Wed Jan 17, 2024: Today on General Hospital, Michael gets his proxy back, Finn and Liz question a doctor for his defense, and Willow lashes out at Nina.
Tuesday’s GH recap: Spencer let Nikolas take Ace, Trina shocked Esme, and Sonny stopped Dex from killing Cyrus.
Carly lights a candle in the GH chapel and sits in a pew. “Miss you mom,” she whimpers. She smiles when Drew arrives.
As she holds him, she sobs. They talk about the emotional night that Joss has had with Adam and his attempted suicide.
He can’t understand how parents can be so hard on their kids. Mistakes are what you learn from.
Carly says she always tried to be balanced with her kids. Michael and Joss are achievers. Morgan wasn’t and she only hopes she doesn’t screw up Donna.
Drew says Donna has incredible role models.
At the nurses’ station, Willow sees Michael is calling her and flashes back to their fight about him manipulating her over Nina.
She answers anyway and her husband tells her all about the puppet show about puppies that Wiley is putting on. He’s filming it for her.
He asks when she will get home and misses her.
When he asks if they can talk when she gets home, she says it won’t work and gets off the line as soon as she spots Nina.
Nina tells her there is more to be said but Willow isn’t feeling it. Nina won’t justify herself but wants to explain and give her the chance to let her have it.
Carly and Drew pop up, bellowing. Carly orders her to leave Willow alone. Hasn’t she done enough damage already?
Nina says that Willow is a grown woman who can tell her to get lost. “But you never go away,” Carly points out.
They bicker and Nina tells them that Michael knew about her informing the SEC and it was kept a secret for so long because of him.
That doesn’t make sense to any of them so Nina explains he was blackmailing her to stay away from Willow.
Carly assumes this is all a lie. Nina prompts her to ask Willow. Carly won’t and Drew leads her away.
“If you hadn’t lost me before Nina, you have now,” Willow tells her mom.
Nina chases her into an exam room and repeats that Carly has kept her from both of her daughter’s.
Willow reminds her Nelle was dead by the time Carly figured out who she was. And she didn’t tell her Nina was her mom because she knew she didn’t want her as a birth mother.
Nina will concede she’s made a few mistakes. Her daughter thinks there’s a lot more than that and she’s enjoyed this.
Breaking up, Nina tells her how upset she was to be losing her. Willow says all she does is lie to everyone, including herself.
Nina claims that she’s going to stop blaming Carly and stop beating herself up for her mistakes. That means nothing to Willow.
Her mom says she made a deal with Michael because they both just wanted her to be happy.
Shaking her head, Willow says all she’s done is hurt her and her family. It’s enough and she wants nothing more to do with her.
Nina sobs. She still hopes they can try again.
Walking out, Willow says she can hope all she wants and Nina sobs she will always be there if she needs her.
At the Quartermaine estate, Michael gets the nanny to take the kids off to bed. Tracy and Ned stroll in and he claims he’s heading out.
He asks Ned to return the proxy he gave him. Tracy points out that he lived up to his end of the bargain.
Michael says he may lose what he cares about over all this so Ned should lose ELQ.
Ned will return it in the morning and tells him not to interpret that as a victory.
He points out that Michael kept the truth from Sonny, Drew, and Carly, but why? Michael flashes back to blackmailing Nina and claims he was just protecting his family.
Ned thinks he sounds like Edward at his worse.
That makes Tracy proud.
Under his baby face is a true Quartermaine.
As Michael explains that he gave Nina his silence for the sake of Willow because he values her about all else, Carly and Drew walk in.
Tracy ushers her son out to leave them to talk.
Michael assumes that Nina told them the truth. Carly says she told the truth for once.
Drew asks why he stayed silent and Michael claims he was just protecting his family.
The damage was already done and it wouldn’t have gotten Drew out.
Michael wanted to tell his father but he was so happy he couldn’t crush it so he just blackmailed Nina instead.
Drew accuses him of putting Sonny’s happiness ahead of their friendship.
Fed up, Drew leaves and Carly stays to talk to her son.
“Where do we go from here?” he asks her. She glares at him.
In the kitchen, Tracy says, “Yum, yum yum,” offering Ned some hummus and wondering why they hear no screaming.
Ned’s appalled that she doesn’t care about Michael playing “fast and loose” with him. She laughs and admires Michael being dedicated to what he wants.
She tells him he’s all she cares out. She’s working on BLQ and adores Leo.
He chuckles as she tells him how happy she is that Michael and Drew are at each other’s throats.
“The only way you come out on top is if you are standing on everyone else,” she says.
Ned thinks she has a point.
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Finn takes Liz into his office and tells her how much he appreciates her support. But it might be best if she’s not there when the doctor shows up because this is legally dicey. She won’t leave.
Dr. Sawyer (played by Catherine Kresge) shows up and asks how she can help, assuming he wants a consult.
She’s startled when he explains the patient is Mr. Muldoon since he’s dead.
Finn explains that he’s being sued for malpractice and was hoping she might have some information that could assist with his defense.
Sawyer can’t help him. She’d be happy to testify but can’t violate doctor-patient privilege.
Before she can go, Liz convinces her to stay and listen to her.
The nurse explains there are things she should know about Finn. She tells her that he saved her sister’s life and saved the hospital from financial ruin.
They get her to agree to talk off the record in hypotheticals.
Sitting down, they go over hypothetical symptoms and how to test them.
She says that if they came up with tests suggesting cancer, she would have referred them to an oncologist.
Liz asks if her office would know if a patient followed a referral.
Sawyer says it’s up to the patient to tell them and some don’t.
Once Sawyer leaves, Finn thanks Liz for all of her help and for saying such nice things about him.
They wonder why Muldoon never mentioned Sawyer or the oncologist. Why would he have hidden this? They need to find the oncologist.
At the penthouse, Esme wants to take her son home but Spencer blocks her way.
He says Ace is asleep and asks why she was let go.
He admits he has mixed feelings about her getting sent away.
She doubts that given that he didn’t bother bringing her son to court so she could kiss him goodbye if she was carted away.
Ava didn’t drop the charges and would have brought her own electric chair.
Her lawyer made a deal and it was just a petty crime.
He stops her again from going after her son.
She’s determined to get him and makes it clear that she knows all about his priorities and that Spencer is planning to jet off to Paris.
Stopping her again, Spencer says that Ace’s home is not with her anymore.
She’s offended. “Ace is gone,” he makes clear.
“Gone where?” she asks. Nikolas took him someplace safe.
She notices he hardly fought him off.
He tells her to accept he’s gone.
Esme says this is kidnapping and she’s going to call the cops.
He accuses the old Esme of being back, the one who used to do her father’s bidding.
She thinks he’s being melodramatic but he challenges her to look in his eyes and tell him she doesn’t remember all she did.
She says those are all stories to her but he’s sure she remembers and is the same Esme she was.
“Your back to being a puppet,” he says.
Backing up, she realizes that he gave Nikolas her son.
She tells him he’s no better than his father and he’s going to prison for this.
When she threatens to go to the cops, he threatens to tell them she has her memory back. Can she afford to risk that?
She storms out.
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