In this episode of The Fosters, titled “Cruel and Unusual,” the family has to deal with the aftermath of Jesus’ injury and hospital stay. Meanwhile, Callie gets into trouble in juvie, and Mariana faces a devastating development in her relationship with Mat.
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Mariana’s Despair
After being told that the kids can’t go see Jesus in the hospital just yet, Mariana shares with Mat that she’s worried something is really wrong with her twin that her mothers just aren’t sharing with them all. So despite the fact that, early on in this episode of The Fosters, Stef literally takes the doors off the kids’ bedrooms in an effort to make them stop keeping secrets from their parents, Mariana manages to sneak into the hospital without the permission of her parents to see her brother.
This turns out to be a terrible plan because Jesus doesn’t respond well to Mariana, and she starts crying upon seeing some of his issues, like the body tremors and language deficiency he’s dealing with. This makes Jesus more upset, and Stef shows up just in time to lead Mariana away to tell her they all have to be strong and positive for Jesus right now. She also admonishes her daughter for disobeying her again and suggests that she get back into therapy. That, on the other hand, is probably a very good plan, considering what the girl has gone through.
And things only get worse for her from there. After a conversation with Brandon, in which the oldest Foster brother asks Mat whether Mariana could possibly be pregnant, and Mat says if she is it wouldn’t be because of sleeping with him, Mat goes to speak with Mariana at her house. He demands to know whether she slept with Nick, and she says no, but he has trouble believing her after all the lies. He tells her he’s not sure he can trust her again, and Mat breaks up with Mariana then and there, devastating her.
When Mariana confronts Brandon, he explains that he saw Emma buy a pregnancy test and then give the bag to Mariana, but she tells him that the other girl was just buying her tampons. Initially, she blames him for Mat breaking up with her. But by the end of the episode, they’ve made up.
So then who was the pregnancy test for?
Callie’s Choice
Robert, Callie’s biological father, shows up at the Foster home, demanding to know why he hasn’t been kept in the loop about Callie’s situation. He also offers for Callie to use a private lawyer of his, but Stef refuses, saying that she trusts the public defender and her daughter has to do a good job. But she does agree to keep him better informed in the future.
In juvenile detention, Callie catches the attention of a guard and gets in a brief argument with a girl who sees him as “her man” because of it. Callie wants nothing to do with him, and that’s a good thing — another girl tells her that he brings drugs into the facility and sleeps with plenty of girls there. Yuck.
When Callie next sits down with her moms and public defender, the lawyer tells her the deal she’s worked out: the call for a fitness hearing will be withdrawn if Callie pleads guilty to vehicular assault and a felony hit and run. Oh, and if she stays in juvie until she’s 18. That’s another eight months of being there.
The public defender thinks it’s a good deal since Callie has a record and it’s a he-said-she-said situation, but Callie isn’t so sure. Her record would be expunged afterwards, but she’d have to stay in juvie. But if she’s tried as an adult, she could face five years in prison and have a record as a felon afterwards if she loses the case. Yikes.
Making the Decision
AJ tries to visit Callie at the detention center since Mike told him he would try to get him on the visitor list, but he’s denied access. Luckily, at the same time, Robert is there, and he asks Callie’s father to give her a letter he brought for her. Aw.
Robert is allowed access and talks to Callie about her options. He expresses regret that he let Stef and Lena adopt her after all, which Callie shuts down quickly. He tells her he’s there for her, whatever she needs, and offers her the use of her lawyer, which she seems to agree to think about. He also gives her the letter, which she reads privately later.
After Callie reads the letter, which adorably ends with AJ telling her he loves her, she hears another girl getting sick in the corner. As she appears to be in real trouble, Callie calls a guard, but she isn’t rewarded for this action. After the girl is taken away, Callie is barely tolerated by a guard questioning her about where the drugs came from. Later, she faces off with the male guard who brought them in.
The male guard gets her alone, demanding to know why she got involved. He’s upset because now other staff will know about drugs getting in and could trace it back to him. He smashes the mop bucket she has against a nearby window, blaming Callie for it, and gets her sent to an isolated cell. This won’t look good for her.
Mike’s Offer
Speaking of AJ, things seem to be going well with him and Mike, and we get a scene of AJ playing with Ana’s baby, Isabella, before he leaves for school one day. Mike thinks things are going so well that he asks Ana if she would like her and her daughter to move in with them. She accepts but only if AJ is okay with it.
