anastomosis ⇏ o'malley

02 | to remember

Wading over to the baby, I heave him up in my arms and begin to coo at him, "Hey, Brian. You're such a big boy. You work out a lot?"

I bounce him up and down on my hip, softly patting the top of his head in attempts to soothe his shrills.

"Hey, what do you think you're doing?"

Glancing up, my eyes are drawn to my resident, a stocky, bull faced man that went by the name Alex Karev. This morning when I had found I had been switched from Stevens to him for no apparent reason, I was a little pissed, as I had heard a mixed bag of reviews about him, and the blonde resident was really starting to grow on me.

"I'm calming him down," I tell him, "what does it look like I'm doing?"

His mouth opens, probably to tell me off in his typical fashion, but another intern draws his attention back away from me.

"CT results," she says, "should I page Shepherd?"

"No, he's in surgery," he says gruffly, "let me take a look."

"What do you see?" I ask curiously, inching in closer as Brian's screams quiet down.

"Nothing acute."

"Acute? Nothing?" I hear Brian's father, Dave, blurt out from his seat next to the empty bed, "that's good, right?"

"He's going to need to run a few more tests," I tell Dave, "but you can hold your son now, I think his fit has passed him."

Ignoring Karev's urgent whispers to my fellow intern, I slip Brian's frail frame into Dave's arms. The father smiles softly, stroking a hand through his sparse blond hair.

"Do you have a kid?" He asks, and I choose not to think that he thinks I'm a lot older than I really am.

"No," I tell him, "but I used to babysit a lot when I was younger. Money was tight where I lived, so I had to get allowance somehow."

I crack a smile and place a hand on his shoulder.

"Everything is going to be fine. I promise."

He looks up at me, tears brimming in his eyes, and I stumble back, a lump in my throat.

"Sorry, I uh," I clear my throat, "I'll be right back."

Turning down the hallway, I hurry down a staircase, beelining for a bathroom. My heart is thudding in my chest, tears threatening to spill from my eyes.

"Everything is going to be fine," I repeat to myself, and for a brief moment, I'm back at the house I spent my childhood in, the one next to George, the one where my mother was killed and I was forced to watch her be violated over and over again until I grabbed the gun from its hiding place and shot the two and my mother in the process.

My feet screech to a halt as I stumble in front of two doctors tucked in the corner of the hallway, who look pretty cozy with each other. They're both familiar faces, and when they turn to see who I am, I realize its Izzie Stevens and George.

"Lucie," George says, surprised, and Izzie's brows shoot up to her hairline.

"I'll see you around, George," she says breezily before she passes by him with a tight smile in my direction.

"What was that about?" I ask him, and he shifts uneasily.

"Uh, nothing," he clears his throat, "I was just talking with my friend, Izzie, about my wife, uh, Callie."