
The third is from Pete, whose marriage renewal cruise is wrapping up on Sunday. "Just calling to see how things are going. Try to keep the studio standing and Tracy out of jail until I get back there."
The fourth is a message from Jack again. "Lemon, where are you? Why is your cell phone - wait - " Liz can hear Jonathan in the background. "You're on your way in. I'll come to you."
"What, does he have me under surveillance?" Liz asks as she hangs up the phone. The last message was left three minutes ago; Jack should be arriving any second to deal with the Tracy situation, which shouldn't be a problem. Surely straight-up craziness is a disqualification from service.
Liz is writing down the address of the courthouse on a post-it when Jenna arrives. Liz can tell it's her because she's the only person who visits her office who wears perfume, and the room has started to smell like peaches.
"Liz, I'm so glad you're here," Jenna says. "I have the best news."
"Good, I could use it," Liz says, and looks up. She has to blink twice to make sure she's not seeing things, but no, it's Jenna, standing there in an ill-fitting floral blouse, turquoise front-pleated pants, and - she blinks again, but her eyes haven't deceived her - penny loafers.
"Jenna, what on earth are you wearing?"
Jenna smiles and puts one hand on her hip, a pose she tells people she learned from Heidi Klum but which Liz knows she taught herself in her bedroom mirror. "It's my mother's. Does it look ironic?"
Liz squints. "Maybe-"
"Because it can't be. I need this to be flat-out, no holds-barred ugly. Kind of like what you wore to last year's Christmas party."
"Hey! You said you liked that dress."
"Five years ago, when you first bought it. And it was borderline, even then." Jenna waves her hand in a theatrical way to dismiss the issue. "But that doesn't matter now. The important thing is - I've been Fugged!"
Liz squints, tries to think of possibilities. "By who? Not the muffin guy. Jenna, I don't care how good the fat-free cranberry muffins are, and how tough it is to get them, that is too high a price to pay. I don't think he bathes. Like, at all."
"No, he does," Jenna says, and doesn't elaborate. "Anyway, I said I was fugged," she says, emphasizing the 'g', but it still sounds like the same thing to Liz, "By those two girls at the New Yorker."
"Two girls? Who work for the New Yorker?" Liz doesn't know which is less possible. "Jenna, wait a second -"
"I'll just show you."
"You know, Jenna, that's not necessary. I'm kind of in the middle of something, and Jack -"
"Great," Jenna says, moving around Liz's desk. She types a different address into the window Liz has open, using only her index fingers, and leans back while the page loads.
Jenna's head appears. Her hair is frizzier than normal and she's got black smudges around her eyes, which either means she was crying or going for the "smoky eye" look she's always insisting Liz should try. But she pretty much looks normal, wearing her typical glad-to-be-photographed smile.
And then Liz scrolls down.
"Jenna!"
"I know! Isn't it exciting?"
"You're not wearing any pants!"
Jenna dismisses this with a shrug. "The salesgirl said it was almost long enough to be a dress, and I was in a rush."
"There is always time to put on pants. You make time."
"Whatever. The point is, I've discovered a whole new way to get my name out there: fashion."
Liz looks back at the website. "You do understand that this website is dedicated to bad fashion, like shirts without pants, and leggings, and - "
"I know, that's the whole point!" Jenna interrupts. "In order to make it onto the best dressed lists, you have to have stylists and tons of money and access to really expensive clothes. To be on the worst dressed list, though, all you need is imagination and a complete lack of shame."
"True," Liz says, and scrolls down further. "Hey, I think you made me buy a pair of those!"
Jenna leans over her shoulder. "Bad call on my part. Burn them. Or, ooh! Even better! Give them to me. I could probably have them taken in."
Liz elbows Jenna away from the computer. "Fine, but I'm really not-"
Jack's typical dramatic entrance cuts her off. "Lemon, we have to - Good God, Jenna, you look terrible."
"Thank you," Jenna says graciously. "Liz, I have to go, but before I do - do you mind if I stop by your place tonight to borrow some clothes for that project I mentioned?"
Liz gives Jenna her best death stare.
"Great," Jenna says, and leaves.
Jack watches her go, and then turns to Liz. "Dare I ask?"
"You don't want to know. So, Jack, you're here about the Tracy thing?"
Jack looks intrigued, steps closer to Liz's desk. "You heard about the Tracy thing?"
Liz leans back in her chair, considers Jack in front of her. He's wearing one of his usual suits, but his hair is a little wild, and he looks tired. Liz had been thinking the jury duty wouldn't be a big deal, but maybe she was wrong. "Yeah, he left me a message overnight. I was going to try to get a hold of him, but he keeps changing cell phones since that incident with the Black Crusaders."
"A wise move," Jack says in a distracted way. "Lemon, what did he say on his message?"
Liz shrugs. "Just that he has jury duty at some securities court."
"WHAT?"
"I know, we have dress and then the show tonight, but tonight's that show you suggested, you know, the one basically re-performing the skits voted most popular on the show's website? If necessary, we can use taped skits for Tracy's most popular characters." Liz has gotten used to creating such contingency plans since taking on Tracy as a cast member, and is pretty proud of herself for being so crafty, but Jack looks panicked instead of impressed. "What's the big deal? Was the jury duty the thing you were freaking out over?"
"No, mine was a different Tracy thing - it's complicated. But my Tracy thing will only be resolved if he gets out of jury duty and back to the studio."
Liz leans over, rests her elbows on her desk. "Jack, what is this Tracy thing you keep mentioning? Because the way you keep talking about it, you know, 'resolving your Tracy thing' - it kinda sounds like you've got the hots for him."
"Lemon, get your mind out of the gutter."
Liz looks beyond Jack to the writer's room, where Frank is sitting with a script in front of him, supposedly marking it up. She knows he's really eavesdropping. "Frank?"
Frank leans back in his chair. "Yeah, it made me wonder if you were into dudes."
Jack shuts the door to her office and runs a hand through his hair, which leaves it looking even more messy and frantic. "Lemon, if I tell you something, can I trust you to keep it in the strictest confidence?"
"Oh boy," Liz says.
"You may recall that last year I joined your poker night and destroyed all who came across my path," Jack says, looking a bit nostalgic for a moment, but then refocusing. "After that, I realized that I wanted to get back in a regular game."
"And you never came back to ours because . . . "
"I shouldn't be surprised that you would be unable to see poker as anything other than a card game played for money, but somehow I am."
"But, Jack, poker is a card game played for money."
"It can be so much more than that - a way to hone your killer instinct, build alliances, create or destroy long-standing rivalries. A poker game with the right players can change the course of history."
Liz shakes her head. "I think maybe you're overstating it a bit."
"You would. Do you know why the Beatles broke up?"
"Most people blame Yoko, but -"
"People should blame Paul," Jack interrupts. "Yoko and Paul were the last two players in an all-night, high-stakes game and Yoko won the biggest pot of the night. She won John Lennon."
"Jack, you are totally making this up."
"Oh, am I? You just want to believe that, Lemon, want to stay in your comfortable world where Yoko drove an emotional wedge between the Beatles, when really it was Paul going all-in with three-of-a-kind that ended it all."
"How could Paul bet John anyway?"
"It doesn't matter," Jack says. He's pacing back and forth now, the kind of frantic Liz has only seen when Bianca is involved. "The point is, I've been seeking out a game with players who could offer me something more than a few grand and a page jacket. And last night, I found one - a late-night, invitation-only, high-stakes game involving the elite of the New York media."
Liz smirks. "How did you get in?"
"Lemon, I am the head of east coast television programming. Believe it or not, I have some clout in these circles. Also, Barbara Walters backed out."
"So, what happened?"
"I lost," Jack says. "I lost big."
Liz stands up. "Jack, you didn't -"
"No, I didn't bet Tracy. But through a series of side pots and foolish raises, I ended up at the end of the night having lost my dog to Letterman and my backstage passes to see Springsteen to Brian Williams."
"None of this involves Tracy."
"No. It wasn't so much that I lost, more that someone else won." Jack pauses, steps closer to Liz, and drops his voice into a lower register even though the door is closed and they're the only people in the room. "Lemon, if Tracy Jordan doesn't go on tonight's show and apologize for his Oprah impersonation, I will lose my job."
"What? How-"
"That Winfrey . . . she's a snake in the grass. Sat there for the first hour losing every pot, and I thought to myself, 'Don't fall for it, Donaghy! She owns entire countries.'"
"She doesn't own entire -"
"That's what you think." Jack turns away from Liz and starts pacing again. "But I did fall for it. I sat there across from her, and thought: she's mastered everything else. Perhaps this, poker, is her weak spot. And I got greedy."
Liz folds her arms, watches as Jack paces across her room once, twice, without saying anything, presumably re-playing hands he lost the night before. Finally she interrupts, saying, "I still don't see how you could lose your job. Oprah doesn't have anything to do with NBC or GE."
"That's how it appears," Jack says. "But when she was first starting out, Oprah discovered that she was unhappy with the way her hair appeared on television. While it was full and glossy in person, on television it looked flat and dull. No amount of product in the world would help. And so, in the early nineties, she and a team of hair experts formed a shadow corporation that acquired a small company with the resources and infrastructure that would allow them to design a series of wigs for her and other high-profile, high-income clients. Cher, RuPaul, at least fifteen Senators, two members of the Supreme Court, one former president, and countless members of Congress. The name of that company?"
