As Royal Pains Pulls The Lawsons Apart Again, We Predict What Will Put Them Back Together

Since introducing the character of Lawson patriarch Eddie back in the Season 2 premiere, Royal Pains has gotten a lot of material out of the fraught relationship he's had with his sons. When Hank and Evan's mother was in the process of...well, dying, Eddie couldn't handle it and took off, getting involved in sketchy activities and being consistent pretty much only in his inconsistency. So when Eddie left his bride at the altar back in the season premiere, it wasn't a shock; just a disappointing return to form.

In this week's episode, we learn that Hank hired a PI to track Eddie down (when he refers to her as "she," we all assumed we were going to get a return visit from that PI Hank treated two seasons ago, right?), and he finds out why Eddie fled: he needed cardiac bypass surgery, and was worried that Ms. Newberg would think he was only marrying her because he didn't want to die alone? Or something? Eddie's been staying at Hank and Evan's childhood home in Passaic; Hank finds him there just in time to save him from post-op complications, and to tell him he deserves his sons' care and love. This is a reversal: normally, Evan is the one who defends Eddie -- his fellow fast-talking hustler -- while Hank keeps his distance. But that's not the only reversal: when Hank brings Eddie back to the guest house at Shadow Pond and is happy to tell Evan that Eddie has reconciled with Ms. Newberg and everything's okay, Evan's worse than cold, declaring, "Paige and I are trying to start our own family right now, and when we do, my first promise will be to never let you near enough to hurt or disappoint our child....I'm not cutting you out; that's your move. Paige and I will come to your wedding. We will wish you well. But make no mistake: my first job as a parent will be protecting my family from you." DRAMA QUEEN MUCH? Particularly about a baby that doesn't even exist yet?

It's not that I don't respect Evan reaching the end of his Eddie rope. It's that there are only two episodes left in this aggressively sunny series, and the likelihood that these two are going to end it on these terms is 0.0%. There's no question that something is going to bring Eddie and Evan together again. But what? Here, in no particular order, are some extremely solid predictions.

• A HankMed patient watches her father die, and Evan draws a parallel lesson for his own life
• That scrap a couple of weeks back turns out to be foreshadowing when Hank physically wrestles Evan into submission
• Eddie writes a self-abasing essay for the Huffington Post
• Emma comes back and cries about the estrangement, and Evan decides he cares about her feelings for some reason
• Hank orchestrates a Parent Trap-style forced sitdown
• When the two get trapped in Southampton's only elevator, Eddie helps deliver Divya's baby
• Eddie pushes Paige out of the path of a runaway jitney
• Hank and Evan's dead mom appears to Evan in a dream and begs Evan to forgive Eddie
• Eddie sells the house in Passaic and tries to buy back Evan's love with the proceeds
• When The Real Housewives Of New York City visit Southampton for their annual bitch trip, Eddie slips them undercooked chicken and gets HankMed both its single biggest payday and its most illustrious concierge clients
• Evan falls down, hits his head, and forgets he was mad
• Eddie saves Evan from drowning in Long Island Sound
• A post-op Eddie takes a turn for the worse and Evan makes peace at his deathbed
• Jeremiah assembles all Evan's loved ones to tell stories about Eddie in a heart-tugging video
• Eddie leaves a conciliatory basket of puppies on Evan's doorstep
• Eddie single-handedly resupplies the hospital's entire blood bank
• Eddie hocks three of Ms. Newberg's tennis bracelets to buy Evan Hamilton tickets
• Eddie helps Evan get his life back after Evan enters his personal information into a real estate search site other than Zillow and becomes the victim of identity theft
• Eddie lets Boris test his bone marrow, which turns out to contain the key to curing Boris's family disease
• Eddie saves Paige from a fire at that hoarder client's house
• Hank convenes a mock trial, with Jeremiah as judge
• Eddie threatens suicide in an extremely maudlin note Evan doesn't really take seriously even as he knows he can't not
• Eddie finds a woozy Evan post-wisdom tooth extraction and gets him to sign papers attesting to his forgiveness of Eddie
• Eddie hides Paige from marauders during The Purge
• Paige tells Evan to quit being ridiculous