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“Chasing Life” recap (1.08): Sometimes Secret Sisters Suck

Previously on Chasing Life, April started bonding with her Cancer Support Group, Beth continued being the best friend ever, Dom discontinued being in Boston, and Brenna kissed Greer.

April is playing cards with her grandmother and their friends, who are all laughing and joking about death and the afterlife, as grandparents sometimes do. My Papa’s favorite joke is, when someone mentions any upcoming event he should be planning to attend, he’ll wave his hand at them and say, “Ah, I’ll be dead by then.” It is my least favorite joke.

This is also April’s least favorite joke, but the women assure her that they’re ready when the grim reaper comes for them in his deathcab. And whether it’s headed to heaven or hell, they’re sure to find people to party with there.

April’s next stop on the “feel better about this whole cancer thing” tour is Cancer Support Group Yoga, which is helping a little, but mostly she misses Dom. Leo tries to be supportive, but April brushes him off, asking where Jackson was; it was his idea for her to try yoga in the first place. Leo gets one of his rare serious expressions on his face and says Jackson’s cancer is back and he’s in the hospital again. April looks horror-stricken, but Leo puts his playboy face back on and shrugs. What did she expect from a Cancer Support Group? Happily ever after?

Back at the Carver household, Brenna is packing for her trip to Miami with the Eco club. April is confused; Brenna? Eco club? But something clicks. April gives her sister a sly smile and asks if the girl she loooooves is in Eco club. Brenna says she doesn’t looooove her, but yes, that girl she’s speaking so coyly of is indeed in Eco club. Before she leaves for school, Brenna asks April what she knows about Natalie Ortiz; her own Google search proved too fruitful for actual results. Their dad couldn’t have had an affair with someone with a less common last name? Sheesh. So inconsiderate. Being VERY considerate, however, is Brenna, who has agreed to get her cheek swabbed after school to see if she’s a match for any potential future bone marrow transplants April might need. On the way out the door, she promises she’ll finish packing for Miami after school, which I always would tell myself, but always ended up packing on the way out the door the next morning anyway.

At the hospital, Uncle Doctor George introduces April to the non-pediatric oncologist who will be her doctor when she starts chemo. The new doctor is friendly and warm and straight-forward and greets April like she has been assigned to be her personal bodyguard in her upcoming battle and it’s a job she was born to have. The new doctor assures April that the bone marrow transplant is just something they want to keep at the ready, for after the chemo, just in case. April tells her that she just doesn’t want to die, and the new doctor cheerily jaunts down a fake note, “Patient does not want to die.” The doctor says that she’s a fighter, and will be fighting tooth and nail for April to survive. This makes April smile a little through her tears.

After school, Greer is in Brenna’s room, and they are kissing! Just making out, like girls sometimes do. Greer pulls away and tells Brenna that she really needs to pack her bags. Brenna would prefer to…procrastinate a little longer, but Greer’s lips are zipped til Brenna’s suitcase is zipped. Which is the best motivator ever and I hope my future girlfriend is taking notes.

While Brenna finishes packing, she tells Greer that her Mystery Sister lives about an hour from where they’re going for the Eco Club trip, and maybe the universe put her in Eco Club so she could meet Natalie. Greer is like, “No, YOU put you in Eco Club because hi hello have you seen me?” Brenna says maybe Natalie will be a match for April’s bone marrow if she isn’t, and Greer offers to go with her to Natalie’s house. Brenna says she doesn’t have to; after all, she actually enjoyed Ecology Club and joined long before one of the membership benefits included sweet lady kisses. Greer giggles and says “Ecology” sounds way nerdier than “Eco” (I beg to differ) but Brenna just smiles and calls her a nerd and kisses her like it’s the most natural thing in the world. And I know it is, but so many shows get that so wrong. Coming out stories are so important, but being out stories are important, too. One of the best things about this relationship so far is that Greer came into it a confident lesbian teenager, and Brenna’s biggest hang-up about liking Greer wasn’t that she was a girl, but was that she smiled so damn much and it didn’t fit in with the broody persona she had been trying out. But now look at her! All smiles and clubs and selfless missions.

Anyway, Greer says that nerds love adventures so she’s going with Brenna to find her Mystery Sister, and they get back to kissing. April, who has had so much thrown at her in such a small period of time, is having nightmare. In it, everyone around her is fading away, one by one. It was something she hadn’t anticipated about having cancer. She had been so afraid of dying, she hadn’t thought about losing anyone else. But now Dom is gone because he doesn’t know she’s sick, she and her mother are fighting because she does know she’s sick, and one of her new friends is dying because of this sickness that has taken over more aspects of her life than she had ever dared fear it would.