Lis gasps. "The Sheinhart Wig Corporation?"
Jack nods. "Parent company of GE, purveyor of the finest fake hair any human head as ever seen."
"If Oprah owns NBC, then why didn't she make us do this when Tracy first did the impression?"
"Because, Lemon, Oprah doesn't like people to realize how far her reach extends. Do people really want to know that she owns one third of the American debt?"
"I thought that was China."
"You thought wrong. It's Oprah's world, and we're all just living in it," Jack says, and looks up and to the side, like he's trying to calculate something. "Lemon, did Tracy say what kind of court he was reporting to?"
"Some kind of securities court, I think, and I got the address but I'm not sure if it can be right -"
Jack takes the post it out of her hand, looks at it. "It's right. Just as I feared."
Liz takes the post-it back. "Jack, I understand that this is scary for you, but I think you need to calm down. There's plenty of time for Tracy to get back here even if he does end up on a jury."
"I can't believe I have to remind you of the kind of havoc Tracy can wreak in just ten minutes in public, let alone in a building devoted to the rule of law. But the point is, getting him through jury duty itself is just the beginning."
"What do you-"
"You'll find out soon enough. Find Tracy, Lemon. Find him now, and bring him back."
"I'll try, Jack," Liz says, putting on her coat.
"Do or do not, Lemon. There is no try!"
Liz smiles. "Do my best I will, Jack."
Jack looks at Liz as if she's just sprouted a second head. "What? Did you suffer a stroke overnight that affected your speech?"
"No, I just - I thought you were quoting Star Wars, you know, Yoda? 'Do or do not, there is no try,'" Liz says in her best Yoda voice.
Jack stares at Liz for a beat longer than usual. "I can't believe I'm entrusting my entire professional future to you."
"Neither can I," Liz says, picking up the post-it with the courthouse's address on it. Jack walks out with her through the writer's room to the elevators, and waits with her for a car to arrive. When it does, she steps inside alone. "You're not coming with?"
"No, I'm working on some other angles upstairs. Seeing if I have anything else I can offer her in the chance you don't succeed."
"I'm loving your faith in me right now," Liz says, and presses the button for the ground floor.
Jack puts a hand out to stop the closing elevator doors. "Go with God, Lemon."
"I was planning to go with Kenneth, but-"
"Weak," Jack says, taking his hand back, but she can see a hint of a smile on his face before the doors shut completely.
- - - -
Liz finds Kenneth just as he's wrapping up his late morning tour, and grabs him before he can do his big wrapup.
"Miss Lemon!" Kenneth says, as she pulls him down the hall, away from the sea of tourists.
"Kenneth, we have an emergency. A television emergency."
Kenneth pulls Liz to a stop. "A Code Peacock?"
Liz stares at Kenneth, who is looking at her with the kind of rapt excitement Liz has only seen on the faces of beauty queens just before the winner of the title is announced. "Maybe. Depends on what a Code Peacock is."
"Nice, Miss Lemon. Testing me to see if I'll betray the code. You can't trick me," Kenneth says, nodding smartly, and beginning to walk toward the outside world under his own power.
"Ah, right! Good job, Kenneth," Liz says, and walks through the heavy doors to the cold street outside. "Kenneth, have you talked to Tracy?"
Kenneth rubs his hands together, bunches up his shoulders. "He called me about three this morning, Miss Lemon, but I think it was on accident because he kept asking me why the spring rolls hadn't gotten to him yet. My name is right next to Kim's Vietnamese Food in his phone and sometimes he gets confused. Anyway, the third time, he realized his mistake and he told me that he probably wouldn't see me until later today on account of his jury duty."
"Yeah, about that," Liz says, but then a taxi pulls up and they climb inside. Liz has to repeat the name of the address of the courthouse three times before the cab driver agrees to take them.
"What?" he says the first time, and then "Really, miss? In the middle of the day, and with him?" the second time, tilting his head toward Kenneth, who sat beside Liz wearing his usual oblivious smile.
"Yes, really," Liz says. "We have to get to the courthouse."
"Oh," the driver says. "That explains it."
Kenneth leans back against the smelly cab seat and sighs happily. "Miss Lemon, isn't it wonderful that Mr. Jordan is doing his civic duty?"
"I suppose," Liz says, scooting up toward the front of the seat, wondering why she never gets the cool cabs with TV monitors in the back. She turns a bit so she can see Kenneth, and says, "But Kenneth, do you think Tracy is really suited to that kind of civic duty?"
"There are kinds?"
"Well, I just think that Tracy might do a better job helping his community by making a large financial contribution to the charity of his choice. Well, actually," Liz says, remembering Tracy's campaign on behalf of the dodo two weeks before, "maybe the charity of Grizz or Dot Com's choice. The point is, I'm not sure if he's really suited for sitting in judgment of a complex legal case."
Kenneth nods in a thoughtful way. "You might be right. I know sometimes people can be real strict about who they put on juries."
"Well, they have to be, since they're doing such an important job."
"That's what my great-uncle Calvin used to say, just before he went to his meetings in the woods. 'It's not their place to sit in judgment of people who are not of their kind,' he'd say, and then get all angry and excited and -"
"Wait, Kenneth, no! I'm not saying that Tracy shouldn't serve on a jury because he's black-"
"You're not?"
"No! I'm saying that Tracy shouldn't serve on a jury because he's crazy."
"Oh. That makes more sense."
- - - -
When Liz first notices the signs, she figures they're taking a shortcut. Then the cab stops.
"Twelve even," the driver says.
"But you didn't take us to where we're supposed to go."
"Sure I did," The driver says, and repeats the intersection Liz announced earlier. "Look at the sign here. Right where you're supposed to be."
Liz peers through the window. He's right. "Well, then, I must have had the address wrong, because there's no way - "
"Lady, you're in the right place, all right? Now, please, get out of my cab. Twelve dollars."
"But there is no-"
"Twelve dollars," he says again, and finally Liz scrambles for her wallet and throws a ten and a five at him before getting out.
"Miss Lemon, I'm not real comfortable with the atmosphere here," Kenneth says, looking around him.
Liz, watching a man walk by her in assless chaps and a "Romney-08" baseball cap walks by him, says, "Me either."
The street is crowded with people, a curious mix of business suits and the barely dressed. The buildings are covered in explicit signage and lurid colors, cutouts of human forms in what seem to be impossible positions (to Liz, at least) on every available surface, along with words like: nude, strip, exotic, adult.
"No wonder Jack didn't think Tracy would make it out of here in time. I don't think we're in Giuliani's Manhattan anymore, Kenneth," Liz says, waving away a trio of women with fliers advertising Songs from Sappho: An All-Female Strip Karaoke Bar. "Why? Why does everythone think I'm a lesbian?"
The three women answer at once.
"Your shoes."
"Your glasses."
"Your outfit."
"Wow, great," Liz says, and then, off of their expressions, "Not - not that being a lesbian is a bad thing. It's a great thing! I wish I were a lesbian - in fact, do any of you know Gretchen Thomas?"
The three women look at each other, and then the shortest one of the three says, "We don't have membership meetings."
"Right. Of course not. Hey, you know, this," Liz says, examining the flyer in her hand more closely, "sounds like a great idea - do you really feature the entire Heart songbook? Because I've gotta tell you, at the end of a long day, nothing improves my mood more than belting out What About Love. And this stuff you've got in here about tort reform looks really interesting-"
"It's a major issue," the same woman as before says.
"I'm sure it is. And in fact, if it weren't for the fact that we have to make it to court as soon as possible, I'd love to stop by and learn more and maybe sing -"
"Well, we're right on the way," one of the taller women says.
Liz is about to turn around, but stops before taking a step. "What do you mean, you're right on the way?"
"Right down the block, we're two down from the courthouse," the woman says, and points. Liz looks, and yes, she can see it: set back from the street a bit, almost hidden by the loud facades of the surrounding buildings, sits a courthouse, small but stately in appearance and completely recognizable.
"Looks like we are in the right place, Miss Lemon," Kenneth says, smiling at one of the trio of women, who is looking at Kenneth in a curious way as she and her two coworkers depart.
"What is this place?" Liz says, walking toward the courthouse, past buildings that have signs like Erotic Audits and a small theater playing a movie called Inside Her: She'll Learn the Value of Blowing Another Kind of Whistle.
"I don't know," Kenneth says. Liz notices that he's tucked his arm through hers, which would be weird normally but is comforting now.
Liz pulls out her cell phone and dials.
"Did you find him?" Jack says instead of hello.
"No, we're not there yet."
"Then why are you calling? Wait - do I hear street noise behind you?"
"Yeah, we're about a block away, and -"
"You didn't get dropped off at the courthouse steps? Lemon, you ALWAYS get dropped off at the courthouse steps!"
