So, I've been thinking about how these four episodes were supposed to remind us all why critics are calling ER "revitalized." The past three, though, have sort of only put the "shite" in "revitalized," so this must be The One. This must be the episode that will redefine all other episodes. I'm ready.
Carter swings open his locker to put something away, and stumbles upon a little blue box. He stares at it. "That's funny," he thinks. "I always thought the instrument of my doom would come in something blacker." Behind him, Susan schlumps into the lounge and groans that tonight's graveyard shift is crawling slower even than the drunkest zombie. Her hair's down. It's shiny. It looks nice, actually. Vital. Revitalized? Maybe. But I feel like ER doctors should either have it up, or wear a hairnet, or something, because what if they're like me, and their hair sheds profusely at the worst times? Isn't she scared she'll dump a few hundred strands inside some cut-up accident victim? Susan notices that Carter's acting spacey. Carter turns, holds out the ring box, and opens it. Susan blinks. "I love you, too, Carter, but it's over," she cracks. He laughs and admits that he's going to propose to Abby that night. "Actually, I already did, but...badly," he sighs. Susan gasps, "She said no?" Carter amends that Abby simply didn't say anything, so he needs to do it right this time. Susan cradles the box and stares at the ring, which is a rectangular-looking stone but with rounded edges, and little diamonds inset into what looks like a platinum band. Carter explains that it belonged to his great-grandmother; her husband gave it to her the day he left for the army. "You know, I don't think she'll mind that it's second-hand," Susan teases. Heh. Although personally, I could totally see her hating it and acting all put-upon about having to wear it anyway, but maybe she's a better person than we think she is... Yeah, I know, I was laughing too.
Chen enters and offers to buy Carter and Susan some grub at Doc Magoo's. They smilingly decline, so Chen exits; outside, she runs into a sedate Luka outside the hospital. He's reading in the early-morning darkness. She tries to make pleasant small talk about a patient, but Luka kills the mood: "He died." Chen's like, "Uh, oh, hmm," and coughs up a toenail. He goes back to reading. She bends down a little to try to catch his eye. "Way to start the day, huh?" she says. Luka grunts. She offers to buy him breakfast, an offer he both accepts and seems to appreciate. As he stands, we see an SUV pulling away from Doc Magoo's, doing a U-turn, and speeding away. "What are you reading?" she asks. "Workplace Sensitivity Manual," he groans. "Weaver wants me to learn it." Why? Is this an old thing, or is this because he walked out the other week? Whatever. It's really just an excuse for Luka to mispronounce "putz" as "pootz," and recite words like "schmuck" and "peckerwood," and marvel at crazy American slang, because Croatians don't comprehend saucy language. Except, when was this manual written? The 1950s? I haven't called anyone a peckerwood...well, ever. But that will end today.
Their glorious conversation about peckerwoods stops when Chen and Luka enter Doc Magoo's. It's silent and empty. They tiptoe inside gingerly until they see a dead man slumped in a booth. "Gray matter. No pulse," Luka says after a quick examination. "We should get the police!" But Detective Chen has wandered behind the counter, where she spies footprints on the linoleum. Rather than leave and wait until the cops have cleared the place of perps, she follows the Yellow Brick Road straight back to the deep freezer. "Good Vibrations" is playing on the jukebox -- well, presumably; that, or the music supervisor has a sick sense of humor. Chen stops short when she sees blood seeping out under the door. Luka appears to her, and they both decide that the smartest thing is to open the freezer door rather than flee. Somebody make them memorize the Workplace Common Sense Manual, please. Chilling inside the freezer are two bodies, both blood-caked. One suffered a gunshot wound to the head, and the other has an exit wound near the spine. A woman moans. "Trina! Oh, my God," Chen panics. Luka notes that she's breathing and orders Chen to get help. We roll into the credits kinda wishing we'd known Trina so that we could be as sad as Chen seems to be.
Maggie makes coffee in Abby's kitchen. She babbles to her daughter about the Rileys, a family the kids used to stay with way back in the day; the implication is that they're the people who helped out when Maggie wasn't doing as well mentally, but neither Maggie nor Abby says quite as much. Maggie wonders if Eric might've gone there. "Maybe," Abby says with a small smile. Maggie starts to reminisce and ends up almost in tears. "He'll be okay, Mom," Abby says gently. "I know," Maggie says. Abby nods at her. Silence. "I should pack," Maggie says. Abby stares at her for a second; her pager breaks the quiet. "Is that John?" Maggie asks. Abby bites her lip. Clearly, she has to think for a second about who this mysterious "John" is, but eventually she remembers he's the pasty lug she's supposed to love. "No, it's work," Abby says. "But guess what? He asked me to marry him." Then she leaps out of her seat to grab the phone, as if she hadn't just said anything important. Maggie's jaw drops with joy. Abby actually smiles, but she insists that Carter didn't really mean it. "We were on the roof, and it was freezing, and there was a helicopter flying around and he was kind of...shouting it at me," she says with a private grin. Looks like Carter might've gotten it a bit more right than he thought. The look on her face is one of a woman who's cherishing the weird and wild memory. She tucks her hair behind her ear as she dials. "Every girl's dream," she giggles. Maggie impatiently and happily asks what Abby said. "Nothing," she replies. "He didn't really mean it. It was just...something that happened." Wait -- suddenly this turned into self-pity, or something. She has such a knack for that.
