Previously: Neela worried that something more was wrong with Fry Cook, but Pratt figured he was fine. Steve showed up at the hospital and got introduced to Luka. He separately, defiantly, told Sam he might not skip off this time. Carter's father Stephen Keaton was dismissive and disapproving of Kem.
We begin the episode with Carter using a paint roller to put sample colors up on the living-room wall. He's chosen sunshine yellow, a burnt orange, a gray, and some others, none of which really say "Carter" to me, but that might be because when I think "Carter," I think either "pasty white" or "red," because those are the two alternating shades of his ever-expanding jowls. Kem is unwrapping gifts, one of which is a book from Elizabeth entitled The American Way Of Birth. Kem reads the title, confused. Carter snickers that it argues that the shift from home births and midwives to hospital births is because American OB/GYNs are greedy SOBs. This coming from a surgeon, who will slice and dice before she prescribes leeches, and isn't exactly raking in minimum wage. It's a very...odd...present. Also, Elizabeth wasn't complaining so much when she gave birth at County, although if memory serves, she was being a right royal beeyotch for other reasons. Those being, her loveless marriage and dilating vagina. Carter kicks back on the couch while Kem flips through the book and yammers that Americans are neurotic and technology-reliant. Thanks, Kem. It's really easy to be judgmental about that when you're in good health. Talk to me after a CAT scan has saved your life. I'd rather pay for a regular mammogram that turns up clean than ignore my breasts and possibly lose one. "With all your money and equipment, your infant mortality rate is still terrible," Kem judges. "You'd rather be in Kivo giving birth on a concrete floor?" Carter asks, amused. That Carter. He's so good for international relations -- really busting through those pesky stereotypes about Africa.
Carter wants to talk about the paint colors, because perhaps even Carter is tired of Kem being preachy. "Why don't we ask George?" he suggests. Kem balks at the name, so Carter gets on his knees and practically shouts right up the birth canal at the Cartus. Dude, don't do that -- you're going to scare it into hibernation. "Would you rather be born on a filthy, dirty floor in a primitive mud hut in Central Africa," Carter begins -- at which Kem gasps, mock-appalled, "I do not live in a mud hut" -- "or in a modern hospital surrounded by the finest doctors and equipment in the world?" Carter finishes. He orders Cartus to kick once for the U.S. and twice for the mud hut, again displaying an impressive sensitivity toward the African nation that allegedly changed his life and morphed the downy fuzz on his chest into sturdy man-vines. Kem and Carter giggle and joke as they curl up on the couch, his hand still pressed to her belly, waiting for the Cartus to wind up and deliver a kick.
Sam is doing laundry, hoping to wash that man right out of her pants, but just then Steve comes home, so apparently she's going to have to try a bit harder. As she idly goes through Alex's pockets to check for stray Kleenex, the likes of which just covered my most recent load of laundry in tiny, persistent little bastard pieces of white fluff, Sam discovers a condom. Angrily, she yanks it from Alex's pocket and storms into the kitchen. "What the hell is this?" she demands. "Honey, you knew what that was when I met you at fifteen," Steve smarms. I hate him. He's annoying, he's unappealing, and he has the charisma of a glass of water. Steve shrugs that Alex saw the condom with his things and asked what it was. "So you gave it to him?" Sam asks, horrified. No kidding. Steve is as dumb as he is bloated. "He knows not to take it to school," Steve insists. Yeah, right. And he knows not to steal severed fingers. Really. Sam storms around the kitchen as Steve confesses that he picked up a few condoms "just in case." Were I Sam, I'd grab a Sharpie, scrawl "LUKA" on the wrapper, and tuck that bitch into my bra right in front of Steve's presumptious face. But instead, she throws the condom out, because she lacks sexual foresight. As Sam turns away from the garbage can, she encounters Steve just a foot away from her. Sighing, she glares at him. "You're not on The Pill right now, right?" he asks. Sam realizes, because she herself is only as bright as a burned-out bulb, that Steve is interested in hooking up with her. Congratulations, Sam. Your deductive reasoning is peerless. Mensa is on Line 2, and the president wants you to bring some eggs he can harvest. "A boy can dream can't he?" Steve coos, leaning down to give her a slow, sloppy kiss on the cheek. "You look good, baby. I missed you." Sam closes her eyes, a pained expression flitting across her face. "What are you doing?" she asks quietly. "What you like. It's still what you like, isn't it?" Steve prods. Sam shakes her head and excuses herself to go finish the laundry. As Steve watches her go, Sam tries to ask lightly if he'll hang out with Alex while she gets some stuff done that night. "Date?" Steve asks. Sam is standing behind a wall that masks her from Steve. "Yeah, sure," Steve finally says. Sam exhales slowly, and looks tense and a little confused.
At the hospital, Neela marvels that they're graduating the day. She can't believe it. "Neither can your future patients," Pratt cracks. "Today, you're ill-prepared students. Tomorrow, baby doctors, with the fate of countless helpless victims in your incapable hands." No one appreciates this. "Jerk," Neela mutters. "Bastard," Lester offers. "Putz," says Abby, somewhat too charitable in her choice of cutdown. Although really, they should have learned by now not to expect anything more from Pratt. Neela reveals that nineteen of her family members are coming to graduation. She asks about Abby's family, but Lester interprets it as a question directed at him and merrily shares that his father, mother, father's new wife, and mother's new boyfriend are coming. I only include that for Lester fetishists, which...exist somewhere, I think, maybe. Neela cuts him off politely, talking over him to ask Abby pointedly who's coming for her. "We're not that close," Abby says of her family. "We're more like survivors of a particularly brutal carjacking than a family." Eh. I don't buy for a second that Maggie wouldn't have leapt at the chance to come. Their lack of closeness seems more a product of Abby's attitude, but she treats it like an irreversible fact. Whatever. I'm so over the Lockhart clan. Pratt crabs at them to get a move on so that they can glean all the pearls of wisdom they can before they're released into the world of malpractice suits. "Wanker," Neela spits. "Turd," Lester says. "Dick," Abby agrees. We smash to the credits feeling sort of annoyed that this show seems so very smug and proud of itself whenever it pushes the limits of linguistic standards. If the show had a face, it would look...well, like Carter looks all the time, actually.
