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The firm is taking on the "Asbury divorce case," and Taylor picks Maggie as her second chair in order to avoid Matt. Matt keeps hitting on Taylor, who tells him that she can't date him with the both of them working for her dad and all. When Matt ends up working with Jordan on some grunt work, and when Matt "hypothetically" asks how Jordan would feel about him pursuing Taylor, Jordan says he would "hypothetically" crush said person, which: hee. Jordan also "hypothetically" tells Eli about Taylor and Matt, and Eli freaks out on Taylor, and there's a whole brouhaha with Eli, Taylor, Matt, and Maggie, and also Maggie's engaged and Taylor and Jordan have words and there's a really, really Smurfy ending to the Asbury case and whatever. Matt, however, totally calls Taylor out on having feelings for him, which, since I love him, is awesome. In more interesting news, Eli wakes up in a stranger's apartment with a strange nurse -- and realizes he's inhabiting his brother's body. The vision is from over ten years ago, but that's not the biggest problem for the Stones, as Nate is getting sued. Turns out he bumped a woman down on the heart transplant list who ended up dying, and her husband is just the teensiest bit miffed about that. Eli's visions of himself as Nate, however, have some big significance -- he gets to see what Nate saw on the day their father died. As it happens, Eli was studying for the bar exam right then, and didn't come home, so he has no idea what happened. Nate gets accused of giving the woman's heart away because she had a drinking problem, and Eli wonders if it might be true, given their dad's addiction. But he learns that his father didn't die from a drunk-driving accident, but in fact had a heart attack, and could have been saved by a heart transplant, which was available -- but Nate passed the heart on to someone else. Nate turned it down because his dad was an alcoholic with a bad liver, and Eli agrees with his reasoning. Nate also, it seems, finally, FINALLY, gets it in his head that Eli's visions are for real -- and also tells Eli that it was the woman herself who decided she didn't want the transplant. The Stones win, of course, and Nate finally, FINALLY, tells Eli that he shouldn't have the operation to remove his aneurysm, because something amazing is happening to him. And speaking of amazing, in the last scene, Eli-as-Nate tells his dad that his family is okay, and his dad in turn tells Eli -- not Nate, but Eli -- that he's sorry. I'll go into a lot more detail in the recap, but for now: SNIFF! Want more? The full recap starts right below!
As "Star People '97" plays in the background, some blonde in her underwear stands by a bed and greets a groggy Eli with a "Morning, sunshine." Eli quickly establishes that he doesn't know who she is and doesn't recognize the place he's in, and jumps to the entirely reasonable conclusion that this is the result of an enormous bender. Entirely reasonable, that is, except for the part where he is not massively hung over, and if he's one of those people who can wake up from Saturday-Night-Live-in-the-seventies levels of partying with no ill effects, remind me never to feel sorry for him again. When Eli expresses surprise at the blonde's assertion that he has rounds, however, she thinks that she, "bad nurse Kerri," is meant to restore Eli the "sexy amnesiac's" memory with a round of role-playing. At least that's what I'm assuming she was going to say before Eli cut her off. She changes gears, however, and heads into the shower, but not before playfully addressing him as "Doctor Stone." When she moves out of frame, Eli can see his reflection in the bathroom mirror -- only it's Nate's, and if that's how his hair looks when he wakes up in the morning, I don't blame him for buying product in bulk.
Eli's in Nate's office, telling him about what he saw. Nate suggests he put a sign up: "Objects in the mirror are handsomer than they appear." Hee. Eli says he was in Nate's old apartment on Divisadero, causing Nate to wax reminiscent about all the "damage" he did in that place. Well, if he was already a doctor at that young an age, that seems like a given. I mean, wasn't Grey's Anatomy sort of founded on that premise? Anyway, Nate thinks Eli's experiencing just another sensory hallucination, and denies having any legal problems when Eli offers that the people in his visions usually do. Nate also mentions that Kerri moved to Seattle, and he hasn't even spoken to her in ten years. "But if you imagine [her] again, tell her to call me. And say nothing to my millionaire girlfriend, who was the source of so much tension between us last episode." I'm filling in a few blanks here.
