The Chief has finally come to terms with the idea that Adele probably has Alzheimer's, and so his way of dealing with it is to pressure Derek to accept her into the study. When a patient unexpectedly drops out, a spot opens up, but when Mere runs the test to see if Adele is eligible, Adele doesn't score low enough to qualify. When Richard finds out that she only failed (passed?) by a single point, he hits the roof, but Mere makes Derek hold firm since the whole study could be ruined if they make one exception to the standard protocol. Adele is thrilled to be rejected since she wants to believe she doesn't have Alzheimer's but when Meredith tells her about the things she got wrong on her test and Adele finally has to admit she's sick; the reason she was in denial is that she and Richard finally found happiness and now this is threatening to tear them apart once again.
As part of his effort to get Derek to bend the rules for Adele, the Chief decides to try out his experimental diabetes procedure on a patient, even though it hasn't yet actually been approved. Granted, the woman needs it, since nothing else has worked, but in order for the Chief to do the surgery he needs a waiver from the FDA to try it out before the approval. The patient turns out to be in such bad shape that they can't wait to see if they are given the waiver, so Richard performs the surgery anyway. Fortunately for him, he's granted the waiver after the fact. Also fortunately for him, it goes perfectly and the results are what he had been hoping for. Bailey is thrilled, too, having helped on the case despite Eli sort of undermining her in front of the patient. The two get into a bit of an argument over it, but after work, outside the hospital, Eli turns Neanderthal as he tells Bailey to come home with him so that he can do all sorts of things to make her forget the day. While I thought she was going to let him have it she seems to actually like his caveman act and ultimately decides to go home with him.
On the opposite end of the Neanderthal spectrum we have Henry. He passes out while jogging and is brought into the hospital, where they discover he has a tumor that needs to come out ASAP. Richard is skeptical about Teddy doing the procedure, but she insists their relationship is nothing more than a business arrangement and she's fine. Once Henry is hopped up on morphine, however, he very sweetly spills his true feelings, which are that he thinks the two of them could be great together. Richard pulls her from the surgery and Cristina gets it instead, but Teddy is allowed to be in the OR to supervise. When things go wrong, Teddy starts to freak out, and it's pretty obvious this is more than a business arrangement for her, too; Cristina has to yell at her to shut up so she can work, and then of course winds up doing an awesome job removing the tumor. Teddy and Henry have a talk afterward, and she tells him that she's thought about their being together but insists she doesn't feel any spark and so they can't. That doesn't seem to be entirely true, given her actions, but maybe she's trying to get herself to believe it. Cristina is so impressed with herself that she orders pizza for dinner for her and Owen -- no cereal tonight! -- but her good mood is dashed when Owen tells her that Richard handed him the task of picking the Chief Resident, and she realizes this means she probably won't get it since if she did everyone would think Owen was just favoring his wife.
Alex and Lucy are still doing their mating dance -- he awkwardly and defensively pines for her while she treats him like dirt. Lucy finally asks Meredith if she's missing anything about him, since Alex must be a better person than he lets on, given how many friends he has that care so much about him. Mere gives Lucy his romantic backstory in the tiniest of nutshells and it's enough to make Lucy kiss him when she runs into him after work.
April and Stark seem to be getting on well, but April is convinced that whatever they are doing is definitely not dating, since it sounds like they haven't gotten physical at all. When he invites her over to watch From Here to Eternity the other docs point out that this isn't just a movie between friends and is a viewing that probably would take place in the bedroom. Freaked out, she breaks things off with him, but that night she watches the movie by herself and seems to be more upset than relieved about ending it, whatever "it" was.
Jackson and Lexie are still together and hooking up everywhere they can, as often as they can. Of course it's only a matter of time before Mark realizes what's going on. Fortunately he doesn't realize it until after he's thrown Callie a huge, girly baby shower. Arizona fights him every step of the way, sure that Callie doesn't want a shower with games and onesie decorating, but it turns out he got it all totally right, and Arizona sulks in a corner for most of the time. At the end of the party Callie gives Arizona a present -- she's whisking her off to a weekend getaway to thank her for going along with all this even though Callie knows she hates it. As they are driving they get in yet another fight over Mark, and Arizona is in a right state, since she feels like Mark gets way more of Callie than she does. Callie asks what would help and a light goes off above Arizona's head -- she asks Callie to marry her. She's so wrapped up in convincing Callie she's serious and that this is exactly what she wants that she doesn't see the truck in the road ahead of them, and the episode ends with the sickening crunch of their vehicle plowing right into it.