Sam and Luka walk out into the ambulance bay; he's lapping up the attention like a kicked puppy and she's smiling up at him like the sun rises and sets in his jar of Brylcreem. "Is Alex coming with us?" he asks. "No," she says. "It'd be fine with me if he did," Luka says. Yeah, but wouldn't you rather have one solo date with your girlfriend, pal? "It's just you and me," Sam grins. Luka asks where she wants to go. She doesn't care; she just wants to hang out. "I miss you," she says, with a beaming smile that prompts Luka to reach out and take her hand. Has anyone told him that there's no need to feast on thrown scraps? He can get a perfectly good whole filet somewhere else.
An ambulance pulls in with a combative eighty-five-year-old man who's screaming about someone stealing his watch. Luka says they'll wait on restraints and try to find out why he's deteriorating mentally. Luka and Sam swap cutesy glances at each other as they wheel him inside.
Frank returns and immediately plotzes at the amount of unfiled paperwork cluttering the front desk. Jerry is delighted to see him, ostensibly because he's forgotten who Frank is. "Thank God you're back!" Jerry grins, all but enveloping Frank in a bear hug. "If you start blubbering, I swear to God I'm going to smack you," Frank warns. Neela chirps that she's surprised to see him back at work already. "My wife threw me out of the house," he says. "I think I was getting on her nerves. She was definitely getting on mine." You old charmer, you.
Carter slides out from under a sleeping Kem, his hand still on her belly. She stirs slowly as he returns from the kitchen with a glass of juice and more or less forces her to drink it. He holds her belly while she does, I think to see how the baby responds to food. "Are you doing your kick counts?" he asks, frowning. "What? No! The baby squirms like mad all the time," Kem snorts. Oh, Cartus. You're toast, aren't you? How little we knew ye. Kem shoos him away, promising to do her counts as she grimaces her way through the juice. She's bugged by the fussing. Or maybe she's realizing that she's hooked up with a total douche. I don't know. Carter shoots her a really nervous glance.
Neela chases down Pratt and tells him that Fry Cook's belly CT came back, and that there's nothing that would be keying abnormally high blood pressure. Pratt doesn't much care because there isn't a blowjob in it for him. "He has primary hypertension," Neela argues. She told him to lose weight, get some exercise, and take some prescribed pills under the direction of the clinic. She thinks he's got something called "left ventricular hypertrophy," which sounds like something you'd win at a science fair for building a really good replica of a beating heart. Neela worries that he's got organ damage. "He's a kid," Pratt says, because apparently for him, medicine works in absolutes, and people who are seventeen absolutely don't have damaged organs. It's no coincidence that "Pratt" and "asshat" rhyme so beautifully.
Abby's treating the nude old dude. He's standing with his back to the camera, gown flapping open to reveal Bare Geezer Ass -- droopy, a little wrinkly in unlikely places and a lot wrinkly in all the expected spots. It's Bea Arthur in derriere form. I'm not sure how this snuck through the censors. It's just the show using nudity for what it thinks is humor and shock. And the only reason it made it through, I'll wager, is that it's not Luka's bare ass blowing in the breeze. So basically, NBC and the FCC are saying that old person nudity doesn't count because it's not sexual, and that naked old people are -- pardon the pun -- nothing but the potential butt of a bad joke. (Like my Bea Arthur crack. Pardon the pun again.) That's really nice, NBC. Abby and Luka think that the Assman is suffering from nothing but worsening dementia.
Luka and Abby pedeconference their way into the hall. Luka asks interestedly about her graduation. "Eight short years later," she sighs self-deprecatingly. He wonders if her board results have come in yet; they haven't. She seems nervous. Malarkey calls out to Luka, and as he approaches, Abby is saying that she can walk in the ceremony, but won't get a diploma until she passes. "You haven't passed your boards yet?" Malarkey gapes. Abby pauses and almost bites off her lip in an effort to wound herself for her lack of volume control. She tries evading it by saying she took them last week; a clueless Malarkey is like, "Wow, I had to take mine six months before I graduated." Luka roughly leads him away before any more damage is done.
At the front desk, Frank is rudely telling a girl that she should go to the sixth floor if she wants Elizabeth, and he's using the kind of tone one would employ in the face of a child who has just somehow counted to five by way of twelve. "Rachel!" Jerry suddenly shouts. And we see that the girl with the curly updo is indeed that most infamous, genetically challenged demon spawn of Vulcan Jen and Zzzzzz, which is the nickname my brain gave to Mark Greene on account of the fact that it always shut itself off when he was on the screen. I will say that Rachel's hair looks nice up, and she's grown into her nose. "Jerry, how've you been?" she smiles. Jerry admires how she's grown, and then reminds Frank who she is. Frank's response is a classic "Oh."
The camera is in the back seat of Carter's Jeep as he plows through traffic to take Kem to the hospital. She's cheerfully freaked at how fast he's both driving and firing questions at her; obviously, the Cartus was underachieving with its kick counts. He wonders if her membranes might've ruptured when she wouldn't notice, like in the shower or something. "I saw the doctor yesterday and my membranes are fine," she insists. Carter screeches to a halt at the hospital, right in the middle of the ambulance bay, and throws the keys at a protesting security guard who really doesn't give a shit what void Carter was told to fill as long as it's not one in which emergency vehicles are supposed to park. Carter rushes Kem inside.
