By Angel Cohn
It's the day before Bailey's wedding and she's starting to get cold feet. Like really cold feet, not just chilly feet because she didn't want this overblown stupid Christmas-themed wedding in the first place. It's weird to see a woman that used to be the epitome of confidence so flustered over a wedding, especially since she's been married before, but Richard chalks up her nerves to the wisdom that comes with age. Still, old-Bailey wouldn't have been steamrolled into a wedding she didn't really want, no matter how good the sex was. But still she asks Arizona, Callie and Meredith to be her bridesmaids, in typical old-Bailey fashion, which sort of made me smile, because I've really missed her awkward social interactions. Anyway, she plans on driving herself to the wedding, but Richard (who also worked out a plan with Ben to get her a pre-wedding distraction surgery) arrives in a limo to take her in style. It's really sweet and shows what a great relationship these two have. And they are on their way, until the hospital calls and says Adele is coughing up blood. When they arrive, some doctor we don't really know is working on Adele, and Richard tries to commandeer the situation, but as the husband he's pushed aside. So since all of the other semi-competent doctors are already at Bailey's wedding, waiting for her to walk down the aisle, she strips off her veil and dress in the middle of the ER and gets down to work. Ben's probably gonna be pissed for being left at the altar, but maybe now he'll actually listen to her instead of pushing her too fast. No matter how pretty he may be, Bailey listened to her gut and made the right decision.
The other big doings is that Neve Campbell is there and totally calls Meredith out for being a shitty sister-in-law. Thank you, Neve Campbell. She says that their family is close-knit and Mere keeps them all away from Zola and doesn't include them in crap, but calls when she needs something. That said, Neve would do anything for her brother Derek, so she agrees to have her nerve cut out of her calf. But it turns out her legs are stumpy, so they need to cut nerves from both legs, and Derek has his normal hissy-fit about the whole thing, but eventually caves and has the surgery. As a reward for going under the knife, or just in an attempt at being in a functional family, Mere decides to tell Neve about the baby, even though she's still thinking that her unstable uterus might not be able to carry the baby to term.
The other person Mere hasn't told about her pregnancy is Cristina, and she senses some awkwardness in their friendship when Derek says the whole reason that Owen is asking for a divorce is because it will allow the crash victims to get more money. The thinking being that Owen has a conflict because he's married to one of the victim's, so they won't have to pay as much settlement. Mere accuses Cristina of keeping secrets, but a gobsmacked Cristina is clueless. So she confronts Owen about the whole thing, since he sped up the divorce papers, and the two get to reconciling, quickly.
Also possibly getting their relationship on track are Arizona and Callie, since Arizona is whining about having to wear flats to the wedding (she needs one of those high-heel legs like Aviva has on Real Housewives of New York City). Callie loses it and says that she's sick of talking about nothing but the damn leg, and sick of not having sex, and Arizona puts her shoes on… and this seems like progress, of sorts.
In the dumbass part of the hospital, April tries to get out of going to Bailey's wedding because she thinks she'll cave and sleep with Jackson. So she tells Jackson to bring a date, because he won't be able to resist her in her strapless dress. Her shoulders are just TOO sexy. Whatever, she's not that irresistible, and she could also wear a sweater, but instead she picks Stephanie to be his date. Then he sets April up with Smash. Both Smash and Stephanie are freaked to be "dating" their residents. Then, because this show has to be stupid, Alex is jealous, as Jackson was supposed to be his date for the night, so Jackson gets Stephanie to bring a friend. This is an insanely ridiculous way to bring Alex and Jo together for some awkwardness, as they are fighting because he let her do part of a surgery and she nearly killed a patient… and then she told Arizona it was Alex's fault for pushing her beyond her abilities. Alex gets pissed that he got in trouble with his boss, and Jo still doesn't get the idea of a teaching hospital, or how to be competent and recover from setbacks, so they have a super awkward trip to the wedding that doesn't end up happening.