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Meredith kicks us off this week with a voiceover that says that while doctors like to think of themselves as sexy renegades, it turns out they are basically sheep who always follow protocol. No matter how much he follows protocol, Jackson has no worries about also looking sexy; he takes off his shirt to sneak up and seduce Lexie as she does laundry and they start to make out. April walks in wanting to use the washer for some unsexy laundry and is ticked to find them there, asking if there is anywhere left in the house that they don't hook up. She storms off and Lexie briefly entertains the idea of their going upstairs but she's quickly distracted by more making out with a half-naked man and they get down to business right there.
Alex has bucked the trend and actually moved OUT of Mere's house, though all he's done is move into Derek's trailer, which he has positioned in the hospital parking lot. Bailey's ticked that he's blocking her parking spot, and not very impressed by Alex's explanation that this way he's able to get surgeries first since he's so close -- something important for a possible future Chief Resident. I'm going to try and forget that he just spits his toothpaste onto the pavement as he brushes his teeth, because it's revolting.
Mere's VO reminds us that not following protocol can lead to people dying. I suppose that puts most other professions into perspective for a moment. She and Derek are examining Adele who is asking them when they are going to just get married, already. Richard tells her gently that they are married, in a tone that says they have had this conversation before, but he'll be gentle because he thinks her mind is going. Adele isn't having any of that and says that she knows about the post-it but she's talking about a real live, actual, white-dress, marriage-licensed wedding, and that has nothing to do with her potential Alzheimer's. I suspect she is just voicing what much of the viewing audience still thinks of the Mere-Der union, though truth be told I think the post-it works for these two and we're not going to see anything else for a long time, if ever. Derek changes the subject and tells her she's got symptoms that can be early onset Alzheimer's, but she doesn't want to hear it and counters by reminding him that she was a nurse and she knows that 20% of all Alzheimer's diagnoses turn out to be wrong. Richard is obviously worried and doesn't believe her when she insists she is fine.
Outside, Meredith and Derek remind him gently that it takes a lot of patients a long time to come to terms with the diagnosis, but Richard isn't any patient and he wants to get things done; he orders Derek to get Adele into the trial. The first problem Derek points out is that they need Adele's consent, which currently seems unlikely, and then he reminds Richard that both the trial and the wait list are totally full. Richard isn't interested in what he sees as excuses and just tells Derek pointedly that he knows Derek will do whatever he can to help Adele.
Bailey and Avery go in to see their patient of the week, Clara, but when Avery starts to recite her info her very exasperated husband Sean demands to hear from the "grown-up doctor" rather than the "kid." Clara is recovering from a tumor removal but she has diabetes and getting her insulin levels back has been a challenge, to say the least. Sean is freaking out because their kids are living with his parents, with whom he seems to have issues. He's clearly just a man at the end of his rope, and Bailey does her best to try and calm him down but not much is helping. Eli is her nurse, and he finally interrupts Bailey to talk Sean down himself. He does a pretty good job, reminding Sean that they weren't sure if Clara would even survive surgery, but that Bailey was willing to take the risk and it paid off. Eli tells them that if Clara can get through that she can do anything, and she smiles up at Sean as he grabs her hand. Bailey looks a little bit put out to have had Eli take over her job for a moment but she keeps it to herself since it worked.
Alex must be serious about being Chief Resident because he does the unthinkable and asks Stark if he has any work for him, since Arizona is busy with the upcoming baby shower. Stark still loathes him and waves him away, but Alex is still there to see how Stark lights up when April comes in to report on their patients. He reminds her of their 7 PM dinner reservation and then when he leaves, Alex sneers that he's impressed that April is sleeping her way to the top. April argues that the two of them aren't even dating; even though she thought at first it might be dating she's realized they are just friends hanging out. Alex, and the viewing audience and the rest of the world, really, don't believe her.
Teddy walks down to the ER to see her patient, a jogger who was found unconscious in the street with no ID on him. Because this is the intimate world of television, she walks in as Cristina shocks him and realizes that the jogger is, in fact, her husband. Also because this is TV, Cristina doesn't seem to have recognized him herself even though she's been one of his doctors already. All the better to leave Teddy looking shocked as we go to our first commercial.
