Lynette heads for ‘Desperate’ finale

For two seasons, Lynette Scavo has been perhaps the most pulled-together resident of Wisteria Lane, where the "Desperate Housewives" head for their finale on May 21. While Susan has gone through romantic disasters to rival a Harlequin romance, Bree has lost her husband, and Gabrielle has cheated on hers, Lynette and Tom's marriage has stayed relatively intact. In fact, Lynette has served as a source of strength for the other women on Wisteria Lane, offering sound advice and a shoulder to cry on when needed.

Sure, the Scavo kids (Parker, Porter, Penny, and Pepsi, or something like that) are P-shaped maniacs. But after a few nanny-daycare shakeups, the tykes appear to have settled down to a much quieter reign of terror. At least they're too young to be sleeping with their parents' paramours, à la Bree's son, Andrew, or whacking a neighbor over the head, as Bree's daughter Danielle did to Betty Applewhite. Unlike what happened to poor Edie and Susan, no one has burned down the Scavo home. And no one is bloodily trying to frame them for murder via finger-amputation, as the getting-more-creepy-by-the-hour Felicia Tillman just did to pretty-creepy-himself Paul Young.

No, the Scavos, up till now, have mostly wrestled with the more mundane world of work woes. Frustrated with life as a stay-at-home mom, Lynette ended up working at the same ad agency as her husband Tom, he quit to try the stay-at-home dad life for a while, then rejoined the company.

Lynette's grappled with a childless boss who seemed to have it in for her as a mother, worked to start up an in-office daycare center, and managed to get said childless boss fired for sexual grappling with another employee. But her biggest work problem has involved the man she both works and lives with, husband Tom.

Scavo vs. Scavo
As anyone who's attempted to work with a loved one can tell you, dealing with a close relative or friend in the business world can try even a saint's patience. Working with a loved one can double the waking hours spent together each day — twice the time for disagreements, for words misinterpreted, for knock-down, drag-out fights.

Even when Lynette and Tom were working separately, they clashed. Lynette sabotaged a promotion Tom was in line for and the betrayal he felt reverberated for months. She finally made him a deal: She'd agree to try and work at the same company with him, under the condition that he never, ever bring up that issue again. So far, he's held to that promise.

But work has been far from a bed of roses for the Scavo two. They've ended up battling for dominance in the boardroom, and it's sometimes carried over into the bedroom. "It's hard for a guy to not feel in control of any part of his life," Tom bluntly told his wife. Lynette's been understanding, to a point, but she's not one to hide her frustration. Tom and new boss Ed's frat-house antics led her to pull a stunt of her own, in which she ate an entire pound of a client's raw bacon.

But Lynette and Tom might have been able to continue working together until the Clan of the P Bears headed off for Penn State or Pepperdine or Parsons or Princeton, if not for a technological slip-up on Lynette's part. Instant-messaging from work with an at-home Tom, she typed a sexy message without she was sending it to their boss. She quickly apologized for the message, and for most employees, that and a horrible bout of embarrassment would have been the end of it.

But Lynette Scavo is not most employees, or most people. Instead of apologizing and slinking back to her desk, she encouraged Ed to start sending sexy messages to his own spouse, Fran. When a nervous Ed fled, Lynette sat down at his desk and played cyber-Cyrano. When Fran discovered that the messages were from another employee, Ed lied and blamed Tom so he wouldn't have to fire Lynette. He then set about finding a reason to fire Tom, which came rather easily when Tom punched him in the face.

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