Abby gets through to the hospital and gasps. "Oh my God. Was anybody there? ...No, from the ER," she clarifies. Silence. "Okay. I'll be right in," Abby says, hanging up. Awkwardly, she grabs her stuff and promises to drive Maggie to the bus station later. Left alone, Maggie clears the table, and something akin to loneliness washes over her face. She seems lost. She's not sure when her Emmy clip is coming, and time seems to be running out. Abby suddenly reappears. "Or, you could stay a few more days," she suggests, trying not to sound hopeful. Maggie swivels; she clearly wants to stay, but instead she unenthusiastically says that she needs to get back to work. Smoke rises from her pants. "[You could] be here waiting in case he shows up," Abby tempts her. Maggie fixes a too-bright smile to her face. "What if he shows up in Minnesota?" she counters. Abby exhales hard and then nods. "You're right," she says, leaving. Maggie looks sad again. Lord, you people have issues.
It's daylight now, as the paramedics wheel the carnage out of Doc Magoo's. A pushy cop wants to quiz Trina right now, in case she dies, but Chen doesn't think that's an awfully optimistic way to behave. Weaver shows up, because that's what she does. "How many [traumas]?" she asks "Only one," Luka replies. "Three were pronounced on the scene." Weaver offers to take Trina, perhaps in case she has hidden leukemia or something. But Luka insists that he's fine, which I thought was much of the point of last week's little escapade in the snow. The cops try to talk to her again, but Trina isn't breathing. Chen figures out that ripping off the dressing on Trina's chest wound will reinflate her, and it does, with a giant whooshing noise. It's the life whooshing back into the show! Choose life, ER! Choose life! Luka pauses as he watches Chen wheel Trina inside. He looks struck by the tragedy of it all. Oh, God, please don't let this be History of a Croat, Version 3.0: I Done Lost My Family In A War-Torn Diner. Weaver calls out to him. "I just need a minute," he says, trying to sound flippant, but failing, because you can't interrupt a good brood with glibness.
Patrick Fugit is still here, and as such, he's still almost famous. He catches Susan mid-stroll. "Dr. Lewis! The patron saint of lost causes," he grins. Trina whizzes past him. "You all right?" Susan asks. "I'm a little nauseous," he says. Ha! The writers meant "nauseated." I'm going to have a bit of a gloat about that. And if Jessica tries to tell you anything about how I only just figured that one out, well, ignore her. She's probably drunk. Anyway, Patrick asks what the big brouhaha is in the ER, so Susan explains about the shooting across the street. "It's scary when it's so close," he nods, hopping up onto a bed and expositing that he's going home today and begins another round of chemo in two days. "I thought I'd come by and say 'so long,'" he says. Susan cocks an eyebrow and asks where Frances is. "She's upstairs with the 'doctor,'" Patrick says, fully utilizing air quotes there. "I kinda snuck off. I actually might need one of those basins." Susan hands him an emesis basin in case he decides to revitalize the NBC Vomit Comet with a casserole of hospital-issue Jell-O and baked beans. She runs off to get him an IV and to speak to his mother, asking Carter to watch Patrick until she's back. Patrick raises his hand. "I'm not a child," he offers. That's right. He's all man, and he's got a hunger for some braised Loin of Lewis.
In an indoor gym, Pratt and Gallant are playing basketball with some cronies. Testosterone is oozing from everything. It drips into my eyes. Oh, it burns. Pratt is pushing and shoving whoever he's defending, and he's getting as good as he gives. Gallant breaks up a near-fight; the time Pratt goes up for a shot, he gets slammed back into a bleacher, cutting the palm of his hand. Everyone stops and stares at him. Pratt checks out his palm, stands up slowly, wipes it onto the white front of his Sean John tank top, and snarls. Nobody messes with his Diddywear. Nobody. He charges at his opponent, but Gallant breaks it up again. "Forget about it. We won," Gallant says. I guess Pratt made the shot. "week," Pratt growls at the guy, pointing at him. Lordy, I hope not. "That's what I thought," huffs his opponent.
Carter is surprised to see Abby at the hospital. He can't believe she's actively being benevolent. "I heard what happened and I thought we might need the help," she says. Except the earlier scene sort of made it sound like she got paged to come in and assist. I suppose it's possible someone just paged her to deliver the news, and she said "I'll be right in" out of the goodness of her heart. She does have a heart, even if she's not always using it. Carter exposits that they only ended up with one patient because the others went straight to the morgue. Then, he apologizes for not coming over last night. "It's okay. Maggie and I played Scrabble," she says. "I got a 75-point word: cyanotic." She's all proud. "She challenged it," Abby adds smugly.
Jerry turns up the volume on the news, which is covering the Doc Magoo's tragedy with such gems as "what got served...was a cold-blooded robbery and homicide." And the killers didn't even leave a tip. Carter and Abby watch for a second, and then move to the Translucent Patient Board of Making Life Easier For the Directors. "Any word on Eric?" he asks. "I don't expect any," she says, surprisingly calm. "It's like a bear hibernating -- he won't come out until spring." Carter pretends he's having an epiphany that they should go out for sushi that night, just the two of them. Abby is underwhelmed and instead chooses to drive Maggie to the bus station. "She's leaving?" he asks. "Is that a good thing?" Abby purses her lips. "I don't know," she admits. "It was kinda nice having a roommate."
