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I said to a friend today, regarding this finale, that I was happy not to be recapping everyone getting shot again like last year. But it turns out that there was plenty of depressing business to go around in this season finale nonetheless. The repercussions of Alex's drunken announcement that Mere tampered with the trial come swiftly. She refuses to tell anyone exactly what she did but since they force Alex to give details about what he saw and on what date, Richard realizes that Mere screwed with things so that Adele could get the medicine. Because of this he suspends rather than fires her, and even takes some of the responsibility because he knows he put a lot of pressure on her to make sure Adele would be okay. Derek is understandably livid that his trial is likely now totally ruined but what makes it worse for him is that Meredith maintains she would do the same thing again given the chance. He thinks she can't tell the difference between right and wrong while she maintains that not every situation is so black and white. (In fact, you might say this is a grey area...) Derek decides that this means Meredith might be a horrible mother after all, so he takes off to sulk by himself. This leaves Meredith alone to receive the news that they have been granted temporary custody of Zola and the authorities are working to make it permanent. She takes Zola home, hoping to find Derek there, but the house is empty. Alex's room has been cleared per her orders earlier in the day -- Alex feels awful about what happened and wants to take it back but obviously that's not possible -- and everyone else is out too. She's finally joined by Cristina but they decamp to their own floors of the house since Cristina can't deal with being around a baby given her own crappy day.
She's having a pretty huge baby issue of her own, namely that she finds out she is six weeks pregnant. She tells Owen and immediately wants to end the pregnancy, but he manages to get her to at least have a few stilted conversations with him on the topic. She tries to talk to Mere about it, but Mere keeps getting pulled away into her own drama so Cristina has to figure this out herself and she does, ultimately not even including Owen in the decision. She comes home and tells him that she scheduled an abortion; he's beyond angry because Cristina wouldn't let him be a part of her decision making. He's so mad that he actually kicks her out of their house, which leaves her finishing this season sad on Meredith's sofa like she's been so many times before.
Because of what happened with Mere and Alex, and because Jackson dropped out of the running, April is awarded Chief Resident kind of by default. She doesn't have time to enjoy it, though, because there is a plane crash and the doctors all jump into gear to handle all of the patients that will be coming in. Sadly, after a while of nothing happening, they realize no patients will be coming because everyone has died. Instead of working on patients the doctors all have to tell multiple families that their loved ones have died. Ultimately, there is one lone survivor -- an unaccompanied minor -- and the few grieving families that are still at the hospital decide to stay there for her while she's in surgery, at least until her mom arrives. It's heartbreaking and heartwarming all at the same time.
Thank goodness that the hospital happens to have trauma counselor extraordinaire Andrew Perkins there to help out, and he and Teddy delay their departure to Germany for a day to assist at the hospital. Teddy spends a lot of time trying to hang out with Henry who is in for another surgery, but Henry finally has had enough and tells her to just go away because she broke his heart and she's making it worse by trying to be buddies with him. She's pretty devastated by this but her emotions, combined with the clarity that mass casualties can bring, make her realize that Henry is awesome and she's actually falling in love with him, not with Andrew. She runs back to his room and they share an awesome kiss.
Mark and Avery are teamed up as trauma buddies and when Mark gripes about it, Owen tells him what Avery did for the Chief's trial. Mark realizes Avery is a good guy after all and so he tells Avery that he's stepping off and "giving" him Lexie. When Lexie finds out she's appropriately appalled, and she goes to see Mark to tell him to leave her alone to just be happy with Avery. She admits that if Mark kept pressing she'd eventually go back to him, but she doesn't want that. However, it's hard for her to walk away at the end of their conversation and if I were Avery, I wouldn't feel so totally confident in this relationship making it for the long haul.
Also uncertain for the long haul: Meredith and Derek. It's not clear if he even knows that they got Zola since he refuses to take any of Meredith's calls and instead goes and sleeps on the concrete slab that is supposed to one day soon be their home, where he can watch the stars and ponder if he now really wants a life with her after all.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!Well who knew -- Derek's house in the woods really is moving forward, and it now has a concrete slab, wooden beams making a partial frame, and then, oddly enough, a nearly filled-in stone fireplace. Derek and Mere are standing in one room while he draws on the floor with chalk to show how Zola's room will be laid out. Mere is worried that he's going to jinx the adoption by jumping the gun like this, but he tells her that the social worker (She finally has a name! Janet!) is coming to check out the house which, right now, is a deathtrap. Well, yes, as it's not even a completed building of COURSE it's a deathtrap. I think Janet realizes you won't house the baby there until there's at least, oh, a roof to keep off the Seattle rain. But oh ho, it's a funny segue into Janet's arrival and Derek brushes some nails out of the way for her to walk into the room. Mere is nervous while Janet looks around skeptically. But seriously, is no one considering the fact that this house has barely even begun to be built? Why is Janet not visiting Meredith's house? This isn't Extreme Makeover: Home Edition where that house will be finished in a week -- they've been talking about it for multiple seasons, so even though there is now a foundation, I won't believe this will be a real house in our lifetimes until I see it. Mere laughs nervously and tries to crack a joke, but Janet isn't really amused. Mere's voiceover this week is actually personal rather than overarching, and she talks about how she always thought she'd be happier alone, because having someone in your life is more trouble than it's worth.
