It was finally Saturday, the last day of what had been a very long week and the morning was appearing to be as gloomy as she felt. She took her coffee with a thanks to the barista before making the journey through the hospital to her office. The whole week had been filled with meetings, and she was missing the rush of the OR. She had some free time today, considering the board didn't work on Saturdays, and she half hoped to be able to scrub in on something, anything.
Ellis and Richard's surgeries had already been taken over by the general surgery team, so she couldn't take one of those. It would probably end up being a case of trolling the ER for something to do. She hadn't spoken to Derek since he had been in her office on Monday, and stealing a case from under his nose felt like a good way to end the week.
She quickly loaded up her laptop, checking through her emails and sending out a few replies before closing it again. She used the adjoining bathroom to change into a pair of indigo scrubs, fastening her hair into plaits against her head. She put her trainers on and felt a sense of relief to finally be out of heels for the first time all week.
"Oh, Dr Grey!" She was greeted by the voice of April Kepner as she entered the OR, "I'm so glad to see you."
"How can I help, Kepner?" Meredith asked, raising an eyebrow as she met her by the admissions desk.
"I was waiting for Dr Shepherd, but I think he's caught up in a surgery, can I borrow you for a neuro consult?" Kepner asked, bringing up patient details on the tablet she held and passing it over to Meredith.
"Sure, which room?" Meredith asked as she read over the information already in the chart, taking it all in and memorising it.
"Room 3, Wilson is already in there with the patient," April said as Meredith's eyes flickered over the age of the patient. Seven. She took a breath before looking up at Kepner.
"I'll go in there now," she told her and April nodded, turning to the computer to presumably update the case.
She entered the room and immediately zoned in on the patient, setting the tablet down before pulling on gloves and sitting in a stool beside the young girl who sat with white gauze pressed against the back of her head by Dr Wilson, a fourth year resident.
"Good morning, Emma is it?" Meredith asked, addressing the girl directly with a warm smile, who nodded with a slight sniffle, appearing as though she had just managed to stop crying.
"My name is Meredith, Emma, and I just want to have a little look at your head and make sure everything is working properly, is that okay?" She asked.
The girl nodded again, having not yet spoken, and Meredith gestured for the resident to pull the gauze away so that the injury could be inspected more closely. Tenderly, she inspected the area, her fingers ever so slight against the girl's scalp, hearing an audible whimper from the girl and immediately pulling her hands away. She sat back down in the stool, eye level with her again.
"Who's here with you today, Emma?" Meredith asked, her gaze flickering up at Wilson a moment.
"Sarah, my babysitter," the young girl muttered softly.
"And where is she?" She asked, looking up at Wilson for the answer this time.
"Oh, she is in the waiting area," the resident said with a slight frown, "she went to call the parents."
"Shall we bring Sarah back in here, Emma? Is that okay?" Meredith asked the girl now, wanting to be able to get more of a history about the girl.
Emma nodded and Meredith looked to Wilson, who seemed to just realise she'd meant for her to go and get the babysitter and left the room.
"How did this happen then, Emma?" Meredith asked as she continued her examination of the girl.
"My head hurt, and I couldn't see and then my head really hurt because I fell over," Emma told her, her eyes starting to tear up again.
"You're being really brave for me Emma," Meredith assured the young girl, "When Sarah gets here I'm going to go get a few things to help with your head but then I'll be right back okay?"
Emma nodded just as Dr Wilson returned with who she supposed to be Sarah who announced that Emma's parents would arrive soon. Meredith slipped out of the room after instructing the resident to stay with them, taking the electronic chart with her to update the notes.
She picked up a suture kit, lost in her own thoughts as she thought about what Emma had said and the symptoms she had witnessed just being in the room with her. They were definitely going to need to get her an CT scan.
There had still been no sign of Derek in the ER when Meredith had returned from taking the young girl for the CT scan, having promised to stay beside the girl since her parents couldn't go in the room. She now left Emma in their care in one of the rooms on the paediatric ward while she went to seek out the scan results and blood test results.
She was still lost in her own thoughts when Yang approached her, almost startling her out of her skin.
"You're being jumpy," Cristina said, narrowing her eyes at Meredith.
"Yeah, I just have a patient I need to get results for," Meredith said with a slight frown.
"Oh you have a patient?" Cristina asked, "is this your first patient whilst being acting chief?"
"Yeah, seven year old girl, suspected brain tumour that's probably pressing the optic nerve," Meredith explained as they walked in the direction of the lab for the results she needed.
"Are you okay?" Cristina asked, genuinely concerned now.
"Cris, I'm fine, I've got it," Meredith assured her as she got the results from the lab, simultaneously receiving a notification to her phone, pulling it out to see the scan was ready for her.
"Okay, if you say so. Page if you need me," she said, her hand resting on Meredith's shoulder a moment before she walked away.