"That would've been nice to know before I got in the cab, Jack," Liz says, pulling Kenneth away from a woman in a nurse's uniform. Kenneth is staring at the pamphlet he gave her, which has nearly-naked women on one side and a testimonial on the importance of eliminating the estate tax on the back. "What is the deal with this place? It's like this area is, like, the geographical representation of Reagan and Madonna's whacked-out love child. And not the Madonna of today, the Madonna of the eighties, you know, not into Kaballah, kind of skanky."
"Apt description, Lemon. What you're walking through is the result of an odd conflagration of zoning laws. The area surrounding this particular courthouse is zoned in such a way that none of the mid-nineties attempts to clean up New York could take effect. Add in the overzealous prosecution of the Attorney General's office under," and here Jack sighs, like it's hard for him to say the next few words, "our current governor, and the last five years have seen an increase in trials for minor offenses in the securities trade. Those trials are handled by this courthouse exclusively, and the area around has evolved to take advantage of that fact."
Liz stops at the bottom of the stairs leading to the courthouse. "You seem to know an awful lot about this, Jack."
"Well, I've been down there a few times. We'll leave it at that," he amends before Liz can ask anything, as if she wanted to know more. Which she kind of does.
"Fine," Liz says, and stumbles a bit when someone brushes past her, a guy in a business suit with his arm around the waist of a woman in a catsuit. "You know, this isn't anything like Law and Order."
"So few things are, Lemon. Now, go get Tracy," Jack says, in that commanding tone of voice that annoys her because she responds so readily to it.
"Right," Liz says, and hangs up. Kenneth, standing next to her, is waiting patiently for her next move. All that weirdness on the street and still he looks cheerful and unflappable and ready to do anything she asks him.
"Kenneth, I wish more NBC employees were like you," Liz says, and pats him on the shoulder.
"Well, thanks, Miss Lemon," Kenneth says. "Now, we are going to into this courthouse now, right? Not visit any of these other places? Because we just had to go through a seminar on sexual harassment in the workplace, and there was this whole segment on inappropriate touching and hostile environments, and-"
Liz snatches her hand back. "Yes, right into the courthouse," she says.
"All right then, Miss Lemon," Kenneth says, his old sunny smile reappearing. "Let's go!"
- - - -
Liz's hope had been that she would be able to snag Tracy before jury selection, but no luck; her first sight of him is in profile, as he leans in from his seat in the jury box to better hear something a witness is saying.
"What?" he says. "I can't hear you. You got to speak up, witness lady."
Liz stares in open-mouthed horror at Tracy and then the judge, who will probably throw Tracy in jail for contempt of court now (whatever that means; Liz has never quite understood it) because she knows this can't have been Tracy's first outburst.
But the judge doesn't look eager to throw Tracy into jail, or even to reprimand him. He looks indulgent, amused, affectionate. Almost like - almost like a fan. Kind of weird; the guy is not in Tracy's target demographic, resembling more than anything a slightly-shrunken Phil Donahue. When the judge does speak, it's not to Tracy, but to the witness.
"Please speak louder," the judge says, nodding a thank you to Tracy, who responds with a benevolent nod.
"Liz! K-Man!" someone whispers.
Liz looks over. Grizz and Dot Com are in the second-to-last row of the courtroom, waving them over.
"What's going on?" Liz says, taking a seat next to Grizz. Kenneth settles in next to her, offering whispered hellos to Grizz and Dot Com.
"The judge is a fan," Grizz says, with a shrug.
"That's a surprise," Liz says, looking back at the judge, only to discover that, to her horror, he is staring right at her with a furious expression.
"Are you quite done?" he asks.
It takes a moment for Liz to remember how to speak. "Me? Yes. Yes, I'm quite done. Most definitely done."
"I hope so. I expect all who enter my courtroom to behave with the tact and decorum a matter such as this deserves," the judge says, finally turning away from Liz. "Mr. Jordan, if you would be so kind as to take your feet off of the laps of your fellow jurors. While I know you must be uncomfortable, certain standards must be met. Bailiff, get Mr. Jordan a footstool."
The trial goes on. Tracy:
(1) Falls asleep for a few minutes while the attorneys are engaged in a lengthy sidebar (Dot Com urges him awake with a well-aimed rubber band, saying, "Not his fault. It's his naptime.");
(2) Calls the judge Phil and Mr. Donahue, which gets an indulgent correction from the judge and gives Liz a sense of vindication; and
(3) Starts talking to the woman next to him about whether the judge actually is Phil Donahue ("Remember that dude? Used to walk up and down the aisles of his show with his microphone, all, 'Did you have a question?' and sometimes God would talk to him?" to which the woman said, "God talked to Phil Donahue?" and Tracy said, "You know, that voice that would ask him questions," and the woman said "I think those were just viewers calling in-") at which point the judge interrupts and gives the woman a terse talking-to, just before giving the jury its final instructions and sending them off to deliberate.
- - - -
Liz, Kenneth, Grizz, and Dot Com end up sitting in the hallway outside the courtroom after the judge closes the courtroom for the length of the jury's deliberation.
"So, how was Tracy before I showed up?" Liz asks.
"Mostly fine," Grizz says. "He did interrupt the opening statements to ask us to get him a sandwich, but the judge was cool. Had the bailiff go and pick one up for him, and us, too."
Grizz digs the wrapper out of his coat pocket.
"Cheeseburger? Lucky," Liz says, remembering her own lunch of goldfish crackers eaten on the subway on her way to work. "Other than that, he was all right?"
Grizz and Dot Com shrug.
"Good. Now he's just got to deliberate super-fast, so that he can be back at the studio in time for dress."
"Shouldn't be a problem. The prosecution really slammed the door with their closing," Grizz says.
"Man, you're dreaming," Dot Com says. "Were you asleep when the firm's accountant was cross-examined? Talk about reasonable doubt. What do you think, K?"
Kenneth looks uncomfortable. "I'm not sure I can say. I missed the beginning."
"Well, that's not going to stop me. I'm with you, Grizz," Liz says. "The accountant said it was possible that the stripper at the Christmas party might have been the one to initiate the trade, but who are we kidding? That guy was from the Netherlands and barely spoke English! How could he have given the tip?"
"How do you know he doesn't speak English? Because the prosecutor said so?" Dot Com waves his hand at Liz in a disgusted way. "Come on, Liz, the Dutch have a long history of recognizing the importance of a multilingual population! And where is the guy now, hm? Convenient how he didn't show up."
Liz is kind of stymied by that. "I didn't know that about the Netherlands."
"You should watch the Travel Channel more," Dot Com says, and leans back against the wall in a more relaxed way.
"You know, I really should," Liz says thoughtfully, and considers the matter of the trial again. "I don't know what I think."
"Me either," Grizz says.
Liz ponders the case in silence for a moment, and then the reality of their situation hits her. "Guys. If we can't figure it out, then-"
Liz doesn't have to finish her sentence. The other three look back grimly at her, and Liz feels the phone in her pocket vibrate. She pulls it out and sees that she's got a text message with a picture attached from Jenna; the message is incomprehensible to Liz.
"Why does she text me? She knows I can't understand them."
"Want some help?" Grizz asks.
Liz hands over your phone, and Grizz looks at it for less than a second before saying, "She says, 'What's up with Jack auditioning Tracy impersonators, and do you think this hat is too cute' - she's really into this worst-dressed thing, isn't she?"
"How'd you hear about it?" Liz asks, taking her phone back. She brings up Jenna's picture. She's wearing a yarmulke with rhinestones bedazzled on it. "Definitely not too cute."
"Dot Com found the site first and showed it to her."
Liz glances up at Dot Com, who looks a little embarrassed.
"Well, of course he did," Kenneth interrupts. "Monitoring high-traffic blogs is part of his responsibilities."
Dot Com offers Kenneth a fist-bump, which he eagerly accepts.
"Liz, what's this about Tracy impersonators?" Grizz asks.
"For once, it has nothing to do with anything Tracy did. This is pure Jack." Liz looks up at the clock; it's getting later, still no signs of a decision, and she's becoming increasingly convinced that Jack is going to do something insane that she won't be able to stop from across town. Tracy's a solid citizen, Jack's having a nervous breakdown, Jenna - well, Jenna is being herself, and of course Pete is out of town. "I need some fatty carbs," Liz says
- - - -
Liz eats five candy bars and fields more frantic calls than she can count from Jack in the time it takes Tracy's jury to deliberate. She's resting against the wall with a hand over her stomach, listening to Dot Com, Grizz, and Kenneth work out the harmony on a Springsteen song, when the door open beside her and Tracy ambles out.
"Entourage! What are you doing sitting on the floor? Diddy makes his crew do that, not me."
"Tracy!" Liz jumps up and grabs him by the shoulders. "I am so happy to see you!"
"I missed you too, Liz Lemon," Tracy says, shaking Liz off and heading toward the courtroom doors.
"Tracy, listen," Liz says, hurrying to match his stride. "We're going to go outside, and there's going to be a lot of, well, stuff going on, and I really need you to stay focused and get back to the studio. Don't be distracted by anything else."
"Liz Lemon, have I ever ignored my obligations as a performer?"
"Are you kidding me?"
"You got me there," Tracy says. "Anyway, what's the big deal? It's a best-of show anyway."