Eli sets a pretty plant on Patti's desk as a welcome-back present, and Patti responds by dropping the thing on the floor. Sassy! Eli apologizes for screwing up the Silver Terrace thing, but only succeeds in getting her attention when he tells her he's having the aneurysm removed. Patti's worried, but Eli leaves her to chase after Maggie, and I hope she at least waters the poor plant to make up for her earlier rudeness. Eli catches Maggie in the break room, and she's completely Stepfordian toward him until he calls her on that explicitly, so she drops the act, saying things are different. She refuses to tell him just how things are different, though, and without giving it completely away, he's standing about half a foot from you and looking in your eyes, hon. Also, he's a guy, and guys need help with this kind of thing. (Flashback to twelve years ago to my friend Mia asking me after about fifteen minutes of chitchat: "John, are you blind?")
Staff meeting. Jordan announces that they've been retained in the "Asbury divorce case," and Taylor specifies that they're on the wife's side, and they could make the law journals with this one. Jordan: "Don't be modest. This one's making the evening news." Even without Eli involved? Taylor requests a second chair, and Matt, with a shit-eating grin, offers his services. Taylor tries to turn him down, saying that she doesn't need someone with his level of experience. Matt, however, says he's sure he'll learn something new, and of course the "with [my/your] vagina" is implied. Taylor, however, calls on Maggie, who recovers before a coffee spit-take comes to pass, and Jordan tells Matt that since he has so much time free, he can join him on the "Fenrich document production. All two thousand pages worth." Matt's face: "Oh, goody." I'd wonder if these other lawyers ever get cases, but it'd be tough for them to litigate, given that SAG isn't allowing them to talk.
Matt comes into Taylor's office (if that's still Eli's old office, she's redecorated) and complains about her boxing him out. When she repeats his choice of phrase, he starts to explain it, but Taylor snits that she knows what it means. "I played varsity forward at Stanford." I'm surprised that she wasn't the center, given that to both Matt and Eli she looks about seven-foot-three. Matt hits on her some more, so Taylor tries to put him off by pointing out that they work together, and her dad wouldn't approve. Matt buys this, but his "I'm on a mission" body language as he leaves gives Taylor cause for concern. Throw an elbow to his ribs, Taylor! No one's going to call that!
Nate comes in to see Eli at the office, and Eli notes his somber look. Nate sits and says he just came from a meeting with his boss, and it was about a former patient of his, "Karen Masters," who died three months ago. Turns out Nate runs the organ donor process at St. Vincent's, and Karen was up for a donor heart, but a woman who was lower on the list took a turn for the worse, and Nate moved her up into first position over Karen. She got the heart, Karen didn't -- and then Karen died, and now Karen's husband is suing him. Nate quickly skips over any discussion of Eli's vision being prescient to tell him he's in real trouble, and says that last week, Eli told him he had faith in his medical expertise. "When it comes to lawyering, and probably only lawyering, I have faith in you." Eli: "Looks like you hired yourself a lawyer." It's a little early in the episode for me to be "Aw"-ing all over the place. Can Matt be Eli's second chair and kill some of the earnestness?
Maggie thanks Taylor for picking her, saying she always thought she'd benefit from the experience of working aside an "older woman." Taylor raises an eyebrow, so Maggie blab-pedals that she didn't mean old, just "seasoned." Taylor snarks that she's beginning to see why Maggie eats lunch at her desk alone, although her light tone makes it seem like she realizes Maggie was being clueless instead of bitchy. She heads upstairs, and Maggie's going to follow when Eli comes breathlessly rushing up. Maggie: "Did you need something work-related?" You do know he's met you before, right? Eli's big production is all to ask Maggie if she got a haircut, and Maggie starts to decry his powers of observation when Taylor, bless her, calls down that people are waiting for them. A jealous Taylor I didn't get or buy, but a Taylor who's too busy to indulge Maggie's bullshit? If you'll forgive me for getting a little sassy, that's what I'm talking about. Speaking of sassy, Eli then falls into step with Patti and asks if there's something different about Maggie, and Patti says yes, but when Eli asks what, she snits, "Can they fix your brain tomorrow, by any chance?" I'll forgive her the attitude for now, because I feel bad for her that her vacation overlapped with Maggie's.
Matt and Jordan are working away, and Matt brings up a "hypothetical" case, and be warned that I can't do justice to the hilarious delivery or Victor Garber's resultant facial expressions. It seems that "ParentCo" has a "particularly attractive subsidiary," called "Daughter Inc." Hee. Matt goes on that Daughter Inc. then receives feelers from a corporate suitor, "who couldn't value her assets more highly." He asks how ParentCo would look on said suitor "pursuing a merger" with Daughter Inc. I seriously cannot get over how great a job Sam Jaeger is doing on this show. Pat yourself on the back, casting people. Jordan allows himself to look horrified for a moment before leaning forward and offering this very deliberate delivery: "ParentCo would do everything within its considerable power to protect Daughter Inc., so soon after her recent failed merger -- in short, ParentCo would not hesitate to crush any suitor who sought to merge with Daughter Inc. at this juncture." He pauses, and then adds, "Hypothetically." Matt tries not to swallow his tongue in fear as I wonder whether Jordan still considers him the new heir to, um, "ParentCo."
