Mere is in Dr. Amy's office -- I'm not quite sure, throughout the two episodes, if this is all in one meeting or if it's a couple, and I can't tell when they take place over the course of the day. I suspect it's at least a couple of separate conversations given that I know Meredith thinks about some things. For instance, right now she's demanding to know why Dr. Amy is so sure her mother didn't want to die, so Dr. Amy asks exactly what her mom said when they were sitting together in her blood. Mere thinks a moment and says that Ellis said she had failed, but that Mere should be extraordinary, and that she shouldn't depend on anyone. Amy stares at her and Mere remembers the exact quote, "Be an extraordinary woman, Meredith." Dr. Amy points out that then Mere became a surgeon, just like her mom. Over Mere's protestations she tells her that she has all of the tools to figure this out for herself, and promises that when she does, she'll be glad. Mere is clearly frustrated but it's nice to see her not just run yet again now that therapy has gotten kind of hard.

Some whiny guy music starts up over Meredith thinking, and then we cut to Derek who is looking at something presumably brain-surgery-related. He gets angry and knocks his papers across the room. It's all very stupid and macho. In another room, Lexie complains that her head is exploding but George just tells her quietly to make it unexploded. She pauses, and then asks incredulously if he's mad at her. He tells her he's not, but she won't let it go and protests that she did him a favor. Very calmly, he tells her she absolutely didn't. He only showed him that he's still George, The Almost Guy. He would have been okay if he'd failed by 50 points, but one point only tells him that he had it in his grasp but couldn't do it. He didn't want to know that, didn't want to think about how checking a single wrong answer kept him from "freedom" and now he's busting his ass to make up for a single missing point. "You didn't do me a favor. Don't kid yourself." She tries to make it better and self-consciously tells him that at least now he knows he has what it takes, but he'll only give her a clipped agreement.

Alex is working on bandaging up Ava's wrists when Izzie comes in and lets him know that she prescribed some anti-anxiety meds to keep her calm until psych comes in an hour. Alex gets up and angrily informs Izzie, like she's the dumbest human alive, that Ava doesn't need drugs or psych. This storyline is almost unwatchable for me, because he's so out of line and because it's still a struggle for me to side with Izzie after so many months of loathing that character. Izzie pulls him aside where they argue in hushed tones. Izzie wants her to have a consult to be admitted, which Alex thinks is unnecessary. His ridiculous argument is that he was watching Ava every minute until he had to take Izzie's call. Well, that's not true -- she had a good two minutes of rocking in the shower before you realized what was up. Izzie, though, takes a stand as a doctor should and tells him that she was admitted under Izzie's name, so Izzie will care for her and this is what she needs. Eager to act like the biggest asshole he can while actually endangering his not-girlfriend's life, Alex cuts her off by screaming, "Would you leave us alone, you stupid bitch?" I don't care how tragic his upbringing, this is actually scary -- because if he's left to his own devices, Ava will actually kill herself. Izzie just steps back, stunned, while Ava watches her detached as she's been watching everything these days.