As Abby leaves, an eavesdropping Susan chides Carter for his super-lame and unromantic suggestion of a sushi dinner. What she doesn't know is that a platter of cold fish is, in reality, a shockingly apt metaphor for Abby and Carter's sex life. "I hope you have a better plan than that," she says. Probably not, but he will now. Carter's all, Hey, baby, it's all about keeping the bitches on their toes. "I don't want to show my hand to her," he says. "Well, the two of you have had enough misdirection," Susan snorts. "Trust me. Show your hand." Carter doesn't know how to take this, so he just blinks a lot and blatantly ignores the conventional wisdom that he should get a haircut.
Trina is covered in blood, but awake. Abby charges in with some blood for her. With the cops hovering, Chen asks Trina if she remembers anything. "They started shooting," she mumbles. "They just started shooting." Chen threads a catheter. I know this because I've been recapping this show for a season and a half now. Also, she just said, "Threading the catheter!" The cops get all pushy again for some details. Trina says she thinks there were two of them in an SUV; Chen recalls the scene before the credits and says, "I might've seen them getting away." So the cops pounce on her instead. She rattles off a description of the car -- gold or tan SUV, fairly new -- but they want something about the men themselves. "It was far away," she hesitates, but with pressure from the cops, she capitulates and offers that she thinks one of the guys was black. Absolutely nothing about her statement seems certain, but of course the cops pounce on it, because it's all they have.
Pratt, naturally, drives a gold or tan SUV that's fairly new. And he's black, too. And he's with Gallant. So the cops pull him over and boom that they must get out and stand to the car. "Welcome to the hood," Pratt grumbles. The cops roughly position them against the SUV as Pratt politely tells them where to find his license and registration. Gallant, though, has suddenly turned into an asshole, and he's all feisty and squirmy and angry, so he yells, "What are we being stopped for?" The cops snarl, "Where'd you get the money for a ride like this?" Pratt calmly, but with a slight edge, explains that they're both doctors at County. "Where are you guys headed in such a hurry?" sneers a white cop. Gallant fights it when they try to pat him down, so they shove him against the SUV again. About three patrol cars arrive as backup, which confuses Pratt, so the police share the news about Doc Magoo's. Gallant screams that they were just at the Y for a pickup game of basketball, and the people there can confirm it. Except, not to be a brat, but would they have been at the Y at 4 in the morning, or whenever it was that the shooting took place? It happened during the graveyard shift, which Susan had just deemed interminable...eh, whatever, sometimes there's no point in questioning every ripple in the space-time continuum. The Y is presented as their alibi, and that's that. Pratt suggests that the cops search the car and clear them so that they can get to work. His pager goes off. "See? That's my boss right now. I'm late for my shift," he sighs. "Dealers got shifts now, huh?" the white cop spits just as his counterpart finds the bloody Sean John tank top in the trunk. As soon as that's brandished, the cops throw Pratt and Gallant to the ground. "Cuff 'em," the white cop growls, stepping extra hard on Pratt's neck. We fade to black wondering when Gallant and Pratt swapped personalities, and if they could please switch back before Gallant gets annoying, because we love him too much to see him morph into a total peckerwood.
At the police station, Pratt and Gallant are being interrogated. We just see single shots of them answering questions, but from the way the questions are asked, it sounds like they're being dealt with separately. They both explain that they play at the Y twice a week, with people who live near Pratt. Gallant is still broody and snappish, while Pratt is calmer and smoother with only the merest edge to his voice. "Have you ever owned a firearm?" the disembodied cop voice asks. "No," Pratt says. "No!" Gallant yells. "I've never owned a firearm! Look, why are you hassling me? Just call County!" The cop asks where he was that day. "I already told you where I was!" Gallant screams. He also screams that he's a med student. He's screaming everything. This is so not Gallant. I never, ever thought I'd say this, and believe me, it doesn't feel good, but here it comes: Shut up, Gallant. He's our little respectful military kid; he's not a writhing loon. The cop tells Pratt they've been brought in because they match an ID. "I match the ID," Pratt parrots. "What, young, black, and handsome?" Oh, Pratt. Don't make me come over there.
Weaver slams down the phone and orders Jerry to send ID sheets for Pratt and Gallant to the precinct. Then she sidles up to Susan and coos that her young lover with the cancer problem is being discharged, and his mom has requested that Susan stay away from him while he's waiting for his ride to cart him away. "What does [Patrick] say?" Susan asks, hurt. "She's a grieving mother. I think we need to respect her wishes," Weaver says. And what about the wishes of the dying kid? If he wants a piece of Roasted Rack of Susan, then he should be allowed to have it. Susan stares at Patrick, who's boredly in the middle of a confab between Frances and his "doctor."
Gallant and Pratt wait at the police station for someone else to show up and marginalize them. Gallant wants to get the names of the offending officers so that they can file a complaint. "Why don't you just be quiet," Pratt barks, closing his eyes, leaning back his head, and dreaming of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. A cop appears and confirms that they have tested positive -- for innocence! "It's not like we didn't tell you guys that four hours ago," Gallant sasses. Pratt crosses his arms, but not so high that they obscure his Sean John leather jacket.