Once Henry is conscious, Teddy yells at him for going jogging when he was having chest pains. When she sees that he's still in obvious pain she yells at Cristina to give him more pain meds, and it's obvious this is a higher caliber of worry than normally occurs within the standard doctor-patient relationship. They plan to run tests to see if he had a heart attack.
Bailey seeks out Richard to tell him she thinks she has a candidate for his trial, once it gets going. He reminds her he doesn't have FDA approval yet but she thinks just being first on the list would help Clara's and her husband's spirits. Avery throws out the idea of doing the surgery today since she's doing so badly; they could apply for an emergency FDA waiver to perform it. Bailey shoots this idea down because if something went wrong, the chances of the FDA ever approving the trial could be shot. But Richard thinks about it and decides that he'll call and see if he can get the waiver, and Avery puffs out his chest a little bit, thinking he's just scored some major Chief Resident points.
Arizona and Mark are up in one of the doctors' lounges preparing for the shower when Mere and Cristina lug a table inside. Arizona is dismayed to find out that he is planning a scrapbook station, complete with glitter pens, and tries to cancel it but Marks' adamant that Callie wanted them to go all out. His voice gets soft as he stares at a tiny white onesie and adds that there will also be a onesie decorating station. Mere looks at him like he just sprouted another head but he defends that he went and researched all this stuff once he knew the baby was on the way. When Callie comes in Arizona runs to her like a pouting child and asks if she wants scrapbooks but is disappointed to hear that Callie not only wants the station but is super excited about it and the inclusion of glitter pens. Mark can't help but grin at his own brilliance.
Tarik is on the phone, clearly in the middle of an argument with the very Gavin that his mother adores, and Mere comes upon him and hears Tarik tell him to stop calling. He sheepishly explains to Meredith that the situation is a little bit more complicated than his mother can handle, which worries Meredith -- she explains to him that they need the caregiver to be a full-time resident of Washington and that this is a very big commitment, and if there's the slightest chance he would move back to London he needs to tell them. But Tarik earnestly tells her about how his mom supported him when he came out, which is something that is considered a crime in their family. His dad left but his mom stood by him even as she lost everything, so this is the least he can do for her. Mere seems to still have a hint of worry but takes him at his word as he seems dead serious and committed.
Bailey and Avery go back to Clara and explain the new procedure that might help, where they would put a device with islet cells into her body that would produce insulin and basically act as a new pancreas. As they explain Eli comes in and defensively watches the proceedings with his arms crossed in front of them. Sean and Clara don't notice because they are so overjoyed that something might actually help her. After Avery tells them that they are waiting on FDA approval, Eli aggressively demands to know what the risks are, adding that they must be serious or else it would already have been approved. I don't know how these things work but I figure this is both true and an oversimplification, as supposedly this is a brand new idea for a procedure that hasn't been tried before, so of course it's not yet approved. Bailey is taken aback and says she was about to get to that; she's been thrown off by his interruption and tries to regain her composure as she lists the potential (bad) side effects that could result. She concludes, though, that this is the best option since everything else has failed, but Sean is confused now and Clara asks them for time. Bailey of course gives it, and then demands that Eli follow her outside.
In the hall she orders Avery to scram and then confronts Eli about his interruption, which made her seem like she was hiding something when she was of course going to tell them the risks. Eli doesn't have a hint of remorse about him as he sasses that in his experience, most doctors do try and hide things. He claims he was standing up for his patients, asking a question they didn't know to ask. As I've been kind of iffy on Eli up until this point, this little show of bravado isn't helping my opinion of him, especially as we all know that Bailey is one of the most awesome and honest surgeons around so this kind of treatment is ridiculous. He's totally cocky as he informs her that this is patient care, helping them understand an experimental procedure. Bailey sasses right back that she thought it was her job as she is the expert on the procedure, and then finally pulls rank on him since nothing else seems to work, reminding him that there is a doctor-nurse protocol in place for a reason. He bitches that he gets it, he should know his place as a nurse, and Bailey is totally fed up with him. She wants them to agree to follow protocol but he just snipes, "Not if it hurts the patient," and saunters off, incredibly self-satisfied. Don't get me wrong, I think patient care should always come first, but I think Eli's needlessly swinging his dick around to try and show he's the big man on campus, rather than actually reading the situation and the participants and choosing his reactions accordingly.