Meredith found herself back in the ER after viewing the scans, ready to speak to Emma's parents about the results but she was intercepted by Derek before she could leave the ER to go up to the paeds floor.
"Dr Grey?" He asked, about to reach for her arm but thinking otherwise when she all but glared at his outstretched hand.
"What do you need Dr Shepherd?" She asked, one hand on her hip, "I have places to be."
"Kepner said you took my consultation," he asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Your point?" She asked, her arms crossing over her chest.
"I mean, I can continue on the case if you're busy," he said, seeming to catch on to her not so pleasant mood toward him now.
"Dr Shepherd, when it takes you or anyone from your team over two hours to see a child with a head injury it doesn't look good. I may have stepped on your toes two weeks ago when I told you to sort your department out, but now it's my job," she told him, standing up straighter now, "if you're having problems with that, I need to know."
"Right, Dr Grey, sorry," he said, realising she wasn't even close to teasing him about this right now.
"I won't have enough time to pick up the slack and I won't always be here to do it either," she said to him, "there needs to be improvements by the end of the next week before Dr Grey returns."
She carried on to the paediatric ward, evidently ending the conversation with Derek. She had more pressing matters to deal with. She needed to speak to the girls' parents and get a surgery scheduled for her as soon as possible.
After a long conversation with Emma's parents and scheduling a surgery for her to resect the damn near impossible tumour, Meredith headed straight for her temporary office, just about ready to head home. She was beyond done with today. She opened the door to her office, stepping inside and turning to close the door, only to be stopped by Derek who just seemed to appear from nowhere.
"I'm getting you a bell to wear permanently," she frowned, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Can we talk?"
"Yeah, sure," she sighed.
She turned back into the office, sitting in the desk chair as he closed the door behind him, sitting in a chair opposite.
"I wanted to apologise, for what happened today," he said, "explain it."
"Oh?"
"Yes. I had Nelson assigned to ER today and it seems he doesn't understand that it wasn't an option... which I've already spoken to him about and as soon as I realised he hadn't responded to the page for the ER, well that's when you saw me. I'm not excusing any of it and I'm going to make sure it doesn't happen again."
"I understand you were in surgery but it's important that inside and outside of the OR, your team knows who is supposed to be where and when. And it isn't up to you to do everything," she said, opening up the laptop in front of her as she spoke, "You've already emailed that over to me about Nelson?"
"Yeah, I've sent it through for you to sign off on," he nodded.
"Good. I... today it's good that I was there and the wound itself wasn't a pressing issue. But it won't always be like that, which I'm sure you're aware of."
"I am, and I've already been thinking of ways to avoid this in the future. There's a few residents I believe will be declaring neuro over the next few weeks so I can look at adding them into rotation, I've also emailed through to you..."
"A request to add a fellow position to the department?" She raised an eyebrow, opening up the email he'd sent to her.
"Yes, there's definitely room in the budget and if I can get the right person in... I have a feeling one or two of the current attendings' roles are at risk if they don't change their behaviour quickly."
"Forward thinking, okay," she nodded, reading over his proposal, "I'll run it past the board and speak to Richard... Dr Webber, over the next week and get back to you."
"Is there anything else we need to discuss?"
"Not right now, unless there's anything else you have? It's getting late."
"Nothing that can't wait," he shook his head a little, and she noticed the look in his eyes change.
"Okay, I'll see you on Monday then, Dr Shepherd," she said with a small smile before standing up, closing her laptop and starting to pack up her things.
"Dr Grey..."
His voice was a lot closer now and when she looked up he was standing beside her, his hand was reaching out to touch her forearm.
"Bells, I'm getting you bells," she murmured.
"I was hoping we would still be going for that drink tonight," he breathed.
His fingers trailed over her skin as he took her hand in his, and she looked up into his eyes.
"Oh, shit."
"You forgot?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I... maybe," she chewed her bottom lip.
"Oh, I mean, if you have other plans..." he started.
"I don't, I was just going to go home, I could, we could," she felt herself stammering a little as she spoke.
"I'll pick you up at 8, then? Or maybe a little later?"
"I think... nine would be good. Yeah, nine is better."
"And where am I picking you up from?" He chuckled softly, leaning toward her a little more.
"Oh, yeah," she grabbed a pen and scribbled her address on a post it note before handing it to him, "here, my address, and there's a bar just down the street, we can go there."
"Sounds good, I'll see you at nine then," he murmured, sliding the post-it into his pocket.
A soft gasp escaped her lips as he leant forward and pressed his lips to hers, his arm sliding around her waist and gently pulling her closer. Her lips responded automatically to his, her hand resting at his neck for the duration of the kiss.
"There'll be more of that later," he breathed softly as their lips parted.
She felt a slight warmth of a blush on her cheeks as her teeth caught her lower lip, watching him walk back out of the office. She as totally done for.