"Jack needs you to read a message at the top of the show. Wait," Liz says, grabbing him by the arm just as they reach the courthouse doors. When Liz stepped out the last time to answer one of Jack's calls, the street had been bright with neon signs and lit window displays, the streets crowded with scantily-clad people. Liz turns to the others. "Maybe we could blindfold him or something?"
"Step ahead of you," Dot Com says, holding up a black padded blindfold with a gold "TJ" charm sewn in on each corner.
"Nice, I could use a nap," Tracy says, putting the blindfold on. He turns this way, that, testing whether the blindfold works. He finally comes to a stop with his back against the courthouse doors, swinging his arms out wildly in front of him, forcing everyone to take a step back. "Man, these are great. I can't see a thing. Well, let's bounce."
Kenneth steps forward to give him his arm but Tracy leans back before he can get there, and Liz realizes what's going to happen a moment before it takes place, and in that moment before Tracy tumbles down the courthouse steps she thinks, with horrifying certainty, I just killed Tracy Jordan.
- - - -
Tracy isn't dead, just a little bruised and a lot angry.
"Those stairs came out of nowhere!" he exclaims as an EMT takes his blood pressure.
"Tracy, again, I am so-"
"Apologies mean nothing, Liz Lemon! And what about you, entourage? You're supposed to protect me!"
The guilt on the faces of Grizz, Dot Com, and Kenneth make Liz feel even worse, which she hadn't thought possible. "The important thing is that you're all right. You are all right, aren't you Tracy?"
"My elbow kind of hurts," he says, bending it experimentally. "But it's not too bad."
Liz looks at the EMT, who is unrolling the blood pressure cuff. "How is he?"
"His pressure's fine, but we're going to have to take him to the hospital. The answers he gave us when we first arrived were consistent with a head injury."
"His answers were consistent with him being Tracy Jordan," Liz says. "Don't you remember the Jedi episode? Fighting off traffic with a plastic lightsaber in his underwear?"
"That was legitimate battle, Liz Lemon! The blue dude was out there threatening the citizens of LA, and I was protecting them!"
"See?" Liz and the EMT say at the same time, certain Tracy has just proved their point.
Liz turns to the others. "Back me up here, guys."
Dot Com and Grizz look at each other, and then finally Grizz speaks up. "He seems like himself, but we should probably go to the hospital to be on the safe side."
"Damn you and your basic human decency," Liz says. "You're right, of course. You're going to ride with him, right? Kenneth, you come back with me."
"I'd like to go with Tracy, Miss Lemon."
"I'd like to go anywhere other than the studio myself, but someone has to go tell Jack, and I'd like to have some backup when I do." Kenneth still looks uncertain, and Liz fumbles for something that will get him to ride back with her, because this is one situation where she doesn't want to go in alone. "Kenneth. I think NBC needs us to be at the studio. It's what would be best for television."
"Well, if that's the case," Kenneth says easily.
- - - -
Liz had told the cab driver to step on it (which was kind of exciting, even amidst the stress), but when they arrive at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, she can't seem to get out of the car.
"Twelve dollars," the cab driver says for the third time, with more than a little annoyance. "Are you two hard of hearing? Do you not speak English? Let's go!"
Kenneth leans over toward Liz. "Are you all right, Miss Lemon?"
"I'm fine," Liz says, but keeps staring straight ahead. "I just - I'm gathering my resolve."
"Do you need money for the taxi? I could go get Jack or-"
"No! No," Liz says, suddenly in motion again. She digs through her purse for money and hands some to the driver before climbing out. She starts for the front door of the building before Kenneth is out of the car, but he catches up quickly.
"Is it really thirty minutes until-"
"Yes, it is," Liz says, upping her walk to an awkward jog-walk, which completely robs her of breath by the time she reaches the elevator. She gets inside and slumps against the wall. "I have to start going to the gym."
Just before the elevator doors start to close, Kenneth gets a panicked look in his eye. "I forgot to sign in!"
"Kenneth, it's not a big-"
"It's a huge deal, Miss Lemon. The continued success of NBC itself depends on the conscientiousness of its staff to security procedures." Kenneth looks determined. "I must adhere to the policy I enforce for others."
"Fine," Liz says, and Kenneth steps out. "Sign me in too, will you?"
Liz presses the close-doors button, but just before the elevator car starts ascending, the doors open again, and a strange homeless woman steps on the elevator with a breathless, "Thank you," which causes Liz to do a second take.
"Jenna?"
"Liz!" Jenna says, and shakes bushy black hair out of her face. She wrinkles her brows over pink-tinted sunglasses, which clash completely with the rest of her outfit: powder blue shiny ski pants, an olive green turtleneck, and moccasins. "You look awful. I think you have nougat in your hair."
"Gross," Liz says, pulling strands of her own apart. "And your hair, it's - black."
"I know! It's Mandy Moore-gone-"
"-Gone horribly wrong?" Liz finishes. "Tell me this isn't permanent dye."
"It isn't. It's a wig. Isn't it awful?" she asks with a delighted smile.
"I thought you were a homeless person when you got on just now."
Jenna puts a hand to her heart. "Liz. That means so much to me."
"You're welcome," Liz says. "How are you going to get out of that stuff for the show?"
"I'm not," Jenna says. "It's part of my new image, and the show is my biggest platform. Hey, where's Tracy? Isn't he supposed to come back with you?"
Liz opens her mouth to explain, but doesn't have the energy. "It's a long story. But the upside is that you'll get more screentime having to fill in for him. And," she says, perking up a bit at a possible positive angle to all this, "There's a chance you'll read a personal apology to Oprah."
"Oprah Winfrey? Wow, Liz. This," Jenna says, and stops for a moment to gather herself. "This might be the greatest day of my life."
"Well it's one of the worst of mine, so I guess we even out."
"I mean, first the blog thing," Jenna says, oblivious to Liz. "And then David called and I totally gave him the cold shoulder, and then just now at least three paparazzi took my picture, and now I'm going to apologize to Oprah. Oprah Winfrey!"
"What a day," Liz says, as the elevator dings for their floor.
"Showtime!" Jenna says, and practically skips out of the elevator.
"Showtime," Liz says, dragging her feet but still making her way toward the studio where Jack is standing by the cameras.
Liz is trying to figure out a way to buy more time when Jack turns around. "Lemon. Where have you been?"
Liz walks toward Jack, who looks more and more confused the closer she gets. "Jack, I have some bad-"
"Is that chocolate on your sweater? Lemon, I've grown accustomed to your lackadaisical approach to business casual, but this is a new low."
Liz looks down at the brown splotch on her shirt. "Oh. I think that was the Mounds bar."
"There were other candy bars?" Jack asks.
Liz rolls her eyes, but before she can say anything, she thinks, this is way too normal. "Aren't you curious about where Tracy is?"
"He's at Mt. Sinai getting a CAT Scan, I believe."
Liz looks at Jack in astonishment. "You do have me under surveillance!"
"No," Jack says. "Grizz called me. He said it was only fair to give me a heads up."
Liz considers Jack's casual posture, his well-groomed hair, the way he keeps looking at the chocolate stain on her shirt. "You're taking this a lot better than I expected."
"One of my contingency plans ended up panning out."
"You found a Tracy impersonator? You know, that could come in pretty handy."
"I found a few we can keep on file. But no, that wasn't the one I was speaking of."
Now Liz is really curious. "What did you-"
"Here," Jack interrupts, handing her a manila folder.
Liz looks inside. The first thing in the folder is a picture of Oprah in a wide-brimmed hat sitting on a beach with a bright yellow book in her hands. Liz gasps. "Oprah reads Cliffs Notes?"
"For Anna Karenina, yes, which was one of her Book Club selections."
Liz walks closer to the stage and holds the picture up under the studio lights. It looks authentic. "Where did you get this?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"Probably not." Liz rifles through the rest of the file, turning around so that she's facing Jack. "What is the rest of this stuff?"
Jack takes the file out of her hands and shuts it. "I also found some information that Winfrey has been attempting to acquire New Zealand, but she folded after I faxed over the picture. I'm saving it for another time."
"So you're not fired?"
"Not fired."
"And we can keep doing the Oprah sketches?"
Jack nods, focused again on the stain on Liz's shirt. "Yes, continued use of the impersonation was a result of the negotiation."
"That's great, because I realized on the way over that one of the Tracy sketches we've got on tape is Samurai Oprah."
"A classic," Jack says. "Lemon, if you need another shirt, I'm sure they can get you one from wardrobe. At the very least get some cold water on that stain. I mean, really. Have some self-respect."
"In a minute, I've got a show to do," Liz says, and then turns around to face the stage. "Jenna, take off Frank's glasses!"
.end.
Fandom: 30 Rock, Gen
Spoilers: None beyond the general premise of the show.
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Tracy has jury duty, Jenna discovers a new source of fame, Jack is on the verge of losing his job, and Liz tries to hold it all together.
Length: 7437 words.
Notes: Written for likeadeuce for the Yuletide 2007 challenge.
JURY DUTY
Liz has four messages when she gets in on Friday.
