I find great comfort in knowing that doctors travel around to go to surgical conventions.
I believe it’s a segment of people who need to keep their skills sharp.
During the day, these highly trained medical professionals educate themselves to further the future of medicine.
Tony Rivetti/ABC
By night, they revert to their college days and party like there’s no tomorrow.
What I’m trying to say is that this convention is a breeding ground for hookups.
And what better way to start this string of trysts than with Catherine Fox knocking at Richard’s door.
Does this seem like a quick fix?
Richard gathers Catherine in a warm embrace and we see them fall onto the bed.
Let the record show, Richard’s got game.
Back downstairs, Teddy patiently waits with Maggie for the Heart Valve Happy Hour to begin.
His name is Winston and Maggie worked with him at Tufts.
Of course, she was his chief and he couldn’t ask her out.
And then she went and moved away to dumb old Seattle.
Maggie’s got game, too.
Their tastes and backgrounds are so similar that it seems unreal.
Both are falling hard and, dare I say, bonding with one another.
What doesn’t click is Cormac’s attitude toward this “sleep-away camp” for doctors.
He is angry and a flashback explains his behavior.
Cormac met his deceased wife Amelia at one of these conventions.
We see a meet-cute over a ballpoint pen advertising erectile dysfunction medication.
AND CORMAC HAS HAIR!
Truth talk: I prefer the bald head.
Moments later we see Amelia in the hospital, about to go in for a routine hysterectomy.
She jokingly tells Cormac that if she dies on the table, he is free to move on.
And with his widower/surgeon/single dad/adorable accent on his dating resume, his game will sell itself.
Sadly, the bright and shiny hospital room morphs into a grey and depressing one.
Amelia is in the bed, sick with cancer.
Then she gives him permission to love again.
He’s still a hot surgeon with a killer accent.
The ladies will love it and he won’t have to work for it one bit.
Amelia passes away and the scene returns to the current timeline.
A salesman hits up Cormac and Teddy to invest in his company’s hysterectomy machine.
Cormac goes off on the guy.
This instrument is the same one that didn’t detect his wife’s cancer.
A tumor that could have been removed was pummeled and cancer cells spread throughout her entire body.
Teddy heads to the bar to let Cormac settle down in private.
There she sees a woman named Claire and hugs her intimately.
They briefly catch up.
Claire asks Teddy, “Do you miss her?”
We melt into another flashback.
Then we get a flashback, within a flashback.
Claire is with a woman named Allison.
They live in a small New York apartment with Teddy.
Claire is paged to go into the hospital.
She kisses Allison goodbye and heads out the door.
Allison turns and sidles up next to Teddy.
Present-day Teddy abruptly states, “I have a baby!”
Claire asks to see a picture, gushes over the baby’s chubby cheeks, and asks her name.
That name would be Allison.
This is where the can opens and the worms spill out everywhere.
Claire gives Teddy permission to come clean.
It’s almost been 20 years.
She can admit that she loved Allison.
Teddy looks like she’s going to hurl.
How long did Claire know?
As the Twin Towers fell around Allison, the last person she tried to call was Teddy.
Claire pats Teddy’s hand and leaves her to cry tears in her wine glass.
Or was that me?
Teddy believes Allison loved them both as much as they loved her.
We also see Richard working diligently on his PATH pen speech in his room.
Catherine offers suggestions and helps him through a breaking discovery.
He rushes over to his yellow legal pad and furiously writes down his thoughts.
He turns to get Catherine’s take and she’s gone.
There’s only a haunting echo of her voice.
Richard continues to have a full-blown conversation with no one.
I did not see that coming.
So help me if they kick Richard to the curb.
The Karev thing is too fresh!
The scene switches to a roomful of doctors at Grey Sloan, including the real Catherine.
Jackson logs into the televised simulcast of the seminar and everyone settles in to watch Richard crush it.
Dozens of eyeballs stare at Catherine.
She concludes that Richard must be drunk.
Several minutes pass with Richard displaying adolescent drawings on the screen.
His behavior is erratic.
Maggie can tell something is majorly wrong.
She and Cormac slowly descend the steps and escort her father off camera.
The last thing we hear is Maggie shouting to a gaggle of doctors for someone to call 9-1-1.
Her father is having a stroke.
