How Uncle Al Became My Favorite Hollering Asshole, and Vice Versa
- By noon, Karl's rumored hotel rendezvous with Marti and hallway make-out session with Darla are the talk of the entire school, though no one has said anything about the incidents with Cheryl, Paul, and naked Darla. Apparently, Stacy isn't talking.
- They stick to the plan the group developed in therapy: Karl repeatedly explains that they didn't have pajamas and didn't want to sleep in dirty clothes. Also, he and Paul are cool now.
- Later, Karl runs into Stacy at his locker. Stacy quietly asks him to tell her the whole story. Karl says he will, if she promises to believe it. Then, it kind of seems like she's hitting on him, which is just weird.
- On his way out of school, Gratz approaches Karl and says he wants to give him a ride home because he has some important things to discuss with him.
- Here's the short version: After their encounter that morning, Gratz realized Karl was making him want to drink, so he caught a midday AA meeting. There was a new guy there—a college professor named Bill who had a big problem.
- The thing about AA meetings in a small town is that there aren't any secrets. You immediately know whom everyone's talking about and what happened. So, it's pretty easy for Gratz to figure out that the girlfriend Bill was confused about is Karl's mom.
- The end result of all of this was that Gratz, Bill, and Dick had a meeting and have a proposal they want to present to Karl. Gratz pulls up to Karl's house, where Dick and Bill are already in the backyard. Karl is so touched by this that he starts crying.
- Bill explains that earlier in the day, his mom was already lining up a trip to the bar with Marti's mom, whom she's apparently friendly with again. She also asked Bill to help her look for Karl's stashes of money.
- In the past, his mom's boyfriends have been such deadbeats that they've just gone along with this. Not Bill. He refused, stormed out, and went to AA, where he met Gratz and Dick.
- There's more. Bill also went snooping in Karl's room and found his book of IOUs. Karl tells him he would always leave it in plain sight because he wanted his mom to read it and feel guilty.
- The guys tell Karl they didn't know he didn't have his money in a bank account or that there were obstacles to this happening. Suddenly, he becomes stunned by the fact that someone actually wants to do something about this situation.
- Here's the plan: Karl is going to open up an account in the bank in a nearby town with "Uncle Al"—aka Coach Gratz—as his cosigner. And they're doing this tonight before the bank closes.
- Overwhelmed, Karl goes through the house grabbing all of his hidden cans of money.
- Gratz explains that he doesn't want Karl to keep more than a couple days' worth of earnings in the house at a time and to make a deposit in the bank three times a week. If he doesn't have a ride, one of the guys will take him.
- He also thinks that if Karl's mom can't get to his money, a lot of her shady friends will stop partying with her, and the whole situation will calm down a lot.
- They are also debating whether it's a good idea to confront Neil about enabling his mom, but they are on the fence about whether that would alienate her completely. For obvious reasons, Karl wants total revenge.
- After Dick gets off at Philbin's that night, they're also going to have a long overdue talk with his mom that she's likely not going to appreciate.
- Gratz and Karl go to the bank and deposit his money, then get sub sandwiches and walk around the park. Karl asks him if there's a way he could help Marti. Then, he realizes that doing so would mean betraying his friends.
- Gratz and Karl agree that if Karl knows something is going on, he'll be Gratz's informant and tell him, and they'll keep Karl's name out of it. At least then, they can get someone unrelated involved who can help.
- They talk a little about Karl's dad and how he only cleaned up his life when he found out he was dying. Karl used to feel offended that it took death to make him realize he needed to spend time with his son; now, he just feels glad to have had his dad for the time he did.
- When Gratz drops him off at home, Karl decides to clean the kitchen. It will be a nice surprise for when his mom comes home.