Previously: The girls lost their power for a few really tense seconds.
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Feats of Clay
Lorraine: Some dude breaks into a house very easily and tries to tell his twitchy friend, Clay, that they have nothing to worry about; the owner of the house is dead. B&Es Are Easy says he’s off to grab the urn. There is a third man present. He follows after B&Es Are Easy and asks if Clay is in the know. B&Es Are Easy says it’s better not to spook Clay, who would totally believe that some curse killed the house owner. Third Man is all, “IDK. Dead House Owner was stung by a scorpion. On an airplane.” B&Es Are Easy asks if Third Man is buying into the curse thing too and despite what he just said about scorpions on airplanes, Third Man is like, “nope.”
They find the Probably Cursed Urn and as soon as B&Es Are Easy touches it, we hear the Tinkling Sound Effects of Magical Things Afoot. The inlaid figure on the on the urn expels some dust that the stupid thieves do not notice. Clay runs in and tells his partners in crime that guards are on their way. The boys decide to split up and meet back in San Francisco. Clay is tasked with selling the urn. B&Es Are Easy takes off and runs right into some Poor Man’s Cleopatra, who calls herself the guardian of the urn. She’s come to punish B&Es Are Easy for his greed with a deadly spider. Third Man sees this and then runs away when Poor Man’s Cleopatra promises to punish all the thieves in the same way.
In San Francisco, three days later, Phoebe is getting ready to meet Clay, who is her ex from New York. Piper thought Phoebe never wanted to see Clay again. Prue’s never even heard of this guy because no one tells her anything. Clay gets there and he and Phoebe stare at each other moonily. When they hug, Phoebe gets a premonition of them having sex. It’s super awesome of her powers to be all, “here’s a thing you need to know!”
I AM THE SAHN.
Qua ke. Prue wonders why Phoebe doesn’t share things with her. Piper tells her it’s because she’s judgey. A waitress walks by and the bartender gets so nervous around her, he flips his tray over. I guess he trips, but it’s bad physical acting, so it just looks like he’s dumping his tray. Piper freezes time.
Piper asks Prue about her job and whether or not she’ll be returning. She will be because now that her evil bosses are gone, she’s got to save the auction house. Bumbling Bartender trips again, Piper freezes time and Prue leaves her sister to her strange management style.
Elsewhere, Clay tells Phoebe about how great Egypt is, listing all the things a 5th grader might know about it (the Nile! Camels! YAY!). He switches gears and admits that Phoebe was right to dump him. Phoebe doesn’t want to have that conversation. She asks why he’s really in San Fran and he comes clean about the urn, clearly wanting to see if Prue would be interested in selling it. He appeals to Phoebe because he needs the money to right the many wrongs of his past. We all know his appeal will work because in 11 episodes, Phoebe has established herself as kind of a sucker.
Auction House. Prue walks in her office and finds a woman there, rifling through her files. This woman’s face is super familiar and a quick scroll through her IMDB reveals that’s she been in just about everything. She introduces herself as Claire and she’s there to assess if the auction house is salvageable. First order of business is that Prue has to hold an auction TOMORROW because of contrivance. They need to move 1.2 million dollars worth of inventory. I’m not sure that any of this would work this way, with the running of the place just falling into Prue’s hands, or with the bank being all, “WE NEED A MILLION TOMORROW.” but, okay show!
Phoebe and Clay walk in with the urn and their request. Prue examines the urn but says she can’t commit to selling it without looking into its origins and previous owners. Phoebe offers to cook dinner in return for speeding the process along. Prue gives a cute, “oh, don’t threaten me!” and agrees to see what she can do.
Outside, Clay and Phoebe flirt and giggle about old times when Third Man calls out to Clay. I’m really sad that the guy I nicknamed B&Es Are Easy died in the cold open, while the guy I phoned in with “Third Man” lives on. Third Man is painfully shifty, as he asks Clay about the urn. Clay explains about Prue trying to sell it for him and Third Man says they will catch up later.
