Previously on Chasing Life, April Carver was diagnosed with cancer, went into remission, then fell out of it again; April’s sister Brenna fell in love with a girl at school who moved away; April and Brenna found out they had a secret half sister named Natalie; April, upon finding out her cancer was back, sacrificed her job for her good-for-nothing coworker Danny; Brenna, not being a match for April, decided to be a bone marrow donor to someone she WAS a match for; Natalie and April’s ex, Dom started dating; and April’s boyfriend Leo proposed while April was undergoing chemo for the second time. Oh also, April’s grandmother was sassy, her mother was supportive albeit sometimes overprotective, and her best friend Beth gave us #squadgoals for the ages.
We open with a long-haired April (well, long for her) sassing everyone at the Boston Post, even going so far as to call Raquel a bitch.
It’s all well and good until Dom comes in and says he’ll meet her at home and they start making out. THANKFULLY, it’s just a dream, though unfortunately it’s a chemo-induced dream and April is still in a coma. Girl, if you don’t love Leo, that’s fine, but PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don’t get back with Dom the Douchecanoe. Please.
When Leo realizes April is awake, he leaves his faithful spot by her bedside and snuggles up next to her like a good little labradoodle. They cuddle and joke about medical tape engagement rings, chemo vintages and wedding plans, but are interrupted by a knock at the door. April thinks it’s her breakfast, but it’s actually Dom with a teddy bear.
He proceeds to be nosy, which results in him being the first one April and Leo tell about their engagement, even though that’s not exactly how April would have planned it.
Flash forward (great show) to a month later. Grandma Emma and Sara are cleaning Casa de Carver from head to toe to get ready for April’s homecoming. April comes home earlier than they thought, though, because she wanted to see Brenna before she left for school. Which I guess is what big sisters are like, which is great. I can tell you it’s not what little brothers are like.
Brenna is excited to see her sister, and can’t believe she’s getting married to Leo.
Grandma asks if this is sort of like how sometimes when you drink you think that trying to do parkour for the first time is a good idea, but April insists that this is a more logical decision than that, and drags Leo upstairs for some long-overdue privacy.
Grandma is surprised Sara seems to be so approving of this impromptu wedding, but Sara is sure they’ll call it off-the engagement ring is medical tape for crying out loud! Little does she know that right above her head, Leo is presenting April with his grandmother’s wedding ring. And it’s just her size.
Unlike her mother and grandmother, Beth is delighted by April’s news, and has nothing but admiration for the ring and her own two cents about the event’s attire.
At April’s next doctor’s appointment, Sara comes rushing in; she is late because she was waiting for April at home, not realizing Leo was escorting her to her appointment. It’s the hardest thing for a parent to take about their child’s new relationships-even friendships-when something they’re used to doing is taken over. Plus also there’s a real ring on April’s finger, so Sara’s starting to realize that she might be more serious about this whole marriage thing than previously assumed.
Dr. Hamburg comes in and tells these poor unfortunate souls that April isn’t in remission like they’d hoped. April will be about to be monitored as an outpatient though, until they figure out what comes next.
April starts to panic, so Leo takes her on a walk, and Sara yet again watches her baby girl slip through her fingers.
Leo tries to help April come to terms with dying, making her stand on the ledge of the building (!) and think about what regrets she would have if he pushed her to her sudden death right now.
Later, at home, Brenna shows April a video she made of the family, and mentions how happy she is to have Natalie around more often, though she wishes April hadn’t missed a month of their lives together.
April, looking out for us, asks how Greer is, and Brenna says that they talk every day. Brenna thought school would be the actual worst without her, but she joined a film club with Ford and things are going surprisingly well. April notices someone in a video clip who is looking at Brenna with raw desperation and Brenna says her name is Erika and she’s the only out lesbian in their grade now that Greer is gone, which somehow makes everyone think they should date. Which isn’t just high school logic. Real life grown-ups in my actual real life have tried to set me up with someone just because they were also into girls, despite us being incompatible in every other conceivable way. But Brenna can’t go to an Erika from a Greer-in fact, it might take her a decade to even be able to think of anyone BUT Greer-but she knows she’ll find her Leo someday. Then April, ever the supportive sister, says, “or Leah!” and giggles at her own joke and it’s just all kind of adorable.
Brenna says she’s ready for her stem cell donation, but she has to decide whether or not she wants updates on how it went with the recipient. Which seems like a weird thing to ask a teenager if she wants. I feel like maybe she should have just told Brenna if it went well, but not even brought it up if it didn’t? Unless she asked? But I got my medical degree from Mercy Grace Seattle West Grey Sloane Memorial for the Tragically Inclined and Perpetually Horny, so what do I know.