Which is precisely why Sara’s new support group focuses more on drinking than on talking about cancer. It hasn’t even invaded their bodies, but it has invaded their lives. But they’re lucky enough to have the chance to take a mini vacation from cancer, unlike their loved ones, so they take advantage of it now and then. They’ll be no use to the ones who need their support if they don’t blow off some steam now and then. This week, they’re going on a boat. And surprise! Uncle Doctor George is coming, too!

April slots in some quality Beth time because nothing can bounce you back from a nightmare like the best best friend a girl could ask for. Beth has some ideas on how to get Dom back, the first of which being just telling him flat-out that she has cancer; he’d be back faster than you could get the song “Get Lucky” out of your head. But April wouldn’t do that to Dom. She just wants to continue life as usual until it’s time for chemo. And maybe try to figure out who paid for her fertility treatment, a phenomenon Beth adorable refers to as getting “free babies.”

After landing in Miami, Greer gives her very nervous teacher some advice about prepping for a speech that is sure to keep him in his room for a while, then ducks out with Brenna. She had arranged everything to make sure they wouldn’t get caught while they did their Nancy Drew-ing. It’s really no wonder Beth likes Greer, they are cut from the same fabulous, warm, happy cloth. April goes to the hospital to visit Cancer Friend Jackson and Cancer Friend Meg is already there. April feels like she’s doing and saying all the wrong things, but Jackson is a good sport. He says he really misses the outdoors, and starts to get a little sentimental, but then Cancer Friend Leo shows up with cannolis. He then starts joking about his own funeral, saying he wants there to be cannolis and Daniel Powter’s Bad Day, but actually, scratch the cannolis because if he can’t have them, no one can. Leo and Meg laugh along with him as he jokingly plans out his own funeral, wishing he could be there, and April freaks the freak out and heads for the hills.

She tries to go to work but a pipe burst so everything is loud. Her boss is annoying, her neighbor Danny and his chips are annoying, the vacuums are annoying. She finally throws in the towel, says she’s sick, and peaces out.

April calls Beth, who is no stranger to playing hooky, and they meet up with Leo…who is in a strip club. April isn’t all that surprised that Leo knows all the strippers, but Leo tells her she knows one, too. She quirks an eyebrow at him but then lo and behold, onto the stage, someone she knows: Meg. Meg, who last week told us she wanted to try stripping, because why not. Meg, who is actually pretty good once she shakes her stage fright. She rips off some clothes and tosses her wig and is smiling so brightly the sun got jealous.

When she gets back to the table, she thanks Leo for helping her achieve her dreams of being Nomi Malone for the day, and helping her feel sexy again for the first time since she lost her hair. April realizes that it was probably Leo that paid for her fertility treatment, and tries to thank him, but he has his Playboy Face on and just says, “Ew, eggs, gross.”

Leo says the next stop on their adventure may or may not involve breaking a law or two but April is up for anything today, so she’s in.

In Florida, Brenna and Greer climb out of a cab and look up at the strange house that supposedly holds the answers to the Carver Mystery Sister. Greer starts up the walk, but Brenna hangs back. Greer takes Brenna by the hand, tells her she can do it, and, together, they walk up to the door.

Brenna knocks a meek little knock and turns on her heels but Greer rolls her eyes and knocks harder. Someone opens the door and Brenna just gapes. It was one thing to Google the hell out of this girl, to hear April talk about her, to know she existed. It was another entirely to see her standing before her. Greer elbows her and she introduces herself as Brenna…Brenna Carver.

And instead of wrapping her in a half-sisterly embrace, Natalie Ortiz says she wants nothing to do with her or her family and slams the door right in Brenna’s face.

Brenna is on the phone trying to get a cab to come back and get them, but when Greer sees Natalie leaving her house, she drags Brenna over to talk to her again. Natalie finally tells them why she slammed the door: She was the secret kid. She had a part-time dad at best, and that didn’t exactly feel awesome. She had googled Brenna and April and it seemed like their lives were pretty damn swell so what did she want to come to Florida for anyway? Brenna tells them their lives are actually kind of a mess and tells her about April’s cancer. She asks if Natalie was ever curious about them, and Mystery Sister gets a mischievous look in her eye and says, “Get in, losers. We’re going bonding.”

At the hospital, Beth and the Cancer Friends (They should start a band!) break Jackson out of the hospital and throw him a funeral; all he wanted was to attend his own funeral, and now he can. April looks uneasy when she realizes what they broke Jackson out for, but her and Beth follow the crowds inside. Jackson directs his own funeral, telling people to really dig deep and share their feelings. One of his friends says what he’ll miss the most is watching a stupid show and laughing together on Monday nights. Such a simple little thing, taken for granted when you think you have all the time in the world. April’s crying, I’m crying, we’re all crying.

I’m not crying as hard as April though, who weeps her way into a waking nightmare. In this nightmare, she’s in her coffin, and her loved ones are all standing somberly over her. She snaps awake, tears still streaming down her face. She doesn’t want to die.

