Everett Ramos is a resident surgeon at Mercy West Hospital in Seattle, Washington. She's on the uphill climb to becoming one of the best orthopedic surgeons in the world, studying alongside her best friends and hoping one day to make a difference...
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DROWNING. IT'S the worst way to go. All that panic, panic, panic. The water pulls you under, filling up your lungs before you get the chance to fight back, to kick your legs and keep you above sea level, hands starting to spasm as your brain starts to shut off. It's frightening, in the beginning, watching your hair float in the water, watching the sunlight disappear behind shades of blue, feeling the burn of your lungs as your airways shut off for good. The thing is, people have this sick, twisted way of romanticising death in all its forms. But, every doctor knows that it all hurts, it is all ugly. Death is not romantic, it is not beautiful. It is not blood the colour of scattered rose petals, or a hooded figure waiting in the corner, scythe glinting in the moonlight. It is, quite simply, death, and fear, and closing your eyes as your monitor beeps out a steady tune, as your loved ones cry over your body, as your doctors call time and lock themselves away to hide their own shaking breaths.
Everett stares at herself in the mirror of the locker room, hand clutching the thick fabric of her light blue scrubs, and takes note of the dark circles beneath her eyes, of the stray hairs that fall out of her ponytail, of the weight she has lost too much of since starting this uphill climb to nab the top spot next year.
Death is ugly. But this is worse.
"How do you look worse than I do?" Callie asks when they finally meet up in the E.R after the cancellation of their knee replacement surgery. Her chin-length hair seems to glisten in the fluorescent lighting and her skin has a glow to it that had been missing during her time off work. But, now she's back and she's wearing a grin that would rival even the summer sun.
It should make Everett just as happy, but she can't seem to think about anything other than her upcoming meeting with Hunt.
"Stress." Everett follows Callie through the E.R, noticing the lack of pep in her step. Maybe she just looks happy to be back. "I've practically been running ortho since Sheridan lacks the balls to stand up, and I've been going over this meeting I have later with Hunt all week with Jackson. I've hardly slept because I've been taking extra hours here to stay out of the house and I usually just sleep in an on-call room. So, yeah, I've looked better."
"You're staying out of the house?"
Everett lets out a hum before thanking a nurse for discharging one of her earlier patients. She's hardly slept at the big house since the wedding, since she let Karev hold her when they both felt lonely, since she looked up into his big, brown eyes and thought that maybe she stood a chance.
