A Million Little Things Recap: Hail Gary

Need to catch up? Check out the previous A Million Little Things recap here. 

Maggie’s intense mother shows up in this week’s A Million Little Things, and the relative smoothness of that visit is a measure of how rough it gets in other parts of the episode.

The hour focuses on Maggie’s cancer-removal surgery, a procedure she once scoffed at but now — as last week’s ep told us — she now hopes will help cure her. Read on for the highlights of “The Rosary.”

IT’S COMING FROM INSIDE THE HOUSE!| MaybeBarbara Morgan is still creepily watching Jon’s family from outside his house, and she goes as far as talking her way into the house by making up a story about having met Sophie at the 5K a few weeks back. But when Delilah unexpectedly returns and Sophie goes to introduce her to MaybeBarbara, who’s calling herself Emma, the woman has skedaddled.

MEET THE MOM | At the hospital, Maggie and Gary nervously try to pretend they’re not nervous as she’s prepped for surgery to remove some lymph nodes. She tells him that she forgot the rosary her mother made her promise she’d hold onto, but he says he’ll cover if Mama ever asks. He leaves to get her some ice chips, but when he returns to the room, she’s being wheeled away and calling for him in a panic. She reveals that she knows Linda, their chemo pal, died; Maggie freaks out that Linda was so sure she was going to get better, but didn’t. Gary calms her as best he can, and then the hospital staff escorts her into the operating room. 

Unable to contain his restless energy during Maggie’s procedure, Gary runs to her place to get the rosary. On the way back, a woman steals the parking spot he was waiting for in the hospital garage, and Gary gets into a loud, honking altercation with her. (He doesn’t get the spot.) Upstairs, as he complains to Rome and Eddie, Gary is gobsmacked when he realizes that the spot-stealer is none other than Maggie’s mom, Patricia.

THE BEAD GOES ON | Gary attempts to smooth things over with his girlfriend’s mother, but she shuts him down: “You don’t have to do this. I live seven hours away.” Gary presses on, telling Patricia that he loves Maggie and will be by her side no matter what. Then he apologizes for being a jerk in the parking lot, but she doesn’t reciprocate, and they get into it again in the waiting room while Eddie and Rome look on in horror. “Wow,” she says before walking away, “you are quite the catch.”

But then there’s a page for a “massive transfusion protocol” in OR #3, which makes both Gary and Patricia worry that Mags is bleeding out. She isn’t — but they get an update that the surgery is taking longer than expected because of the placement of the tumor. “She’s going to be OK,” Gary reassures Patricia. “You don’t know that,” she replies.

He eventually finds her in the hospital’s chapel, where he admits that Maggie forgot the rosary and he was coming back from getting it “when we met.” She invites him to sit with her, and when she eventually begins to cry over the fear of losing another child, he puts a comforting hand on her shoulder while she clutches the rosary tight. And then they’re both by Maggie’s bedside when she wakes up.

The next morning, Gary asks her to move in with him. She balks, saying that they don’t have the pathology results from her operation, but he says he doesn’t want to stop living because they’re afraid of her dying. She doesn’t take long to convince, handing him a Post-It note that says, “I’m in.”

ROME’S FIRST FAN | Rome’s screenplay is done, but he won’t let anyone see it until it’s proofed. So he brings a printout to the hospital but misplaces it. He eventually finds it in the hands of a teen he meets at the vending machine: The kid loves what he’s read, so Rome tells him to sit and finish the script.

When the kid — whose name is PJ — is done, he loves the screenplay even more. He says that he strongly identifies with the lead character, who has undergone emotional turmoil like Rome has. “I see you,” Rome tells PJ, and it seems to bolster the teen.

When he’s alone again, Rome calls the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline to get information on volunteering. And the next morning, Rome gives Gina a copy of the screenplay to read.

CREDIT WHERE IT’S DUE | Regina’s restaurant gets a great review in the newspaper (yay!) but she’s bummed that it focuses on the involvement of Delilah’s kinda-possible-future-honey Andrew and gives her very little of the credit. “This was supposed to be my do-over,” she later tells Delilah, blaming her for siding with Andrew. “How am I supposed to believe in myself when my own partner and best friend doesn’t?”

Later, to prove how much she does believe in Regina, Delilah makes a point of directing her to a table of Gina Super Fans, and the pals make up just as Delilah and Andrew go to move some boxes from Jon’s apartment.

A RECONCILIATION AHEAD? | After a day chaperoning Theo’s class trip to the aquarium, Katherine is a little emotionally beat down, and Eddie have a tender moment when he comes over to sign the divorce papers. But just as they’re about to kiss, Theo has a night terror, and they don’t actually smooch. 

They wind up falling asleep in Theo’s bed. The next morning, before the boy wakes, they creep downstairs and both sign the papers to end their marriage.

CAUGHT! | While going through Jon’s old photo albums, Sophie recognizes someone in a photo and points her out to Delilah: It’s the woman who called herself Emma!

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