Neela can't reach Fry Cook, and hangs up the phone in irritation. "Bloody hell," she curses. Abby's amused. Neela explains that she's futilely trying to find this seventeen-year-old with organ damage. "Is that even possible?" Abby muses. I wish, in a hospital that's seen every medical abnormality known to man, that they'd do a better job explaining why it's so unfathomable that a kid that young would have what amounts to shitty luck. It happens.
Assman strolls through the hospital, naked as the day he was born. Possibly even nakeder. "Anybody know whose patient that is?" asks an amused Sam. "Mine," sighs Abby. "Malik! Larry Godiva's taking an afternoon stroll!" Hee. Malik takes care of it. Guess he's on booty duty, which you'd think would be Pratt territory. Meanwhile, a guy comes in looking for Samantha Taggart. "You a process server?" Sam asks. He isn't. "Then that's me!" she chirps. The man laughs, as if this isn't the most trite little gimmick in the universe. Sam opens up the box he hands her, and it's full of a ton of take-out ice-cream sundaes from Baskin Robbins. Sam offers them around to everyone while smiling knowingly to herself.
As Rachel and a brooding teen wait in the other room, Elizabeth puts in a hushed phone call to Vulcan Jen to let her know that her daughter is safe. My screen then goes dark for a few seconds, hopefully in protest of the regurgitation of the Greene family saga. Elizabeth heads out into the lounge, and asks the boy -- whose name is BJ -- to give them a minute. Rachel sends him downstairs for fries and a Diet Coke, and he graciously thinks to ask Elizabeth whether she wants anything, despite otherwise looking like something of a stoned deadbeat. After he toddles off, Elizabeth sits down to chat with Rachel. Apparently, she doesn't live at home -- she and a friend from school have a place together. What the...? How are they paying for that? I highly doubt Vulcan Jen would be cowed into paying the rent, but maybe she's afraid Rachel will run away if she doesn't. I say, let her run.
Hot Dr. Lawson interrupts, calling Elizabeth away and purring in a low voice that he got those Itzhak Perlman tickets they'd wanted. He's right to whisper. That sounds damn dull. Well, except for dinner. And the implied intercourse. Elizabeth squirms. Evidently she doesn't want Rachel to think she's defiling Mark's memory, but Rachel is smiling privately with pleasure. Elizabeth awkwardly blows Lawson off temporarily so that she can continue chatting with Rachel. "Handsome," Rachel grins, referring to Lawson. Elizabeth tries not to choke on her embarrassment. Rachel asks to stay with her, saying she'd like to check out Northwestern and the University of Illinois. That's not in Chicago, but I guess Chicago's closer than St. Louis, so I'll buy that explanation even though I know she's full of more shit than a pig sty. Elizabeth sighs with relief and agrees to let Rachel and BJ stay. "Separate bedrooms, of course," she giggles. "Of course," Rachel nods. Because what's one night in separate beds when you can shag yourself silly back at your own apartment?
Sam, Abby, and Neela snack on ice cream. Frank pops up long enough to steal one and get admonished by Neela. "One treat now and again isn't going to kill anyone," Frank insists. "In your case, that little truism might not be completely accurate," Neela says cheerfully. Sam decides that an eating audience is a captive audience, so she decides to retell the phenomenally boring story of her and Steve. It actually makes me wish I owned Ishtar so I could pop it in and show myself a better time. Sam was fifteen and scooping ice cream at the mall, and he was twenty-three and working construction, and apparently unfamiliar with the words "statutory rape" -- or even "disgusting." Apparently Steve would come in with his pals and eat ice cream and scope out her underage ass, and impress her with his sweat and his muscles and his apparent inability to snag a chick of his own age, presumably because they saw through his macho bullshit. So he and Sam hooked up and started making out in his Mustang. Having once made out with a guy in a Mustang equivalent, I can attest to the fact that it's uncomfortable and cramped, unless you are an Oompa Loompa. Neela, typically, wonders what Sam's parents had to say about all this. "They had plenty to say, but I didn't listen," Sam says. "What happened?" Neela asks. "Alex happened," Sam shrugs, licking her spoon.
Blair Brown shows up to play Kem's obstetrician. Apparently Amy Aquino (Dr. Coburn) either wasn't available, or didn't feel like boarding the Titanic this time. Dr. Fauxburn is giving Kem an ultrasound as she and Carter watch with panic. "When was the last time you're sure you felt the baby move?" Fauxburn asks. "In the bath this morning," Kem says, sweat breaking out on her forehead. "No bleeding, no cramping?" Fauxburn asks. Kem shakes her head. Carter begins doing an amazing thing: he's pacing the floor in anxiety without actually taking a single step. It's a rather intriguing effect, as if his innards are all trying to charge out through his skin. Fauxburn buzzes Kem's belly to try to shock the baby into motion, but nothing happens, so she grimly switches off the machine. Carter fights an explosion of emotion. Violins begin whining their way into the scene, which can mean only one thing: the Cartus is being played off-stage. "John, sit down," Fauxburn orders him. "Take Kem's hand." For some reason, this made me laugh. I half expect her to continue directing him thusly: "Hang your head in defeated anguish before placing your right hand on Kem's head and stroking her hair. Then, chew gum and walk backwards at the same time." Fauxburn tells them that she's been looking for a heartbeat for over five minutes, and there just isn't one. Kem lets out a primal gasp for air. "Sorry, John, Kem...The baby died. I'm so sorry," Fauxburn says. Kem begins to sob as Carter turns beet red. We fade to black hoping that this train of fetal fatalities, which began with the Weavus and just railroaded straight over the Cartus, manages to avoid the Chuckus altogether.