The first is from Tracy, and is accompanied by background noise so loud that Tracy only barely manages to overcome it with the focused projection of his voice. "Liz Lemon, I have some bad news. I have to go to jury duty at some securities court tomorrow so I won't be - hey! Hey, Fiona! Get over here!"
Sixty seconds of noise follow, mostly thumping music and occasional distant laughter, during which Liz Googles jury duty and securities and starts to figure out where Tracy's supposed to be.
The second is a message from Jack. "Lemon, we have a situation. Call me when you get in."
The third is from Pete, whose marriage renewal cruise is wrapping up on Sunday. "Just calling to see how things are going. Try to keep the studio standing and Tracy out of jail until I get back there."
The fourth is a message from Jack again. "Lemon, where are you? Why is your cell phone - wait - " Liz can hear Jonathan in the background. "You're on your way in. I'll come to you."
"What, does he have me under surveillance?" Liz asks as she hangs up the phone. The last message was left three minutes ago; Jack should be arriving any second to deal with the Tracy situation, which shouldn't be a problem. Surely straight-up craziness is a disqualification from service.
Liz is writing down the address of the courthouse on a post-it when Jenna arrives. Liz can tell it's her because she's the only person who visits her office who wears perfume, and the room has started to smell like peaches.
"Liz, I'm so glad you're here," Jenna says. "I have the best news."
"Good, I could use it," Liz says, and looks up. She has to blink twice to make sure she's not seeing things, but no, it's Jenna, standing there in an ill-fitting floral blouse, turquoise front-pleated pants, and - she blinks again, but her eyes haven't deceived her - penny loafers.
"Jenna, what on earth are you wearing?"
Jenna smiles and puts one hand on her hip, a pose she tells people she learned from Heidi Klum but which Liz knows she taught herself in her bedroom mirror. "It's my mother's. Does it look ironic?"
Liz squints. "Maybe-"
"Because it can't be. I need this to be flat-out, no holds-barred ugly. Kind of like what you wore to last year's Christmas party."
"Hey! You said you liked that dress."
"Five years ago, when you first bought it. And it was borderline, even then." Jenna waves her hand in a theatrical way to dismiss the issue. "But that doesn't matter now. The important thing is - I've been Fugged!"
Liz squints, tries to think of possibilities. "By who? Not the muffin guy. Jenna, I don't care how good the fat-free cranberry muffins are, and how tough it is to get them, that is too high a price to pay. I don't think he bathes. Like, at all."
"No, he does," Jenna says, and doesn't elaborate. "Anyway, I said I was fugged," she says, emphasizing the 'g', but it still sounds like the same thing to Liz, "By those two girls at the New Yorker."
"Two girls? Who work for the New Yorker?" Liz doesn't know which is less possible. "Jenna, wait a second -"
"I'll just show you."
"You know, Jenna, that's not necessary. I'm kind of in the middle of something, and Jack -"
"Great," Jenna says, moving around Liz's desk. She types a different address into the window Liz has open, using only her index fingers, and leans back while the page loads.
Jenna's head appears. Her hair is frizzier than normal and she's got black smudges around her eyes, which either means she was crying or going for the "smoky eye" look she's always insisting Liz should try. But she pretty much looks normal, wearing her typical glad-to-be-photographed smile.
And then Liz scrolls down.
"Jenna!"
"I know! Isn't it exciting?"
"You're not wearing any pants!"
Jenna dismisses this with a shrug. "The salesgirl said it was almost long enough to be a dress, and I was in a rush."
"There is always time to put on pants. You make time."
"Whatever. The point is, I've discovered a whole new way to get my name out there: fashion."
Liz looks back at the website. "You do understand that this website is dedicated to bad fashion, like shirts without pants, and leggings, and - "
"I know, that's the whole point!" Jenna interrupts. "In order to make it onto the best dressed lists, you have to have stylists and tons of money and access to really expensive clothes. To be on the worst dressed list, though, all you need is imagination and a complete lack of shame."
"True," Liz says, and scrolls down further. "Hey, I think you made me buy a pair of those!"
Jenna leans over her shoulder. "Bad call on my part. Burn them. Or, ooh! Even better! Give them to me. I could probably have them taken in."
Liz elbows Jenna away from the computer. "Fine, but I'm really not-"
Jack's typical dramatic entrance cuts her off. "Lemon, we have to - Good God, Jenna, you look terrible."
"Thank you," Jenna says graciously. "Liz, I have to go, but before I do - do you mind if I stop by your place tonight to borrow some clothes for that project I mentioned?"
Liz gives Jenna her best death stare.
"Great," Jenna says, and leaves.
Jack watches her go, and then turns to Liz. "Dare I ask?"
"You don't want to know. So, Jack, you're here about the Tracy thing?"
Jack looks intrigued, steps closer to Liz's desk. "You heard about the Tracy thing?"
Liz leans back in her chair, considers Jack in front of her. He's wearing one of his usual suits, but his hair is a little wild, and he looks tired. Liz had been thinking the jury duty wouldn't be a big deal, but maybe she was wrong. "Yeah, he left me a message overnight. I was going to try to get a hold of him, but he keeps changing cell phones since that incident with the Black Crusaders."
"A wise move," Jack says in a distracted way. "Lemon, what did he say on his message?"
Liz shrugs. "Just that he has jury duty at some securities court."
"WHAT?"
"I know, we have dress and then the show tonight, but tonight's that show you suggested, you know, the one basically re-performing the skits voted most popular on the show's website? If necessary, we can use taped skits for Tracy's most popular characters." Liz has gotten used to creating such contingency plans since taking on Tracy as a cast member, and is pretty proud of herself for being so crafty, but Jack looks panicked instead of impressed. "What's the big deal? Was the jury duty the thing you were freaking out over?"
"No, mine was a different Tracy thing - it's complicated. But my Tracy thing will only be resolved if he gets out of jury duty and back to the studio."
Liz leans over, rests her elbows on her desk. "Jack, what is this Tracy thing you keep mentioning? Because the way you keep talking about it, you know, 'resolving your Tracy thing' - it kinda sounds like you've got the hots for him."
"Lemon, get your mind out of the gutter."
Liz looks beyond Jack to the writer's room, where Frank is sitting with a script in front of him, supposedly marking it up. She knows he's really eavesdropping. "Frank?"
Frank leans back in his chair. "Yeah, it made me wonder if you were into dudes."
Jack shuts the door to her office and runs a hand through his hair, which leaves it looking even more messy and frantic. "Lemon, if I tell you something, can I trust you to keep it in the strictest confidence?"
"Oh boy," Liz says.
"You may recall that last year I joined your poker night and destroyed all who came across my path," Jack says, looking a bit nostalgic for a moment, but then refocusing. "After that, I realized that I wanted to get back in a regular game."
"And you never came back to ours because . . . "
"I shouldn't be surprised that you would be unable to see poker as anything other than a card game played for money, but somehow I am."
"But, Jack, poker is a card game played for money."
"It can be so much more than that - a way to hone your killer instinct, build alliances, create or destroy long-standing rivalries. A poker game with the right players can change the course of history."
Liz shakes her head. "I think maybe you're overstating it a bit."
"You would. Do you know why the Beatles broke up?"
"Most people blame Yoko, but -"
"People should blame Paul," Jack interrupts. "Yoko and Paul were the last two players in an all-night, high-stakes game and Yoko won the biggest pot of the night. She won John Lennon."
"Jack, you are totally making this up."
"Oh, am I? You just want to believe that, Lemon, want to stay in your comfortable world where Yoko drove an emotional wedge between the Beatles, when really it was Paul going all-in with three-of-a-kind that ended it all."
"How could Paul bet John anyway?"
"It doesn't matter," Jack says. He's pacing back and forth now, the kind of frantic Liz has only seen when Bianca is involved. "The point is, I've been seeking out a game with players who could offer me something more than a few grand and a page jacket. And last night, I found one - a late-night, invitation-only, high-stakes game involving the elite of the New York media."
Liz smirks. "How did you get in?"
"Lemon, I am the head of east coast television programming. Believe it or not, I have some clout in these circles. Also, Barbara Walters backed out."
"So, what happened?"
"I lost," Jack says. "I lost big."
Liz stands up. "Jack, you didn't -"
"No, I didn't bet Tracy. But through a series of side pots and foolish raises, I ended up at the end of the night having lost my dog to Letterman and my backstage passes to see Springsteen to Brian Williams."
"None of this involves Tracy."
"No. It wasn't so much that I lost, more that someone else won." Jack pauses, steps closer to Liz, and drops his voice into a lower register even though the door is closed and they're the only people in the room. "Lemon, if Tracy Jordan doesn't go on tonight's show and apologize for his Oprah impersonation, I will lose my job."
"What? How-"
"That Winfrey . . . she's a snake in the grass. Sat there for the first hour losing every pot, and I thought to myself, 'Don't fall for it, Donaghy! She owns entire countries.'"
"She doesn't own entire -"
"That's what you think." Jack turns away from Liz and starts pacing again. "But I did fall for it. I sat there across from her, and thought: she's mastered everything else. Perhaps this, poker, is her weak spot. And I got greedy."
