all that matters | mark sloan

i.

"The game-- they say a person either has what it takes to play or they don't."

I've always wanted to be one of the greats, and I worked my ass off in school to prove it. Anderson Williams-- top of my class in high school and medical school, accepted into the internship program of some of the best hospitals in the country (Johns Hopkins, Mayo, and Mass. Gen. to name a few), and I somehow managed to finish medical school at the age of 22. This was only because I had skipped the second grade and finished my pre-med degree in three years instead of four, which made my level of socializing and partying in college pretty low. I had basically no friends, except for the few I met throughout my time in the foster care system that I tried to keep in touch with after I left for college, which is why I was excited to start my internship at Seattle Grace Hospital.

"Each of you comes here today hopeful, wanting in on the game. A month ago, you were in med school, being taught by doctors. Today... you are the doctors." I glanced down at my hand, already shaking from the anxiety running through me. I gripped the bottom of my top tightly and took a breath before redirecting my attention to the man at the front of the room.

"The 7 years you spend here as a surgical resident will be the best and worst of your life. You will be pushed to the breaking point. Look around you. Say hello to your competition. Eight of you will switch to an easier specialty. Five of you will crack under the pressure. Two of you will be asked to leave. This is your starting line. This is your arena. How well you play... that's up to you." I let out a soft exhale, feeling a bit overwhelmed at the pressure that Chief Webber had just placed on all of us. While I knew that there was a pretty good chance I would be one of the thirteen interns that made it to residency at Seattle Grace, I was still pretty worried that I wouldn't measure up to the other talented people in the room.

I was given a pair of light blue scrubs to wear once I entered the locker room with my fellow interns, and went to find a place to store all of my things. I took a quick glance around the room, noticing the amount of men as opposed to women in the room.

"Only seven women out of twenty," a tall blonde says from the other side of the aisle I'm standing in. I smile at her and let out a short laugh, and the dark haired woman next to her adds, "Yeah. I hear one of them's a model. Seriously, like that's going to help with the respect thing?"

"How did you know that I was a model?" I furrow my brows as I question the dark haired woman. She looks up with wide eyes and opens her mouth slightly before responding.

"You're the model? I thought she had blonde hair. I didn't mean to offend you," she says. I stare at her with a blank face for a second before breaking into soft laughter and shaking my head.

"I'm not the model, but your face looked pretty funny when I said I was," I say through my laughter. The idea of me being a model is pretty laughable. Not because I'm not pretty, but mostly because I don't have the features that most people consider marketable. I have dark brown dyed hair and I'm only 5'2" with a slightly curvy figure.

"You're Christina and Anderson, right?" The blonde asks the dark haired woman and I, both of us nodding in response. "I'm Meredith." I smile and quickly shake both of their hands before Christina asks us both who we have as our resident this year.

"The Nazi? Yeah, me too," Meredith says. I tilt my head slightly, not having heard the nickname for Bailey before and a bit confused about the name.

"You got the Nazi? So did I. At least we'll be tortured together, right? I'm George O'Malley, uh, we met at the mixer, you had a black dress with a slit up the side, strappy sandals..." He trails off as Meredith and Christina exchange a quick look before George shakes his head and keeps speaking. "Now you think I'm gay. No, I'm not gay, it's, ah, it's just that, you know, you were, I mean, you were very, unforgettable."