All right here's the thing about this divorce case: On paper, the premise looks mildly interesting, but in practice it's both sappy and boring as shit, at least for me. It's supposed to be this landmark case, but in fact it's as simplistic as it is treacly, so you're getting the bare-bones version. The wife of five years arranged for a hotel-room assignation with a guy she met online, and the prenup between her and her husband clearly states that the first party to cheat gets nothing from the other. The twist, however, is that the person at the end of the computer was actually her husband. I'm assuming, of course, that the husband knew it was his wife (or the infidelities would cancel each other out) so the question is whether this actually can be construed as infidelity. And now I will be skipping the rest of the scene, as it is dumb.
On to Nate and Eli, and the widower says that Nate promised Karen was on the list, which Nate gently denies. Eli adds that the law doesn't second-guess medical decisions that are a matter of judgment, but the opposing counsel says that's not true in cases of misconduct, and points out that Karen died only three days after the heart that was meant for her was given to someone else, so how much less urgent could her need have been? After the widower offers some more grief-stricken accusations, his lawyer declares his intention to take Nate down hard, in both reputation and financial means. I'd be real worried for him if his girlfriend, as I mentioned, weren't a newly-minted multimillionaire. When their enemies are gone, Nate breathes that he hasn't been sued before in ten years of practice, and he thought that if he ever was, it would be because he screwed up. Eli, knowing that they're only in the second act, urgently asks if there's anything about the case Nate hasn't told him, but Nate says no. Eli pushes again, saying that the opposing attorney seems very confident for someone who doesn't have the law on his side. Well, Eli, he might just have been inspired by the results of some of your cases earlier in the season. Nate, somewhat agitated, again denies that he's hiding anything, and leaves -- except when Eli looks at the chrome pitcher in front of him, he sees his brother's reflection. He reaches forward...
...and then he, as Nate, is sitting in an outdoor café with Kerri, who's dressed in scrubs and muses about how sad Princess Diana's "recent" death is. Eli unnecessarily says it's "ten years ago," prompting some silly dialogue that's interrupted by his phone ringing -- his mammoth phone, a touch I appreciated. It's his mother, who tells him there's been an accident involving a car and his dad, and he needs to get over to Golden Gate Heights right away. Kerri asks what's wrong, and Eli, after taking a moment, breathes, "Today is the day my father died." Just as well -- that Diana story's totally running out of juice. (Well, at least you can't claim that that was too soon.)
Chen opens his door to find Eli, and they totally greet each other like significant others who recently had their first big fight. Proving my point is that Chen busies himself with some wires coming out of a small TV he's apparently trying to fix as Eli launches into an awkward apology, and then tells Chen that he found a doctor to take out the aneurysm. Chen's like, "Great," so Eli rambles on, telling him about George Michael's visit and dream about him. Chen can't resist looking at Eli after that one, and grins, "Probably just a coincidence." When Eli tells Chen that he's "sorta kinda having Nate's flashbacks," though, Chen snaps to attention, and asks Eli what he remembers from the day his dad died. Unfortunately, as it happened, Eli's bar exam was only two days from the day of the accident (it's implied that he was studying in a location other than San Francisco) and Nate and his mom told him not to come home. Eli looks down for a moment as he confesses that his dad was gone by the time he finally made it home, and Chen opines that someone wants him to know what actually happened that day, and suggests he talk to Nate about it. Doesn't seem like that advice required a whole lot of inspiration, but you can't expect to get his A material the first time back.
Maggie and Taylor are on their way to a depo when Matt appears and grabs Taylor away in order to tell her that he approached her dad and "opened negotiations." He looks pretty cocky here, considering it seemed like the only thing he opened in the earlier scene was his bowels. Taylor's exasperated, and in frustration blabs the news about sleeping with Matt to Maggie. Since the scene suddenly calls for Maggie to have an attack of insight, she asks if Taylor picked her for the case to avoid working with Matt, and Taylor hesitates before replying, "If I answer no, would that prevent you from ever uttering a word of this to Eli?" Maggie looks confused, so we're back to normal, then.