April goes to visit Dom and tells him that, for reasons I think are not entirely unrelated to her dream, she still wants him to be able to be part of her life without any weirdness. Natalie appears as April’s hugging her half-sister’s boyfriend, and April tells her that she won’t need her transplant just yet.
Natalie, like April, doesn’t have anywhere to be in the immediate future, so they go for a walk. Natalie is a little weirded out that April has been out of the hospital for about 24 hours and has send out as many resumes, but April insists that journalism isn’t a lay-in-wait kind of profession. April does thank Natalie for looking after Brenna, saying the two of them are similar in a lot of ways, and wondering how they live without letting every single thing stress them out so much it drives them batty. Natalie tells her that it’s easy, and throws April into a drum circle, encouraging her to dance.
Natalie laughs and tells her sister that she looks ridiculous, but for once April doesn’t care.
April goes to the hospital for a voluntary transfusion? The science of cancer alludes me, and the idea of it stresses me out too much to Google it. (I also have WebMD-induced hypochondria, so have been banned from researching anything even remotely medical by family, friends, and anyone who ever has to hear or read anything I think ever.) Next to her is Krysta Rodriguez, who you might know from Smash or from her theatre gigs or from her just generally awesomeing around. Krysta is reading the obituaries and meditating, because she’s just like Wednesday Addams, who she played (flawlessly) on Broadway.
Krysta’s name in this show is Vanessa, and she asks April who she is. April starts listing off her achievements like a yearbook, but Vanessa says she didn’t ask about her career or what she’s done. She asked who are you.But April doesn’t know who she is if not a journalist. She’s never even considered it. So she says she needs to prep for a job interview and presumably spends the next few hours in silence.
Meanwhile, Sara meets up with Leo’s parents, who are not all that concerned that this engagement might just be a dying girl’s final flight of fancy. But Sara is sure that April is coming from a deeper place than that; there’s no way her strong, fierce, fighter of a daughter is checking off her bucket list. Not yet.
As repayment for selflessly relenting her job to him, Danny set April up with an interview at a company called Sitegeizt. Sitegeizt is to Buzzfeed as Boston Post is to Boston Globe. Sitegeizt (a genius name, by the way) seems like the perfect place for April, because they have a flexible schedule and are cool with “journalists” working from home; however, they consist of mostly quizzes and lists. Hence the quotation marks around “journalists.”
April gets the job on the spot, and celebrates by hiring a Party Bus, simply because she’s always wanted to. All of April’s friends are there, including Beth’s new boyfriend, who is cute enough for a lumbersexual, I guess, but is significantly below Beth’s intelligence level. And possibly a pothead. The best best friend in the world deserves better, I’ll tell you that.
Anyway, it turns out that April’s friends do better when she visits them all one by one, because before long, Dom and Leo have a metaphorical penis measuring contest, which grosses everyone out, including but not limited to Natalie, who also deserves better than Dom the Douchecanoe.
At Brenna’s school, Erika-not-Ericka is rambling at Brenna, trying so desperately for the coolest queer in school to like her back, but Brenna is very obviously not having it, and the poor girl can’t seem to take a hint. Luckily for both of them, someone comes in to interrupt, sending Erika on her way. The saving grace is a woman named Margo, who is a former student and recent Emerson graduate named Margo. Brenna is excited to see her, because she wants help with her video project for her recently engaged sister who also has cancer. Luckily for Brenna, Margo has experience (wink wink) and has some ideas that can help her.
(PS. I got temporarily angry that Chasing Life was hinting that they might do a grown-up/teenager relationship like every other ABC Family show, but if Margo isn’t in charge of the film club/in an authority position and is just helping out, I can get on board, but ONLY because Brenna is mature for her age and above the legal age of consent in Massachusetts-YES, I CHECKED-and ONLY because it’s fiction. Because fiction is the only place 17 to 22 isn’t an impossible maturity gap to overcome. Also they might not even go there, Margo might just be a mentor, but don’t even try to convince me gf isn’t queer. DON’T TRY.)
At April’s next hospital visit, Vanessa congratulates April on getting the job she mentioned on their first meeting. April revises her original answer to Vanessa’s question, which she has spent every waking (and some non-waking) hour since revising, saying she is unapologetically career-minded and driven. Vanessa says she was an EMT once. She saved lives before she got cancer. But now she travels. Because when it comes down to it, your job is just a line in your obituary. It’s how you spent your life that matters.
Though I would argue that saving lives is a pretty damn valuable way to spend your days, however numbered. But, to each their own. Either way, April is pretty shaken by the notion.