Once they get to the hospital, Mere gets ready to get a new Alzheimer's patient set up for the trial. She's sad when she sees that this guy has young kids and Derek immediately offers to take care of it for her, but she orders him to treat her like a colleague at work rather than his wife, and adds that she's allowed to say something bums her out without Derek needing to coddle her. She walks away and Owen finds Derek, telling him that they need to talk about the trial. Derek wants to go with Meredith, especially after the lecture he just got, but Owen tells him that he thinks it's best for them to speak alone.
Also speaking alone are Teddy and Henry. He's back in the hospital for yet another procedure, and Teddy is saying her goodbyes before she leaves for Germany. Henry's on edge and isn't shy about making Teddy feel guilty for leaving, especially for a "rock star" like Andrew. He punctuates this with the breathy mock-roar of a crowd each time one of them says Andrew's name. Teddy finally starts to get annoyed but Henry maintains that his wife is leaving, so he's allowed to be annoying. When Teddy points out that she's not a real wife he one-ups her by pointing out that she is his real best friend, then. He does tell her sincerely to go be happy, though, and they share an incredibly sad hug.
Since Owen didn't actually have any details regarding what happened, Derek tries to get Mere to tell him exactly what she did, alternately begging and demanding that she say it. He thinks that they might be able to fix the situation, but Meredith thinks it will make things worse. She assures Derek that she loves him and she's sorry, but she holds firm and silent.
As you can imagine, Derek doesn't take too well to this, and before they walk in to see Richard, he warns Meredith that now she's about to be treated like a colleague, just like she wanted. I guess Alex did explain a little bit to Owen, because Derek is able to tell Richard that Meredith switched placebos and meds in the trial. He adds that this probably invalidates everything and shoots Meredith an especially angry glare. I actually think he's treating her even more like a wife than a colleague now because the level of his rage seems even higher than it would be if this was just a betrayal by some co-worker. Meredith still refuses to say anything even when Richard basically begs her to deny everything, or at least to tell them that Alex exaggerated the story. Derek's enraged that this will probably invalidate the trial and that the FDA will never let the hospital try another one ever again. Meredith stubbornly tells them to kick her off the trial and for the umpteenth time tries to justify that nothing she did changes any results. Yes, it invalidates everything, but doesn't change the results at all! Richard is beyond that, though, and informs her that it looks like she just lost her job.
Once her flogging is over, Mere finds Alex and informs him -- in front of an audience of all of the other residents -- that they are probably going to fire her, so she hopes he's happy. Alex tries to argue that she won't be fired but Mere cuts him off by ordering him to clear all of his stuff out of the house by the end of the day. When she walks off Cristina turns to Alex and demands to know what he did, but he can't answer because they all get paged at once.
Richard gathers what looks to be the entire hospital staff and lets them know that a 757 went down in Puget Sound, and that there are going to be something like 200 injured passengers. In case that wasn't enough, the hospital is also the crisis center so all of the families will be coming there to find their loved ones. He puts Owen in charge and urges everyone to stay calm. They need all hands on deck, so Meredith's firing appears to be postponed when Bailey chooses her to help discharge whoever they can to make more beds available. Callie is with Owen, April is to set up the ER for triage, Lexie is in charge of the family center in the cafeteria, and Cristina gets the blood bank. Mark is assigned the role of "candy man." No, seriously. It's not quite as sexy as it sounds -- he's in charge of pain meds and sedatives for anyone who needs it. For maximum storytelling drama, Avery is assigned to help him. Once Owen sends everyone on their way Cristina goes to find out what happened with Mere and Owen finally admits that she messed with the Alzheimer's study, which invalidates the results and essentially destroys the entire trial. Cristina is pretty stunned, naturally, but I wonder if that's also because Cristina knows Meredith well enough to assume there must be some really good reason behind what she did. Honestly, everyone should be wondering that given how well they know her; I know what she did is awful and did destroy the whole trial, and I'm not justifying that, but it seems that someone along the way might ask themselves, "Why?"
Teddy marches into Henry's room, all business, and gives him instructions on just what to say so that he's kept in the hospital and is at the top of the list when they start doing surgeries again. Henry's not so worried about that, but realizes that Teddy is now obviously working instead of leaving. She confirms that she and Andrew will stay and help out until it's over.
