Kish: Those Boots Were Made For Walkin'!

Today brought another fantastic episode of One Life to Live, complete with one of the best pure soap opera moments I've seen in a long while.

Since I don't really write about the non-Kish stories (which are usually pretty great as well), I'd just like to note the fantastic scenes today between Bo (played by the very talented Robert S. Woods) and Gigi and Rex's son Shane (played by Austin Williams).

Long story short, Bo & Nora had spirited Jessica's daughter Bree and Shane off to safety at the Buchanan ranch in Texas until their biological Grandpsycho Mitch was no longer a threat, and today found them all en route back to Llanview on the Buchanan jet.

Bo broke the news to Shane about his Aunt Stacy's death and the two had this incredibly realistic conversation about Shane's feelings that was not only well written but perfectly played. Truly great scenes.

With that said, let's talk Kish! As the hunky doctor (is there any other kind on a soap?) informed Gigi and Schuyler that Sierra Rose had a congenital heat defect that would require surgery if she was to survive, Kyle filled Oliver in about the nature of the condition out in the hall as they looked through the nursery window.

Oliver broke my heart when he asked Kyle if they could wait until Sierra was bigger, his voice breaking as he noted that she was not even a day old yet and so tiny. Kyle explained that they had special tools for operating on infants and that to wait would be fatal.

Kyle told Fish that they'd need permission to do the surgery and since Stacy was dead it would have to be from the father. Oliver said that it was up to Schuyler, then, and Kyle said that it was if Joplin was the father, but what if he wasn't?

Kyle told Fish that it would be easy to find out for sure if Sierra was his, since so many tests had already been run on her. All Kyle would need was a swab of Oliver's cheek and they could know for sure.

Fish insisted that he didn't want any tests, that it didn't matter since the baby might not make it. I was surprised by this, but only momentarily. After all, this is Fish we're talking about, the guy who can be incredibly heroic when it comes to saving others but who has a history of hiding from his own feelings. He's clearly terrified of finding out that Sierra is his daughter and then losing her.

I'm sure he's also still scared about the prospect of being a father at all. Remember how quickly he accepted Stacy's assurances that the baby really was Schuyler's? He referenced that again today, asking Kyle why Stacy would have lied about that all the way up to the point of naming Schuyler the guardian in her will if it wasn't the truth.

Kyle suggested that Stacy may have been homophobic, at least when it came to the idea of her child being raised by its gay father, but Fish didn't believe that was the case and pointed out how Schuyler had been there for the baby the whole time.

Kyle: And you haven't? You've been standing guard the whole time!

Fish: Rex paid me for that.

Kyle: Yeah, and he didn't pay you to run up a mountain and risk your life in a blizzard!

Fish asked Kyle to let it go, saying that he didn't want to add to everything Gigi was going through already and noting that she'd stepped up for the baby, in spite of her feelings towards her sister.

We didn't see Kyle answer Oliver's request to let the subject go, but the look in his eyes didn't make it seem like he was willing to do so. I think they're playing this whole thing in a way that's very true to these characters. Kyle has always known who he is and what he wants, while Oliver spent so many years blocking out his true feelings that even now it must seem like a natural response to him.

Meanwhile, Rex and Kim were still mid-confrontation at the lake. Kim side stepped Rex's question about who the father was if it wasn't him or Schuyler, saying that the baby was Stacy's and that's all that mattered.

Kim then laid into Rex about Stacy's death being his fault, that she wouldn't have been pregnant or kidnapped at all if it wasn't for him. She also told him that Stacy had loved him so much that she'd given up everything for him and asked if anyone else had ever loved him that much!

I appreciate that Kim is still in Stacy's corner, no matter what, but I think that in her less grief stricken moments, even she must recognize that Stacy's obsession with Rex wasn't really love. I think that's part of why I finally started liking Stacy when Kim showed up. We finally saw that there was someone she genuinely cared for, and then after she got pregnant it became clear the she loved her baby. It made her more human.

After a few more rounds about whether or not Stacy had loved him more than Gigi did, Rex decided it was time for him to go and offered to give Kim a ride back to town. Kim refused, saying that she wasn't leaving Stacy.

When Rex was gone, Kim began to tearfully talk to her friend as if she were still there. She 'showed' Stacy her new boots, the ones that Clint had just bought for her, and noted that they'd cost more than the motel room Stacy and Kim had lived in back in Vegas.

Kim broke down, noting that everything would have been fine if Stacy hadn't left the cabin. Why, Kim cried, did she leave her? They were supposed to be a team! Kim yelled at Stacy that she was talking to her, as if she were expecting an answer.

Again, Amanda Setton did a fantastic job in these scenes. Crying on camera is one of the hardest things to do, or so I've heard, and I should note that I never saw any actual tears from Kim. Still, there are some actresses (one in particular on this very show) who fake cry so badly that it's downright painful to watch, but Amanda Setton managed to make crying without real tears very believable.

Watching Kim go through all the stages of grief was pretty powerful stuff. She finally got to acceptance and promised Stacy that she'd make sure that her daughter never wanted for anything.

Rex, meanwhile, had made it to the hospital at last and Gigi filled him in on what was going on with Sierra and how they needed his consent to operate. (Gigi momentarily discovered that Rex wasn't the father when she thought Stacy had faked going into labor, but once Stacy went into labor for real, Gigi thought she'd been wrong about that and no one had told her the truth yet)

While Kyle and Fish looked on, with Kyle shooting Oliver all these looks that clearly said "Step up and claim your child!" Rex explained to Gigi that he couldn't give the consent. When Gigi demanded to know why, Schuyler finally admitted that he was the baby's real father.

Back at the lake, Kim decided it was time to go and check on Sierra. She said her own special good bye to Stacy, leaving her expensive new boots behind as a tribute and saying that she loved Stacy. It seemed an odd thing to do, I admit, especially since Kim now has to walk around barefoot in the snow, but at the same time it totally seemed like something Kim would do. What better sort of tribute from someone so materialistic?

The final scene of today's show was a shot of the icy lake, now completely silent. The camera cut over to the snow covered dock, where Kim had left the boots, but they were no longer there. Then, the camera panned slowly over some bootprints in the snow!

Now that was truly a classic soap moment! The kind that makes you sit up and yell "What?!" I thought the no body thing meant that they were leaving a door open just in case, but today's ending would indicate that they've already got something big planned. I love it!

All in all, a great show today. Kyle isn't going to let up on the issue of Sierra's paternity, and Oliver is clearly terrified about the whole thing. This is probably going to cause some tension between them, but I think they can take it.

As always, I can't wait to see what's going to happen next.