Synopsis of If Memory Serves
Written by TK
Sydney has a dream that she and Joanie are at a singles bar, and her mother is picking up more men than the two girls are.
Robbie is riding his motorcycle through town when he sees a girl with her own motorcycle and a little engine trouble. He goes over and offers to lend her a hand, she says she has it under control. He compliments her bike, and she says she'd be happy to give him a demo if he can keep up. They ride around town, but eventually he can't keep up and he loses her. He talks to a friend of his at the bar whose brother is cop, and gives him her license plate number for her address. He finds her at school, and she's on her way to the gym to play basketball. He says he's love to play with her. After he makes the first basket he starts getting cocky. That's the last basket he makes. She whups his ass at basketball and he asks her to lunch. She shows up for lunch and he is his charming self. They talk, and get along. They compare notes on insane families. He invites her to his father's dinner at the Biltmore and she gets a full dose of the Hansens at their not-so-finest.
Sydney is at the clinic and is treating a woman, Libby, who has high blood-pressure and rapid heartbeat. Sydney suggests to Libby that she's under stress. Libby complains about her husband, Frank, who says he has a brain tumor. Libby convinces Syd to come talk to Frank, since Frank refuses to see a doctor. Libby and Syd ambush Frank at work. He's on the docks unloading a fishing boat. He says that he knows he had a brain tumor, 'cause his dad had one too and he has the exact same symptoms. He doesn't want to waste away in some hospital with tubes up his nose, so he doesn't want to get diagnosed. Sydney reminds him that his diagnosis affects his wife as well, and convinces him to come in for some tests. He comes in for the tests, and the MRI shows that he doesn't have a brain tumore. He rants and raves that the MRI doesn't prove anything, and upsets Libby to the point where she starts hyperventilating. Sydney says she'd like to run a few more tests to make sure that there isn't something else going on, and gives him a preliminary verbal test for Alzheimer's, which he fails. After the final test results come back, Sydney tells Frank that he definitely does not have a brain tumor, but does have the beginning stages of Alzheimer's. He gets upset and leaves. Later, Libby comes to get Sydney because Frank has gone out on his boat and won't come back in. The coast guard won't search for him because he hasn't been gone longer than 24 hours. Finally, Frank comes into the clinic because he hears that Libby is there. She's lying on one of the beds, breathing into a paper bag. He wonders who will take care of her once he's gone.
Joanie and Sydney are out for a night on the town. They have a great time kicking some beautiful male butt on the pool table, but then on their way out of the bar they see their father escorting a beautiful blonde woman around town. They get suspicious that their father is seeing someone and not telling them about it. Jim asks Joanie if she knows where her mother's leather jewelry box is. Joanie says she doesn't remember, but then goes and finds it and looks inside. She find a picture of her father with the mysterious blonde woman. She shows it to Sydney, who with some help from her mother in a dream deduces that the woman's name is Blair Mason, and she was an old family friend. Sydney has a vague memory of her that leads her to believe that her father may have been having an affair with Blair in 1972. Jim invites all of his children to have dinner with him and Blair at the Biltmore. Joanie steals Jim's keys and goes over there early herself. She throws back a bunch of double martinis and starts accusing Blair of having an affair. Robbie, with his new girlfriend, and Sydney show up just in time to hear Blair tell Joanie that she wanted to have an affair with Jim in 1972, but that Sydney walked in and interrupted them, and then she realized that Jim would never fool around with his kids in the house. Blair says that Jim never knew how she felt then, and now they were just getting to know each other again... they haven't even held hands yet. Joanie is sheepish. Jim finally arrives and they have dinner. When they get him, Jim is grateful to his daughters for being so accepting of Blair, because he tells them Blair said she couldn't wait to spend more time with them the next time she was in town.
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