The ER is in chaos, but that's just from the doctors trying to get everything ready. Mark gripes to Owen about having to work with Avery but when he calls him an idiot quitter, Owen explains about Avery quitting Richard's trial so that he has a shot at a Harper Avery. Mark looks over and appears to see the pretty, green-eyed girlfriend thief in a new light.
Cristina takes a detour on the way to the blood bank to corner Alex while he's in the supply closet. Alex has the good grace to act sheepish, and he doesn't say a word as Cristina reminds him that Meredith was the only one who really cared about him and now he might have ruined her career. After promising that no one will ever rescue him from a burning building, she stalks out. And look, while I say that people aren't considering that Meredith probably had a good reason for what she did, I don't think it's fair to make Alex the bad guy here either. He told on Mere for the wrong, drunk, reason, but at the same time it's not his duty to cover up potential fraud in a clinical trial. Basically, it's just a shitty situation all the way around.
Lexie already has her hands full with the gathered families, who want more information than she has to give. Eli is helping her out and he tries his best to keep everyone calm and patient, but his mysterious love spell that works so well on Bailey doesn't really have an effect on people who might have just lost a family member. When one person demands to speak to Lexie's supervisor, Lexie has to be firm as she informs them that no one, supervisors included, have any idea what's going on. She seems to be struggling as she tries to keep everyone calm.
Alex finds Owen and tries to tell him that he only told on Mere because he was drunk and didn't want her to win Chief Resident, but Owen is unimpressed by this noble and passionate argument and points out that if Alex didn't think this through before he spilled the beans, he's as stupid as Meredith.
Bailey is in the hallway, having a moment where she tries to get control of herself. I figured at first that this was someone having a reaction to another large-scale trauma during a season finale, but it turns out that she's affected because the plane that crashed was a flight from Baltimore that she's taken many times herself with little Tuck. Eli asks her if she wants to sit down but Bailey wants to just stand there, and she seems slightly embarrassed while willing herself to stay calm. Eli tells her that he'd like to just stand there with her for a moment, then, and after she thinks about this a moment she nods and smiles a bit at him.
Cristina is talking to a very sweet airhead who is there to give blood, and when she asks the girl if there is a chance she is pregnant, the girl realizes she doesn't know. As Cristina tells her tricks to try and remember when her last period might have been the girl hilariously gapes -- I mean, seriously, mouth wide open, eyes more glazed than a donut -- as she tries to think about it. She finally realizes, happily, that she can pinpoint her last period but while she's been gaping and musing, Cristina seems to have done some musing of her own. After a moment, she just walks away and out of the room while the confused girl yells after her. But come on, girl, use your sisterhood-ESP and you'll realize what just happened.
Lucy hasn't yet left on her African betrayal-cation and does an ultrasound for Cristina, telling her she thinks she is about six weeks pregnant. Cristina's body language -- most notably, her arms flung over her face -- and monosyllabic responses tell Lucy that this wasn't planned, but Cristina declines the offer to talk about her options.
Down in the ER, the docs are all sitting around in the eerily empty ER listening to the radio for updates and killing time as they wait for patients. Lexie can't believe there is no news yet, and Mark awesomely offers that she could play Angry Birds while they wait while he tells her that it takes a while to get that many people out of the water. Owen adds that setting up waterfront triage takes a long time, and then realizes that people will start to get hypothermic so April sprints away to go get blankets and heated IV liquids. Even the first time I watched this episode it seemed rather obvious what the lack of news might mean, but no one mentions it and I wonder if it's that no one wants to jinx anything and figures if they don't voice the worst, then the worst won't happen? With one notable exception, when jetliners crash there usually aren't a whole lot of actual survivors. Mark then asks Owen if he's posted Chief Resident yet and when Owen says no, Callie takes her one moment of airtime this week to mock-bicker with Arizona about if it will be Meredith or Alex. I guess we've seen so much of her lately that it was time to focus on some other characters to round out the month of May. Alex has been moping and tossing playing cards into a bedpan but is interrupted by Richard who comes over and demands a full report of everything Alex saw Mere do and when specifically he saw it. Alex tries to argue but he's immediately shut down.
Avery comes in to get some more sedatives for family members and Mark chooses that moment to walk up and declare that Avery is a good man and, "Lexie's yours." Ew. He tells Avery to take care of her, and he will stay out of his way. Avery's confused and rather cockily points out that he already has Lexie, but... thanks? Mark sincerely tells Avery, "You're welcome." Boys are weird. I would think Mark is experienced enough to know that Avery had some confused sarcasm in that answer, but chose to ignore it. I don't know. I feel that this kind of exchange seems to only take place on the tee vee and then mostly between men trying to act manly. Across the room, Cristina walks up to Owen and tells him they need to talk.