Liz folds her arms, watches as Jack paces across her room once, twice, without saying anything, presumably re-playing hands he lost the night before. Finally she interrupts, saying, "I still don't see how you could lose your job. Oprah doesn't have anything to do with NBC or GE."
"That's how it appears," Jack says. "But when she was first starting out, Oprah discovered that she was unhappy with the way her hair appeared on television. While it was full and glossy in person, on television it looked flat and dull. No amount of product in the world would help. And so, in the early nineties, she and a team of hair experts formed a shadow corporation that acquired a small company with the resources and infrastructure that would allow them to design a series of wigs for her and other high-profile, high-income clients. Cher, RuPaul, at least fifteen Senators, two members of the Supreme Court, one former president, and countless members of Congress. The name of that company?"
Lis gasps. "The Sheinhart Wig Corporation?"
Jack nods. "Parent company of GE, purveyor of the finest fake hair any human head as ever seen."
"If Oprah owns NBC, then why didn't she make us do this when Tracy first did the impression?"
"Because, Lemon, Oprah doesn't like people to realize how far her reach extends. Do people really want to know that she owns one third of the American debt?"
"I thought that was China."
"You thought wrong. It's Oprah's world, and we're all just living in it," Jack says, and looks up and to the side, like he's trying to calculate something. "Lemon, did Tracy say what kind of court he was reporting to?"
"Some kind of securities court, I think, and I got the address but I'm not sure if it can be right -"
Jack takes the post it out of her hand, looks at it. "It's right. Just as I feared."
Liz takes the post-it back. "Jack, I understand that this is scary for you, but I think you need to calm down. There's plenty of time for Tracy to get back here even if he does end up on a jury."
"I can't believe I have to remind you of the kind of havoc Tracy can wreak in just ten minutes in public, let alone in a building devoted to the rule of law. But the point is, getting him through jury duty itself is just the beginning."
"What do you-"
"You'll find out soon enough. Find Tracy, Lemon. Find him now, and bring him back."
"I'll try, Jack," Liz says, putting on her coat.
"Do or do not, Lemon. There is no try!"
Liz smiles. "Do my best I will, Jack."
Jack looks at Liz as if she's just sprouted a second head. "What? Did you suffer a stroke overnight that affected your speech?"
"No, I just - I thought you were quoting Star Wars, you know, Yoda? 'Do or do not, there is no try,'" Liz says in her best Yoda voice.
Jack stares at Liz for a beat longer than usual. "I can't believe I'm entrusting my entire professional future to you."
"Neither can I," Liz says, picking up the post-it with the courthouse's address on it. Jack walks out with her through the writer's room to the elevators, and waits with her for a car to arrive. When it does, she steps inside alone. "You're not coming with?"
"No, I'm working on some other angles upstairs. Seeing if I have anything else I can offer her in the chance you don't succeed."
"I'm loving your faith in me right now," Liz says, and presses the button for the ground floor.
Jack puts a hand out to stop the closing elevator doors. "Go with God, Lemon."
"I was planning to go with Kenneth, but-"
"Weak," Jack says, taking his hand back, but she can see a hint of a smile on his face before the doors shut completely.
- - - -
Liz finds Kenneth just as he's wrapping up his late morning tour, and grabs him before he can do his big wrapup.
"Miss Lemon!" Kenneth says, as she pulls him down the hall, away from the sea of tourists.
"Kenneth, we have an emergency. A television emergency."
Kenneth pulls Liz to a stop. "A Code Peacock?"
Liz stares at Kenneth, who is looking at her with the kind of rapt excitement Liz has only seen on the faces of beauty queens just before the winner of the title is announced. "Maybe. Depends on what a Code Peacock is."
"Nice, Miss Lemon. Testing me to see if I'll betray the code. You can't trick me," Kenneth says, nodding smartly, and beginning to walk toward the outside world under his own power.
"Ah, right! Good job, Kenneth," Liz says, and walks through the heavy doors to the cold street outside. "Kenneth, have you talked to Tracy?"
Kenneth rubs his hands together, bunches up his shoulders. "He called me about three this morning, Miss Lemon, but I think it was on accident because he kept asking me why the spring rolls hadn't gotten to him yet. My name is right next to Kim's Vietnamese Food in his phone and sometimes he gets confused. Anyway, the third time, he realized his mistake and he told me that he probably wouldn't see me until later today on account of his jury duty."
"Yeah, about that," Liz says, but then a taxi pulls up and they climb inside. Liz has to repeat the name of the address of the courthouse three times before the cab driver agrees to take them.
"What?" he says the first time, and then "Really, miss? In the middle of the day, and with him?" the second time, tilting his head toward Kenneth, who sat beside Liz wearing his usual oblivious smile.
"Yes, really," Liz says. "We have to get to the courthouse."
"Oh," the driver says. "That explains it."
Kenneth leans back against the smelly cab seat and sighs happily. "Miss Lemon, isn't it wonderful that Mr. Jordan is doing his civic duty?"
"I suppose," Liz says, scooting up toward the front of the seat, wondering why she never gets the cool cabs with TV monitors in the back. She turns a bit so she can see Kenneth, and says, "But Kenneth, do you think Tracy is really suited to that kind of civic duty?"
"There are kinds?"
"Well, I just think that Tracy might do a better job helping his community by making a large financial contribution to the charity of his choice. Well, actually," Liz says, remembering Tracy's campaign on behalf of the dodo two weeks before, "maybe the charity of Grizz or Dot Com's choice. The point is, I'm not sure if he's really suited for sitting in judgment of a complex legal case."
Kenneth nods in a thoughtful way. "You might be right. I know sometimes people can be real strict about who they put on juries."
"Well, they have to be, since they're doing such an important job."
"That's what my great-uncle Calvin used to say, just before he went to his meetings in the woods. 'It's not their place to sit in judgment of people who are not of their kind,' he'd say, and then get all angry and excited and -"
"Wait, Kenneth, no! I'm not saying that Tracy shouldn't serve on a jury because he's black-"
"You're not?"
"No! I'm saying that Tracy shouldn't serve on a jury because he's crazy."
"Oh. That makes more sense."
- - - -
When Liz first notices the signs, she figures they're taking a shortcut. Then the cab stops.
"Twelve even," the driver says.
"But you didn't take us to where we're supposed to go."
"Sure I did," The driver says, and repeats the intersection Liz announced earlier. "Look at the sign here. Right where you're supposed to be."
Liz peers through the window. He's right. "Well, then, I must have had the address wrong, because there's no way - "
"Lady, you're in the right place, all right? Now, please, get out of my cab. Twelve dollars."
"But there is no-"
"Twelve dollars," he says again, and finally Liz scrambles for her wallet and throws a ten and a five at him before getting out.
"Miss Lemon, I'm not real comfortable with the atmosphere here," Kenneth says, looking around him.
Liz, watching a man walk by her in assless chaps and a "Romney-08" baseball cap walks by him, says, "Me either."
The street is crowded with people, a curious mix of business suits and the barely dressed. The buildings are covered in explicit signage and lurid colors, cutouts of human forms in what seem to be impossible positions (to Liz, at least) on every available surface, along with words like: nude, strip, exotic, adult.
"No wonder Jack didn't think Tracy would make it out of here in time. I don't think we're in Giuliani's Manhattan anymore, Kenneth," Liz says, waving away a trio of women with fliers advertising Songs from Sappho: An All-Female Strip Karaoke Bar. "Why? Why does everythone think I'm a lesbian?"
The three women answer at once.
"Your shoes."
"Your glasses."
"Your outfit."
"Wow, great," Liz says, and then, off of their expressions, "Not - not that being a lesbian is a bad thing. It's a great thing! I wish I were a lesbian - in fact, do any of you know Gretchen Thomas?"
The three women look at each other, and then the shortest one of the three says, "We don't have membership meetings."
"Right. Of course not. Hey, you know, this," Liz says, examining the flyer in her hand more closely, "sounds like a great idea - do you really feature the entire Heart songbook? Because I've gotta tell you, at the end of a long day, nothing improves my mood more than belting out What About Love. And this stuff you've got in here about tort reform looks really interesting-"
"It's a major issue," the same woman as before says.
"I'm sure it is. And in fact, if it weren't for the fact that we have to make it to court as soon as possible, I'd love to stop by and learn more and maybe sing -"
"Well, we're right on the way," one of the taller women says.
Liz is about to turn around, but stops before taking a step. "What do you mean, you're right on the way?"
"Right down the block, we're two down from the courthouse," the woman says, and points. Liz looks, and yes, she can see it: set back from the street a bit, almost hidden by the loud facades of the surrounding buildings, sits a courthouse, small but stately in appearance and completely recognizable.
"Looks like we are in the right place, Miss Lemon," Kenneth says, smiling at one of the trio of women, who is looking at Kenneth in a curious way as she and her two coworkers depart.
"What is this place?" Liz says, walking toward the courthouse, past buildings that have signs like Erotic Audits and a small theater playing a movie called Inside Her: She'll Learn the Value of Blowing Another Kind of Whistle.
"I don't know," Kenneth says. Liz notices that he's tucked his arm through hers, which would be weird normally but is comforting now.
Liz pulls out her cell phone and dials.