So in the conference room, CyberCheatingWife admits that she didn't know she was talking to her husband, because she hadn't seen "that side of him" in years -- there was honesty, and warmth. The opposing counsel points out that she proposed meeting in real life, although I'd argue that that's not actually infidelity, and the wife sappily says she hoped to feel as wanted as her husband used to make her feel. Excuse me for a moment...
...okay, I'm back. The widower is on the stand talking about fluid building up in the voice box, which is an interesting coincidence, given what that last scene just forced me to do. Widower, however, is talking not about the stealthy appearance of uncontrolled vomiting, but the "death rattle" -- a terrible raspiness that the fluid caused in Karen's voice right before she died. He goes on that Nate promised her the heart, but he changed his mind, and he thinks that's because Nate found out that she had a drinking problem -- Karen told her husband on her deathbed that she'd confessed her alcoholism to Nate. Eli casts an appraising glance at his brother, who looks to him for help, but Eli says nothing as the widower goes on that Karen said that was probably the reason he gave her heart to someone else.
Nate leads Eli into the latter's office, and chews him out for not objecting while the widower was painting him as a monster. Eli, in turn, heatedly asks why Nate didn't tell him about the drinking problem, and Nate claims it was privileged information, causing Eli to get to the real point: "Did you give that woman's heart to someone else because of Dad?" He says that the defense's move will be to claim exactly that, and goes on to tell Nate about his visions of the day their father died. He asks what Nate isn't telling him about that day, but Nate blusters that Eli's visions are "crap," and while Eli's indulging them and asking dumb questions about the past, it's Nate's ass that's getting hung out to dry. "And right now, what I don't know is why the hell I trusted you in the first place!" He storms out, and Eli does that thing he does where he looks like he's chewing off both his lips at once.
Jordan has Eli in his office, and he's prefacing his upcoming comments by asserting that they're not having this conversation, and he'll deny it ever happened. Sadly, this disclaimer does not lead to a rendition of Minnie Riperton's "Lovin' You." Jordan instead informs Eli that Taylor has become involved with a co-worker with whom they'd both rather see her not be involved, and you know I love my Berlanti shows, but like I mentioned earlier, wasn't Jordan just sort of telling Matt a couple episodes ago that he was his new heir apparent? After babbling a bit about the "I Got You Babe" vision, Eli whispers, "If you'll excuse me, I have to go yell at someone, and then go...kill somebody else." If you're taking requests, I'll pick Patti and Maggie, respectively. Eli leaves the room like a psycho, and Jordan smiles and sips his drink in satisfaction. First he's a George Michael fan, now he's a stealth gossip. Can his star rise any higher?
Eli doesn't listen to me, instead choosing to bark at Taylor, who yells at him right back before turning her attention to the conveniently-appearing Maggie and chewing her out for apparently having told Eli about her and Matt. Maggie denies that, causing Eli to bitch at her for not telling him, and then Matt walks in, looks around, and jauntily observes, "I take it there's a bag somewhere missing a cat!" Hee. Cross-bitchery ensues, and then Taylor yells at Maggie some more, Eli defends her, Matt says he's going to talk to Jordan again, and Taylor tells him not to bother -- she was only trying to get Matt off her back. Matt actually looks hurt as he leaves, but I choose to believe that's just part of his effort to get into her pants again. More bitchery among the remaining folks occurs about office romances and Hawaii and the like, and then Eli finally notices the engagement ring on Maggie's finger, and Taylor snarks, "Interesting that she didn't tell you she was engaged. I'm sure there's nothing to that." Well, one can only hope. Taylor stomps off, and Maggie and Eli engage (heh) in some retread, but I'll give Maggie a bit of credit for saying that she and Eli had a moment (when they kissed), but the moment has passed. I'd give her more credit, though, if I thought she actually meant it.
Nate is testifying that he wanted Karen to get the heart, but he didn't promise that she would -- he never can in his position. He did reprioritize the list, because the other patient got sicker, although it might help his case if he were to, say, MENTION WHAT HE OR SHE HAD. Nate goes on that Karen's alcoholism had nothing to do with his decision -- in fact, had he wanted to scuttle her chances, he would have disclosed her drinking problem, but he didn't, because he knows that alcoholism comes with a lot of shame, and he wanted to protect Karen's privacy. The opposing counsel stands and gets Nate to admit his dad's alcoholism, and says he has affidavits from numerous and varying sources attesting to how much Nate resented his dad for his drinking. Nate practically barks that that had nothing to do with Karen, and the attorney snarks in response that they can all see how objective he is on the subject. I hate to armchair-practice here, but I really think Nate had a point about Eli's failure to use the word "objection."