They walk into an on-call room, Cristina looking stern yet nauseated. But since this is her look a lot of the time Owen doesn't realizing that it's serious and starts talking about ordering some food. In reply, Cristina announces that she is pregnant. It's actually quite a big step for her to have told him immediately what was going on, but that's as far as her maturity and giving goes. He's clearly happy but also tries to calm her; when he tries to touch her belly, though, she smacks his hand away and yells at him that there is no way she is doing this. They start to argue, and she doesn't want to hear anything he has to say. Eventually, though, he reminds her that they are partners and asks if they can just think about this together. Dejected, she nods. He assures her that he loves her and wouldn't want to make her miserable and run away to Meredith, but this is all just a lead-up to his suggesting that this might not actually be the worst situation in the world. Cristina can't deal and just whines and yells like an angry teenager fighting with her mom. She point-blank tells him that she doesn't want a baby and he responds by pointing out that she already has one. She's aghast at this and accuses him of "going lifey" on her, and then tries to start a debate about when life actually begins. Her facade crumbles, though, and appears to feel pretty betrayed by his actually wanting her to think about having this child. She maintains that she doesn't hate kids and thinks that they deserve to have parents who want them. Owen pleads that he does want the kid and that one day she might too, but she's certain that is lunacy. Finally, though, after a lot of gentle pleading on his part, he convinces her to agree to just think about it with him before doing anything.
Cristina, of course, then goes running away to Meredith. She sees that Mere is in a conference room with Richard and Derek and peeks through the window. Mere sees her and gives an infinitesimal head shake which Richard doesn't notice on account of all of his yelling. He still wants answers that Mere is still not giving up, and he warns her that once they get all of the info from Alex they'll figure out the dates on which this happened and what patients were involved. Seriously, Richard? No tiny pang of uncertainty that you might realize what possibly happened? Meredith again maintains that nothing she did changes the trial, SIGH. That line has gotten very old, very fast. But the worst thing about this situation is that it's brought Self-Righteous Derek back with a vengeance. He yells at Meredith that she doesn't get to choose which patients get what and when Meredith tries to say that the trial is still blind since he doesn't know who got what, Derek haughtily spits that the trial is over. He then decides to get personal and yells that she screwed him and the hospital. As Derek rants, Alex knocks on the door and hands his report to Richard, who looks it over and then pulls out his own datebook and starts to flip through. Quietly, he finally says something but Derek can't hear over the sound of his own voice, which is growling at Mere that he did this whole trial for her, to cure her disease. I'd say this whole "treating the spouse like a colleague" has failed rather spectacularly at this point. Richard speaks up and tells Derek that Meredith's shenanigans were for Adele. Meredith remains silent; Derek is gobsmacked.
As the doctors are all waiting around in the ER, reality seems to have set it for everyone but April, who is still thinking of things she can prepare for the potential onslaught of patients. Mark is the one to finally say out loud that if no one has been brought in thus far, it means no one survived the crash. It looks like April is the only one who hadn't realized this already, and she's crushed.
We managed to have so much of this season be blissfully free of Derek's self-righteousness, but he's got his holier-than-thou pants hiked up and secured tight with his superiority belt; he demands to know what Richard is going to do about it the situation. When Richard sighs and admits he doesn't know, Derek sneers that the protocol for this is clear. Mere asks, aghast, if Derek is actually encouraging Richard to fire her. I guess these two should really have just stuck with the post-it considering how things are going now that they have actual legal marriage paperwork. Richard admits his own role in the whole mess and says that he basically pressured Mere into doing what she did, so they'd have to both be fired. It's not the answer Derek wanted, so he storms out in a huff. Richard tells Meredith that he has to suspend her so that it doesn't look so bad, and then sighs that he'll hand the whole thing over to the FDA to figure out. There's a knock at the door and Owen nods, which sends a silent message that seems to say that everyone is dead and Richard is needed for the phase of notifying everyone. But before Richard leaves the room, he says to Meredith with a voice a bit husky with emotion, "I don't know how to..." Mere doesn't make him finish the sentence but just tells him that she knows. Despite all the crap that has just hit the fan, she still seems totally at peace with what she did.
Richard goes from one non-stop party to another: once the staff is all gathered he tells them that the authorities have begun identifying bodies and have sent over a list of names. Each doctor is going to be assigned families so that they can inform them of the deaths. Andrew is of course leading this traumatic charge, and tells everyone to meet him at the cafeteria in an hour. As the crowd dissipates, Owen walks over to the board and nonchalantly pins up a notice that announces that April has won Chief Resident. She sees this and grins, but the smile then dies on her face as Alex sneers and Meredith rolls her eyes at the news.