Alex must have gotten some work as he's working at a computer station in pediatrics, which gives him a front-row seat to an exchange between April and Stark. She's not sure she'll be done in time for their dinner reservation but he's not worried, he tells her that From Here to Eternity is on cable (who actually says that anymore?) and they could eat dinner at his place. April sees the knowing look on Alex's face and overcompensates, telling him that sounds awesome, but she's still not sure she'll be done in time. Hearing this, Stark calls Alex over to help her out. After Stark leaves, Alex teases her that the only way she'll see the movie is if it's playing on Stark's bedroom ceiling. He cackles at the idea while she grows more terrified.
While Henry is prepared for a scan of some variety Richard, Cristina and Teddy sit in the control room and discuss his case. It sounds like it's not a heart attack. Richard asks Teddy if she thinks she can stay on the case but she once again assures him that their relationship is merely a business arrangement.
She goes in to see Henry, whose pain meds have finally kicked in and made him deliciously loopy. His inhibitions gone, he tells Teddy that the reason her dates have all been going horribly is because they haven't been with him. Teddy calls to the other docs that it's time to start the test but Henry is on a roll and he tells her that they're married and she's hot, so why not be together? Cristina's head is in her hand and she's peeking at the unfolding scene through her fingers, mortified, while the Chief glares.
By the time she's back in the control room, he looks much like an angry cartoon character with steam coming out of his ears. Teddy foolishly tries to argue that it was the painkillers talking but Richard knows that they just loosened Henry's lips enough for him to say what he really means. Teddy insists that even if he means that, she doesn't, and Cristina mercifully breaks it up by yelling that the scans have just come up. It turns out that Henry has a mass near his heart that Teddy wants to take out immediately but Richard forbids her doing the surgery. Cristina pipes up and says that she can do it and points out to a highly skeptical Teddy that she soloed on a similar surgery the month before and Teddy said she did an awesome job. Nothing stings more than having your own words bite you in the ass, huh, Teddy? Richard thinks it's a perfect solution and tells Teddy that she can supervise. Once she leaves Cristina cuts off Teddy's lecture at the pass by pointing out that this way she can at least stay in the OR during the procedure. Teddy storms off but Cristina does a little head bob of self-satisfaction.
Callie, true to her word, is super excited about every scrapbook page and silly game at her shower, and is having an absolute blast. Arizona looks like she's attending a funeral, and Mark can't help but needle her about how well he knows Callie, and how he knows that having a baby in these ultra-nontraditional circumstances is hard for a nice Catholic girl like her. Arizona counters that she's not a bad person for finding showers annoying. No, she's not, and she's right that there are many women who feel the same way when their friends are having showers, but she's forgetting that the polite thing to do is to smile and at least pretend like you're having a good time. Especially as one of the parents of the baby, she might do well to not act like someone is shoving bamboo shoots under her fingernails. Yes, he's being a baby but... he's also right about Callie so wouldn't Arizona's best comeback be to get to know Callie just as well as he does? Callie then calls out to her that it's her turn to play, and Mark delightedly hands her a balloon that she shoves under her scrubs with a barely-concealed sneer before heading off to her happy girlfriend.
When they get to the room they find Clara in a hypoglycemic coma and Richard tells Sean that if they want to try the transplant they need his consent immediately. He agrees, but as the doctors run out the door Bailey reminds the Chief that they don't have their waiver yet. Richard tells her that Clara will die without it, so she's to book an OR anyway. I'm sure he's really trying to save Clara's life, but it's incredibly uncomfortable since it looks like he's also willing to break the rules just to prove a point to Derek.
When Teddy tells Henry that Cristina is doing his surgery he's first confused and a little bit disappointed, but this turns to hopeful happiness when he realizes it's because of the whole family members/feelings getting involved rule. Teddy tries to ignore his flirting as best she can and after she finishes explaining what will happen, she flees. Henry believes (as we all do) that this means she must be into him, and though Cristina ignores the question, he smiles to himself.
Lucy seeks out Meredith to ask her about Alex but manages to do it rather off-puttingly, as she does most things to do with him. She asks Mere if it's real that she is friends with him and then says that she didn't think Meredith was the type to put up with his Neanderthal act. She asks what she's missing and Mere tells her bluntly that she's missing a lot. Mere then gives the nutshelliest possible version of his life: one girl went crazy on him, his wife nearly died and then left him, and then he got shot and nearly bled to death in an elevator. She doesn't even mention his problems with his family, but it seems to be enough to surprise Lucy anyway, and Meredith says that the Neanderthal thing is just an act that he's very good at. One could also argue that other than the awful first "cabbage patch" incident they had, Lucy hasn't even seen Alex go nearly as Neanderthal as he can and has in the past.