Unfortunately, Stef points out to Mike later that, since Ana has a record and is a felon, a foster child like AJ can’t live in the same residence with her, despite the fact that she’s not his foster parent. But Ana seems excited about the move, and Mike doesn’t have the heart to tell her about that little snag.
Towards the end of this episode of The Fosters, Mike calms AJ’s nerves about another hearing Callie is facing, reassuring him that he loves Callie like family — like he loves AJ too. He then tells the boy he’d like to adopt him officially. He tells AJ he can have some time to think about it, as the boy is clearly floored.
I want to like this development. I’m just not sure it’s coming from a good place. Is Mike really ready to adopt AJ or does he just want to that so that, legally, Ana can live with them? Time will tell.
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Jude and Noah
After having a conversation with Monte about possibly taking a leave of absence while she and Stef deal with Jesus, Lena spots Noah and Jude talking in the school hallway at Jude’s locker. Noah isn’t supposed to be there, as he shouldn’t be talking to Noah at all, per Jude’s mom’s orders. Uh oh.
Noah gives Jude an envelope, as gentle encouragement to get through all the stress he’s dealing with, but we don’t see what’s in it. Later, Lena goes through his locker and opens it, thinking it’s pot. But as she tells Stef later, it’s not drugs at all — it’s actually a poem Noah wrote for the other boy, about having hope.
She and Stef then decide that forcing Jude to lose yet another person in his life might not be a good thing, and they later give him permission to keep seeing the boy, provided that he lay off the marijuana.
Jesus’ Recovery
The moms face a difficult choice in this episode of The Fosters: should they bring Jesus home, where he will need round-the-clock care for this recovery, or have him stay in a rehab center at the hospital, where he’ll undoubtedly have great care but with no option for them to stay with their son at night?
Jesus is having some major issues with speech, hand tremors, leg twitches, walking and brain function, so it’s clear he needs some real help. But the moms are really unsure about leaving him there alone at night, when they’re already having trouble trying to have one of them at the hospital with him as often as possible.
Ultimately, after touring the rehabilitation facility, Stef and Lena decide to bring Jesus home instead. He’s set up in a special bed there, and there’s a quick flash forward towards the end of the episode showing him surrounded by much of his family and friends there. Lena, as it turns out, has decided to take a leave of absence after all, to help care for him.
But when the moms order pizza and offer a piece to Jesus, he doesn’t recognize the pepperoni on it, a topping that had been a favorite of his in the past. They try to stay positive and pick it off for him, but he refuses it. When they persist, he angrily denies the offering and smashes the plate on the floor. It’s becoming clear that some of those behavioral issues the doctors warned about may be an issue for Jesus after all.
The Hearing
Finally, it’s the day of Callie’s hearing, regarding whether she’ll be tried as an adult for her case. She decides privately — with her moms, the public defender, Robert and his lawyer — not to take the deal she was offered, even though her moms think she should. Robert disagrees and thinks she should be able to tell her side of the story, with the help of his lawyer.
Callie tells them all she can’t go back to juvie, not for that long, so the fitness hearing proceeds. Her whole family is there, plus other supporters, and it’s a good showing for the teenage girl. Her public defender alludes to this while pleading her case, saying she excels in school and has loving parents, and being tried as an adult and possibly being made to go to jail could derail her successes.
But the lawyer on the other side of the case makes an argument for Callie having a record, with no sign of past reformation efforts working, and brings up her altercation with the guard. Though the judge agrees that Callie is in a much better situation with her home and school life than many kids he sees, he also recognizes that she continues to find trouble in spite of that. He rules that she will be tried as an adult after all.
Robert is able to post bail for Callie, and she goes home, but she now has a trial before her in which she could go to jail and have a record. Later, AJ comforts her in her bedroom, and she thanks him for the letter she received. She also tells him that she loves him too, which makes me pretty happy because I can’t help it — I love those crazy kids together!
So will Callie end up being found guilty in court? Will Mike adopt AJ and is it for the right reasons? Plus, who used the pregnancy test Brandon saw Emma buy? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.
The Fosters season 4 airs Tuesday nights at 8/7c on Freeform. Want more news? Like BuddyTV’s Facebook page.
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Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
