The fire department was having a big picnic gathering to raise money the day after Maya's evaluations. They'd been planning on going, Carina wasn't sure if she'd still want to after the previous day but she did, she needed a distraction and they could always leave if she needed to. So they were pulling up at the park a bit before it started. Carina parked and got out as someone came over looking annoyed.
"Hey! You can't park there, that's a handicapped spot and you clearly don't need it! Move your car!"
Carina ignored him, walking around to the trunk and opening it to get Maya's chair.
"Hey, don't ignore me. You need to move your car. Handicapped spots are not for unloading, get back in your car. You can carry whatever you have from the regular parking" the guy insisted
"Move" Carina says to the guy now blocking her from getting to the trunk. He didn't so she walked around him to get the chair, lifting it out of the trunk.
"Why do you have that? You clearly don't need it, you're taking things away from people who need it." The guy continues, getting in her way again.
Carina just moved around him again, going to the passenger side and opening Maya's door. The guy continued following her, refusing to give up.
"I'm sorry" Carina whispered to Maya as she reached over her to unbuckle her seatbelt. The guy was right behind her still going on about how she needed to move and shouldn't be taking wheelchairs from people who need them. Maya wrapped her arms around Carina's neck and she lifted her out of the car, carrying her to her chair and putting her down. Then she closed the car door and started positioning Maya and strapping her in.
"Am I disabled enough for you?" Maya says "Or do I need to snap my neck up a bit higher so I can't breathe to qualify for this spot?" Then she turns around and started pushing herself away, Carina following her. Then she turns back toward him "also, it's accessible parking, not handicapped. Carina let's go find 19"
Carina understood what Maya meant, she wanted to be pushed but couldn't ask for it. Carina took over pushing her chair and they went to find the rest of 19.
Once they joined 19 they were having fun. Maya couldn't move herself around on the grass which she didn't like but Carina or someone from 19 would always help her. Her neck and shoulders were sore from all the testing the day before but she was trying to ignore it and enjoy the day. The combination of pushing herself the day before at the evaluation and being pushed around on the bumpy grass was causing her legs to spasm which was hard to ignore, she hated spasms in general but especially when she was in public, people always stared. Of course it was her luck that the angry guy from the parking lot walked by while she was having one of her more intense spasms, one leg bouncing while the other had kicked out off her footrest entirely.
"Hey! Why are you faking? You want nice parking that bad you're going to sit in a wheelchair all day? How did you even get that wheelchair?" The guy started yelling. At first Maya was confused why he though she was faking. Why anyone would pretend to be paralyzed was beyond her but why would he think she was faking when she couldn't even use her hands. "If you're going to pretend to be paralyzed to get pity you shouldn't move your leg!" He continued.
Maya realized what he was talking about then, her spasms. The involuntary, often painful muscle spasms she would get anywhere in her body that made it difficult to do anything.
"I am paralyzed, why would anyone fake that? My legs are spasming, I don't have any control over it, its signals trying to get through my messed up, severed spinal cord." Maya replies, not being able to ignore him anymore. "Do you even know what a spinal cord injury is?"
"Of course I do, I'm a trained firefighter and medic, this is a firefighter picnic, what are you doing here?" He says.
"Probie! What are you doing?" Maya hears someone shout, Andy she realizes.
"I'm-" he starts but Andy cuts him off. "No, I know what you're doing, you're being rude and disrespectful to a superior. What station are you from?"
"Station 82. I'm sorry Captain, I wasn't trying to be disrespectful to you, you weren't even here. I was just trying to get this woman"
"Captain Bishop" Andy cut him off again
"This woman that you have been harassing is captain Bishop."
"What? She should be the one getting reported, she's pretending to be paralyzed, that's not acceptable." He says, annoyed he's getting in trouble and still clueless.
Andy looks to Maya, wanting to know how she wants to handle this. Maya decides to speak up for herself.