"Did you find him?" Jack says instead of hello.
"No, we're not there yet."
"Then why are you calling? Wait - do I hear street noise behind you?"
"Yeah, we're about a block away, and -"
"You didn't get dropped off at the courthouse steps? Lemon, you ALWAYS get dropped off at the courthouse steps!"
"That would've been nice to know before I got in the cab, Jack," Liz says, pulling Kenneth away from a woman in a nurse's uniform. Kenneth is staring at the pamphlet he gave her, which has nearly-naked women on one side and a testimonial on the importance of eliminating the estate tax on the back. "What is the deal with this place? It's like this area is, like, the geographical representation of Reagan and Madonna's whacked-out love child. And not the Madonna of today, the Madonna of the eighties, you know, not into Kaballah, kind of skanky."
"Apt description, Lemon. What you're walking through is the result of an odd conflagration of zoning laws. The area surrounding this particular courthouse is zoned in such a way that none of the mid-nineties attempts to clean up New York could take effect. Add in the overzealous prosecution of the Attorney General's office under," and here Jack sighs, like it's hard for him to say the next few words, "our current governor, and the last five years have seen an increase in trials for minor offenses in the securities trade. Those trials are handled by this courthouse exclusively, and the area around has evolved to take advantage of that fact."
Liz stops at the bottom of the stairs leading to the courthouse. "You seem to know an awful lot about this, Jack."
"Well, I've been down there a few times. We'll leave it at that," he amends before Liz can ask anything, as if she wanted to know more. Which she kind of does.
"Fine," Liz says, and stumbles a bit when someone brushes past her, a guy in a business suit with his arm around the waist of a woman in a catsuit. "You know, this isn't anything like Law and Order."
"So few things are, Lemon. Now, go get Tracy," Jack says, in that commanding tone of voice that annoys her because she responds so readily to it.
"Right," Liz says, and hangs up. Kenneth, standing next to her, is waiting patiently for her next move. All that weirdness on the street and still he looks cheerful and unflappable and ready to do anything she asks him.
"Kenneth, I wish more NBC employees were like you," Liz says, and pats him on the shoulder.
"Well, thanks, Miss Lemon," Kenneth says. "Now, we are going to into this courthouse now, right? Not visit any of these other places? Because we just had to go through a seminar on sexual harassment in the workplace, and there was this whole segment on inappropriate touching and hostile environments, and-"
Liz snatches her hand back. "Yes, right into the courthouse," she says.
"All right then, Miss Lemon," Kenneth says, his old sunny smile reappearing. "Let's go!"
- - - -
Liz's hope had been that she would be able to snag Tracy before jury selection, but no luck; her first sight of him is in profile, as he leans in from his seat in the jury box to better hear something a witness is saying.
"What?" he says. "I can't hear you. You got to speak up, witness lady."
Liz stares in open-mouthed horror at Tracy and then the judge, who will probably throw Tracy in jail for contempt of court now (whatever that means; Liz has never quite understood it) because she knows this can't have been Tracy's first outburst.
But the judge doesn't look eager to throw Tracy into jail, or even to reprimand him. He looks indulgent, amused, affectionate. Almost like - almost like a fan. Kind of weird; the guy is not in Tracy's target demographic, resembling more than anything a slightly-shrunken Phil Donahue. When the judge does speak, it's not to Tracy, but to the witness.
"Please speak louder," the judge says, nodding a thank you to Tracy, who responds with a benevolent nod.
"Liz! K-Man!" someone whispers.
Liz looks over. Grizz and Dot Com are in the second-to-last row of the courtroom, waving them over.
"What's going on?" Liz says, taking a seat next to Grizz. Kenneth settles in next to her, offering whispered hellos to Grizz and Dot Com.
"The judge is a fan," Grizz says, with a shrug.
"That's a surprise," Liz says, looking back at the judge, only to discover that, to her horror, he is staring right at her with a furious expression.
"Are you quite done?" he asks.
It takes a moment for Liz to remember how to speak. "Me? Yes. Yes, I'm quite done. Most definitely done."
"I hope so. I expect all who enter my courtroom to behave with the tact and decorum a matter such as this deserves," the judge says, finally turning away from Liz. "Mr. Jordan, if you would be so kind as to take your feet off of the laps of your fellow jurors. While I know you must be uncomfortable, certain standards must be met. Bailiff, get Mr. Jordan a footstool."
The trial goes on. Tracy:
(1) Falls asleep for a few minutes while the attorneys are engaged in a lengthy sidebar (Dot Com urges him awake with a well-aimed rubber band, saying, "Not his fault. It's his naptime.");
(2) Calls the judge Phil and Mr. Donahue, which gets an indulgent correction from the judge and gives Liz a sense of vindication; and
(3) Starts talking to the woman next to him about whether the judge actually is Phil Donahue ("Remember that dude? Used to walk up and down the aisles of his show with his microphone, all, 'Did you have a question?' and sometimes God would talk to him?" to which the woman said, "God talked to Phil Donahue?" and Tracy said, "You know, that voice that would ask him questions," and the woman said "I think those were just viewers calling in-") at which point the judge interrupts and gives the woman a terse talking-to, just before giving the jury its final instructions and sending them off to deliberate.
- - - -
Liz, Kenneth, Grizz, and Dot Com end up sitting in the hallway outside the courtroom after the judge closes the courtroom for the length of the jury's deliberation.
"So, how was Tracy before I showed up?" Liz asks.
"Mostly fine," Grizz says. "He did interrupt the opening statements to ask us to get him a sandwich, but the judge was cool. Had the bailiff go and pick one up for him, and us, too."
Grizz digs the wrapper out of his coat pocket.
"Cheeseburger? Lucky," Liz says, remembering her own lunch of goldfish crackers eaten on the subway on her way to work. "Other than that, he was all right?"
Grizz and Dot Com shrug.
"Good. Now he's just got to deliberate super-fast, so that he can be back at the studio in time for dress."
"Shouldn't be a problem. The prosecution really slammed the door with their closing," Grizz says.
"Man, you're dreaming," Dot Com says. "Were you asleep when the firm's accountant was cross-examined? Talk about reasonable doubt. What do you think, K?"
Kenneth looks uncomfortable. "I'm not sure I can say. I missed the beginning."
"Well, that's not going to stop me. I'm with you, Grizz," Liz says. "The accountant said it was possible that the stripper at the Christmas party might have been the one to initiate the trade, but who are we kidding? That guy was from the Netherlands and barely spoke English! How could he have given the tip?"
"How do you know he doesn't speak English? Because the prosecutor said so?" Dot Com waves his hand at Liz in a disgusted way. "Come on, Liz, the Dutch have a long history of recognizing the importance of a multilingual population! And where is the guy now, hm? Convenient how he didn't show up."
Liz is kind of stymied by that. "I didn't know that about the Netherlands."
"You should watch the Travel Channel more," Dot Com says, and leans back against the wall in a more relaxed way.
"You know, I really should," Liz says thoughtfully, and considers the matter of the trial again. "I don't know what I think."
"Me either," Grizz says.
Liz ponders the case in silence for a moment, and then the reality of their situation hits her. "Guys. If we can't figure it out, then-"
Liz doesn't have to finish her sentence. The other three look back grimly at her, and Liz feels the phone in her pocket vibrate. She pulls it out and sees that she's got a text message with a picture attached from Jenna; the message is incomprehensible to Liz.
"Why does she text me? She knows I can't understand them."
"Want some help?" Grizz asks.
Liz hands over your phone, and Grizz looks at it for less than a second before saying, "She says, 'What's up with Jack auditioning Tracy impersonators, and do you think this hat is too cute' - she's really into this worst-dressed thing, isn't she?"
"How'd you hear about it?" Liz asks, taking her phone back. She brings up Jenna's picture. She's wearing a yarmulke with rhinestones bedazzled on it. "Definitely not too cute."
"Dot Com found the site first and showed it to her."
Liz glances up at Dot Com, who looks a little embarrassed.
"Well, of course he did," Kenneth interrupts. "Monitoring high-traffic blogs is part of his responsibilities."
Dot Com offers Kenneth a fist-bump, which he eagerly accepts.
"Liz, what's this about Tracy impersonators?" Grizz asks.
"For once, it has nothing to do with anything Tracy did. This is pure Jack." Liz looks up at the clock; it's getting later, still no signs of a decision, and she's becoming increasingly convinced that Jack is going to do something insane that she won't be able to stop from across town. Tracy's a solid citizen, Jack's having a nervous breakdown, Jenna - well, Jenna is being herself, and of course Pete is out of town. "I need some fatty carbs," Liz says
- - - -
Liz eats five candy bars and fields more frantic calls than she can count from Jack in the time it takes Tracy's jury to deliberate. She's resting against the wall with a hand over her stomach, listening to Dot Com, Grizz, and Kenneth work out the harmony on a Springsteen song, when the door open beside her and Tracy ambles out.
"Entourage! What are you doing sitting on the floor? Diddy makes his crew do that, not me."
"Tracy!" Liz jumps up and grabs him by the shoulders. "I am so happy to see you!"