Fauxburn tells a sobbing Kem that they're not entirely sure why the baby died, but that they'll need to admit her so that they can begin inducing labor. Carter blinks, tomato-red. He is actually setting off my father's food allergy right now. "An induction?" Kem whispers, wiping her eyes. "I have to go through labor?" Fauxburn is apologetic. I do wish they'd explained why Kem has to go through labor. They never give her the C-section option, and never explain why that's not a choice she can make. I'd have liked to see Kem being given the decision, and the risks, and having tochoose to deliver her dead son for one reason or another. Feels like the mark was missed here, as it often is. As Fauxburn backs out of the room to start the paperwork, Kem turns away from Carter and squeezes her eyes shut.
Carter follows Fauxburn and more or less sputters that he doesn't understand. I'm not sure why he thinks this is going to trigger some new realization in her -- she's already said she doesn't understand it, either. Fauxburn promises to do an autopsy, and tells Carter that the induction may take as long as twenty-four hours. She touches his arm sympathetically and turns away. Carter sighs, blowing the air out of his cheeks in the vain hope that it will deflate them, or at least release some of the water that he's retaining. He's an aquatic packrat.
Neela keeps after Pratt about Fry Cook, fretting that no one's answering his telephone. "Seventeen-year-olds don't have trouble with high blood pressure," Pratt says, with the kind of definitive, unshakeable confidence that ensures he will be proven grossly wrong. Doesn't this show ever get tired of executing this ridiculous tug-of-war? Neela exposits that left ventricular hypertrophy, when placed on a mantelpiece and left there to collect dust and tarnish and dead flies, will cause congestive heart failure and sudden death. That's why so many of us gave our science fair trophies to Goodwill. "You're a cardiologist now?" Pratt sasses. "I looked it up on the internet," Neela says smugly. A nearby Malarkey says, "And we all know everything on the internet is true." He has been reading the site. Which means...he can read! Neela wheedles to Pratt that she Mapquested Fry Cook's address, and that it's only ten minutes away. He's annoyed as she rattles off a list of things she'll need to bring there. When Pratt finds out that Fry Cook lives in the projects, he refuses to let Neela go there, but she's resolute. Pratt relents and agrees to go there with her after his shift ends, but only in exchange for some post-intervention Chicken Vindaloo.
Weaver shows up, spies the Assman, and barks that Abby needs to use whatever means necessary to keep him in his bed. "I don't want to see his Wee Willy Wonka wagging around here any more than anyone else does," Weaver snits. I only transcribed that line because Laura Innes deserves the damn Emmy for saying it with a straight face. Utterly ludicrous. And, assheads, it's Wee Willie Winkie, isn't it? I mean, if they're going for juvenile epithets for "dick," which apparently can only make one appearance per episode, they might as well get it right and not needlessly invoke Gene Wilder. Abby toddles off to lock down the Assman.
Frank tells Luka that Security called, and that his car alarm's going off in the garage and irritating everyone. Luka heads off to see about it. Malarkey then sidles up to Neela and asks her if she likes Indian food. Neela looks at him blankly, unsure how to respond to this and fairly sure that he's not worthy of even the bluntest, hokiest witticism. Malarkey inexplicably asks her out for a celebratory dinner once she opens her match letter. "May not be anything to celebrate," Neela says, distracted. "You'll do great -- you're smart, cute, you work your ass off," Malarkey drools. "Not like Lockhart. Some residency program's going to get a hell of a shock when they find out she hasn't passed her boards." Weaver is instantly visible in the background; stationed between them, her back to the camera, she stiffens visibly and her head pops up, turning to the side just-so to allow for maximum subtle eavesdropping. Neela is overwhelmed, between Fry Cook's health woes and Malarkey's blatherings and the general stench of failure, lunacy, and delusion that cloaks him like Pig Pen's dirt cloud. So she blurts out that "maybe" they'll go to dinner, and beats a quick retreat. Malarkey looks pleased with himself, because he's just the most enormous moron. I love the idea that he's been dying to prey on Neela the second she ceased to be a student, but it's so hilarious to me that he actually thought she'd lap up the chance to go out with someone she openly derides. Ah, sweet Malarkey, you are indeed full of it.
Kem is wheeled into her own room, where a kindly nurse introduces her to the call button and the television remote control. Kem's all, Great, nothing like a little Passions to ease the mind of a woman carrying an ex-Cartus. Screw the baby! What's in The Shed? WHAT?!? Carter watches his unresponsive girlfriend staring emptily at the wall, her face twisted by grief. The soundtrack to their suffering is the distant echo of newborns crying.
Luka's beige SUV is honking and flashing its lights. He turns it off, and Steve emerges from the shadows. "You know, your alarm's a little sensitive," he says. Clearly, he's been hovering there, and most likely set it off to force Luka to come out to the garage for this choice little confrontation. Luka just stares at Steve with the blandest expression in the world on his face. Actually, wait, there's a tinge of disgust. "Nice ride," Steve says. Luka refrains from saying, "Sam? Yeah -- throw in a lube job, and she really is." Steve greasily admires the SUV, and tells Luka rather pointedly that it should hold up well on resale, indicating that Luka won't be needing a family-sized car any time soon. Steve's gross. And Luka is just staring at him. I hate what a lame-ass Luka is now. I'm sorry, but it's true. All he does is stare at people. Being with Luka hasn't made Sam less boring -- it's made Luka more boring. He blinks. "You know, I really screwed this thing up with my family, but I'm going to make it right this time," Steve says, setting his jaw. "And I really need time to make it right. To let Sam see how much I've changed." Luka blinks. "Time to be a father to my son," Steve continues. Blink. Luka's mouth puckers unattractively. Yes, that's right, I just used "unattractively" and "Luka" in the same sentence. Steve creepily insists that he and Sam and Alex belong together, as he steps closer and closer to Luka. "And Sam knows that," he finishes, walking straight past an unmoving Luka. Who just blinks. Blink, blink, blink, pucker, glare, blink. I think he's communicating the subtext in morse code. And Steve, I just don't care about -- as far as I'm concerned, he can go away and take Sam with him so that Luka can get involved in something interesting again. I don't know why it has to be either hookers or humdrum. Isn't there middle ground?
