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

19 | Gone Fishing

As soon as I started to stir, slowly waking from my dreamless sleep, I immediately tried to drift off again. Lately, it was rare that I got such a cozy and undisturbed sleep. The room was dark, I had a soft pillow, I had a warm blanket over me, and I had an . . . arm around me?

My eyes shot open and the plain wall of the on-call room stared back at me. Suddenly, I remembered that I hadn't fallen asleep in my own bed the night before. I combed my memory for the series of events that had taken place, my mind immediately taking me back to the embarrassing crying I had done. Although, I suppose it could have been worse. I could have cried and then had sex with someone. 

Thankfully, I was still wearing my scrubs.

As I let out a sigh, the figure beside me started to move and the arm that had once held me captive lifted from my body. Now being free, I turned to my other side and came face to face with a sleeping Jackson. I smiled softly. He had been a really good friend to me when I had needed it.

"You're so cute when you sleep." I jokingly whispered, thinking he couldn't hear me, but I was wrong.

"Thanks. You are, too," he whispered back with a cheeky grin on his face.

"You're not even sleeping!" I laughed and lightly smacked him on the shoulder. 

Jackson chuckled and pulled the covers over his head. "Hey! Don't do that!"

With that, I knew there was no chance of getting back to sleep, and after glancing at my watch, I noted there were only fifteen minutes or so before I had to be up for rounds anyway. Crawling out of the small on-call room bed, I snatched my pager from the small bedside table and stuffed my feet back into my sneakers. 

"Are you coming?" I glanced back at Jackson as I started for the door. Jackson groaned in protest but got out of bed anyway. He grabbed his belongings, and once we were both ready, I turned to him. "Thanks for last night," I said. 

"I know you'd do the same for me." he pressed a quick kiss to my lips before reached past me and opening the door. 

Carefully, the two of us checked to make sure the coast was clear before making our great escape. It was well known that on-call rooms were notorious locations for hospital hook-ups, but still, I didn't want people thinking that I was one of those people. 

I preferred to keep work and my personal life separate. 

Parting ways, Jackson and I departed for morning rounds but ended up reuniting afterwards when we were coincidentally paged for the same case. Meredith and April had been paged as well, and in a group of four, we stood on the hospital catwalk, awaiting further instructions.

I was just about to ask if anyone knew anything about the case we were working, but before I could, Cristina walked past with a well-dressed man that I vaguely recognized but could not place a name to that drew everyone's attention. 

"Is that Thomas Evans from Baylor?" Jackson asked and it instantly clicked in my mind. I had read many articles by Thomas Evans. He was an exceptional cardiothoracic surgeon, to say the least. 

"Yes," Meredith answered. "But don't get too excited. He's only here for one case."

"Oh, are you sure?" April asked in her usual annoying, high-pitched voice. "Because I overheard Chief Shepherd discussing the fact that Dr. Altman doesn't have a permanent contract. So it would actually be a really genius move on the Chief's part to go in the seize the opportunity to-"

"-oh, here we go again." Jackson rolled his eyes.

Meredith chuckled. "What?"

"Shut up," April warned, narrowing her eyes at Jackson. 

Jackson ignored April, however, and turned to Meredith. "She thinks your husband walks on water."

"I don't." April tried to deny, but it was already common knowledge at that point. "I don't. I, um . . . no, I'm . . . I mean, it's . . . it's a professional thing. It's, um . . . it's a mentor thing. He's . . . he's just my mentor because he's . . . he's married . . . to you. And you guys are . . . so great and, um, together . . . together as a married couple and you . . . you are so great."

Meredith looked to Jackson and me, and we could barely stop ourselves from laughing. "Wow." Jackson looked down at April. What had just come out of her mouth was so much worse than any of us had been expecting. 

"I, um, I do . . . I do think that your husband is brilliant, but I'm . . . I'm sure that you think that, too, so . . ." April concluded before shutting her mouth for good on the subject.

Jackson nodded. "That's right."

"Okay. That, um . . ." April mumbled before simply turning on her heel and walking off. 

"Thank you," Jackson told her as she left.

Turning back to Meredith, all three of us stared at each other, a very odd expression on our faces. "Wow." I sighed. "Even I feel weird after that." Both Jackson and Meredith nodded in agreement.