"I am not faking anything, I am quadriplegic, I have no feeling or movement from the chest down, I had a muscle spasm." Maya says, even though she's told him this already.
"Really? Prove it"
"I don't have to prove anything to you, I don't owe you an explanation."
"You should really pick your story better, you can't pretend to be a fire captain and be paralyzed"
"Andy, I want to leave." Maya says, looking to her best friend. This whole interaction made her hate the fact that she couldn't move herself even more. Andy was immediately by her side.
"Where are we going?" Andy asks as she grabs the push handles of Maya's chair.
"To find the captain of 82, then maybe chief Ross." Maya says, making Andy smile.
They found where 82 was set up but unfortunately ran into someone else before they found the captain.
"What are you doing here?" Maya asks coldly as she sees Beckett, in uniform.
"Bishop, still milking it from that little crash I see. You should really get over that, it's been what, 6 months?" Beckett says, cocky as always
"I should get over it? That little crash? You mean that night 6 months and 5 days ago when you chose to ignore information on field conditions and make decisions with no information to protect your ego resulting in the crash that broke my spine in multiple places? I know exactly when that was because that is the night that my spinal cord was severed, that my neck was broken. I am a C5 quadriplegic, do you have any idea what that means? Because I do, I know far too well how that means I can't feel or move anything from my chest down, my hands and wrists are paralyzed. I rely on other people to do everything for me because I can't do it myself and this is permanent. So no, I'm not going to 'get over it'" Maya says, fuming.
Beckett lost the smirk as she talked at least, when she stopped he didn't say anything, just stood there staring at her.
"Andy can you please take me to Carina now, I need to leave" she says, looking back at her friend.
"Of course" Andy says, moving them away from Beckett before pulling out her phone and calling Carina, telling her to meet them at their car.
"Will you talk to the captain for me? Or maybe just chief Ross." Maya asks while their waiting for Carina by the car. "I don't want to talk about it anymore and I need to go lay down."
"I'll talk to both of them about everything."
"And the guy was harassing Carina too when we got here, for parking."
"I'll tell them that too. His behaviour's less surprising now that I know who he works with."
Carina arrived then. "Is everything okay?" She asks
"No, I'll tell you later. Nothing's physically wrong, other than my neck hurting but that's not new. I just need to go home right now."
"Ok, come here." Carina says, unlocking the car and opening Maya's door then getting ready to pick her up. When Carina lifted her she held her for a few seconds longer than usual, knowing something was wrong and that was enough for Maya to start crying. Then Carina put her in the car and went around to get in herself, Andy having already put the wheelchair in the trunk.
When they got home Carina went to get her wheelchair out of the trunk and her phone started ringing.
"Carina, someone's calling me and I can't get my phone" Maya called to her. Carina came and pulled out her phone, telling her it was Amelia, answering it for her and putting it on speakerphone.
Amelia had the results from her scans and evaluation and wanted her to come for appointment. She said she had an opening and wanted them to come right away so Carina put her chair back in the car and drove to the hospital. They were both nervous that Amelia wanted to see her right away, they went straight up to her office.
"Your evaluation showed a decrease in movement and strength compared to a PT report from a 2 months ago. Originally everyone thought you were just struggling more from being off therapy while on vacation then being sick but you've continued to decline since starting therapy again. You also mentioned you've been having more neck pain and spasms recently, which would also be from this. It's nothing drastic or sudden which is why it wasn't noticed sooner but looking at your scans there is compression of your spinal cord again. You had compression and fractures to your cervical vertebrae in the accident which was treated with immobilization and traction and improved. We considered surgery to stabilize your spine like we did on your back but determined it wasn't necessary. These results show that your spine is still unstable and surgery is necessary." Amelia says. Maya and Carina just listen, shocked by what she's saying. Amelia just waits, letting them absorb the news.
"Why didn't you do the surgery originally?" Maya asks when she finally feels like she can speak.