At Sitegeist later, April’s new boss isn’t overly impressed, because April took a journalist’s approach to listmaking instead of tapping into what the millennials will tweet about. The woman is mentioning gifs and memes when April zones out and realizes this isn’t actually she wants at all.
Instead of making a list of “52 Things Justin Bieber Did That Should Make the World Hate Him But Somehow Made Them Love Him More”, April makes a list of things she would regret not doing if she died tomorrow, including getting fired from a job. She doesn’t want her obit to be boring is all.
At her engagement party, April casually mentions to complete strangers, in front of her mother, that she isn’t really into journalism anymore, and Sara promptly drags her outside and demands to know what the heck is going on and if she’s giving up. April explains that living like you’re dying and giving up are very different, and she’s just trying to enjoy her life just in case, since dying is an even more real and known possibility than it is for any random person on the street. April’s not giving in to death, she’s just applying the fearlessness she used to focus 100% on her career and spreading it out to other aspects of her life. She asks her mother to get on board, and of course Sara responds with a hug, because Sara is nothing if not supportive.
Back inside, everyone watches a video Brenna made for April and Leo, in which everyone gives the happy couple their advice for a happy life together. Natalie watches Dom watch the video and-combined with his shadiness earlier when she, the stunning Natalie whose eyebrow game is always on point, tried to get him to sneak off with her and he wouldn’t-realizes that the Douchecanoe still has feelings for her half sister.
Sara makes a speech about understanding how worldviews can change, quickly, entirely, and for the better, because it’s exactly what happened to her when she had April, and that before you know it, your kids are all grown up with worldviews of their own. April gets the message and thanks her mama for being so very understanding.
Later that night, Natalie angrily tells Dom that he’s still in love with April and acting weird ever since April came over to say she wanted him in her life. This is the second time in her life that a man has made her number two to April Carver, and she’s damn sick of it. All she really needed in this moment was for Dom to deny it, or at least assure her of his feelings for her. But instead, the Douchecanoe, despite being pretty far up the creek, lost his paddle and said simply, “She’s getting married.”
At Casa de Carver, Brenna says goodbye to her sister as she heads off to give her bone marrow donation. April asks if she’s thought more about the recipient of her bone marrow, and Brenna has decided she does want to know. She has come to terms with the fact that donating is all she can do, and whether the person does or doesn’t survive after, she’ll come to terms with it.
Across town, Beth asks her roomie if she’s okay, and Natalie shows off her polished brave exterior and says she’s just going through some of her father’s old things that Sara gave her. But as soon as Beth leaves, she finds more than she bargained for: A novel from the point of view of someone who had two families, lead two lives, and planned his own death…written by her father.
What did you think of “A View from the Ledge”?
Here are some of our favorite #ChasingLesbians tweets from this week:
April’s grandma is my favorite. #ChasingLesbians #ChasingLife
– Devon (@KDevNic) July 7, 2015
Aaaawww and Brenna saying that “she isn’t Greer” of course! No one can be Greer except Greer!! #ChasingLesbians #ChasingLife
– Audrey (@pamplemoussee76) July 7, 2015
Sorry Erica, I dislike you on principle also because you have a side mullet but mostly because I want Greer back. #ChasingLesbians
– Lady Liberty (@CindyLMarshall) July 7, 2015
Guys let’s be honest, if we went to high school with Brenna, we’d totally be Erika. #ChasingLesbians #ChasingLife
– Karly (@karlyko) July 7, 2015
I will not like any new girl. I will not like any new girl… She’s kinda pretty. And… not Erika. You can stay. For now #chasinglesbians
– Jennifer (@JenKasper81) July 7, 2015
If these queer girls keep popping up this is gonna look like Rosewood #ChasingLife #ChasingLesbians #BooRadleyVanCullen
– Águeda Volta (@aguedavolta) July 7, 2015
BRENNA BEING LIKED BY ALL THE GIRLS AAAHH YES PLEASE #ChasingLife #ChasingLesbians
– Ary (@heyaftbrittana) July 7, 2015
IF MARGOT IS NOT GAY, MY NAME IS NOT ALYSSA #ChasingLife #ChasingLesbians #Flanneldoh
– Alyssa (@tvwithapb) July 7, 2015
I may have just read “Gear up” as “Greer Up.” Sigh. #ChasingLife #ChasingLesbians
– Josh (@YankeeJosh) July 7, 2015
This show’s the Oprah of feels. “You get a feel! And you get a feel! Everyone gets a feel!!” #ChasingLife #ChasingLesbians #ChasingLifeChat
– TheOtherNic (@CloneNic) July 7, 2015