Weaver bursts in to check on Trina, who has only Luka attending her right now. Weaver pauses uncomfortably, because she can sense that the moment demands some sensitivity, and she's not sure if she's got any in stock today. "If you want to take it easy for a while, I can keep you out of the trauma rooms. Assign you to non-critical care cases," she attempts gently. It's sort of sweet. So of course, Luka not only doesn't acknowledges it, but misses the point -- possibly deliberately. "If you need me anywhere, Kerry, you need me here," he says flatly. "We all have...times...where we could use a little less stress," she fumbles. Luka ignores her. "There's nothing wrong with admitting that you need some help," she continues, and she seems to mean it, which is amusing given that she was so reluctant to admit she needed help when she miscarried. Weaver's such a fascinating animal. She's nice and she's mean and she's considerate and she's tough, and sometimes it all comes out at once in a confusing cocktail, and sometimes she can compartmentalize it, and sometimes she taps into the wrong thing altogether. Here, I think she's genuinely trying to do what she failed to do a couple weeks ago. "I don't [need help]," Luka says emptily. Weaver gulps. "Even so," she says, toughening up, "I've scheduled a meeting with Dr. Meyers on seven. It's a formality. Unless you want to make it something more." It's a little unclear why she did this -- personally, I think she's pretending it's because of the shock of the Dog Magoo's discovery, but really she's hoping he'll use it to take care of those other "things" that were plaguing him -- things other than those persistent dreams of a curly-haired strawberry-blonde recapper in a hot tub. Luka digests all this and decides that the best strategy is to blink hard.
Pratt and Gallant charge into the hospital, the latter whipped up into a semi-righteous rage. "You shouldn't have let them search the car," he babbles. "That's what you do when you're innocent and in a rush," Pratt insists. "I don't usually ride around with a bloody shirt in my car." They pass Susan, who asks if they've heard the news, and exposits for Pratt that Chen was the first one on the scene. "She okay?" Pratt asks. "A little freaked," Susan says. Gallant isn't quite done being bitter about the situation with the cops, so he complains that Pratt is basically just bending over and inviting the cops to stick it where no sun should ever shine, ever. "That's the way it works sometimes," Pratt says, because he's worldly. "Yeah, if you let it," Gallant says. Pratt insists that there's no point in fighting any of this, and Gallant persists in disagreeing with this, and the argument goes on and on and they're totally losing me. I think what happened sucks, and that the cops were pricks, but it's not like they were pulled over for no reason at all. They matched an ID, vague as it was. "We could be perfect like Gandhi, but as soon as crap goes down, we'll be the first ones laid out on the street with a gun to the head," Pratt explains. He launches into the "I Had It Rough" monologue -- you know, the one about how he grew up in a shoebox in a dumpster behind the McDonald's where Hamburglar hung out and tried to push low-grade meat patties to innocent young kids. He concludes, "It happens to you enough, you get the message: You are not equal. You are not a full citizen. You are first, last, and above all else one thing, and one thing only: a suspect."
A nurse wheels Patrick outside to wait for the van to take him home. Susan -- having meditated on this and decided that a dying boy trumps a grieving mother -- shows up to tantalize Patrick one last time with her gravelly voice and spunky wool hat. He sulks that his mother left early to make sure the home hospice stuff is all set up. "I think you're doing the right thing," she coos. "I think it doesn't matter what you think," he pouts. Then he apologizes for being pissed at her, which he bloody well should, and explains that death just feels a little too imminent these days. He rattles off all the things he always wanted to do, and bless him, first on the list is getting drunk at a college party. Patrick, paradoxical though it seems, that is both an overrated and highly underrated experience. I did a lot of puking that can attest to that. He also mentions windsurfing and getting married and having kids. "Even after I got sick, I kept tricking myself into believing that I had more time," Patrick concludes wistfully. His ride shows up, but not in time to head off one of Susan's wild impulses. She stands up firmly. "I can't get you into college, and windsurfing's nuts, but come on, let's get out of here," she announces. Oh my God. They're going to elope and try to impregnate her. "Call his mom," Susan says. "Tell her we went on a date," Patrick grins, standing up excitedly. "I'll have him back by curfew," giggles Susan. "Maybe. Say 'maybe,'" whispers Patrick with a wink. The guy stares after them, smiling. "I remember my first doctor," he thinks.
Maggie shows up at the hospital and tells Abby that she got hold of the Riley family, and that Abby will hear from them if Eric shows up there. "Okay," Abby says tolerantly. Chuny dumps an assignment into her lap. Abby tries to make lunch plans with Maggie, but she gets sidelined with another emergency, so Maggie brave-little-soldiers that she can catch a cab to the bus station. Abby apologizes to her. "I'll call you when I get home," Maggie calls out, trying to keep he composure. But she looks lost and lonely. I have a hard time feeling sorry for her, given that she could totally stay and has indeed been invited to stay. She looks hurt and wounded and alone, all of which are sort of her own fault. Wet-eyed, Maggie grabs her suitcase and stalks out of the ER. Carter watches her. Then he remembers that the script says he's supposed to follow her, and he curses his bad luck, because he still hasn't recovered from that nasty time in Season Seven when Sally Field chowed down on all the scenery in sight and tragically mistook him for a prop tree.