"Your original surgery was long and you weren't stable enough to stay under anesthesia for several more hours, you also needed traction to improve the compression. After that it appeared to be healing well on its own. This type of surgery comes with risks it didn't seem necessary at the time."
"What kind of risks"
"The main concern with spinal surgery is damage to the spinal cord"
"So it could make her paralysis worse?" Carina asks, speaking for the first time.
"Yes, it could cause damage higher on the spinal cord."
"What happens if I don't get the surgery?"
"Your spine in your neck is unstable, causing your vertebrae to shift and compress your spinal cord. Without the surgery you will continue to have increasing pain and your movement and sensation will continue to decline as your spinal cord is compressed more. It's impossible to know how you will be affected."
"So it might get worse if I do the surgery and it might get worse if I don't"
"It will get worse if you don't, we just don't know how much worse. I strongly recommend getting the surgery and we should book it for as soon as possible."
"I just need to think and process this."
"Of course, why don't we have another appointment on Monday and you can always call or text me if you have any questions before then."
"Grazie Amelia" Carina says. Maya didn't say anything, very overwhelmed with all the information she'd just received. "Let's got home bambina."
"Hmm? Ya, home, bye Amelia." Maya says, very distracted by her thoughts.
When they got home Maya asked to lay down in bed so Carina got her settled in bed and was going to join her but Maya asked for some time alone so she went out to the living room. It only last about 15 minutes before Maya was calling for her.
"Sorry I told you to leave, I was just overwhelmed. I'm sorry, will you stay? If you still want to, I understand if you're mad" she rambles.
"Bambina, it's fine. You're allowed to want space and time alone, this is a lot to process, I'm not mad." Carina reassures her, climbing into their bed with her. "What are you thinking?"
"More surgery terrifies me but so does the uncertainty of not getting surgery. And if we're going to have kids, we need to know what I can do."
"You want kids? Do you want to talk about this now?"
"I want kids I'm just scared and have no idea if I could do it. And I need some more time first, to get past this surgery stuff and figure out how it would work before we start anything."
"Of course, I'm not ready yet either."
"I'm not ready to commit to it but I want to keep talking and figure out what it would be like."
"That sounds perfecto. Do you want to talk about the surgery or not yet?"
"We can talk about it. I know I should do it I'm just terrified it will make things worse and feel like it's going backwards. I was finally figuring out how to do normal things again and this would mean more time in the hospital and maybe more in-patient rehab and I just want to try to move on with life."
"I know, I wish we could just move on too but I don't want you being in pain. And I know you are, you're not good at hiding it from me."
"I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't hide it, I just don't like pointing it out and talking about it, it's hard."
"You've gotten much better about it. What do you want to do for the rest of the day?"
"I don't know, I need to lay down for while, I can't be in my chair right now." Maya says, even though she hates admitting it.
"That's ok, I'm going to go make something for lunch, do you want anything?"
"Not right now."
They mostly stayed home for the next few days. Maya had physio one day which was hard, since the meeting with Amelia she'd been noticing what she couldn't do a lot more and physio didn't help with that, realizing that she couldn't do things she'd just relearned a few months earlier. Her and Carina discussed the surgery more and knew she had to get it. They went to the next appointment with Amelia with lots of questions about what the surgery and recovery would look like.