Bailey and Richard have Clara in the OR, but they still haven't gotten the call from the FDA. Bailey wants to wait but Richard knows Clara is getting worse the longer they hold off. Very delicately, Bailey asks him if he's sure that he isn't just doing this surgery to prove a point to Derek. He insists that he's only thinking of his patient and then decides to just go ahead with the surgery despite Bailey's skepticism.
We join Tarik, Meredith and Derek mid-Tarik-freakout and it seems that he left his phone in his mom's room, Gavin called, and she picked up and talked to him. He begs the docs to not let her "do" this and when they go in the room, "this" turns out to be "leaving the program." She learned from Gavin that he and Tarik only broke up the week before when she was accepted into the trial, and Tarik left to care for her. And while this makes her proud, she can't handle the idea of Tarik doing this and she wants him to go back to London and Gavin. Derek reminds her that she was picked from hundreds of people and there might not be another opportunity, and Tarik tries to blame her change of mind on her disease. But she's adamant, and she tells the small crowd a ton of details about her life to prove she's lucid. It's obvious that there will be no changing her mind.
As Cristina operates on Henry, Teddy stands behind her and keeps telling her to be careful, like a nervous mother watching her child ride a bike without training wheels for the first time. Since she and we know Cristina's been riding trick bikes like a pro for a long time now, it's obvious that she's just extra worried because this is Henry. When things suddenly take a bad turn she starts hollering at Cristina, demanding updates and threatening to take over, until Cristina has to holler back at her to shut up and, "Stop acting like a scared wife!" Cristina then fixes the problem and everything settles down; she immediately apologizes to Teddy but to her credit Teddy cuts her off and assures her that it's okay.
Richard struts through the hospital like a proud peacock and when Derek finds him, Richard tells him about how he just did his first trial surgery without approval and brags that he doesn't know if or how they will punish him, but he doesn't care because he just saved someone's life. It actually seems like he means it, and that his need to prove something to Derek finally took second place to his desire to help someone. But Derek turns his world back upside down when he announces that someone just dropped out of the trial.
The one obstacle left to getting Adele into the trial is Adele herself. She and Richard are fighting about it in his office because she doesn't want to take the test to see if she qualifies for the trial. Richard pleads with her that they don't have the luxury of time right now, and begs her to do it for him. She finally agrees to do it but stubbornly tells him that she's going to pass to prove that she's fine and they are going to grow old together like they are supposed to.
Mark and Arizona are cleaning up from the successful shower, but Arizona's face is like thunder as she paws through a trash bag looking for the gift list. She rants while Mark gently teases her and we're mercifully saved from too much of it when Callie comes in and asks for a moment alone with her girlfriend. Callie tells Arizona there is one more gift and hands her an envelope containing a flyer for a B&B a few hours away. Excitedly, she tells Arizona they leave in the morning. Arizona is now so used to being a humorless killjoy that she just responds by saying they have patients to see, and Callie finally pleads with her to accept the olive branch that she is offering. She tells Arizona that having this baby is her dream and she knows she's acting kind of insane, and she understands that Arizona doesn't really understand or like the level of insanity. Finally, Arizona snaps back into her former self and grins and hugs Callie happily as we pan over to a onesie that says, "I [heart] My Mommies."
Please, please, Show, I beg of you -- can we please go back to making both Callie and Arizona likeable people at the same time? I think they are a great couple and I'm tired of always hating one or the other for being an unreasonable, selfish, pain in the ass. I want to [heart] my mommies again!!Adele is taking her test, and Richard sits behind her so that he can motion to Meredith whether she gets answers right or wrong. She's able to correctly remember what she did for Thanksgiving the year, but she can't really celebrate her small success with everyone else in the room so somber.
It's getting close to dinner reservation time, and April reports to Stark on what she and Alex accomplished. He's happy until April says that Alex did most of the work and then vows to double-check it all to make sure it was done right. Good to see that he's still as vindictive and petty as a middle-aged girl even when he's trying to impress April. She gently chastises him and uses his first name, but then dissolves into horror after Alex leaves at having done so in front of a colleague. Stark assures her it was fine and admits he liked it, which pretty much assures that he does like April That Way, and it's too much for her to process. She stutters as she tells him that she can't make it over to his place and should stay late at work since she's competing for Chief Resident. Stark is oblivious in so many ways but he knows a dumping when he sees it and he accepts it but chides her for blaming it on work. She insists that she loves spending time with him but just thinks of him as a friend and he replies sadly that the only problem is that he never wanted to just be her friend. She seems pretty shattered as he wishes her goodnight rather formally and leaves. I think that against all odds she does actually like him (though I would argue that she could do way better) but that the fear of seeing his bedroom ceiling when she's never seen a bedroom ceiling before was too much for her to handle.