As Maggie heads for the El, she covers her face and weeps. Carter gives chase. "Nurses shortage, you know?" he offers, as if he wasn't responsible for the firing of three senior nurses. Man, they followed up on that storyline about as well as I follow rules of nutrition. And to clarify my point, I am currently surrounded by cookies. Carter stops short when he notices that Maggie is blubbering, and offers her a handkerchief. She sniffles that she's sorry for the outburst, but she just wanted so badly to have Eric and Abby together, because it's been...oh, several episodes now since they all breathed the same air. "Abby and I were getting along so well," she sobs. Carter points out that Abby would be thrilled to have Maggie stay longer, which is such a bizarre role reversal. I guess when you tell Abby that she's right, suddenly you're golden in her eyes. If Maggie had kowtowed to her sooner, we might've been spared this entire storyline. Maggie hands him the handkerchief and dolefully says, "I can catch a cab out here, right?" Carter insists that he'll be free in a few minutes to drive her to the station himself.
Luka unceremoniously enters Dr. Meyers's office, but doesn't sit down. "What brings you here?" Meyers asks pleasantly. "Dr. Weaver," Luka sighs. "She told me to come." Meyers shrinks that perhaps Luka should talk about why he thinks Weaver wanted to meet with him. Luka's like, Up yours, Miss Cleo. You should be able to tell me. "You're a doctor," Luka shrugs. "Someone comes to me with a problem, I tell them how to fix it." Then he takes a swig of his delicious, cold, sweet, and sassily fizzy Coke, defiantly not having it with a smile. "Let's start with you telling me..." Meyers begins. "My problem?" Luka smirks. He sets his jaw, adopts a "be careful what you wish for" stance, and begins. "My family died during the war in Croatia," he says with a defiant twinkle in his eye. "So I came to America. I had a relationship with someone I cared about which I then ruined, so I started to look for the answers in the wrong places, like sex, drinking, driving fast. I killed a patient I should've saved, and then I almost killed a med student in a car crash." So, he ruined his relationship with Abby? What about when he was all, "Let's move in together," and she totally shut him down and shut him out and then started acting like a giant bitch to him? Sigh. He screwed up too, but I don't get this revisionist Abby-did-nothing stance. For his part, Meyers stares at Luka, lost. They're at the Fair and Luka's throwing softballs right at the dunk-tank target, drenching Meyers in his own incompetence. "So I woke up one morning, and everything I thought I had was gone," Luka finishes. The fuck-you-and-your-couch gleam in his eye fades. "Gone, or broken," he whispers. Then he steels himself again and cocks an eyebrow at Meyers. "So what do you have for that?" he asks. Meyers stutters and mutters and mumbles something, still cowed by his own gross inadequacies as a therapist and as an actor. "Yeah, that's what I thought," Luka smiles emptily. "I should get back to work. Tell Weaver I showed up." As he exits, we fade to black wondering whether he'd consider switching to Diet Coke, and also drinking it out of my mouth.
The news is still blaring at high volume in the ER waiting area. The cops are engaged in a high-speed chase with the SUV they now think contains the Doc Magoo's perps. Weaver snits, "Do they even consider the collateral damage of a pursuit like that?" Jerry thinks they should shoot the guys and spare everyone the cost of due process. "Not to mention they might have the wrong suspects," Gallant says. "The last time I checked, the police were still on our side," Elizabeth says coolly. Hey there, Lizzie. When Susan's getting more storyline play than you are -- and it's so she can be shit on by a patient -- then it's time to reconsider that contract. Pratt wonders what side that is, exactly, and urges Gallant to tell her all about their indignity. Gallant gives a lame and toned-down description of it. "That's terrible," Elizabeth says. Jerry points out that they're both guilty -- of "driving while black." Elizabeth shrugs that cops play the odds. "It's about percentages," she says. "Last time I flew to London, they pulled two Arab men out of the boarding line for a security check. I hate to admit it, but it made me feel more secure." Me, I always feel better when they pull over the little old ladies. You never know what monster costumes they've got in their suitcases, in a brave attempt to do evil without being foiled by meddling kids. Gallant sneers that they aren't exactly pulling over Arabs in Highland Park. "No. Terrorist acts in Highland Park aren't high on the list of concerns," Lizzie points out. "Oh, but violent crime by African-Americans is," Gallant spits. Pratt tries to shut him up. "So you think racial profiling is a legitimate law-enforcement tool?" Gallant asks Elizabeth. "A lot of people do," she shrugs. Okay, am I stupid, or were they not racially profiled? They fit a description that Chen gave them. Yes, the cops were assholes to them, total assholes. But they didn't just say to themselves, "We know nothing about who shot those people in Doc Magoo's, so let's go pull over two black guys in a tan SUV." They were wrong, and they said horrible things, but I don't think they were racially profiling them. Maybe I'm just unclear on the term. Whatever. It just struck me as a strange way to raise the issue.