"I missed you too, Liz Lemon," Tracy says, shaking Liz off and heading toward the courtroom doors.
"Tracy, listen," Liz says, hurrying to match his stride. "We're going to go outside, and there's going to be a lot of, well, stuff going on, and I really need you to stay focused and get back to the studio. Don't be distracted by anything else."
"Liz Lemon, have I ever ignored my obligations as a performer?"
"Are you kidding me?"
"You got me there," Tracy says. "Anyway, what's the big deal? It's a best-of show anyway."
"Jack needs you to read a message at the top of the show. Wait," Liz says, grabbing him by the arm just as they reach the courthouse doors. When Liz stepped out the last time to answer one of Jack's calls, the street had been bright with neon signs and lit window displays, the streets crowded with scantily-clad people. Liz turns to the others. "Maybe we could blindfold him or something?"
"Step ahead of you," Dot Com says, holding up a black padded blindfold with a gold "TJ" charm sewn in on each corner.
"Nice, I could use a nap," Tracy says, putting the blindfold on. He turns this way, that, testing whether the blindfold works. He finally comes to a stop with his back against the courthouse doors, swinging his arms out wildly in front of him, forcing everyone to take a step back. "Man, these are great. I can't see a thing. Well, let's bounce."
Kenneth steps forward to give him his arm but Tracy leans back before he can get there, and Liz realizes what's going to happen a moment before it takes place, and in that moment before Tracy tumbles down the courthouse steps she thinks, with horrifying certainty, I just killed Tracy Jordan.
- - - -
Tracy isn't dead, just a little bruised and a lot angry.
"Those stairs came out of nowhere!" he exclaims as an EMT takes his blood pressure.
"Tracy, again, I am so-"
"Apologies mean nothing, Liz Lemon! And what about you, entourage? You're supposed to protect me!"
The guilt on the faces of Grizz, Dot Com, and Kenneth make Liz feel even worse, which she hadn't thought possible. "The important thing is that you're all right. You are all right, aren't you Tracy?"
"My elbow kind of hurts," he says, bending it experimentally. "But it's not too bad."
Liz looks at the EMT, who is unrolling the blood pressure cuff. "How is he?"
"His pressure's fine, but we're going to have to take him to the hospital. The answers he gave us when we first arrived were consistent with a head injury."
"His answers were consistent with him being Tracy Jordan," Liz says. "Don't you remember the Jedi episode? Fighting off traffic with a plastic lightsaber in his underwear?"
"That was legitimate battle, Liz Lemon! The blue dude was out there threatening the citizens of LA, and I was protecting them!"
"See?" Liz and the EMT say at the same time, certain Tracy has just proved their point.
Liz turns to the others. "Back me up here, guys."
Dot Com and Grizz look at each other, and then finally Grizz speaks up. "He seems like himself, but we should probably go to the hospital to be on the safe side."
"Damn you and your basic human decency," Liz says. "You're right, of course. You're going to ride with him, right? Kenneth, you come back with me."
"I'd like to go with Tracy, Miss Lemon."
"I'd like to go anywhere other than the studio myself, but someone has to go tell Jack, and I'd like to have some backup when I do." Kenneth still looks uncertain, and Liz fumbles for something that will get him to ride back with her, because this is one situation where she doesn't want to go in alone. "Kenneth. I think NBC needs us to be at the studio. It's what would be best for television."
"Well, if that's the case," Kenneth says easily.
- - - -
Liz had told the cab driver to step on it (which was kind of exciting, even amidst the stress), but when they arrive at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, she can't seem to get out of the car.
"Twelve dollars," the cab driver says for the third time, with more than a little annoyance. "Are you two hard of hearing? Do you not speak English? Let's go!"
Kenneth leans over toward Liz. "Are you all right, Miss Lemon?"
"I'm fine," Liz says, but keeps staring straight ahead. "I just - I'm gathering my resolve."
"Do you need money for the taxi? I could go get Jack or-"
"No! No," Liz says, suddenly in motion again. She digs through her purse for money and hands some to the driver before climbing out. She starts for the front door of the building before Kenneth is out of the car, but he catches up quickly.
"Is it really thirty minutes until-"
"Yes, it is," Liz says, upping her walk to an awkward jog-walk, which completely robs her of breath by the time she reaches the elevator. She gets inside and slumps against the wall. "I have to start going to the gym."
Just before the elevator doors start to close, Kenneth gets a panicked look in his eye. "I forgot to sign in!"
"Kenneth, it's not a big-"
"It's a huge deal, Miss Lemon. The continued success of NBC itself depends on the conscientiousness of its staff to security procedures." Kenneth looks determined. "I must adhere to the policy I enforce for others."
"Fine," Liz says, and Kenneth steps out. "Sign me in too, will you?"
Liz presses the close-doors button, but just before the elevator car starts ascending, the doors open again, and a strange homeless woman steps on the elevator with a breathless, "Thank you," which causes Liz to do a second take.
"Jenna?"
"Liz!" Jenna says, and shakes bushy black hair out of her face. She wrinkles her brows over pink-tinted sunglasses, which clash completely with the rest of her outfit: powder blue shiny ski pants, an olive green turtleneck, and moccasins. "You look awful. I think you have nougat in your hair."
"Gross," Liz says, pulling strands of her own apart. "And your hair, it's - black."
"I know! It's Mandy Moore-gone-"
"-Gone horribly wrong?" Liz finishes. "Tell me this isn't permanent dye."
"It isn't. It's a wig. Isn't it awful?" she asks with a delighted smile.
"I thought you were a homeless person when you got on just now."
Jenna puts a hand to her heart. "Liz. That means so much to me."
"You're welcome," Liz says. "How are you going to get out of that stuff for the show?"
"I'm not," Jenna says. "It's part of my new image, and the show is my biggest platform. Hey, where's Tracy? Isn't he supposed to come back with you?"
Liz opens her mouth to explain, but doesn't have the energy. "It's a long story. But the upside is that you'll get more screentime having to fill in for him. And," she says, perking up a bit at a possible positive angle to all this, "There's a chance you'll read a personal apology to Oprah."
"Oprah Winfrey? Wow, Liz. This," Jenna says, and stops for a moment to gather herself. "This might be the greatest day of my life."
"Well it's one of the worst of mine, so I guess we even out."
"I mean, first the blog thing," Jenna says, oblivious to Liz. "And then David called and I totally gave him the cold shoulder, and then just now at least three paparazzi took my picture, and now I'm going to apologize to Oprah. Oprah Winfrey!"
"What a day," Liz says, as the elevator dings for their floor.
"Showtime!" Jenna says, and practically skips out of the elevator.
"Showtime," Liz says, dragging her feet but still making her way toward the studio where Jack is standing by the cameras.
Liz is trying to figure out a way to buy more time when Jack turns around. "Lemon. Where have you been?"
Liz walks toward Jack, who looks more and more confused the closer she gets. "Jack, I have some bad-"
"Is that chocolate on your sweater? Lemon, I've grown accustomed to your lackadaisical approach to business casual, but this is a new low."
Liz looks down at the brown splotch on her shirt. "Oh. I think that was the Mounds bar."
"There were other candy bars?" Jack asks.
Liz rolls her eyes, but before she can say anything, she thinks, this is way too normal. "Aren't you curious about where Tracy is?"
"He's at Mt. Sinai getting a CAT Scan, I believe."
Liz looks at Jack in astonishment. "You do have me under surveillance!"
"No," Jack says. "Grizz called me. He said it was only fair to give me a heads up."
Liz considers Jack's casual posture, his well-groomed hair, the way he keeps looking at the chocolate stain on her shirt. "You're taking this a lot better than I expected."
"One of my contingency plans ended up panning out."
"You found a Tracy impersonator? You know, that could come in pretty handy."
"I found a few we can keep on file. But no, that wasn't the one I was speaking of."
Now Liz is really curious. "What did you-"
"Here," Jack interrupts, handing her a manila folder.
Liz looks inside. The first thing in the folder is a picture of Oprah in a wide-brimmed hat sitting on a beach with a bright yellow book in her hands. Liz gasps. "Oprah reads Cliffs Notes?"
"For Anna Karenina, yes, which was one of her Book Club selections."
Liz walks closer to the stage and holds the picture up under the studio lights. It looks authentic. "Where did you get this?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"Probably not." Liz rifles through the rest of the file, turning around so that she's facing Jack. "What is the rest of this stuff?"
Jack takes the file out of her hands and shuts it. "I also found some information that Winfrey has been attempting to acquire New Zealand, but she folded after I faxed over the picture. I'm saving it for another time."
"So you're not fired?"
"Not fired."
"And we can keep doing the Oprah sketches?"
Jack nods, focused again on the stain on Liz's shirt. "Yes, continued use of the impersonation was a result of the negotiation."
"That's great, because I realized on the way over that one of the Tracy sketches we've got on tape is Samurai Oprah."
"A classic," Jack says. "Lemon, if you need another shirt, I'm sure they can get you one from wardrobe. At the very least get some cold water on that stain. I mean, really. Have some self-respect."
"In a minute, I've got a show to do," Liz says, and then turns around to face the stage. "Jenna, take off Frank's glasses!"
.end.