Amelia explained the surgery, she would go in through the back of her neck and possibly also the front if needed and fuse C3-6. Her injury was from C4-C6 with the most damage being to the C4 and 5 vertebrae. After surgery she would wear a neck brace for a few weeks while everything healed. Amelia recommended that Maya return to inpatient rehab after the surgery to get the best results and discussed different rehab centres with them. The rehab unit at Grey-Sloan had been fine but Amelia was recommending going to a larger, more specialized rehab facility this time. They also discussed the risks, there's a chance the surgery would cause further injury to the spinal cord resulting in a higher injury and less function but it's unlikely. Its more likely that the surgery could cause swelling or spinal shock which would result in more paralysis after surgery but would improve in the weeks after surgery. Amelia discussed the possibility of diaphragm paralysis which was their main concern if there was any further injury because Maya had just avoided that with her initial injury. Amelia had to ask what she wanted to do if she couldn't breathe on her own after surgery, how long she wanted them to wait before doing trach surgery, understanding that if she couldn't breathe she'd have to be sedated and intubated until trach surgery. Amelia reassured them that even if she wasn't breathing on her own and needed a trach she would probably be able to wean off a ventilator eventual and that there was not a huge risk any of these complications would happen. It was a very hard conversation and Maya wanted to back out of the surgery entirely when Amelia started talking about not being able to breathe on her own but she didn't and eventually decided with Carina to follow Amelia's advice- if she wasn't showing any signs of improvement in her ability to breathe 3 days after surgery they could place a trach. They booked the surgery for 2 weeks later.
When they got home after the long, stressful appointment Maya realized something else she needed to do before having this surgery.
"I think I need to call my mom" She says to Carina once they were settled on the couch together.
"Ok, do you want to do that now?"
"Ya, I'll never do it if I wait"
"Ok, do you want me to stay or give you privacy?"
"I think I need to do this by myself but can you stay close?"
"Of course, I'll just be in kitchen making lunch. Just call if you need me. Are you comfortable on the couch?"
"Ya, I'm good. Can you give me my phone?" Carina put her phone on her lap and went to the kitchen.
"Hello?"
"Hi mom"
"Maya, I haven't heard from you in so long, how have you been? How's Carina?"
Maya didn't respond, unsure what to say, regretting deciding to call her. How does she say this. How do you tell your mom that you snapped your neck and are paralyzed AND that it happened 6 months ago and you didn't think to call her.
"Maya? Is everything ok? Did something happen with Carina?"
"No, Carina's fine, we're fine, well I'm, um, I don't..."
"Maya, what's going on?"
"Um, I was in an accident at work and um, I..."
"Maya, you're scaring me, are you ok? Are you hurt"
"So, um, the aid car lost control and rolled and I was in the back so I got thrown and-"
"That sounds really bad, did you get hurt?"
"I broke my spine"
"What? What does that mean?"
"I have a spinal cord injury, I'm paralyzed"
"But, you'll get better right? That's bad but you just need time to recover."
Maya paused again, pulling herself together.
"No, I'm not going to get better. The accident was 6 months ago, I'm not going to get better."
Now it was Katherine's turn to pause.
"So, what does that mean? Can you walk?"
"No, I, my injury is very high, I'm quadriplegic, paralyzed from the shoulders down, I got some arm movement back. I was doing pretty well but uh, there are some issues, I'm going to have another surgery soon but it's fine. I'm ok, Carina and I are figuring it out."
"Maya, why didn't- no, sorry, it wasn't your job to call, I should have been checking in. I'm, I'll come visit. I mean, is that ok, can I come visit?"
"Um, sure, I guess, but you don't have to."
"Of course I do, I haven't seen you in so long and you're my daughter and you're hurt."
"Ok, just, don't tell dad any of this, he doesn't know and I don't want him too."
"Of course, I won't say anything."
They talked for a while longer, it was awkward but that wasn't new for Maya talking to her family. Eventually she came up with a reason to end the call and Carina came back in. Maya told her a little about the call but mostly didn't want to talk about it. Carina knew that it would have been very hard on her so she didn't push, she just sat down next to her, moving Maya so she was laying against her and held her. Maya started crying and Carina continued to hold her, then started crying herself. The day had been too much for both of them. They held each other for a long time until they had both calmed down.
A/N
I think this is the longest chapter yet! Thank you all for all your suggestions, I think the consensus is all the ideas. So here's the start of my first idea and I'll be working the rest in too. Three seems to be the most popular, it will be a few chapters before I get there but I will definitely include it.
Thanks so much for your support and ideas💜