In Florida, Natalie buys Mai Tais for everyone, even though it’s the middle of the day and Natalie MIGHT be 21 but Brenna and Greer certainly aren’t. At one point, Greer runs a supportive hand down Brenna’s arm. Natalie sees this and asks plainly, “Are you two lesbians?” the same way you’d ask someone if they were Italian. Greer responds just as plainly, “I am,” without missing a beat. Which is important for two reasons. One, because it’s just another example of how comfortable Greer is in her own skin, one of things that draws Brenna to her in the first place. Two, because she doesn’t automatically lump Brenna in with her. She doesn’t just say, “Yes.” She respects that just because they’re together in whatever respect they’re together doesn’t mean Brenna is a lesbian. Maybe they’ve talked about it and Brenna told her what she told Beth, that she doesn’t feel like she needs a label, or maybe they haven’t. Either way, Greer’s answer was perfect. Brenna kind of stalls with an “uhh” sound while she tries to figure out how to condense her belief that sexuality is a spectrum, but social biases codify sexual attraction when Natalie says, “Let’s dance!” Because it was just a question, and she got an answer.

At the funeral home, Jackson makes everyone cry by giving his own eulogy. Before the party is over, though, Leo has one more surprise: The a capella group Nothing but Treble is here to sing “Bad Day” by Daniel Powter. Everyone is crying even harder now, April looks like she’s breaking, but when Beth asks if she’s okay, she says she is okay. She wasn’t breaking down, she was breaking through. At the Florida Bar For Minors and Mai Tais, Greer looks like she’s been doing jägerbombs for hours. Brenna gets her some water and demands to know what Natalie did to her; she was fine a second ago, and she only had the one drink. Natalie just shrugs and tells her to “ditch the lightweight” because she’s that friend who always gets too drunk and has someone take care of her and doesn’t know what it’s like to be on the other end of it. Brenna has had just about enough and tells her that she didn’t come here for a friend or a new sister, she just came for her bone marrow, but she can see now that she’s wasting her time.

Wanting to have the last word, Natalie drops a truth bomb: Sara knows about Natalie. So now both of her parents were liars. She says, “Point one for the bastard,” but it’s more like TEN POINTS FROM SLYTHERIN, amiright?

Brenna leads Greer out and probably wishes she had just gone to the Ecology Speech.

Oh while all this is going on Sara and George are being boring grown ups. Things we learn: George had a girlfriend when his brother died but then they broke up, George blames himself for his brother’s death, Sara doesn’t. Sara was more mad about him covering up the affair and the Mystery Sister than the actual accident.

After Jackson’s funeral, him, Beth and Meg go for food while April hangs back to help Leo clean up. She tells him that there’s a bit of an angel behind that devil mask and thanks him again for helping her out with the fertility treatments. He tells her that helping people is his legacy. He’ll have his own memory to leave behind, instead of just being his father’s son. He kisses her, and at first she pushes back again, but then she remembers her new, “no regrets” mantra and kisses him back. She then takes the “no regrets” thing too far by having sex with him ON THE COUCH OF THE FUNERAL HOME. So many kinds of wrong.

After, April asks Leo who will grant HIS last wish, and he jokes that she just did. She asks him if he’s scared, and he says he won’t let himself be scared. He just wants to live while he can and not think about the worst case scenario, which is why he didn’t get the very risky surgery that could either remove his tumor or leave him in a vegetative state. This choice confuses April to no end and she gets a glimpse of the kind of impossible choices she might have to make down the road.

Back at the Floridian hotel, Greer is chugging water and sporting a hangover she doesn’t deserve. She thanks Brenna for taking such good care of her last night, and my heart grows five sizes. Greer flatters her teacher on his speech, even quoting it back at him, and he thanks her for her speech tips. Brenna is in awe; this girl has so many more layers than she knew, and she likes it. Brenna thanks her for going with her even though Natalie was kind of the worst. She’s glad she went, glad she doesn’t have to wonder anymore.

When she gets home, April makes up with her mom, because she doesn’t want to die, but if she dies tomorrow, she wants to die with no regrets, and she knows she would regret this fight they’re in if she doesn’t end it now. Sara didn’t even need a reason, she was so desperate to end this tension, so she wraps April into the hug I want to give her at least three times an episode. Brenna comes home and joins the hug, then grandma wanders in to join. The four of them smile and laugh and play bridge together. For now, that’s all that matters. Not Mystery Sisters, or ex-boyfriends, or current girlfriends, and especially not cancer. Right now, all that matters, is that they’re together.

What did you think of “Death Becomes Her”?

Here are some of our favorite #ChasingLesbians tweets from last night! Including one from Brenna herself:

Lesbian Apparel and Accessories Gay All Day sweatshirt -- AE exclusive

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