That night, Third Man goes to some cargo area where B&Es Are Easy’s body is in a box. Apparently, the Easy family asked Third Man to check up on the body during its layover? Third Man apologizes to the box/corpse and we pan down to see there is a sweet sticker of Poor Man’s Cleopatra on it. It dissolves in a little burst of sand and as Third Man leaves, Poor Man’s Cleopatra materializes.
Prue and Piper catch up via phone. Prue doesn’t think it’s a coincidence that Clay popped into town with an urn to sell. Piper basically tells her to mind her own business. Prue asks how it’s going with the Bumbling Bartender. Piper admits that freezing things so often is getting draining. She needs to find a better way to deal with him.
Halliwell Manor. Over takeout, Clay asks about what Phoebe’s been doing since New York. She tells him she’s been protecting innocents against evil, which qualifies as a, “Phoebe announces she’s a witch” shot by my standards. Clay doesn’t believe that, but does believe her when she says she’s changed a lot. He’s trying to change too. They kiss, but Phoebe breaks away. Prue comes in and apologizes for interrupting, but then just stands there like she is not at all sorry for interrupting. Clay casually asks after the urn and Prue’s all, “MMHMM. THE URN YOU SUSPICIOUSLY WANT TO SELL ASAP?” Clay says goodbye to Phoebe with kisses and he leaves.
The girls hear a crash from upstairs. In the attic, Piper is performing a charm for Bumbling Bartender, to give him confidence. Prue pointedly says that maybe Bumbling and Waitress aren’t meant to be together because not everyone is. Phoebe gets the message loud and clear. Piper sticks by her decision to use magics. I’m sure nothing will go wrong.
In her office, Third Man is waiting in an actual dark corner of her office. He asks why Prue didn’t sell the urn. She tells him to GTFO. He tries to explain that the urn is cursed, but then decides to just grab the urn and make a break for it. Prue telekinesises the urn away from the man and is all, “Oh! Look! It is cursed!” She has to really squint at things to get them to move, so it goes: long pause, SQUINT, “OH! It did it again!” Third Man runs away.
Phoebe and Piper walk and talk about second chances. Me not recapping any of this in more detail is not robbing you of anything significant. The girls arrive at Qua ke and find Bumbling full of confidence and surrounded by girls. Piper asks him about Waitress and he’s over her, now that he has many womans to chose from.
Third Man gets back to his hotel room and doesn’t notice the sweet Poor Man’s Cleopatra sticker on the back of his door. She materializes and Third Man begs for his life, but she isn’t even hearing his pleas. She makes a scorpion appear from her gold lame top and places the magical scorpion that doesn’t allow anyone to, I don’t know, run away or swat it off on Third Man.
Manor. Phoebe and Clay laugh and reminisce some more. This soon leads to kissing and sinking back onto Phoebe’s bed.
Prue gets home and asks where Phoebe is. Piper directs her upstairs, but Prue doesn’t hear her warning to knock first. Prue barges in and Phoebe and Clay are naked and stuff. Prue is embarrassed but she stays looking for way too long. After a Not!Break, Phoebe and Prue have their confrontation. Phoebe is mad at the privacy invasion and Prue is mad because Clay is a liar and a thief. Prue presents Phoebe with the evidence, but she won’t believe it. Even Piper is all, “girl, BELIEVE IT.” Phoebe is totally sure that Clay would never put her life at risk with a cursed urn.
Dead Man Hotel. A medical examiner tells Andy that Third Man died of a scorpion sting. The only other thing they found is a business card in Third Man’s pocket from Buckland’s Auction House. Andy interrupts and guesses, “Prue Halliwell?” The examiner asks how he know. Andy says he’s cursed.
