Liliana's pov
"Hey beautiful" Jackson says walking over to me at the front desk
"Hey" I sigh dropping my charts on the desk and leaning against it
"What's wrong with you" he says noticing the the tone of my voice
"Nothing, I'm just exhausted" I say. I barely got any sleep last night because after only being home for a little while, I got paged to come back in for a surgery so right now I'm only functioning on 2 hours of sleep and I felt like a walking zombie. I had absolutely no energy.
"Long night" he asks
"Yes. I thought after I finished surgery I would have enough time to take a quick nap, but the surgery ran way longer then I expected, so I didn't get the chance to. Now I'm exhausted and I have a migraine" I yawn
"You should go try to get some rest while you have a little free time before your next surgery" he suggests
"I can't. I need to go do a post op check on my patient" I tell him, giving him a kiss before walking away to the patients room.
"Why are you still in here" I ask seeing Riggs in the room examining our patient. He joined me to operate on the patient this morning, but I thought he would be out of the room by the time I came back to check in him
"Just doing a post-op exam" he says
"Great" I mumble dryly
"Dr. Garcia, is this Mr. McColl" Penny asks walking into the patients room
"Yes, Blake. Why" I ask folding my arms. I was not in the mood to deal with Penny today and most days I don't have to, so I was confused as to why she was even in my presence at the moment.
"The patients wife is down stairs" she says
"Why are you telling me this. Where's Edwards" I frown
"Dr. Webber mixed us up today. I pulled your service" she says
"No" I shake my head
"No" she asks
"No, where's the wife" I ask
"She's downstairs in admitting" she says
"Okay, you can leave now" I say motioning for her to leave the room.
"Dr. Webber told me..." she begins to say before I stop her
"Tell Dr. Webber I said no" I frown, before she walks out of the room
"You don't like a lot of people do you" Riggs asks
"Not really" I shake my head. After Riggs finishes examining the patient we go downstairs to update the wife
"Surgery? Oh God" his wife gasps as we tell her what happened
"Well, his heart rhythm had become very erratic, probably due to electrical shock so I had to implant a pacemaker" Riggs explains
"Oh no. Poor Griffin" she sighs
"The other concern is Griffin suffered a brain bleed, which I operated on" I say
"A brain bleed" she frowns
"Your husband will be awake soon, and we'll know more then" I explain
"Oh, he's...Well Griffins not my husband" she begins to say before another lady walks up to us
"Hello Lena. How's my husband. I understand he's been in a terrible accident" the lady says side eyeing Lena before turning her attention to Riggs and I
"I'm sorry. We thought you were the wife" Riggs says to Lena
"I am the wife. She's the slut he's been hitting on the side" his wife says flashing her ring for us to see
"It's been 11 years, Gayle" Lena sighs
"How is Griffin? Is he dead" Gayle asks
"His accident was severe. He needed surgery on his heart and his brain" I inform her
"So he's almost dead" Gayle asks
"We can take you to see him if..." I begin to say before she stops me
"I don't want to see him until he is dead" she says. I was definitely surprised at her reaction to hearing about Griffins condition. I've been a doctor for years now and I don't remember having any of my patients spouses hoping that they would die.
"Um, why don't we just take a step back and look over some paperwork I need you to sign" I say. I leave Riggs with them before I go grab the paper work. When I return I see that Penny is back, so I hand Riggs the paperwork before pulling her to the side to lecture her about giving us the wrong information.
"If I had known she wasn't actually his wife..." Penny tries to defend herself
"You should've known. It's your job to know" I frown
"You're right. You're absolutely right. I just didn't..." she sighs
"No excuses. Get your facts straight before you let me go spilling medical information to just anybody. You embarrassed me" I scold her
"I'm sorry. She said that she was his..." she apologizes
"Why are you even here? I told you to go talk to Webber" I frown
"Dr. Webber said that he chooses to decline your proposal" she says
"Well then take the freaking day off" I sigh
"I tried. Dr. Webber rejected that too" she says
"Fine. Watch his monitor. Do not touch him and stay the hell out of my way today" I say before walking back over to Riggs who was still talking to Gayle.
"Dr. Garcia" Penny says after Riggs and I finish talking to Gayle
"What" I answer
"Mr. McColl's waking up" Penny says before Riggs and I follow her into the patients room
"What? Who the hell are you" Mr. McColl asks Lena who was by his side as he sits up
"Mr. McColl" I say
"Griffin it's me. It's Lena" she says
"You've been in a pretty bad car wreck. You've had surgery" Riggs explains
"Where's Gayle? Gayle! Where's Gayle" he asks leaning up and looking around the room
"Griffin, just relax okay. You need to calm down" Riggs says as we try to get him to lay back down
"Bugs! Help me. Bugs" he yells
"He's hallucinating. Give him 5 of haldol" I say to the nurse
"Bugs" he continues calling
"He's calling me. I'm bugs. He hasn't called me that in 30 years" Gayle says walking into the room
"There you are. Bugs, come here" he says motioning for Gayle to walk over to him so she does
"Honey, what's happening" he says. It was obvious that Mr. McColl is suffering from some type of memory loss. We have both Lena and Gayle leave the room so we can examine the patient and after we finish Riggs goes to speak to Gayle while I talk to Lena in the hallway.
"He doesn't remember me at all" she asks
"A brain injury of this nature, it's not uncommon for some memory loss to have occurred" I say
"We've been together 11 years. He wanted a divorce, but she wouldn't. Can I talk to him? Help him remember me" she asks
"He's still confused and agitated. It's best if you wait out here for now" I say before walking into the patients room
"Her? I took up with that lady? Why" Mr. McColl asks Gayle as he glances over at Lena
"Because you're a stupid son a bitch, that's why" she answers
"Heart rates looking good" Riggs says after checking his heart rate
"Wait, why would I take up with her when I have you. My wife. You are the funniest. She is. She's the funniest gal I've ever met and you've got the softest hands" he says. He begins to ramble on and on as I check over his vitals.