Outside, Eli pedebitches at Nate, asking why he didn't put Karen's condition on her form, and seething that he can't help Nate if he won't tell him everything. Nate yells right back, saying he told all the necessary and relevant info, and it's just his bad luck that things came down this way -- bad luck which, by the way, he seems to have caught from Eli. Nate stomps off to take the stairs, and Eli stares after his brother until the elevator shows up. When he gets on, "Father Figure" starts to play, and when the doors close, he sees Nate looking back at him, wearing the same purple hoodie with the St. Vincent's name he had on in the last vision. Eli and Reflecto-Nate both bark, "I am so not in the mood right now!" This is why Eli doesn't do nearly as much, um, "damage" as his brother. The doors open, and the song fades as Eli gets off the elevator. His mom sees him and greets him using his brother's name, and then leads him over to a "Doctor Francis," who explains his dad's condition, only on the first run-through, he uses medical terminology that makes Eli go, roughly, "Buh?" He asks for a layman's translation so, you know, "his mother" can follow along, and learns that while his dad did have a car accident, it only happened because he had a heart attack first, and he needs a transplant. Eli's mom goes to call, well, him, but she looks in on her unconscious husband first. The doc then tells "Nate" that there's actually a donor available in that very hospital, and his dad would be at the top of the list, given his condition. Eli stares at his dad as the doctor asks what he wants to do. Get out of this really, really upsetting vision, I'm guessing.
Eli shows up at Nate's and tells him he knows about their dad's heart. As Nate stares at him in abject horror, Eli goes on that he thinks their dad wasn't drunk the night of his accident, but had a heart attack and could have had a transplant. Without much fanfare, Nate admits that it's true, and says he's glad Eli knows now. "Killing our father hasn't been the easiest thing to live with." It's not any picnic to watch, either. Eli, eyes downcast, tells Nate that he did the right thing -- the heart would have been wasted on him. Nate agrees, adding that he would have needed a healthy liver for the transplant to take (remember that for later), and their dad was never going to stop drinking, but while he knows he made the right decision intellectually, it's still hard to take. He asks if Eli talked to their mother, but Eli says no -- it's the visions. Nate, the scales finally falling from his eyes, asks if this happens a lot, and Eli says yes before wondering if Nate made the same choice for Karen as he did for their father. Nate tells him that after four days in the hospital, Karen started experiencing the symptoms of alcohol withdrawal, but he didn't make the decision to bump her down the list -- she did, and made Nate promise never to tell her husband. Two things: One, if she conspired with Nate to keep her husband in the dark, it seems either illogical or callous of her to turn around and tell her husband that she informed Nate of her alcoholism -- she had to know it would make him look bad, and it really seems like she totally sold him out. Two, more importantly, Nate just told us that their father's alcoholism made him a bad candidate for the transplant. So why would he have been willing for Karen to undergo the same doomed procedure had she not spoken up? Eli asks why Nate kept the information about Karen from him, and Nate says he was just hoping that he wouldn't get punished for simply making the best choice he could. This hits home with Eli, and he responds, "If this goes the wrong way, you may have a future as a lawyer." That's a nice thought, but can't we see Nate in scrubs first?
Taylor catches Jordan and asks him about Matt, and Jordan tells her that Matt approached him with a hypothetical. "Truthfully, I expected him to be less of a wuss." I could listen to Victor Garber say "wuss" all day. He begs Taylor to tell him that nothing happened between the two of them, but Taylor, no wuss she, not only doesn't hide it but quickly realizes that Jordan's the one who blabbed the news to Eli. After a hilarious moment of Jordan decrying the mental picture of Taylor and Matt, Jordan says he simply thought she still wanted Eli to fight for her, but Taylor orders him to stay out of it before running off, saying she's late for a depo. Maybe all this tardiness is her subconscious editorializing about how fucking boring that divorce case is.
Maggie has gotten the ball rolling, for which I'll give her points again, and CyberCuckoldHusband says he thought he was going to the hotel to meet his "soul mate," and instead he found his wife. Okay, so first of all, he actually didn't know he was going to meet his wife? How is he less culpable than she, then? And secondly, minus a billion points for the use of "soul mate." Someone at least bang him on the head with a gavel for that one. Anyway, CyberCuckoldHusband is saying basically the same thing his wife did, about how her online personality was so great and wasn't like their marriage at all and speeeeeyaaaack. And once again, THANK GOD for Taylor, as she says this is all completely ridiculous and they should obviously just get back together. She's overidentifying because of her lingering desire for Eli, of course, and she uses a lot of barfy sentiments that I won't be recapping to get there, but the bottom line is that she recuses herself and Maggie from the case for 72 hours, and orders the opposing counsel to do the same. As she walks out, her lips seem to say "There's a reason you two keep falling in love," but all I heard was "Case DISMISSED!"