Cut to Pratt sitting in the lounge, changing the dressing on his palm wound. Chen enters. "Hey," she says softly, bending down and kissing him gently. "I don't know whose day was worse -- yours or mine," he sighs. Chen sits down and shakily admits that she never thought she'd see anything like that. "It's a lot different when they roll in on a gurney," she breathes. Pratt commends her for staying strong and doing her job well. "I heard she gave an ID," he says of Trina. Chen shares that she filled in a few details, too, based on the glimpse she got as they fled. "They were black, huh?" he asks. "I think so," she says. "It was quick, you know? I only saw one of them." Pratt exhales. "That's why the cops are picking up brothers all over town," he realizes. Um, well, yeah. That's how it works when you have a lead. "I told them what I saw," Chen insists. "What you saw, or what you thought you saw?" he presses. Chen insists that she was trying to help the cops. "You fed right into what they always want to jump to," he argues. Dude, you weren't there. Don't tell her what she saw. "So, what, now I'm a racist?" Chen spits. Pratt stares at her. "It's just hard not to feel that everybody is when you're lying face down in the street with a cop's foot to the back of your neck," he murmurs.
Carter and Maggie are stuck in a huge traffic jam. Carter pops in a CD, and then freaks when he hears The Pixies, as if he wasn't in the car the last time Abby was. Which makes no sense, as we've established that Abby has a car, and that Carter got to work this morning without her. "That's not your music, that's Abby's," Maggie announces. Evidently, she's implying that Carter and Abby are somehow different, and therefore, not perhaps entirely the same. Insanity. "She always liked that noise," Maggie continues. "I'm getting used to it," Carter says, popping out the CD and replacing it with a wailing, angsty ovary. I hope that isn't symbolic of the change he wants Abby to make -- from loud to whiny and chock full of estrogen -- because I don't feel a pressing need to hear from her ovaries at this time. A cop appears at the Jeep window, so Carter unzips it because he's the unpretentious rich kid with plastic windows, and learns there's a mighty accident ahead that's blocking everything. Great. Zip. Maggie apologizes again for crying. "I hate being so pathetic," she says. "Just the idea of going home alone, waiting..." Carter coughs up the obligatory optimism. "I worry. About both of them," Maggie sighs. "Abby's good," Carter says. "We're both good. You don't have to worry about that." He grins smugly. He has forgotten the tequila already, I guess. Maggie beams that Abby told her she and Carter might get married. "Is that what she said?" he brightens. "No, she told me you proposed," Maggie giggles. "I know she's work -- it runs in the family -- but she's so worth it." Carter smiles. Then he blushes. Then he goes into this fairly unromantic spiel about how he spends twenty-three hours of the day rehashing all the reasons she blows more goats than a bored farmer, and in the final hour he realizes he has at least spent all day thinking about her, and that apparently eclipses all the bad stuff and the bestiality. "There's something about her," he declares. "Something about her that makes me want to..." here, he laughs, "love her." Yeah, you want to love her, but do you? Can you kiss her like she's soft and sexy as a tree trunk, and still love her?
Susan has not eloped with Patrick, but rather taken him to an amusement park. They're on a ferris wheel. Whee. I would so dump her ass if she was like, "Sorry you're dying -- let's go somewhere sticky with urine and sugar that you've probably already been to anyway." But Patrick chooses this moment to tell her a meaningful tale about a story Julia, his sister, read: "It's about a little Japanese girl with cancer, and she tried to make a thousand paper cranes because she thought if she did, it would make her wish come true," he explains. Her wish? To recover. "How many paper cuts do you have?" Susan smiles. "A lot," he admits. "But my wish is kind of different." And they lock eyes. Gingerly, he leans in and kisses her on the lips. She lets him, blushing like she's his age, and shakes her head, laughing. "Kiss pretty good for a dead kid, huh?" he says proudly. "Not bad at all," she chuckles, thinking, "The kid's dying -- I probably shouldn't even bother introducing him to tongue."
The accident, it turns out, did indeed stem from the police car chase. Ambulances arrive carrying cops, one of whom is a white guy named Mitch. Yup, he's the same guy who offended Pratt and Gallant, and yup, Pratt's assigned to his case. Now, if you didn't see this twist coming, then you should stop watching this show and dive into television more slowly, perhaps through something like Saved By The Bell. "Nice to see you again," Pratt mouths off. "You know him?" Weaver asks. "He wears Florsheims. Rubber soles. Isn't that right?" snickers Pratt. The cop shits a nightstick.
The story wouldn't be complete if Gallant didn't get on this, so once inside, Weaver yells for Gallant to join them at Mitch's side. Gallant hangs back, so Pratt stays with him to give him a speech. "Hurry the hell up," Weaver snaps. Pratt points out that Gallant needs to be a bigger man and go in there and do his job, and help save the trauma patient. "I can't help that guy," Gallant insists. "This is what we do!" rages Pratt. "Get your ass in there."
Carter peers outside to see what the fuss is all about, and concludes that the word "clusterfuck" aptly describes the traffic situation. He also concludes that furrowing his brow won't clear the way, so he gets back in the car. Maggie has paused in her knitting to admire the ring. "Marriage can be a great thing," she says dreamily. "'Can be,'" Carter says, amused but a little uncomfortable. "What the hell do I know? Mine failed, for many reasons," Maggie snorts. "You sure as hell don't want my advice." But she puts down her knitting anyway, because you can't shut up a Wyczenski. "But I would think that with that kind of commitment to somebody, you have to be ready for anything," she muses. "Or nothing," Carter offers. "You never know what's going to happen." Maggie looks at him. "Or, you do," she says pointedly. "You mean the drinking?" Carter asks, shifting uneasily in his seat. Maggie babbles that it took having a baby to make her stop smoking, but that she never did stop drinking. "Maybe Abby will be stronger," she says unconvincingly. Carter either really hates this conversation, or his jock itch is back.