Alex rather pathetically runs after Owen to complain about his choice, which some might consider being really bold and others might call utter stupidity. He whines that Chief Resident should have gone to him or Mere, because no one will listen to April. Owen isn't in the mood and turns on Alex, asking if he thinks anyone would listen to him after he just sold out the one person at the hospital that everyone liked. (And man, let's all take a moment to ponder how strange that sounds, especially because at this point it in time it seems to be true. Who could have guessed?) He rubs some salt in Alex's wound by reminding him that the Chief Resident is supposed to be a resource for his peers, and who exactly does Alex think would come to him about anything now? He finishes up with one last, sharp blow -- telling Alex that until this all went down, he was going to give it to Alex.
Meredith now has to tell today's trial patient and his family that he's not having surgery after all, and that in fact he might never have it. His wife takes this about as well as you'd expect -- she unleashes a tirade on Mere about how badly he needs the medicine, and how the doctors are just choosing not to give it to him when they have it just sitting in a box in the hospital somewhere. In case this wasn't horrible enough for Meredith, their two young children seem terrified as their mom rants and raves, so the two little ones hold each other's hand for comfort. Derek just watches the whole scene with a glare, leaning in the doorway.
Owen and Cristina are sitting outside and he's trying to continue their conversation but she's still more interested in shooting down all of his suggestions, including his taking leave for a year to raise the baby. When he pleads that this doesn't have to be her problem, she points out that it's not like she's just going to ignore the baby -- she's not a horrible monster and that if she had a baby she'd love it. Owen hears this and the proverbial light goes on over his head; he can't help smiling as he realizes that her problem is that she would love the baby and she obviously doesn't want to. It only infuriates her more that he seems amused by this, and she finally tells him that there is no compromise because the bottom line is that she just doesn't want to be a mother. He changes his approach, and asks if she loves and trusts him. She can tell it's a trap but she does love and trust him, even if she thinks he's ridiculous when he says she would make a great mother. He then begs her again to sleep on the idea but Cristina's pissed that he's not just agreeing with her point of view and seems appalled at the fact that he keeps using their love as a reason for her to not make a rash decision.
Notification time has arrived; Lexie has three families to notify and frets that she's not sure she can go through this three times. I don't blame her. Avery assures her to take it a step at a time and then decides that she'll be cheered up by hearing about Mark's having "given" her to Avery that morning. I can't tell if he is doing this because he thinks Lexie will be appalled and it will be a knock against Sloan or if he's fishing for a reaction that will assure him that Lexie doesn't care about Mark anymore. Whatever his reasoning it works to get Lexie's mind off of the notifications for a second, though it seems to have been more because of horror than amusement. Andrew then comes out and tells them all that it's time.
The docs pile into the cafeteria en masse and then one at a time begin to call families forward. As they take them off to a private room the people who have been called are all smiling, and April realizes that they all think they are about to receive good news. I guess they don't notice that the doctors all seem gutted and many of them have tears in their eyes as they call out names.
Teddy goes to see Henry and brings some pudding to share, but Henry informs her coldly that his nurse can bring him snacks. She's looking for comfort after two hours of informing people that their family members are dead, and is confused that Henry isn't his usual self. What she didn't realize is that Henry's limit was reached when they had their first emotional goodbye, and he's over it now. He tells her that he tried to be a gentleman but now he just wants her to leave. Teddy thinks he's joking but Henry informs her that letting her go was the most painful thing he's ever done, and that's including all of his 82 surgeries. He lashes out that he's not her security blanket, he's in love with her, and now she just needs to go take herself off to Germany and leave him alone. She gets up and leaves the room crying with her pudding cups in hand.
Mark walks in to the ER to get some more meds and finds April there, and they talk about everything that's going on. They're both pretty depressed but then the ER phone rings and after April answers it, she turns and tells Mark, shocked, that there is one survivor after all.
Derek finds his wife in the locker room and asks if she's leaving, but Meredith informs him in a clipped tone that she didn't get fired, but she knows that is disappointing to him. Smug Wronged Derek of course doesn't take this well and informs her that while the fact that Mere helped Adele changes things for Richard, it doesn't for him. Derek must never get cold in his life with all of his absolute knowledge of right and wrong to keep him warm. When Meredith has the nerve to snark that she knows this, Derek goes into full on pissypants mode as he yells at her that she couldn't possibly understand or she never would have done what she did. He actually has the nerve to then ask Meredith with a shake of his head how it's possible that she doesn't know the difference between right and wrong. Come on, Derek, really? There isn't one tiny shred of you that, even if you think it's wrong, understand where Meredith is coming from? We were making such progress on your attitude problem. Sigh. Meredith isn't about to take all of this and points out that she doesn't think things are always just right or wrong. It's not black and white, it's... GREY, get it?? Oh, I slay me. But seriously, this was the whole basis of the show in its early seasons: situations weren't always just black and white. She yells that this was, in fact, complicated, since it was Richard and Adele and since there was a drug that could help her, and that she's sorry she screwed up the trial but she would do it again. This isn't what Saint Derek wanted to hear from his wife and he finally tells her simply that he's not sure he can raise a child with someone who doesn't understand right and wrong. Well come on, Derek, you have enough moral superiority for both parents and could cover her share for sure. Meredith asks if he's really going to go there, but Derek tells her that she's been saying for weeks that she'd be a bad mother, and maybe she's right. Bring a shooter in the hospital right now, and I'm not so sure Meredith would try and jump in front of the gun again. Derek tells her that he needs time to think and leaves; as he does, Meredith gets a text from Janet saying they need to talk about the adoption.