Eli has called a "Dana Michelle Austin" to the stand, and the opposing counsel renews his objection. Judge Who Looks Like Oddly An Older Kelly Rutherford: "And I renew my overruling of your objection." Heh. Eli says he actually doesn't have any questions, but simply wanted the jury to meet the woman who actually did receive the heart that could have gone to Karen. He then speechifies about the tough decisions doctors make every day, and is it normal for a witness to be on the stand when a lawyer is making his closing arguments? Eli goes on in this vein, and his point is taken but this is distractingly ridiculous procedurally. He actually didn't ask her any questions! Wouldn't a cardboard cutout have sufficed? If I were the opposing counsel, I'd request to give my closing arguments at Karen's graveside. Nate looks teary as we head into the last break.
Nate: Not guilty. Eli turns: "Now might be a good time to mention I stole your Boba Fett figure when I was eleven." Aw. Nate's pretty overwhelmed, but gets up to apologize to the widower, who tells him he just wants Nate to feel like he does. "I hope you do one day." I'm pretty sure he's ten years ahead of you.
Matt finds Taylor and tells her it hurt that she threw her dad up as a roadblock, and Taylor counters by saying she didn't think he'd actually be crazy enough to approach Jordan. Given that Jordan actually expected Matt to be more bold than he was, it doesn't sound like he's ever going to score an across-the-board win with the Weathersby family. Matt's feelings aren't too hurt, though, as he tells Taylor that he might have bought that she wasn't into "the Dowd," but then he realized if she weren't, she wouldn't have been so nervous about working with him. On the one hand, he makes a fair point. But on the other, he's really risking killing whatever attraction there might be by referring to himself as "the Dowd." (Although if he's simply a big Scrubs fan, I could forgive it.) Anyway, Matt believes that what happened between them wasn't just sex, and Taylor does a not-that-convincing job of denying it.
On Eli's balcony, the brothers drink a beer as Matt babbles about the appendix by way of making the point that science isn't always right. Eli jokes that that's really reassuring on the eve of his surgery, but that's just what Matt is getting at -- he no longer thinks Eli should have the operation. "Something is happening with you. I don't know what, I wouldn't even begin to guess why, but what you knew about me and Dad...I can tell you with absolute medical certainty that it's impossible -- unless it's beyond science." Eli, wanting to believe that his brother believes, asks what he does think is happening, and Nate says he doesn't know, but smiles that it's pretty amazing. "It almost makes me wish it was happening to me." Aw! God, these two have great scenes. They laugh at that idea, and Eli says that for all these years, he was jealous of him and their dad. Nate tells him that Eli was always their dad's favorite, but Eli wistfully whispers that Nate got to say goodbye. Nate's smile fades, as that's something he can't fix, and after a pause, he breaks the tension by going to get another round. Eli looks back at the glass door and sees Nate's reflection one more time, and steps forward...
...and then he's walking into his dad's hospital room. He tells his seemingly-unconscious father that he, Nate, and their mother are going to be okay -- they all turn out okay. His dad opens his eyes and looks at his son in wonder, and Eli smiles through his tears: "It's Nate. I'm here." Eli's dad's eyes fill as he manages to choke out (in a death rattle, and that's an exquisitely heartbreaking touch) that he's sorry, and Eli tells him not to be. Mr. Stone: "I'm sorry, Eli." Looks like since he's going to die, he's determined to take me with him. Eli half-sobs at the mention of his name, and babbles that he's the one that's sorry, because he knows his dad tried to tell him about his visions. "I know it seemed like I wasn't listening, but I heard you, Dad." His dad manages a dazed smile, and just like that, he's gone. Eli strokes his hair and cries, and we fade to black.
Man, the stuff with Eli was so resonant -- it must be killing him to know that his dad had to go through everything he did with no one believing him or helping him make sense of things, yet he must be so appreciative that he now has people in his life to do for him what no one did for his dad. The stuff with Nate was amazing, too, with the heart-transplant case tying in perfectly. I have to ding the episode for that awful divorce storyline, but know that any subplot having to do with the name "Stone" this week just completely kicked ass. Can't wait for the one!