I don't know how I feel about the fact that Jessica and Sarah are leaving. I know the twitter fandom has been attacking Ellen and Krista and Shonda nonstop, but I am not one of those people. I will miss them (more Arizona than April) but I am truly sad because I liked carizona and now japril cannot be a thing (why IS JAGGIE EVEN A THING??)
Okay, so I started writing this a while ago, as you probably can tell. S14 Finale when they played Callie's song had me in tears.
All of these original characters are due to my lack of a better way to incorporate Grey's characters and are based on people at my school. They're not that important anyway.
-
In life, we all strive for different things. Some strive to be great, to succeed academically, socially, financially, and have the world at their fingertips. Some hope to find true love: to find someone that fills the void we all have inside us. To have children, to become parents, to give someone else the happiness you never had as a child. To travel the world and see everything with nothing but some hiking shoes, a bottle of water, and a camera. To find someone that makes you laugh so hard that your insides hurt and you can't breathe. Some want to mix and match. What I learned is this: plans change. Accidents happen. People walk away. People have a million other things they prioritize over you. You have to accept that. You have to be okay with being alone. You have to love yourself when no one else does. That's how you play the game.
It was going to be fine.
It WAS going to be fine.
Right?
How could Cassie even try to make a guess when she had been handed this life on a silver platter? Dead mom who gave her up, unknown father...
She digressed.
"Hey, Cass. You okay?" Meredith tried, grabbing her niece's hand with the hand that wasn't grasping the steering hand of the Lexus. Cassie clutched her purple backpack nervously like it was her lifeline.
She had been in a traumatic car accident a month ago.
She had moved in with an aunt she hardly knew.
She was scared about high school for goodness sake!
She gulped.
"I'm fine." She muttered, coughing to clear her throat.
"Are you sure you want to go?" Meredith's eyes were no-nonsense, but warm at the same time. That had to be a Grey trait, to be capable of being both at the same time.
Cassie swallowed. She could feel the tension in her shoulders building. It was what happened when she got nervous or stressed. She exhaled. "It's the first day of school. It's better to go now and just rip off the metaphorical band-aid."
Meredith smiled. "That's my girl. But, if you really need me to come bail you out, I can be here within twenty minutes. Same with Amelia, Alex, or Maggie. Call them and they will be here."
"Thanks, Mer, but I really think I should stick this one out. Even if it sucks." Cassie's stomach knots tripled in size as Meredith pulled into the high school parking lot.
It was going to be fine.
Meredith pulled up to the front curb, putting the car in park. She turned to her niece. "I love you, Cass. I know I should probably give you a motivation speech, but that's a load of crap and we both know it, so just go and do what you gotta do."
Cassie reached over the center console to give her aunt a hug. Her aunt gave her a squeeze before releasing. Cassie let out a deep breath. She opened the door and bounced out of the Lexus without a second thought. She had to walk into the building. Just one step at a time.
Her legs suddenly weighted a thousand pounds apiece.
She pushed herself until she had walked through the front doors of the school. Clutching the straps of her backpack with her fingers, she shuffled upstairs to her US History classroom. There stood a smiling bald man at the podium in the front of the classroom. He grinned, "welcome to APUSH!"
Where was she going to sit?
Ugh, how awkward.
Her eyes met the ones of a friendly looking girl sitting in the second chair in the middle row. The girl smiled at her, motioning to the chair behind her.
It could not be that easy, could it?
Cassie collapsed in the desk behind her. The girl turned around to face her.
"Hey, I'm Diana. Are you new or have I just never had a class with you?"
That actually made Cassie laugh. The girl was so chill, even a little blunt. "I'm new. I just moved here."
"Where did you live?"
"My uncle was stationed on an island, so yeah..." she chuckled nervously. She was not going to tell every person she met her life story. What were the chances of her and Diana actually hitting it off?
"That's cool." Diana turned back around to greet a boy who sat down next to her in one row over. "Hey, Ben."
Ben turned out to be a shy, smart Indian kid who never left his house because his sisters and parents always assumed that it was to hang out with his "girlfriend" that didn't actually exist.
That's what Diana told her, anyway.
APUSH wasn't that boring, much to Cassie's surprise. Mr. Borg managed to keep them entertained with his bad jokes and singing. She liked this class.