Adele's test results are in: She needed to score a 26 or lower to get into the trial and she was higher than that. She beams at the news but Richard demands to know what she scored and Derek pretty quickly caves and admits she scored a 27. For the umpteenth time today Richard blows a fuse, this time because Derek is turning her away over just one point. Adele remains oblivious to his mood and just assures him that this is good news because it means she's not sick. Richard pouts that it means nothing of the sort and when Adele asks for confirmation from Meredith and Derek that she's okay, Meredith sadly tells about all of the mistakes she made during the test. Adele doesn't want to hear any of it and she yells at them that they are all obsessed with this trial and seeing Alzheimer's everywhere, just like Richard yelled at Meredith when she first realized that something might be wrong. But Meredith has been right all this time and after she yells at them for a while Adele finally breaks down and cries that it's not fair she should get this disease just when she and Richard are finally happy together. He pulls her into his arms as she cries that she is scared and assures her that he's not going anywhere. The problem with having an Alzheimer's trial as a central storyline of a TV show is that MAN, do these storylines get horribly depressing. I'm going to need to go watch RuPaul's Drag Race and delight at all the sequins and lip syncing to pull myself out of my funk once this recap is done.
Richard is in his office later that night when Bailey comes in to happily report that the procedure seems to be working and Clara is doing well. He's glad, and he tells her that the FDA also granted their waiver -- I assume that they'll just fudge the fact that technically they did the surgery before that happened. Even though he's happy, the wind has definitely been taken out of his sails after everything with Adele. Avery sprints to the door, having heard about the waiver and he yammers about Chief Resident but Bailey mercifully shuts the door in his face. She then tells Richard that he has to choose someone soon because the residents are all turning into lunatics as they wait to hear who will win. She knows he has a lot of other things going on and so instructs him to go ahead and delegate the job, so he immediately delegates it to her. The beauty of Bailey is that she doesn't feel the need to accept what her boss just told her, and she declares that since these residents are all her babies, she can't choose and he has to delegate to someone else. She then congratulates him again as he leaves, but for him this day has turned bittersweet.
Once he wakes up, Teddy tells Henry that he's going to be okay, but while he's glad he's less worried about his outcome than about her reaction to his morphine-induced outburst. She tells him gently that he has to stop flirting with her and he apologizes, but admits he's not actually sorry at all and he meant every word. "If not more." He didn't count on Teddy's nerves of steel. Though I'll admit that I don't believe her, she convincingly tells Henry that while she knows it would make an awesome story and he's cute and wonderful, she just doesn't feel that way about him. She and April should go get a drink together and compare technique for convincing men they like that they aren't actually interested. She apologizes, and then flees before she or Henry can say any more on the subject.
Meredith finds Derek with his head in his hand at the computer looking as if the weight of the entire world is on his shoulders. She's upbeat for both of them and asks if he heard back from the patient on the waiting list. He admits what I'm sure she already knew -- that he hasn't actually called yet -- and then wonders if Richard was right that just one little point isn't that important. Mere's incredibly gentle but firm as she reminds Derek that point could ruin the trial for everyone else they are trying to save, and then she waits and watches as Derek calls the person at the top of the waiting list.
When Bailey leaves for the night she finds Eli waiting outside for her and looks utterly uninterested in continuing their fight from earlier. Eli, though, needles her by saying he heard their patient is doing well before correcting, "Sorry, your patient." She sighs and tries to stop him but he tells her that she should go ahead and admit he was right so that they can kiss and make up. Admit he was right about what? The experimental procedure about which he was so doubtful was a roaring success, and I know I won't stoop to pretending that Bailey was going to hide all of the risks from Clara and Sean. Fortunately, Bailey declares with disgust that she's not tired enough to tell him that. And here's where I finally make up my mind about Eli, and my conclusion isn't positive. He calls after her and calls her by her full name, then proceeds to give a little speech about how inside the hospital, she's the man, but outside he's the man and that she can call him old-fashioned or Cro-Magnon but it won't stop him taking her to his bed to show her what kind of a man he is. Ugh. If Alex has perfected the Neanderthal act, Eli is teaching the master class. Here's where I would have predicted that Bailey would inform him that he was going to bed alone, but actually she winds up caving and admitting that bedding him sounds pretty good. He kisses her and orders her to be at his place in 15 minutes. I know it's true (and lord knows I've done it myself) that women like jerks and bad boys, but I just love Bailey so much that I wish she was above it and had left him yearning for her in the parking lot while she went home.