"It's like a time machine" Penny says to me
"I'm good here. You can go" I say not looking up at her as she walks out of the room. After Riggs and I get through examining Mr. McColl, we leave the room.
"I'll come back in a little bit to check his vitals" he says as we walk down the hallway
"Make sure Blake's watching the monitors once you come back up" I say
"What is Blake's problem? What don't you like about her. She seems on top of it to me, so what am I not seeing" he asks
"She's just..." I sigh
"I'm the new guy, so if she's the dead fish I'd like to know" he says
"Not that it's really your business, but it's personal between her and me. You're free to form your own conclusions" I say
"That's kind of you. Must be nice for Blake" he says
"What does that mean" I ask
"Oh come one. You and Hunt are obviously really close friends. I'm sure you've formed some conclusions about me" he says
"Yeah, I have because Hunt is my friend and I have his back. You and I are not friends, so what I think about Penny should not have any effect on how you feel about her" I say before walking away. I go to an on-call room to take a nap, but a short while after I fall asleep I get a page that I'm needed in Mr. Collins room, so I rush to his room, by the time I get there I see that Penny is helping Riggs work on the patient.
"What the hell are you doing" I frown as I start putting on my gloves
"His ICP was through the roof. Evidence of herniation. He needed a burr hole to..." Penny begins to say before I interrupt her
"Relieve the pressure. Don't tell me what a ventric is" I frown. "Why would you let her do this" I ask Riggs
"Cause she caught it and she could" Riggs says making me roll my eyes
"Get out of my way. Get away from him" I say trading spots with her
"Ventriculostomy catheter" I say to the nurse as I work on him. After I stop the bleeding we have to go notify Gayle.
"His C.T. showed that he's having a rebleed. I will operate, but the fact that it's bleeding again...it's not good" I sigh
"And when he wakes up, will he be the same or..." Lena asks
"Will you please go away. This is between me and my husband. So please go" Gayle frowns before Lena goes back to the waiting area. "Will he be the same" Gayle asks
"There's no way of knowing" I sigh
"I just got him back. I lost 33 years with that old jerk. Only a man that I could love that much would make me feel so angry. I just want him back. I just want to have the chance to love him again" Gayle says holding back tears
"Blake, go find Edwards and tell her to meet me in O.R. one" I whisper before walking away
"Garcia, you don't have time to go chasing around after Edwards. You need to be in there now" Riggs says following behind me
"And you need to mind your business" I frown
"Look I know you don't like me and you don't like Blake and I'm not asking you to change that. I'm asking you to put our patient first. We need to get him up to the O.R. now and we don't know where Edwards is or if she's in surgery right now, but we know that Blake is here and available" he says
"Fine" I sigh. "Blake, just follow me" I say causing her to follow behind me to the O.R. We get scrubbed in before starting surgery.
"I want to tell you what I did and why" Blake says as we operate
"Blake, I don't need your excuses now" I sigh
"It's not for me. It's for you. I think you'd like to know what happens when you're not here. Edwards says you like that" she says
"Just suction" I sigh
"I was tracking his vitals. He was bradying down slowly and becoming hypotensive. He had a dilated pupil. All classic signs of raised intracranial pressure. I knew that he needed the ventric, so I asked Dr. Riggs to prepare it. He thought I was qualified. I knew I was qualified" she says
"More suction" I say. "Then what" I sigh
"I used your craniometric method for the drilling site...prepared it adequately. I identified Kocher's point at 11 centimeters, then..." she continues to explain every step that she did as I operate. No matter how much I dislike her, I can't lie she did everything that she was supposed to. I keep operating, but the patient begins to herniate and flat line.
"Should we keep packing. Should we resuscitate" Penny asks me
"No. He's gone. He herniated again. He was brain dead minutes ago. Time of death 18:09" I sigh
"Did I...Was it what I..." she asks
"No. No. You didn't do anything wrong. You were perfect" I sigh before walking away to scrub out
"He didn't make it" Riggs sighs when he sees us in the hallway and I shake my head no
"Should I find Gayle" Riggs asks
"No, I will. Let's go Blake" I sigh before we leave to find Gayle. I hated having to tell people when their spouse or family member has died, but it's part of the job. After Penny and I told her the news, I left to change out of my scrubs. As soon as I finished Jackson and I left to go home. We had dinner, before going to take a shower and laying down.
"Hey, are sure you're okay. It seems like something's bothering you" Jackson says
"I'm just tired and I have a headache" I sigh
"And" he says
"And I lost my patient today and Blake..." I sigh
"Blake lost your patient" he asks
"No. Blake was perfect as much as I hate to admit it, she was. She has microscope hands, a level head, more assured in the O.R. then any resident I have ever seen, kind of reminds me of myself as a resident. She's a natural neurosurgeon and now I feel like I have to teach her because that's my job" I sigh
"You want to know what I think" Jackson asks
"Yeah" I nod laying my head on his chest
"That if you don't want to teach her, you don't have to, but because you're such an amazing mentor and doctor, you should or you're going to regret it later" he says
"You're completely right" I sigh. Penny will never be my favorite person. I know she didn't actually kill Derek, but it's just every time I look at her face I picture Derek. I picture Jackson telling me that he died, I picture seeing his casket lowered into the ground and having her around just reminded me that he was gone. But I'm a surgeon and as a surgeon I have to push my feelings aside and find a way to teach her no matter how hard it is.
I'm so excited for Greys tonight! I know it's going to be so good. What did you guys think of last weeks episode?
Thanks for reading, please vote and comment!