Her next class was Human Phys with Mrs. Pataky, who was a slightly overweight lady with purple streaks in her hair. Diana was in that class too. Ironically enough, Diana was considering a career in the medical field, as she appeared to be incredibly intelligent as well. Diana said she was dying to watch a surgery this year in class.
Cassie really wanted to tell her who her aunt was but was also unsure as to whether or not high schoolers knew who the Greys were. She just thought it was so very ironic that the first person who talked to her was a science nerd.
They sat next to each other again, and Diana once again turned around to talk to some other person. She seemed to know everyone, and everyone seemed to know her.
Cassie wondered if she would ever reach that point too.
Pataky introduced her class to the rules and syllabus and then began a presentation on general anatomy. Cassie listened actively and watched Diana take notes with twenty different colors of pen. Towards the end of class, Pataky came over to give Diana a piece of paper. She scanned it before putting it in her green folder. Cassie managed to scan the top, that read "Med Academy."
Hm.
"Hey Diana, what was that piece of paper?"
"Oh, it's just for this thing I'm doing. The local hospital is having their surgical residents bring high schoolers on rounds with them. It's during school, so I have to adjust my schedule and all of that stuff. You should totally do it next year!"
"Is it too late to sign up this year?"
"I mean, it was super competitive to get in, and it does start tomorrow. You could ask Pataky though if it's something you're really interested in."
So during her lunch, Cassie went back up to Pataky's room. She was nervous; her palms were sweaty; her heart was pounding.
"Hey, Cassie. What can I do for you?" Pataky asked, looking up from her laptop where she was sitting at her island in the middle of the room.
"I was just wondering about the Med Academy thing. Diana told me about it, and I was kind of interested. Is it too late to sign up?"
"Not for a Grey it isn't." At Cassie's tilted head, Pataky just laughed. "I admit, I was curious about whether or not you were related to Ellis."
"You knew Ellis?"
"I used to work at Seattle Grace many moons ago. It's a very small world. I also worked with Richard to jump-start this project. It's something we have been working on for a long time. I think that you would be a great addition to their team. I'm almost certain Richard will let you in." She reached into one of her desk drawers. "I'm ninety-nine percent sure that your guardian will say yes, so just have her sign this form so that the counselors can change your schedule around. Do you have a lunch?"
Cassie nodded.
"Okay. It shouldn't move everything around that much then." Cassie turned around to walk out, but Pataky wasn't done. "Give Meredith my regards. She probably doesn't remember me; she was a small, small thing when I met her."
Cassie smiled in response. Was she ever going to go to a school where she wasn't immediately known for being related to a surgical god?
Not that she was complaining.
She took the form with her and headed back to where Diana was sitting in the cafeteria, taking bites out of her turkey sandwich. She looked up, eyeballing the piece of paper in the teenager's hand. "You got it?" She asked, disbelief filling her features, her mouth full of half-chewed sandwich. "That's amazing!"
Cassie chuckled nervously. "Yeah. I guess they did have room for one more person. Hopefully, I get to start tomorrow with you guys."
Diana turned her head to Ben. "She got in!"
Ben smiled at her from where he was sitting. "That's great, Cassie! If I was into that medical stuff, I'd probably be jumping in joy for you. Come on, sit with us!"
Cassie dropped her bag to the ground. She sat down, feeling pretty normal at that moment. She debated texting someone from the house to tell them. Things were going extremely well! It was more than she could hope for.
Ah well, she'd tell Meredith when she saw her later. She probably was working, either operating or doing some sort of work on a trauma patient.
She couldn't wait to tell Mer.
-
Mer prayed to the gods- Lexie, George, and Derek- that Cassie would come out of this day okay. She couldn't explain the feeling she had that something bad was going to happen that day. The last time she had gotten that feeling, she had almost died from holding a bomb in a body cavity. She was not going to let Cassie get some of that bad luck.
Amelia had been actively avoiding Meredith in the hospital and had chosen to do her other patients first. Meredith didn't really care; Amelia was being... weird.
The patient she was currently with was calm, asleep even. He seemed like such a family man. A father. Someone who's first thought in the morning was their kids. There was a time in Meredith's life where she would have given anything to have that too. As she grew older, the void slowly went away, but more voids came to fill its place.
It happened so fast. She was in the midst of cleaning up the trauma room and gathering supplies to treat her patient, and the next thing she knew, she was up against the glass of the wall. She blinked again, and she was on the floor.
And the first thing she thought of before she blacked out? Cassie. Her sweet, sweet, Cassie.