Neela and Pratt walk up to the rundown apartment complex in which Fry Cook and his family live. Pratt's still dismissive -- go in, get him to the clinic, get out, go get curry. "The lifts are over there," says Neela. "Trust me, the elevators don't work," Pratt snorts. As they go upstairs, they're greeted with chain-link and wire balconies that stretch higher than average, and a sonic boom of rap music. "So much wire mesh," Neela notices. "It's so people don't throw things on the folks below," Pratt says. "Like trash?" Neela asks. "Like bricks," Pratt replies. That seems ill-conceived. The fences aren't that high. If you're so dedicated to hurling heavy objects, you could totally heave it up and over. Pratt and Neela bang on the door; Fry Cook isn't there, so they leave a pre-scribbled note and turn to leave. That's when Neela sees Fry Cook huffing and puffing up the stairs, almost passing out from the exertion. She immediately whips out a blood-pressure cuff as Fry Cook exposits that he's not taking his pills, because he thought that if he got some exercise he'd be fine. Pratt notices a fast-food cheeseburger in his fist and frowns. Death! Death in a bun! "Mom's working. I have to pick up the kids," Fry Cook wheezes. Neela frets about his blood pressure, which is way too high. Pratt tells him to take his pills and come in week, and Fry Cook limps past them to his apartment, barely able to hold his hefty frame upright. Way to go, Pratt. How can you look at that kid and think he's okay? He's paler than I am, for God's sake. Neela insists that he needs an EKG and a chest x-ray, but Pratt swears all he needs is to pick up and feed his family, and escorts Neela out of there.
Luka and Abby talk about graduation, which he seems interested in attending, but Abby says she's not planning on going. "It's boring!" she says. ["True. I tried to get out of mine, but since my dad was the registrar at my university and signed and handed out the diplomas to me and my fellow graduands, I kind of couldn't." -- Wing Chun] Luka's startled, until Abby admits that it seems a bit pointless to go to the ceremony, considering that she might not even get to practice medicine after the ceremony. But Weaver approaches, so she shuts up; Weaver asks to speak with her. Abby thanks Luka quickly for showing interest, and follows Weaver down the hall.
After some kind small talk about Henry, Weaver coughs and tries to ask subtly whether Abby got confirmation of her match list. "Couple weeks ago, yeah," she says. "With your clinical skills, I'm sure you'll do very well," Weaver says generically. Abby knows that's not why Weaver sought her out, so she gets Weaver to keep talking. Weaver tells her, off the record, that Abby's in their top twenty, so if County is her first choice, she's guaranteed to match there. "I thought we weren't supposed to talk about this," Abby says curiously. Weaver looks as guilty as a human being possibly can. Silence. Abby realizes that Weaver found out she failed her boards the first time around, and snaps, "I took them again last week." Adopting the voice she'd use to talk to a small and very stupid child, Weaver basically explains -- hypothetically, of course -- that if a student failed a second time, whatever program he or she matched with would be short an intern; however, if his or her first-choice hospital were to delete him or her from its list before the deadline, then the hypothetical would-be intern match with his/her second choice, thereby putting that hospital in the position of being understaffed. Basically, she's saying that if Abby chose County, Weaver wants to know so that she can consider deleting Abby from their list, thereby putting the liability on another hospital if Abby fails again and can't start her internship. Clearly, Weaver thinks Abby has as much chance of passing her boards as I do becoming an eye doctor. Pissed, especially in light of how supportive she'd been until now, Abby "hypothetically" vows to report any chief of staff who would act in such a way. She flounces off angrily, leaving a sputtering Weaver to marinate in her own total ineptitude and jerkwaddery.
Sam skips out of the hospital and up to Luka. "Where to? I'm starving!" she grins, gazing up at him happily. Luka uncomfortably lies that he's tired and needs to back out of their date. Sam immediately smells a rat, because she slept with one once and it fathered her child, so she knows that odor inside and out. "Does this have something to do with Steve?" she asks. "I keep telling him he's got to find another place to crash." Does she, though? Luka shrugs that he thinks this is confusing for Alex. Sam insists that Alex isn't confused, but Luka decides that this just isn't that simple, and says nothing more. Is he a grownup? Is Sam? Well, I don't really think she is, but I am just suddenly -- courtesy of this episode -- tired of the two of them doing this stupid dance. I don't think that the key to Luka reconnecting with life here is this relationship, because it's made him a spineless doormat. He's mooning after her and waiting around for her and letting her ridiculous, stubbly lump of a deadbead ex dictate what he says and does. I don't buy that the strong, assertive, revitalized Luka who returned from the Congo would stand for this junk, and I don't think he'd be impressed with Sam's wishy-washy behavior on the matter. But, as written, all Luka does is frown. He's silent, and he frowns. BORING. This relationship is fucking boring. Steve has made it worse. Sam watches him, and hangs her head a bit, probably because she knows she sucks. I have tried to like her. I can't. She's tiresome and not worth the trouble, and -- yes -- Steve has made her worse. Because I just don't care. "Want me to give you a lift?" he asks finally. "No, that's okay," Sam says, leaving. We fade out on Luka's mournful expression, and we hope that it's the last time we see that particular arrangement of his pretty features, because it's stopped being sexy and started being drippy.