Arizona and Owen run into the ER with Sarah, the girl who survived the crash, and it turns out she was an unaccompanied minor. Every attending in the hospital is working on her and when she opens her eyes, Derek says hello and assures her that all of these docs are here to help. You'd have no idea that he just came from putting his wife in her place with how gentle he is towards the girl.
In the cafeteria, a number of grieving family members are still hanging out, trying to absorb the news they have all received. The woman who earlier demanded to see Lexie's supervisor is starting to break down because her phone is dead, and Lexie comes over to offer them use of a hospital phone. While her husband goes to make the call, Lexie sits with the woman. This is why I need to memorize some phone numbers -- if my cell dies during an emergency, I'm screwed as basically I can only manage to call my home phone or the phone number of my house where I grew up, for a house in a city that none of my family lives in any longer. April runs in asking for Sarah's family but no one is there yet so April goes over to tell Lexie the news. The woman's husband comes back and tells his wife they should go, while around them the other stragglers are getting ready to leave too. But Sarah's plight has touched something in the woman, and she wants to stay. When her husband balks a bit, she starts to break down, mentioning their own son who died, and then she gets a hold of her emotions enough to sit and calmly tell him she'd like to stay. The other people are all moved by her actions and sit back down too, so Lexie assures her that she will come back and update them during the surgery.
Cristina finally gets a chance to talk to Mere but Mere is in a bad state, ranting about Derek disappearing and Janet's constant pages. Cristina just asks Mere if it's true and what she was thinking, and Mere answers that she was thinking that the Chief's wife was about to have saline injected into her brain instead of a drug that could help stop her from becoming a "gorked-out lump." I hope that is the official medical terminology. Mere gives Cristina the quick rundown of the day and adds that she did what she had to, and couldn't have lived with herself if she hadn't done it. Cristina breaks in and says Mere's name rather plaintively but Mere is too wrapped up in her own troubles (which sucks for Cristina, but is understandable -- at least these are, in fact, pretty Real Troubles and not just boyfriend drama or something) and then when Mere sees Alex speaking with Janet, she flips out. Cristina calls after her but Mere makes a beeline for Janet and Alex.
Mere demands to know what Alex said to Janet and then immediately starts to dig her own grave as she tries to discredit Alex. He manages to cut her off so that Janet doesn't hear the whole sordid tale, and Janet just smiles at her and tells her happily that they are granting her and Derek temporary custody of Zola which will become permanent after a petition goes through. Alex is there as Zola's doctor to give an update on the baby's health, and she's doing great. Alex then walks Meredith through Zola's current condition like he would any parent but when he asks if Mere has any questions, she just stares, seemingly unable to process what is actually happening.
It seems even rock star trauma counselors can get beaten down by hours of death notifications. Andrew pages Teddy and tells her he just wanted to see her since when something like this happens you just want to be with someone you love. He gives her a big hug, but she is starting to look a little bit vexed. He tells her that they are on a flight the morning and suggests they spend the night in a fancy hotel in a nice bath. She seems a little bit stunned, and he asks her if she is okay.
Meredith is gazing at Zola through the window while she leaves what sounds like the latest in a string of message for Derek. She tells him that this is important and reminds him that she is, in fact, his wife and she needs him to call her back. I mean, seriously, didn't Derek know that Janet would be trying to reach them? He's been ever-present for the whole process, so it's strangely convenient now that he just chooses to vanish and Janet seems only to have Meredith's cell number on the day that big news arrives. He may think Mere's a crappy mother but I figured he was still in love with the adorable baby.
Sarah's temporary extended family is waiting in the cafeteria when a frazzled woman runs in, saying her daughter was in the crash. This is Sarah's mother, Mrs. Gordon, and the woman who wanted to stay (Who I think, from what I can find online, is named Gilda? But I didn't catch that during the episode. Oh well, Gilda it is so that we don't get into awkward pronoun overload. If Gilda is actually another character, I apologize profusely.) greets her and explains that the doctors are giving them updates and should be here any moment. Someone goes to get Mrs G coffee as she sits down, confused. Gilda explains that they knew Sarah was alone and as a parent, she thought the girl should have someone there with her. Lexie walks in and sits down quietly, like she's trying not to disturb frightened animals, as the woman takes Mrs. Gordon's hand.
