No Time | Grey's Anatomy // Book 1 // COMPLETED |

11 | We Did Everything We Could

Picking up the remote control for Mrs. Banks' bed, Meredith pressed a few buttons, slowly and carefully adjusting the bed while trying not to wake her up. I was surprised the woman was able to fall asleep at all in the first place, what with the ordeal she had been through, her husband being in surgery, and Emile talking her ear off.

"You think she needs an extra blanket?" Emile asked, still worried. "She gets chilled easily."

Plopping down into a chair next to Emile's bed, Alex smirked. "She must be one hell of a tipper." 

Emile turned his head towards Alex. "Sorry?"

"Well, I can see why she comes in every week," Alex said. " I bet you take better care of her than her own husband."

Emile turned away and chuckled, his cheeks flushing slightly. "When she first started coming in, before they met, we had a little game. She would try anything we served. She was adventurous . . . fearless. When she'd gone through the menu, I challenged the chefs to come up with something new. It became . . . she became  . . . my favourite part of the week. Then one night, she came in with him. She felt like this was a safe place for a first date. That ring on her finger? The night he proposed to her . . . I placed it in the crème brulee for her to find. I watched her say yes from the kitchen window. And they never stopped coming in.

"But now he orders for her, same thing every time. For fifteen years, I've watched their conversations grow shorter and shorter, until now all they do is eat. She has no children. If he dies, she'll . . . she'll be all alone. She's so afraid. I can see. And all I want to do is take her hand in mine and tell her she'll be all right. She'll never have to be alone . . . if she doesn't want to be." Emile took a deep breath and tried to fight back the tears. "You'll let me know when you have good news about Mr. Banks, yes?"

Alex nodded, taken aback by the unexpected emotional monologue. "Yeah. Right. Of course."

Alex, Meredith, and I all looked at each other, clearly thinking the same thing. Looking down, I could see that Mrs. Banks had woken up. Turned away from Emile, her eyes were wide open, and it was obvious she had heard everything that Emile had said. Ever-so-slightly, she looked up at Meredith and me and cracked a small smile. 

Placing my hand over hers, I smiled back, silently assuring her that everything was going to be okay.

An hour later, Meredith and I sat just outside the patient room, watching as Emile slept and Mrs. Banks looked at him. It was clear she wanted to say something to Emile—to confront him about what he had said—but instead so just laid there and watched him sleep.

With Alex's shoes squeaking as he walked down the hall, Meredith and I looked up to greet him as he shoved a heart-shaped box of chocolates in our faces. "Oh, thank God. Where'd you get those?" Meredith asked as Alex opened the box and she took one.

"Patient room. Guy's in a coma." Alex answered truthfully. "He's not gonna miss 'em. Anything happen?"

"He's still asleep." I picked out a chocolate for myself. "But she wants to say something."

Jogging over to us, Cristina's eyes lit up when she spotted the candies. "Oh, my God. I'm starving." she reached for a chocolate but stopped herself halfway. "Ew. These are all half-eaten."

Alex took a bite of his chocolate and grinned. "Now you can see what they are."

Too tired and too hungry to argue with that logic, Cristina shrugged and picked up a treat anyway. Taking a bite, she followed our gazes into the patient room. "What are we doing?" she asked.

"Her boring husband's in surgery," Alex said with a mouthful of stolen chocolate. "This dude's been in love with her for fifteen years."

"But she just found out," Meredith added. "So we're waiting to see if she says anything."