Rain beats down upon Chicago, and Carter watches it from inside Kem's hospital room. He notices the time and whispers to Kem that it's morning in Kinshasa, so he can call her family if she'd like. Kem is facing the other direction, motionless. She shakes her head and mutters something in Congolese. Or French, or something. The captions said, "native language," and I couldn't really hear her. Carter strokes her hair and she instinctively jerks her head away. "Have you told anybody?" she asks. "No, I've been here with you," he says, and if I'm not mistaken, that's actually a "duh" tone that has crept into his voice. That's charming, Carter. The two nurses enter to check on her, bickering under their breath about who misplaced the last breast-pump kit, which is maybe not the most considerate thing to say in front of a woman who won't get to use one. Carter and Kem are silent for the brief few seconds they're in the room. Once they leave, Kem opens her mouth. "I don't want anyone to know," Kem chokes, beginning to cry again. "Okay," Carter says, perplexed and unsure what else to say.
Rachel is drying dishes in Elizabeth's house. She tells Elizabeth that Minivan called, wanting to know if she's up for a movie. "He has a daughter, same school as Ella," babbles Elizabeth, nervous. Rachel cottons on to the fact that Elizabeth is juggling two suitors, but Elizabeth clears her throat and firmly changes the subject by asking how Rachel's liking school. "Don't worry, I'm going to college," Rachel snorts. "Do I look worried?" Elizabeth asks. She should. Rachel's not exactly a safe bet for anything but a shotgun wedding. Elizabeth decides to cut through the pleasantries and levels Rachel: "Why are you here?" Rachel pretends she wants to look at colleges, and then meets Lizzie's eye and confesses that she needs a prescription for the morning-after pill. Elizabeth swallows with difficulty, choking down the bolus of rage that's blocking her windpipe and which, if expelled, would blow down the house.
Fauxburn reports that Kem is five centimeters dilated, but could be hours away from delivery. She leaves Carter with Kem, who still won't really look at him; this time, she leans her head back on the pillows and stares at the ceiling. Carter leans in really close and rasps that he's going to get a cup of coffee. Kem swallows as if she's suppressing vomit. "You'll be okay for a couple of minutes?" he asks. She does nothing. He kisses her; she's still stone-faced, looking anywhere but at him. He actually seems to be nauseating her, which...welcome to my world, Kem.
Carter walks into the hallway, where the sounds of labor and delivery bombard him. A guy at the soda machines chats amiably with Carter, trying for expectant-father camaraderie. He yammers about this being his fourth girl, and Carter just watches him with a smile and acts polite and doesn't betray his own heartbreak. "Good luck!" the man grins. "You too," Carter says with difficulty.
Steve watches in the mirror as Sam washes her face. "You didn't mention anything about the ice cream," he intones. "It was a big hit," she says flatly, drying her skin on a hand towel. Steve drools over her beauty. "Yeah, this is me at my finest," she cracks. Nice that she's washing her face, yet she's still got lip stain and mascara on it. She really should look into a better cleanser, but I guess it's hard to look pouty and trembly and sad without your lips as plump and pink as they can get. Steve titters that Sam's all grown up. "You're drunk," she says with a tiny smile. "A little bit," he admits. Sam turns and gingerly asks if he went to talk to Luka; Steve doesn't deny it, but instead hits her with "I want another chance." Sam ignores this, asks him not to go to the hospital, and walks toward the door. He's blocking it. "Come on, Steve," she says, closing her eyes and wincing as he gently touches her shoulders. He starts petting her torso and face, reminiscing about screwing down by the river while drinking Schnapps. Yeah, in all my most cherished memories, Schnapps was there. "[We'd be] making love to Dave Matthews, coming from my car stereo," he purrs. Dave Matthews, music to make love by? Only if you want your girlfriend to be sobbing through intercourse. Sam lets a moment of joy flit across her face, carried away a little by remembering that time, and also allowed to enjoy it because her eyes are closed and she's not looking right into the ugly face of her youth. Steve bends down to kiss her, and she parts her lips for him, but pulls out of the kiss almost as soon as it starts. "Please," she whispers, but she's not moving away yet. "Sammy, I love you, sweetie," he murmurs. "Please, Steve," she repeats, her eyes squished shut. He tips her chin up firmly. "Please Steve what?" he demands, a tad harsher. "Let my by, please," she chokes. He pulls back and lets her go, and she slams the door to her room and starts crying quietly, covering her face with her hands. So...I'm not sure if he used to hit her or not, because I'm not sure he's been around her enough since Alex to really fall into that pattern. I think Sam's pissed that Alex's father is a deadbeat, and upset that she can't take him back, sad that she's torn even a little, and probably bumming out that a good, solid thing like Luka might be slipping away. Or, she's just fucked up. I don't know. I don't feel sorry for her because Steve is so slimy, and I can't see why she ever let him back in her bed in the past -- which I am pretty sure she did, based on the earlier scene and on how he almost swept her up in memories a moment ago. I don't know why I bother. I think I'm trying to make myself interested. I can't.
Kem screams that she can't feel anything. She's trying to push out the baby, and Carter is holding her hand; they're both crying steady streams of tears. Wow, this one's a downer. The whole episode is wet. Kem's screams are primal. Finally, Fauxburn pulls out the Cartus, and it's all over. "There's a knot," she says, surprised. "He twisted in such a way that he tied a knot in his umbilical cord." Fauxburn assures Kem that there's nothing they could have done. Carter is shaking his head almost convulsively, back and forth, back and forth, as his lips purse. "Would you like to see him?" Fauxburn asks. "No, no, no," Kem moans. Carter seems taken aback. Fauxburn is surprised, too, especially since the show spent all this money on ExCartus and Kem doesn't even want to marvel over it, the ungrateful slag. Carter presses his cheek to Kem's as she wails and wriggles in the other direction.
Carter steps out of the delivery room. "John," he hears. Carter turns, and sees the silhouette of his father, arms outstretched. Carter breaks down into convulsive sobs and throws himself into his father's embrace, his legs giving way in the process and knocking them both backward. Stephen Keaton holds them up. "It's okay, son," he says as Carter unleashes his grief. We fade to black relieved that this episode has featured some proof that Noah Wyle can still act.