Zola needs to have her picture in the dictionary to "adorable," or maybe in a medical journal that explains the biological cuteness of babies because I seriously want to just reach through the screen and nibble on her cheeks and dissolve into incoherent baby talk each time they show her on screen. Mere is signing a sheaf of papers while a nurse gathers supplies for her; the woman clearly knows far more than Meredith does about what she'll need to take care of a baby. When she finds out Mere doesn't have a diaper bag, she offers to get them one from the supply in the NICU -- parents who lose children generally don't want to see any reminders and so leave all of their gear there. Wow, that thought just brought me down hard from my Zola high. She asks Meredith if her husband is putting the car seat in the car and Mere deadpans that she doesn't have a car seat and isn't sure she even has a husband. The nurse giggles and jokes about surgeons' busy schedules, not realizing that Mere is quite serious.
Mrs. Gordon tells Gilda about how Sarah came to be flying alone and can't seem to quite wrap her mind around what happened. After a moment she has the horrible realization that she didn't ask Gilda if she had someone on the plane. Gilda sadly tells her that her son was on the plane, and Mrs. G asks if he is in surgery too. I guess she opted not to turn on the radio in the car because I have to imagine that the news is all over the fact that only one survivor was found. Gilda decides not to give Mrs. G anything else to worry about and answers yes, and he will be okay. April then comes in to say that Sarah is out of surgery and Mrs. G jumps up and sprints to the door. After a second, though, she turns and runs back to Gilda and gives her a giant hug while the other families watch sadly, and Mrs. G says that she's going to pray for Gilda's son. Gilda has a visibly hard time letting Mrs. G go, and after the woman leaves she starts to cry. These may have been one-off characters but man, did they tug at my own heartstrings this week.
Teddy, much to Henry's chagrin, shows back up in his room and asks him to stand up. He angrily tries to order her away but she yells at him that she has to do something and he has to be standing for it. Henry is expecting (and dreading) a hug, but he finally gets out of bed. Teddy takes a step closer to him and then kisses him, to which Henry reacts with stunned silence. She smiles up at him and tells him that he is her husband, and she's falling in love with him. Now Henry is ready for it and goes in for another long and happy kiss.
Lexie is getting a snack from the machine when Mark walks up and asks how she's doing. She's in no mood for it but Mark presses, knowing she has to be down after sitting with the families all day. She doesn't answer this but just turns and orders him to stop talking to her and to Avery. Mark's head drops and Lexie finally admits that she still loves Mark but she doesn't want to, because she's with Avery and Avery makes her happy. She essentially gives Mark an in by admitting that if he presses hard enough, she'll go back to him but she doesn't want to, and Mark finally says that she is right and apologizes. As if she didn't hear she goes on to remind Mark that he got a family like he wanted, so now he has to let her have what she wants. He repeats that she's right and asks if Avery told her that he's letting her go. Lexie says she heard about their conversation. "It's paternalistic and weird." Couldn't have said it better myself. She keeps staring at Mark and finally he has to tell her that he said he's letting her go, so she now has to walk away. It takes her a while to unglue her feet from the floor and force them away, having just been bested at her own game. I suspect that deep down, she still wanted Mark to try and win her back.
Avery, meanwhile, comes across April and congratulates her for becoming Chief Resident. I forget that these two really are friends; it's nice to see April get support from at least one of her peers though she apologizes to him since it means he didn't get it. He's fine with it, though, and they look through the window and see Lexie standing there. Avery dreamily tells April he has what he wants. April points out that it's kind of a miracle that after this year both of them are now happy at the hospital and have friends, and she adds that she can't believe they like her enough to make her Chief Resident. Avery is kind enough to not point out that truthfully, she only won because every other candidate managed to knock themselves out of the running and she was the only one left. He does, however, point out that everyone will hate her once again since now it's her job to boss them around. Amazingly, she somehow didn't realize this and is now horrified, but Jackson is too busy gazing at a smiling Lexie to notice.
Mere walks in the door of her house with Zola strapped to her chest, carrying armfuls of donated baby gear. She sweetly welcomes Zola to her new home and tells her about the house they are building while she walks through the house, turning on lights and calling for Derek. She tells Zola that they had a big plan to have a lullaby from Malawi playing when they brought her home so that she'd feel at home, but obviously that got scrapped and Mere can't remember any lullaby right now. Derek is nowhere to be found, nor are any of the other inhabitants. She goes into Alex's room and finds it empty, per her orders, but she's obviously sad and maybe wishes she hadn't been so rash now that she and Zola are alone. She tells the baby how glad she is that she is there, and that the two of them are a team, and tough, and will figure everything out and be okay. And while she's devastated inside she keeps it totally together and upbeat for the baby, displaying a maturity that I think will never cease to surprise me.
