Don’t these doctors know? No one at Grey Sloan Memorial gets a happy ending. Well, except maybe Christina Yang — but she had to ride off into the Swiss sunset with a 3-D printer just to get it. Speaking of Christina, do we think she’s hooking up with Shane again? I need a detailed video chat from Mer’s person, like, yesterday. Regardless, Christina had to leave to avoid the Grey Sloan curse. If you remain at that hospital, tragedy and hardships are sure to befall you. But there’s a fun part, too, right?
“At Last†finds some of our docs attempting to make that happy ending a reality. In fact, the follow-up to last week’s riveting courtroom drama is mainly one big relationship status check-in. So instead of your usual recap, we’re going to run through where our Grey’s couples currently stand. Time to find out who’s on the rocks, who’s going all-in, and who’s hooking up in hospital parking lots. (Spoiler alert: That last one is Meredith and Riggs. MEREDITH AND RIGGS, YOU GUYS.).
The Couple: Callie and Penny
Current location: Splitsville, U.S.A
Oh, dear, sweet, Penny Blake: GET OUT. After the custody hearing did not go their way, Penny and Callie are, well, broken. Callie can barely speak to the woman whose love was so great she needed to risk her parental rights. Penny tries to adjust their plans — she will come back to visit Callie and Sofia every weekend — but Callie doesn’t see a point. She summarizes the future they have if they attempt to make long distance work, and it ends with their relationship slowly petering out. Callie will never leave Seattle without Sofia; Penny can’t give up her fellowship. They’re doomed, supposedly. Not that I want Callie and Penny to stay together, but, come on — it’s just one year. Get a grip, girl. And thus ends the epic romance of Callie Torres and Penny Blake.
As brilliantly as Sara Ramirez sells her anguish in this episode, I have no sympathy for Callie. After breaking up with Penny, Callie begs Arizona to switch Sofia’s schedule for the second time — all so she can have a little comfort at the end of a horrible day — and Arizona goes off. She tried to be agreeable the first time, but, after everything Callie put them through, she’s done being nice. You brought this on yourself, Callie. I stand with AZ.
The Couple: Alex and Jo
Current location: Strung-Along City
This one stung, you guys. After the grandmother of a patient offers to set Alex up with her daughter, Alex is rethinking the in-limbo nature of his relationship with Jo. It doesn’t help that his go-to gal Meredith is in a foul mood, and is feeling very “down with love†at the moment. (More on that later.) She thinks it’s great that Alex and Jo aren’t rushing into marriage, and points to the mother of a patient and her boyfriend, who are constantly on the verge of breaking up. When Alex informs the couple that the teen survived because the boyfriend brought him in, they reconcile. (A teenager has flesh-eating bacteria and this is all we get from it? For shame!) Alex points to this as evidence that happy endings do exist. He’s fed up with Mer’s pessimism; it didn’t work out with Major Handsome, but that doesn’t mean someone else won’t come along. For good measure, he also tells her that he is going to have a big wedding and she’ll have to be there because she’s going to be his best man. Just make out already, guys.
Alex is tired of waiting around for Jo. He knows what he wants: He wants to marry her. He’s proposed twice and he’s been very patient, so now he’s laying it all out there. He asks Jo one more time whether she’ll marry him … and Jo says no. There must be some twist coming, but for now: That’s real cold, Jo Wilson.
The Couple: Ben and Bailey
Current location: Nowhere, fast
As Jackson succinctly puts it after offering his couch to Ben, Ben and Bailey are “still living in the same house, but not talking.†Not much happens on this front, but Ben and Bailey’s mirrored conversations with Jackson and Webber made me laugh. Both inform their friends that they are simply waiting the other out. Both think they are in the right, and know the other will come around eventually. Jackson is confused by Ben’s plan, but Ben reminds him that Miranda is the love of his life, duh. There are much bigger couple revelations in “At Last,†but that moment was a nice reminder that Ben and Bailey are just the best. In other news, Ben is a #Japril shipper! Like I said, THE BEST.
The Couple: Stephanie and Kyle
Current location: The morgue, probably
We all knew this was coming, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. Kyle’s only getting worse, and Steph can’t seem to stay away from the guy. He has an infection where his second implant was placed, they had to remove his first implant so his tremor is back, and all the antibiotics are making him very nauseous. A lot of terrible illnesses have paid a visit to the halls of Grey Sloan, but a brain infection sounds like one of the worst.
Stern warnings from Amelia and Kyle’s family be damned! Steph sneaks in to see Kyle one last time. (“I’m really bad at following directions.â€) Ugh! It is so lovely. She apologizes for hurting him, he admits that he’s in deep with her, she plants a kiss on him that says the same thing. His death is a foregone conclusion.
The surgery goes south pretty quickly, and as soon as Amelia realizes there’s no saving him she makes Jo run up to the gallery to remove Stephanie, so she doesn’t watch as Kyle dies. Let’s be honest: Jo is a terrible runner. She’s too late, and as she reaches the gallery, Amelia calls time of death. Good-bye, Kyle Diaz! You deserved at least two more episodes in your story arc.
The Couple: Amelia and Owen
Current location: Barreling toward the altar
It is the end of an era: Owen has sold Derek’s trailer. There were a lot of good memories in that trailer, almost all of them sex-related. But Amelia has informed Owen it’s time he buy a grown-up house. While in surgery with Maggie, Owen and Amelia discuss hypothetical furniture for the new house, which leads to their discussing hypothetically living together, which leads to their discussing marriage, which, hypothetically, they are both open to doing again. This all leads to Maggie’s brain hypothetically exploding.
When Meredith catches wind of how quickly things have progressed between Owen and Amelia, she’s mad. It’s not because she hates love, though. It’s because she hates Amelia in love. Seeing Derek’s trailer being hauled away really got to her — life is moving on without Derek, and we all know how Mer loves to focus her Derek-related rage onto Amelia. She accuses Amelia of stealing her dead husband’s life: Living in his home, taking care of his kids, attempting to do his job. It doesn’t make total sense, but rage on, Mer. Rage on.
That dressing down, paired with Kyle’s death, makes Amelia reassess her and Owen’s hypotheticals. She tells O that she wants to get busy living — so she proposes to him. A Grey’s Anatomy wedding, people! Surely, it will go off without a hitch.
The Couple: Meredith and Riggs
Current location: The backseat of Meredith’s SUV, henceforth known as Humpsville
True confession: I actually thought we were headed toward a Maggie/Riggs romance. They’ve been very buddy-buddy lately, and the way Maggie looks at Riggs after they share a cute chat over bacon was … well, the way I look at bacon. I’m into bacon, you guys. It turns out I was wrong — unless we’re setting up a love triangle, which I am, admittedly, always here for.
As previously mentioned, Meredith is in a mood. But she does coin the phrase “post-traumatic stress romance,†so that’s a win. Riggs is the only person to call her out. As someone who lost a love, he knows what Meredith is feeling. She can’t stand watching Amelia be happy while her husband is still dead. Meredith does not appreciate Riggs’s analysis of her feelings, and she demonstrates as much by furiously making out with him in a very public parking lot, then emphasizes the point by pulling him into the backseat of her car. Let’s hope she informs the carpool!