Maggie asks whether Abby and Carter have discussed having children. Woman, they've barely discussed marriage. Abby doesn't like to discuss anything unless there's a woe-is-me angle. "I know that she worries about passing on the disease," Carter says. Maggie throws down her knitting again and stares contemplatively out the window. "She and Richard never communicated, ever, I don't think," Maggie decides. I totally thought she was going to bust Abby on the abortion here, but she doesn't. Maggie babbles that Richard had all these lofty expectations of Abby that he set because he didn't understand her -- like she's actually super-lowly, and doesn't deserve to have people who believe the best in her. That's a supportive mother. Carter looks like he wants to throw up. Defensively, he insists that he's not walking into this thing blind. "I just don't want you to want to fix her," Maggie says. "Abby doesn't need to be fixed," he says. Oh really? Since when? "Or heal her, or change her," Maggie continues. Carter swears that he isn't trying to do that, but he's not convincing anybody. "She's an amazing person," Maggie says. You just know there's a "but" coming. Shut up, Maggie. You absolutely suck at promoting Abby's supposed finer qualities. "An amazing person with certain weaknesses," she continues. "And you'd be lucky to have her, even with those weaknesses. But you have to love her, even if she never changes anything." Carter has turned ashen, and he's sweating bullets that could pierce flesh. Because he doesn't love Abby -- he loves what he wants Abby to be. End it now.
In Trauma Green, Mitch the cop groggily announces that he doesn't want Pratt and Gallant to treat him. Weaver shrugs that it's not up to him to choose his doctors right now. "Just like we don't get to choose our patients," Pratt points out. They diagnose him with a collapsed lung, but Gallant halts them and announces that he thinks there's a cardiac contusion, not a problem with the lung. A check of the x-rays proves that he's right, and Weaver compliments him. And just like that, all is right with the world and with Mitch. Everyone but Pratt and Gallant leaves the trauma room as if on cue, because of course they are. Our two heroes stare right into CopCam. "This must be a really scary part for you, huh?" Pratt grins sadistically at us. We don't like it one bit. "All the white folks left. Now it's just you and a couple of niggers with knives," Pratt snarls. Mitch blinks. His machinery beeps sonorously. We fade to black really, really annoyed that Pratt took the bait, and really, really annoyed at how self-satisfied they both looked, and also tired.
Abby waits on a cold street corner, her hair in a nice updo. Carter sprints toward her and apologizes for being so late, blaming traffic. "Why did you make me wait outside?" she crabs. A charming greeting. "It's a surprise," Carter giggles. "It's February in Chicago," she counters. But Abby's negativity can't kill Carter's spirit. No, only the heft of her emotional baggage can do that.
Sheepishly, Susan brings Patrick home and apologizes to Frances for the lateness of the hour. Patrick deflects the blame onto himself, and heads upstairs to check out his saucy adjustable bed, presumably to see if there's enough room for two. His young sister Julia follows. "I didn't mean to worry you. I wanted to make it easier for [Patrick]," Susan apologizes. Frances is frosty. "He wasn't ready to come home yet," explains Susan. Frances dismisses her, but Julia trots back down and says that Patrick wants Susan to wait for a second. As Frances heads upstairs to have a word with her wayward son, Julia dishes that Patrick told her Susan was "the only doctor he met who was like a friend," and also, super-hot. Susan blushes, then whips out her camera so they can take We Can't Believe We Had Sex On It pictures for the Craftmatic Adjustable Bed catalogue.
In Mitch's room, after he's had a chance to regain some strength courtesy of the Angel Morphine, Pratt and Gallant decide to sass him some more -- this time, in front of his partner. Pratt sings Gallant's praises. "We profiled you as a collapsed lung, but he kept an open mind. Saved you from getting surgery you don't need," Pratt explains. Mitch snorts. Pratt snaps and demands that he apologize to Gallant for being a total fucking peckerwood. Gallant says it's fine, and has apparently decided that he's a bigger man now that he's all about diagnosing cardiac contusions. "I didn't do anything wrong," Mitch brats. "Three people were butchered right outside your hospital. We were doing what we were supposed to. You need cops like me to catch animals like that." Gallant simply leaves rather than comment on any of this. "'Sorry' would've been a whole lot easier," Pratt growls. Naturally, Mitch's partner looks affected by all this, because obviously somebody's life had to change today.
