Dawson "Jack Kedorkian" Leery looks through the window of a hospital room, then slips in and walks over to the bed, beside which Grams "A Widow For One Year, Twice" Ryan sits, knitting. "Glad you came," she tells him. "Good to have some company." Um, only if it's a choice between "company, meaning 'Dawson'" and "a night alone in the morgue, naked." And I'd still take the morgue, and I'd like it, too. There's a shot of "Our" Mr. Brooks attached to a ventilator before Dawson asks what the doctors say. "What can they say?" Grams says acidly. "More bad news delivered in even tones." She gets to her feet to do the funky exposition, saying that Mr. Brooks "remains in a coma, brought on by pills," and the machines keep him alive, but "it's still cancer." Dawson, who has neglected to shave, mutters that it doesn't make sense, that Mr. Brooks is "stuck between dying and dead." Uh duh. Shut up, Dawson. Grams says that, before Dawson came in, she sat there and tried to picture the situation through Mr. Brooks's eyes, and she watched the nurses and doctors coming and going and blah blah blah it's in God's hands. Dawson smiles slightly. In the oh-so-apt words of Parker Posey's character in Dazed & Confused, "Wipe that face off your head, biiiiitch."

Ski lodge. The Guitar Chords Of Fratty Fun Times crank away on the soundtrack as the seniors file off of the bus. Pacey tells Joey, "Okay, Missy Self-Reliance, please let me give you a hand." Joey, hauling a duffel the size of Gary, Indiana, retorts that she carried it to the bus, so she can carry it to their room. Pacey takes it from her anyway and slings it over himself; Joey smiles tightly in response. On the steps of the lodge, Mr. Kasdan makes an announcement about the room keys and says, to groans from the kids, that it's same-sex sleeping arrangements and the keys to the mini-bars in the rooms "have been duly confiscated." Whatever, Mr. K -- like the kids don't all have bottles wrapped in t-shirts in their bags. Somehow Drue puts himself in charge of key duty, making sure that Joey and Pacey and Jack and Jen (and himself and Anna) get to room together. Jack asks Jen when obnoxiousness "became an adequate substitute for wit," making it two meta-statements for this episode. "Ignore him, we're making an effort," Jen grumbles. It's not that easy, sister. Trust me. Still blathering on in the "we're just gonna have fun" vein, Jen goes down like a ton of bricks in the snow.