Downstairs, the news has gotten to Chen, Elizabeth, and Weaver. "Stillborn?" Elizabeth asks. "Knot in the cord," Chen yawns. "How terrible," Elizabeth snores. "I can't imagine," Chen blahs, picking lint out of her belly button. They sound as enthused as if they were standing around a water cooler talking about a plot on a once-great, washed-up television show. Elizabeth lies that she'll try to go up there after her rounds. They reach Malarkey. "Tough break," he says. They stare at him in surprise. "What? I was being sincere," he protests.
Neela bursts in with her passel of relatives. She's giving them a tour, and introduces them to Jerry: "He makes this whole place work, and he's very big." Then she says, as Frank shows up with a box of donuts, "That's Frank. He works with Jerry and just had a massive heart attack and shouldn't be eating that donut." Frank looks tickled. Almost delighted. Interesting. Neela leads them down the hall, giving them a fairly cold tour evocative of "We're walking, we're walking, we're walking...and, we're stopping." Suddenly, she does stop, and the camera pulls back to reveal the Assman standing in full frontal, facing her. Without missing a beat, Neela continues: "And, that's a naked patient. Now, if you come through this way...."
A nurse is wrapping Kem's torso. I'm not sure why. Maybe she had a tube of some kind in her body. But Thandie Newton should not ever allow herself to be shot like this again. She's got a sheet covering her front, and from this angle, she looks totally wasted -- emaciated, wan, weak. And that's her body, not her face. Girlfriend needs to eat a meatball sub pronto, before she gets sucked up through one of the A/C vents. Carter watches the other nurse stamp little Cartus's footprints on a card. She offers him a peek, and Carter takes the little tongs to draw back the blanket. He smiles brokenly at his son.
Lawson is scrubbing up as Elizabeth sashays into the room. "You look radiant," he flirts. "Liar," she grins. "I was up half the night." He purrs, "Doing what?" She lowers her voice and asks him for a prescription for birth control and two packets of the morning-after pill. Lawson pauses for a second to digest this, and then continues scrubbing. Hee.
Fauxburn calls Carter out of the room and informs him that they're going to move Kem downstairs so they can monitor her a bit longer. "Has she held the baby yet?" she asks, worried. Carter shakes his head. Fauxburn insists that in her twenty years of doing this, she has learned one thing: dead babies are gross. Oh, also, that Kem will regret not holding her baby for the rest of her life. Carter stares at her, wishing she were Amy Aquino.
Elizabeth hands off the birth control and pills to Rachel. "You still need to use condoms," she says. As if Rachel's been using them in the first place. Rachel notices the name on the prescription and wonders thickly why Elizabeth didn't do it herself. Elizabeth answers rather sensibly that when Vulcan Jen inevitably goes rummaging through all of Rachel's things, looking for drugs and incriminating tidbits, Elizabeth doesn't want to be the one at the other end of the wrath of Khan. "Lawson -- is he that British guy from yesterday?" Rachel asks. "Do you like him more than [Minivan]?" Elizabeth rather defensively insists that she's just getting the occasional movie and meal with them; I didn't know those were euphemisms for sex, but okay, whatever she wants. "It's okay," Rachel says gently. "Dad would want you to be happy." Elizabeth is silent. "Do you miss him?" Rachel asks. Elizabeth quietly ponders how to field this question without doing a spit-take, or laughing out loud. "Yes, I do," she says, actually sounding a little surprised, which I find hilarious. "Me too," Rachel confesses. Elizabeth's eyes moisten, and she smiles and squeezes her stepdaughter's arm.
Abby and Luka have gone up to visit Carter. Why not Chen? I'm a little tired of this threesome being positioned in various geometric shapes. Carter thanks them for coming, but insists that they should go home, especially because Abby might miss her graduation. "I was going to miss it anyway," she shrugs. Stephen arrives with coffee for everyone, and Carter offers his gratitude again, but restates that he thinks they should go home, because he and Kem are fine. Luka and Abby meet each other's gaze for a second, and apparently deem him sincere, because they rise to their feet. "If you..." Abby begins. Carter nods smugly. God, there he goes again -- The Face is back. I had hoped we'd be free for at least one whole episode, but apparently that is impossible. Abby leans down and kisses Carter affectionately on the head. Luka clearly considers doing the same, but settles for a chaste handshake, because the maternity ward is not the place to indulge their secret passion. Carter turns to Stephen and says, "You too, Dad." But Stephen shrugs it off. "I think I'll stay," he says blithely. Carter seems touched.
At graduation, Neela searches frantically for Abby, going so far as to stand on a chair and scan the crowd. She looks so cute in her little pink cardigan and her pink-and-white dress. I love Neela. She's managed to make ambiguity interesting and charming; to me, she's the antithesis of Sam.
Carter tiptoes inside Kem's room. She's facing the other way, lying on her side. Carter quietly tells her that they want to move her to another room, and that when they do, they're taking away the baby. "Would you like to hold him?" he asks. Kem ignores this. She closes her eyes and furrows her brow.