At the auction house, the sand of Poor Man’s Cleopatra settles back on the urn. Prue walks into her office with Claire. Prue apologizes again for the urn drama, but Claire doesn’t really care because the auction made enough money. Buckland’s will see another day. Claire leaves and Andy enters. He notices the urn and isn’t surprised when he sees a scorpion on it. Andy tells Prue all about the dead man with her business card in his pocket. Prue plays dumb, leading Andy to say that he still cares about Prue and if she’s ever in a bind, she can call him.
Dead Man Hotel. Clay is packing up his stuff when Phoebe comes to accuse him of being a liar and a thief. He claims he truly didn’t know about any curse. Phoebe doesn’t believe him and storms out. Clay probably can’t take her storming out seriously because she’s got two big plastic clips in her hair. I think I used to wear something like that. When I was five.
Qua ke. Bumbling Bartender is bumbling again and as Phoebe sits next to Piper at the bar, she guesses it’s because her sister reversed the spell. Phoebe quickly turns this talk into talk about Clay. She asks if she’s a sucker for punishment. Maybe just the “sucker?” She’s often the sacrifice on the plot altar. Anyway, the girls have a chat about boring safe guys vs, I don’t know, guys who steal things from Egypt.
Later, at the Manor, Clay visits Phoebe to swear he didn’t know about the curse. He wants to turn himself into the police but knows that Prue isn’t going to just hand over the urn. He wants Phoebe to come with him. Phoebe doesn’t want to, but when he touches her, she gets another premonition: a Bad Special Effects snake preparing to attack Clay. Phoebe’s reaction is to immediately take off for the auction house. Where the snake is.
There, Phoebe tries to tell Prue about the curse, but she doesn’t have to waste much breath because Poor Man’s Cleopatra [PMC] appears. Phoebe pushes Clay out the door. Prue tries to telekinesis PMC, but only succeeds in giving her little shoves. When it’s clear they are outmatched, Phoebe and Prue run.
Clay and Phoebe have another relationship moment downstairs before she runs up to join her sister in the attic. They, in all of one minute, have searched the whole Book of Shadows and haven’t been able to find a useful spell. Prue says maybe they aren’t meant to protect Clay, just like Piper wasn’t meant to bring Bumbling Bartender and Waitress together (SEE THE PLOT CONNECTION?). Phoebe refuses to believe that. Somehow, Prue realizes that Clay needs to do something selfless to stop PMC from punishing his greed.
The girls head back downstairs and find that Clay is gone. Phoebe, thanks to her previous premonition, knows where he’s going.
Sure enough, Clay is back at the Auction House. PMC thinks he’s back because his greed consumes him, but he’s really there to be punished. He makes sure that she won’t hurt anyone else. PMC uses another piece of her jewelery to make a snake appear. The snake stares at Clay long enough to give the 3Ps time to arrive. Piper and Prue just run off to the side to watch the events unfold. For real. Phoebe runs for Clay, just as the snake attacks. He puts his arm up to protect Phoebe and the snake disappears. It was a selfless act, you see. PMC and the urn disappear.
Phoebe hugs Clay and asks, “who says people never change?” All it takes is a robbery gone wrong and an ancient Egyptian curse, girl! If that doesn’t change a man, nothing will.
The next day at Qua ke, Bumbling trips again and Piper freezes him. Prue is sick of this plot and decides to take matters into her own hands. She walks over to the frozen dude and takes the engagement ring he’s been carrying out of his pocket. Piper unfreezes time. Waitress sees the box and Bumbling admits he was carrying it around, waiting for the right moment to ask her. They smile at each other and all is well.
The girls laugh about their meddling ways but now it’s time to wrap up the main plot. Clay walks in and Prue and Piper give Phoebe some little encouragements. Phoebe slaps the bar and announces, “I’m going in.” The girls laugh and it looks cute and natural.
Clay and Phoebe kiss goodbye and other stuff that isn’t important. I guess I’ll end by saying that I pulled this gif to use but I must’ve missed when it happened in the episode. So, here, have this to end:
Next time on Charmed: Piper is attacked by a beast and it has ugly side-effects in S01 E12 – The Wendigo.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
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