Mere is a hair behind the others when the elevator door opens and she hears a patient yelling and screaming. She looks up and sees that her nightmare is coming to life; they are wheeling her mother in on a bed. Her mom yells for the Chief and derides them all as amateurs. Nothing I type here could get across the venom and absolute disdain with which she screams all of her insults. It's easy to imagine why Meredith had such a hard upbringing with a mother who seems literally incapable of warmth, even taking into consideration the fact that she's descending into dementia. Cristina gives the bullet on Ellis and when she sees the name, hesitates when she realizes who she is. At that moment Ellis sees Meredith and begins to scream at her about how she's never to bother Ellis at work. Meredith runs away and hides behind a wall, glancing around the corner with the body language of a terrified five-year-old. Cristina finally admits the patient's name, and George is the one to realize out loud that this is Meredith's mother. Ellis continues screaming at all of them and Meredith hides completely.

The interns are now all in the hall yelling over each other through a doorway to a room beyond, and Bailey finally shuts them all up. George then calls through the doorway to ask Meredith if she is okay, and Bailey has to put her hand over his mouth. She starts to order them all away. Alex goes with Kelly and gets a warning: "Her blushing impulse? Is not a toy for you to play with or a button for you to push. Understood?" Instead of hearing his response, we hear Cristina call into the room that her great-grandmother died of Alzheimer's. Izzie is aghast that she'd say that, and there's more bickering, and Bailey shuts Izzie up by sending her up to both Drs. Shepherd in the NICU. Izzie is appropriately horrified at the idea of having to be the only other person in between two spouses who loathe each other, but Bailey sends her away. She then sends Cristina to Mr. Gaston, who is having a thorachotomy, who whines to go to a different patient. Wait, why didn't they say that before when they were in his room? I've actually had one of those; I can now imagine what's involved. That's...not necessarily a good thing. In response to Cristina's begging, Bailey gives her what for: "I'm sorry, I thought I was your resident, not your hostess. I assign. You take. Is there a problem? Is there some problem why it's inconvenient for you to spend the day in the OR learning from Dr. Burke?" Put in her place by probably the only person who could do so, Cristina announces, "No, I'm very happy to be learning from Dr. Burke thankyouverymuch," and flees. Inside, there's a glimpse of Meredith leaning miserably against the wall. Bailey tells George quietly to take care of Dr. Grey. He's thrilled and even hugs her, declaring that someone needs to be her friend right now, and Bailey needs to correct him that she meant the other Dr. Grey.