Graduation. Applause. Neela looks at Abby's empty chair, which is only, like, two seats away from hers. That seems alphabetically unlikely. ["Maybe this med school arranged graduands by height." -- Wing Chun] Luka speed-walks toward his seat, clad in a suit and shades and looking so fine that he almost erases the rest of the episode from my mind. Almost. Wait...hang on...yes, it's all gone. God love his smoking hot, fine ass. He plops down to an ecstatic Susan. "I thought you were on bed rest," he says. "Please," she snorts. "I'm already a week late. I'm desperate to get this kid out." That, I hated. First, I loathed that Susan -- who's known Carter for an eternity -- wouldn't have taken pains to offer condolences to her former boyfriend and good pal. I'd even have settled for a scene where she struggled with whether to do it, or he struggled with whether to see her, because she's pregnant with a healthy baby and Carter's got an ex-Cartus. It just seemed weird to me that the show would go to the trouble of putting Susan at graduation and not try to work her into Carter's story somehow. ["I just figured she didn't know." -- Wing Chun] And second, hearing her make a glib remark about wanting her baby to rush out of her womb, when this scene is juxtaposed with Carter's loss, makes her look really insensitive. Kem doesn't want to face her dead son, and Carter is heartbroken. Cut to Susan all but proclaiming that she'd rip the baby out of her beaver herself, if she knew how. Classy!
Luka looks over and locks eyes with Sam, who is at graduation with Steve and Alex. What? I don't buy that Sam's tight enough with any of the students to show up at graduation -- much less to drag Alex and Steve there. Makes no sense. There's no way, for one thing, that Alex would stay in his seat this long. He'd be running through the garden banging squirrels together. ["Also, anyone can just show up? No graduation tickets?" -- Wing Chun]
Fry Cook gets wheeled into the ER, and Malarkey recognizes him as Pratt's patient. Chen treats him for congestive heart failure as Pratt looks on, downtrodden, realizing with a sinking heart that Neela was right and that he was just schooled by a student. Were this three months ago, a You Got Served joke would fit in nicely here. Damn the bad timing. "I haven't seen a kid this young in heart failure before," Malarkey says cheerfully as Pratt pouts. Does this mean he has to regurgitate the Vindaloo? Perhaps he can arrange to do it onto Malarkey's lab coat. Or his dinner plate.
Lester's middle name is "Rodney." Abby sprints to her place in line just in time to hear them all her name; her middle name is "Marjorie." For once, Abby grins widely as she crosses the stage, accepting her diploma -- or blank piece of paper -- and getting her hood draped across her gown. Luka stands up and cheers, as does Susan, who whistles with glee. Sam and Alex give her a standing ovation as well, which is so unrealistic. Alex doesn't give a shit. Suddenly, Neela's crossing the stage, and her whole family leaps to its feet. Susan cracks up as Neela glows.
Carter caresses a little baggie that contains a lock of ExCartus's hair. Stephen comes up behind him and decides that this would be a prime time for some overdue parenting. "When your brother died, I think the thing I hated most were other people's platitudes," he begins. "There are no words." Carter silently agrees. "You don't know where you'll find the strength, but somehow you do," he adds. Then he opens his mouth and spits out what has to be the least thought-out statement ever: "You can have another child." And yet Carter doesn't seem to think it's weird that his father is basically like, "Eh, the Cartus is replaceable -- just make a better one!" Stephen finishes by barfing up some of the reviled platitudes about being a tragic and unforseeable accident. "The whole thing was an accident," Carter murmurs. "No, it wasn't," Stephen says. "You love each other. Everybody can see that." Carter shakes his head and mourns that he's not sure Kem will want to make a replacement baby with him. Gross. It's way too early to be thinking in those terms. That's kind of selfish. So, Carter, allow me to roll that up and shove it in your gaping mouth so that you can suck on it. Stephen insists that Kem will want to have another kid with him, as long as Carter gives it some time. Like, at least another five minutes -- maybe long enough for her to get out of the bed in which she birthed their dead baby and into a different hospital bed that's a little bit better for an unprotected tryst.
Luka chases Abby after the ceremony and congratulates her. He touches her elbow with awkward affection. Susan comes up and exclaims that she's so proud of Abby, and invites her out to get some food with them. "No, I'm tired, but thanks," Abby demurs. "And thank you for coming." She turns and leaves. Okay, then. Luka turns away and sees Sam wearing a fabulous white spring trench and chatting away to someone with a hand on Alex's neck. Steve sees Luka and puts a possessive hand on Sam's shoulder. Luka, because he is boring, resists the urge to walk up there and flirt with Sam so relentlessly that Steve starts to cry, or bond with Alex so successfully that Steve actually keels over from suffocating on his own jealousy. Sigh. I hate that I miss Luka the Man Whore so much. It feels dirty. But at least when he was rakishly charming the pants off the hospital nurses, he was having fun.
Abby opens her diploma case, and the certificate reads, "Graduation pending." She appears to blow a raspberry or something, which she shouldn't do with the duck lips. Really. It's not helping her cause. Then she calls Maggie. "Good to hear your voice too," she says, sounding like a lost little girl. "Hey, Mom, guess what. I graduated today," she says. "Really! Can you believe it?" Aw, poor lonely Abby, blah blah blah. Let's please not go back there when she had been becoming a lot more stable.
Carter walks around Kem's bed, forcing her to face him. She hasn't moved. He re-explains that this is her last chance to see her son. She is wordless. "I don't know what the right thing is to say," he says, his voice leaping up a few registers. "And I don't know what the right thing to do is. It was an accident." Kem begins to sniffle. Her face is making all the right movements and she's making all the right noises, but I can't see any tears coursing down her cheeks at all. "I love you," Carter pleads. "And I want to spend the rest of my life with you. But we have to say goodbye to our son now. I have to help you do that, and I don't know how to do that. Please help me. Please." Thandie Newton still, uncharacteristically, looks like she's totally faking like she's crying without actually shedding a tear. It's ooky. But she gulps and nods, and sits up as the violins return to their oppressive symphony of fetal gloom. Carter picks up ExCartus, wrapped tightly in cloth, and carries him to Kem's arms. She falls in love with his face instantly. "He's beautiful," she gasps, touching him lovingly and then clutching him tightly to her chest as Carter sits behind her, patting her and cooing that he loves her and that they're going to be okay. We leave them there.