A waiter at a ritzy, empty restaurant clears Abby and Carter's dinner plates. She leans forward. "Are you going to tell me what this is all about?" she asks, suspiciously. Carter pretends it's because they had a rough day and he thought they deserved a true break. Abby doesn't buy this for a second, and seems mischievously excited. "So you think this is a keeper?" Carter asks abruptly. "The restaurant?" Abby asks, confused. He shakes his head. "Us," he says. "You and me." She blinks, possibly because she can't believe how unromantic that statement was. I'm not sure what she was expecting, though, considering that his other grand romantic gestures involved either quarantine or an outburst on the hospital roof. "Are you okay?" she asks, squinting. Carter leans back in his seat and spits out the absolute dregs of his romantic urges. "I've spent a long time looking for a relationship that would stick," he says. "Sometimes it was the wrong person, sometimes I guess I wasn't ready. Or in the right place. But I think I am now. I really think I am now." Note that he doesn't say, "And I really think you're the right person." He just says he's in the right place. Abby gazes at him expectantly. "Are you?" he asks. Rolling her eyes a tiny bit, Abby opens her mouth. "I really want this to stick," he interrupts. What is she, a pan of brownies? Abby leans forward a bit more. "Me too," she says, earnestly. Carter beams and reaches into his pocket. "I know that, uh, we've had a rough time, and that there's still a lot of stuff we have to get through," he adds. "But I think we're doing okay. I think that we're..." he laughs. "We're growing, we're...changing." With this, he shoots her a pointed look. "Do you?" he asks, a centimeter from whipping out the ring, but waiting to make absolutely sure she passes the test. "I don't know if people ever really change," Abby says, confused. "But I know what you mean." Carter's face falls. "You do?" he asks. "I think I do," she says, now looking a tiny bit perplexed. Carter jolts into action, sliding the ring box back into his pocket. "Mmm-hmm," he says. "Well, let's see what's for dessert." Abby bites her lip. "That's it?" she asks. "You bought out this whole place just for that?" She purses her lips so completely that she actually lets out a quack and lays an egg. "That...and the chocolate soufflé," he says, aiming for breezy and missing badly. The camera pulls away as he hands her a menu, and Abby is left wondering what the hell Carter smoked this afternoon, and why he's bogarting it.
Susan sits down in Patrick's room and smiles affectionately at his bald noggin. "Hi," he says. "Check this out!" He moves the bed up and down. "Who knew it would be so much fun, huh?" he says, feigning delight, and still waiting for complicated adjustable sex. Susan just smiles. Patrick hands her a brown paper bag, but instructs her not to open it until later. Then he turns morose. "Sometimes, if I think about what comes , it helps," he whispers. "Maybe afterwards, I'll know. I'll know what this is all about...That sucks." Susan nods regretfully. "Yeah, it does," she agrees. Patrick gulps and says, "I want you to know what you did for me, Susan." Choked, she reaches out and clasps his hand. "It's mutual," she says. "I want you to know..." he trails off. "I know," she murmurs emotionally. "I know." Really? Because I know I've watched this whole thing, but I sort of don't know what she did for him, other than convince him to go for another round of chemo and buy him a hot dog. Am I just obtuse, or are hot dogs just that good?
Chen stands outside, leaning against a wall and staring across the street at a darkened Doc Magoo's. Luka approaches. "It's so quiet now," she says softly. "I mean, you'd hardly know anything happened there." Luka ruins the moment by noting, "Yeah, except for the police tape." Brill. He then commends her on her composure, and on saving Trina. Then, he leaves. What? Okay. Bye. Sure. Pratt replaces Luka in the scene, which I consider an extremely cheap substitute indeed. "Since I was a kid, I always acted like it doesn't bother me," he begins. "Well, you know something? It bothers me." They stare at each other. "At least they caught the guys," Pratt says. He gazes at her. Get off the window ledges, people, because everything is magically okay for these two crazy kids. She falls against him and he embraces her. "Let's get out of here," Chen says. They run off to have grief sex.
Oppressively meaningful music plays as Susan strolls alone on a bridge. One of the lyrics actually assaults me with a box of tissues. , the director chooses a really unflattering camera angle-- Susan is shot from the ground, right up her nostrils, and it makes her look like the Michelin Man with a pointy witch's nose. She should sue -- Sue should sue. Hee. Opening the brown bag, Susan takes out one origami crane, smiles at it, and tosses it over the railing. Then she shakes out all of them as the testicle moans, "Our most precious dreams are always in the sky." We're supposed to be stricken by the lovely cranes of different colors flapping on the breeze, but all I can think is that she's bitchy for throwing away something that took Patrick a long time, and she's littering to boot. Where are those cops now, eh?
At home, Abby is making tea when Maggie calls. She's stuck in Tomah, Wisconsin, so she's calling to let Abby know, and to pull another whiny self-pitying routine. I'm thinking this has to be signaling a backslide, because Maggie was way more stable and calm than this earlier; now, Abby loves her and is nice to her, and Maggie's coming unglued. "I know I was in the way, and I'm sorry. I never want to be a burden," she sniffles. "Mom, you were not a burden," Abby says, not sure what triggered that. "I just wished Eric would come back," Maggie sighs. "And we all could've been together just for one little minute. I love you both so much, sometimes I don't know what to do with it." Her voice is high-pitched and tinny, so you can tell she's going to cry in a huge way. "I love you, too," Abby says. Maggie faux-cheerfully promises to call in a few days. Abby tells her to call tomorrow, and wishes her a safe trip. "Bye," Maggie shrills.
During the end of the conversation, Abby had picked up Carter's coat to fold it, and the ring box dropped onto the table. Now, with him in the other room, Abby grabs it and stares at it, eyes big as saucers. Then she opens it and momentarily loses her breath. It all clicks, and she realizes that somehow, Carter changed his mind about proposing that night. This is a sad harbinger of another self-pity binge, I fear, but hopefully they'll delay it until May sweeps so we can have a quick holiday from her mental issues. "Who was that?" Carter calls out. Guiltily, she jumps, but she can't take her eyes off the ring. "Maggie," she answers shakily. "She wanted to thank you for the ride." Suddenly, she slams the box shut and trembles. As the kettle whistles, she shoves it back in Carter's pocket, pale.