After all that, Alex seems as macho as a puppy dog in a bandana when Lucy sees him sitting on the stoop of his trailer in the parking lot, drinking a beer. He offers her one and she takes it and sits down, but once she sits she asks if his plan was really to sit in his trailer and wait for her to walk by because he finds her charming and hot. Girlfriend, I'm sure he finds you hot, but you need to rethink your definition of "charming." Alex stutters when he denies this and so she takes advantage and pounces, announcing that she intimidates him, which is probably why he hasn't made a move. Wasn't inviting her out a couple of times making a move? And didn't she shoot him down unceremoniously? She seems determined to not remember that. I hate when TV does this -- girls like this are always depicted like we're supposed to find them strong and charming and awesome, when in reality they're just bitchy and mean. Regardless, she sits down to him and tells him that he's forcing her to make the move, and they kiss. She can't even leave it at that, though, and interrupts herself to ask, "Was I right?" Unfortunately, like Bailey before him, he seems into it. Yuck.
When April gets to the sofa, bowl of popcorn in hand and despair on her face, it's the last straw to find Avery and April already there and making out. She pauses only for a moment before stomping over, yanking their legs out of the way, and sitting down. They are surprised and ask, "Do you mind?" but they're messing with a girl who is both bummed and kind of embarrassed, and that's given her the strength to at least stand up to her horny roommates. She tells them that if this were her she might want to make out in private, and both Lexie and Avery seem to think she might still be kidding until she pointedly starts to turn up the volume on the TV. They finally get up and go upstairs and she sits down to watch From Here To Eternity and mope about the ornery little man she could be cuddling with right now.
Meredith starts her voiceover, reminding us that the theme of the hour was protocol, and questioning if it's better to follow it or not. Hey, remember Owen? Hot redheaded Army surgeon? He's still on this show, who knew? We'd barely seen him for so long that I'd forgotten about him. He gets home to find Cristina so excited about her surgery that she ordered pizza for dinner instead of their usual dry cereal. She talks about how she's sure she'll get Chief Resident but finally notices the look on his face and pauses; he tells her that Richard gave him the task of choosing the Chief Resident. Cristina is stoked for one moment until she realizes this means she'll never get it, since everyone would think Owen was picking favorites. She starts to moan and freak out and can't believe that Owen is so calm as to be able to eat pizza at a time like this.
Meredith tells us that risk brings both rewards and fallout, but that sometimes you need to take the chance and bet big. Arizona and Callie are on their babymoon, and Callie gets a text that Mark, freaking out because he realized Lexie is dating Avery. (Why this wouldn't have come up before the morning, I don't know -- and last time we saw Mark he was elated about the successful shower, but hey, this brings tension!) She seems to find his distress endearing and wants to call him but Arizona can't believe that Mark is part of their vacation only ten minutes in, and she throws Callie's phone into the backseat. For the record, besides the fact that most TV scenes that take place in cars lead to only one conclusion, Arizona is barely even pretending to look at the road while they bicker about him. Callie takes off her seatbelt to reach into the back and retrieve her phone and they argue about Arizona's jealousy. Finally, Callie yells that she's doing the best she can to make sure that the three adults involved plus the little baby inside of her are all happy. She's at a loss of what else to do for her jealous, bitter girlfriend, and she pleads with Arizona to tell her what to do, and she'll do it. Arizona just seethes silently but then has an idea and as Callie texts Mark, she says, "Marry me." Callie thinks it is a joke but Arizona is totally serious and assures Callie that she loves her more than anything and wants to take it to the level with the rings and the ceremony and everything else. She beams at Callie, happily seeing nothing else other than her beloved, and Callie stares back, not saying anything. Finally, she faces forward, sucks in a breath, and there's a loud, sickening crash as we fade to white. Dude, you know what this show needed? More near-death hallucinations! And this way we're going to get them in spades with week's musical episode.