"Oh my god! Meredith! Page... page everyone!"
Her whole family of doctors shuffled in in groups. Alex, Maggie, Webber, Bailey, Kepner, Torres and Robbins. Amelia popped in sometime later and sunk to the ground. She had done this. She had left Meredith alone with this guy because she didn't want to be with Meredith and then she had gotten attacked.
She could feel whatever sobriety she had left slip from underneath her fingertips.
...
Little Grey was standing alone in the front lobby of Grey Sloan Memorial. Lexie looked around, the building was evacuated, and there was not one person in sight. Except for the woman in the dark blue scrubs with the ferry boat scrub cap coming down the stairs. Her face lit up once she saw her brunette sister standing at the bottom of them. She skipped down the stairs.
"Lex!" She squealed.
My sister died out there.
I don't know what it's like to have a father, but I do know what it's like to have a sister. And it's good.
"Mer! What are you doing here?" Lexie's face turned to one of concern. Mere didn't hesitate at throwing herself at her sister. God, she missed her. She loved her.
"I think I'm dying. Where's Derek?" Mere asked, looking around. "If you're here, then he is too, right?" She didn't even seem concerned that she was talking to her dead sister. No, she just wanted to talk to her dead husband, even if she was dead.
"Mere-" Lexie tried again. Her sister could not be so nonchalant about seeing her dead sister. It meant something bad was about to happen. She had seen her own mother when she had been drifting away under the plane. "You need to start fighting. You can't die! What happened? Cassie-"
Lexie wanted to smack her sister. She was standing there in dark blue scrubs. Lexie had never gotten the opportunity to wear those attending scrubs. She dreamed of being the head of neuro after Derek retired. She couldn't let her sister give up the life she was lucky enough to still be living. "Do you hear yourself Mere? You're giving up! You cannot give up! You have my daughter! She's a part of you now! She's never going to get to be a part of me!"
Meredith sighed. "I know. Cassie is amazing. I wish she would have gotten the chance to meet you and know you. You would have been a phenomenal mother, Lexie. You are her mother. She will always be a part of you, and you will always be a part of her."
"I waited too long, Mer. I died under a plane at 28 years old! I had it all planned out: I was going to get with Mark, and we were going to get Cassie back and raise Cassie together and Sofia together! They deserved so much more! Cassie thinks I didn't want her! That was not true in any way. I thought I was doing the right thing by giving her away for a little while. She deserved better than Dad being drunk all the time and me being busy with school. That little girl, my daughter, deserved the world. And that is not what she got."
If this was real, if she was really talking to her dead sister while she was fighting for her life, she had to ask. "Who is Cassie's father?"
Lexie turned away. "Meredith-"
"No, tell me. I am talking to you right now. You've been dead for years and I am standing here having a whole conversation with you. Tell me. Is he still alive? Is he in Seattle? Does he know about-"
"Cassie's father is... he's dead, Meredith. Joel Harris."
"Cassie deserves to know. I won't get to tell her..."
"That's crap and you know it," popped in Mark. "Sofia is growing up without a father. Your kids will never know their father, and now you're depriving them the chance of having a mother! Because why? Because you feel sorry for yourself? Listen, we'll wait for you up here! Forever! There's no rush! Live your life! Give your kids what I couldn't give mine!"
"Mere, I need you to tell your kids about me, and their cool uncle Mark, and their dad with the dreamy eyes and overrated hair. No one else can. You have to take Zola to buy her prom dress, and see her down the aisle and graduate med school and climb the ranks at Grey Sloan Memorial. She needs to know who it was named for. And Bailey is going to need dating advice, and Ellis is going to need stories about her father. And there's only one person who can do that. You." She ran a hand through her hair. "You need to give Cassie everything I couldn't. I've been watching you. She's everything I dreamed of and more and you, you're doing a way better job than I would have done. You need to be there for her graduation, and her wedding and her med school graduation and you need to be for her because I can't."
...
"You can't work on your family!" Webber screamed.
"Everyone in this damn room is her family!"
...
Meredith opened her mouth to respond, but then George popped in, "I know it's been a while, but... I've seen your kids. I've seen all of the things you've been through. This isn't it for you. You've survived much worse."
"George?" Mere felt a pang of guilt. She had seen so many people come and leave, so many had died, and she hadn't thought of George in forever. She missed him. She missed him and Izzie and... