S14 E20 (15 Jan 00) : Fall Out by Ben Cooper
Episode Summary
Tina is looking through the records and finds that Adam was in last night. Charlie tells her he was mugged. Adam thinks everyone knows about his HIV, but Barney and Charlie assure him no one knows. However, Adam keeps hearing people whispering about him being mugged and thinks everyone is talking about his HIV. Suddenly he snaps, and shouts for everyone’s attention. He tells them all that he’s HIV positive and that he’s gay.
Sean has just got back from holiday. He gives Max a bottle of tequila and tells him he thinks he’s finally over Tina. He tries to chase up his exam results, which have gone missing. He uses the phone in Max’s office to make a call, and finds two tickets to a Robbie Williams concert. Max tries to say they’re for Frank but Sean doesn’t believe him, and jokingly suggests to Duffy, who’s there, that Max has a secret girlfriend. When he has gone, Duffy tells Max that he should tell Sean about him and Tina.
Max asks Tina if she’s forgiven him yet. She says she spent last night on her own getting drunk. She says that Duffy being married makes a difference. Max says he didn’t plan it. She asks how sorry he is, and when he says “Really very sorry” she pulls him inside a room and they kiss. Max tells Tina he thinks they should tell Sean, and asks her to let him do it.
Ken Garnham, who has been blind for the last fifty years, is taken to a home by his daughter Susan. It’s very nice and he’s happy to be there. Susan leaves, saying she’ll be back later. Ken is left in his room watching television. He drops the remote control and gets up to try to find it. He accidentally kicks it under a table and gets down on his knees to find it. He crawls under the table to pick it up, but once he has got it he tries to stand up straight away, and cracks his head on the table. He is picked up by ambulance and brought into resus, where he says he’s regained his sight. It is obvious that he can see, and Patrick doesn’t believe he was ever blind, until he speaks to Susan. She and her father are both very happy, and go up to the roof to take a look at everything.
Patrick wants to get to the bottom of it; Charlie’s happy just to believe it was a miracle. Patrick thinks it might have been psychological. He asks Ken about when he went blind. Ken tells him it was when he was fighting in the Korean War. His plane went down and a soldier clung to him, half his face burned away. Ken didn’t recognise him but then realised it was his best friend. Patrick says the stress may have caused his blindness, but Ken says that many others experienced the same things but didn’t go blind. He tells Patrick to accept it as a miracle.
Stuart and his boss and mate Jim have been on a binge the night before. Stuart says he isn’t feeling well, but they both think it’s just a hangover. Stuart has been getting calls from Judy, who he went out with on holiday, but he’s been ignoring her. He says he only went with her because her name began with J – he has a chart of the alphabet with most letters crossed out, and he crosses out J. Judy comes round to the flat, fed up with him ignoring her. She finds that Stuart is having big problems walking, and is losing the feeling in his arms. She calls an ambulance. In resus, Stuart gets worse – the loss of sensations is spreading upwards, and will soon reach his head. Sean realises it’s GBS. He calls in another doctor, who says that over fifty percent of people with the syndrome recover completely; the others have some sort of disability. Judy says she won’t leave him. Stuart tells her to go and says he only went out with her because her name begins with J. She leaves, and Stuart says she won’t want him like this. Charlie goes after Judy. He asks her about Stuart’s relatives; she says his parents are dead and the only person she’s got is Jim, who’s going to Germany to work in a couple of weeks. Charlie says he’s all alone apart from her; she tells him not to try to make her feel guilty. Stuart is taken to ITU, as he’s now having difficulty breathing. As he is going he asks about Judy; Charlie says she’s gone, but Judy comes in. She says she loves him and she’ll be waiting for him.
Angie goes to see Frank and tells him she needs money for a train ticket to go and see her mother, who she says is ill. Frank says he’s not going to give her money for drugs. He tries to persuade her to let the clinic help her become clean, but she doesn’t want to know. She meets with the dealers and they make her mug a woman at the cash machine. They wait in the car to drive off when she’s done it, but it goes wrong and someone else sees, so they drive off without her. She tries to get in the car and runs round it, but ends up getting hit. Frank is passing. He has borrowed Max’s new car to run some errands for the centre, so he takes Angie to A&E in the car – she bleeds all over the seats. Chloe recognises Angie from the night before in the car park, and asks Barney to confirm that it’s her. When Adam finds out, he calls the police. He goes in to see Angie and tells her she’s ruined his life. She denies mugging him. He tells her he wishes they’d let her die. Frank goes to see Adam and has a go at him, telling him that Angie’s a victim and he expected Adam, as a nurse, to understand. Adam later calls the police and tells them he made a mistake. Frank and Angie thank him.
Sean finds his exam results but doesn’t want to open them. He asks Max to do it. Max tells him he’s failed, but says it doesn’t make him a bad doctor – lots of people fail the first time round. He tells Sean to just carry on studying and get it over with. Sean thanks him, saying he’s been really supportive – first about Tina, now about this. He says he’ll go straight off to the library to get some books.
Tina and Chloe go round singing a Robbie Williams song. Sean hears them and asks Barney why they’re singing that. Barney says he thinks they’re going to a concert. Tina and Max go into the staff room and start kissing. Sean bursts in on them. He starts shouting at Tina. Max tries to get him to calm down, but Sean turns to him and starts pushing him; they start fighting but Tina yells at them to stop and they do. Sean grabs Max’s tequila bottle and goes outside. Max follows him. Sean yells at Max, saying Tina’s a nice little blonde to sit in the front of his car and make him feel 25 again. He calls Max a dirty old con man. Max says Sean had his chance but threw it away. He goes up to Max’s car and smashes the bottle through one of the windows.
Patients
– Ken Garnham, a 69-year-old veteran that hits his head and suddenly no longer is blind
– Angie Lynch, one of Frank’s friends, hit by car
– Stuart Young, a 28-year-old man with Guillame-Barre syndrome
First Scene/words
[Max and Sean are walking into work.]
Max: … mirrors, electric seat adjustment, electic hood…
Sean: Nice car, Max. My aunt just bought one! Only joking.
Last Scene/words
[Sean and Max are standing outsides in the rain, having a row. Sean shows the tequila bottle he gave to Max earlier amd starts walking towards Max’s brand new car.]
Max: Sean? Sean!
[Sean walks up to the car and throws the bottle through on of the front windows of the car, before walking away into the rain.]
Guide by Alison & Karin.
UK Viewing Figures
12.14m