One relationship now seriously in jeopardy; one to go. Cristina trudges up the stairs to her apartment, and she looks like walking death. This is where Sandra Oh is just amazing -- despite knowing just how much Cristina doesn't want anything to do with this baby it's still an awful and tough situation, and she looks like death and radiates grim exhaustion. Owen has been working at the table and when he looks up at her, she asks softly how much he loves her. He laughs like maybe this is a game but assures her he loves her very much, so Cristina asks him to remember that when she tells him that she made an appointment to terminate the pregnancy. At first, he's stunned beyond words, and she tells him she's sorry if it upsets him but she can't talk any more about it. She wants to go lie down but he finally finds his voice and begins to yell at her that this is a marriage, a partnership, and she can't make this kind of decision without him. She looks ill and keeps grabbing at her head -- I wondered for a moment if this season's cliffhanger might be her collapsing with some crazy undiagnosed disease, but I'll reassure you now that doesn't happen. Owen keeps yelling about making sacrifices and doing things for each other, but Cristina finally yells back that this isn't like making a compromise on what to have for dinner; you don't give a little on a baby. Finally, she hollers, "I am saying no!" He nods and turns away, then finally turns back to her and orders her out. She's appalled as she thinks this is because she is denying him a baby but, so he has to explain that it's actually because she denied him a part of the decision and therefore a part of their marriage. She winds up for an indignant comeback but he just yells again for her to get out.
Bailey is ready to leave for the night but when she tries to say goodnight to Eli he declares that he wants to go home with her, and his tone makes it sound like she doesn't have a choice. Look, I don't think we're supposed to think Eli is an asshole -- I think he's supposed to be the super hot nurse who figures out how to break down Bailey's emotional defenses. Maybe it's this guy's acting style? But his bossy, domineering manner makes me yearn for Bailey to put him in his place like she could do so well and so easily. I can tolerate a fairly high level of barbarian but everything he does rubs me the wrong way, especially because he's dealing with Bailey, who I love. She's surprised at his reaction and explains that she has her son with her but Eli just quips that he can meet her son; he doesn't bite. When she tries to tell him it's not the right time he lectures her that this is a relationship and they need to lean on each other when things get bad, which is a lesson that shouldn't hurt her son. Bailey is now rubbing her aching head like Cristina was earlier -- ah, now I know what that is! It's an outbreak of Difficult Relationship Problemitis. He adds that if she can't see all of that, this might not be the relationship for him. He promises to be good and not make any moves on her, and adds that she can tell Tuck whatever she wants about who he is. Finally, she cuts him off and agrees, and they walk off into the night holding hands.
Someone unlocks Mere's front door but when she runs downstairs to see who it is, she's disappointed to find Cristina there instead of her husband. Mere tells Cristina that the hospital gave her a baby who is now asleep upstairs, so Cristina finally announces, "I'm getting an abortion and Owen just kicked me out of my house." Mere is appropriately shocked to learn Cristina is pregnant and tries to process this small avalanche of information while she asks why Cristina didn't tell her. Fortunately, this isn't the start of another big fight between these two -- Cristina just tells her sadly that she knew Mere was having a really busy day. Zola then starts to cry and Mere invites Cristina upstairs but a baby is the last thing she can deal with, and she goes to lie on the couch instead. Mere VOs that she didn't want to be alone because she thought it would make her happy, but that if she did love someone and it fell apart, she might not make it. And there we have the great risk of relationships, laid out in voiceover form.
Lucy finds Alex once again doing shots at the bar -- thank goodness he has no more secrets to spill. She pleads for him to tell her not to go to Africa. Owen's admonition about Alex not thinking his decision through could go for Lucy here, too. Fortunately, Alex tells her to go to hell.
Mere's VO continues that it's easier to be alone, because what if you find out that you need love and then it's gone? We have an End of Season Sad People Montage: Cristina is hugging a pillow to herself on the sofa much like she did at the beginning of the season, while elsewhere Owen stares at the wall. Mere is holding Zola and picks up her phone to make a call as her VO wonders if one can survive the pain of love ending.
As Mere compares losing love to dying, we see that Derek has retreated to his unfinished house and is about to curl up in a sleeping bag in the baby's future room. His phone rings but he rejects the call -- it's never clear if Mere left the news about Zola on a message or if she did, that he even listened to it. So he might not realize he's sulking while his wife is at home with his new baby. Thunder peals, and I hope he thought to bring an umbrella because while his principles might keep him warm, I don't think they'll keep him dry in a rainstorm. Mere finishes up that the only difference between the pain of a lost love and dying is that at least death ends, while pain can go on forever. Forever, or the length of the summer, at the very least.
We'll see what comes of these ladies and their grown-up relationships come Fall! Once again, thanks to all of you lovely readers for spending this season with me, and see you in September.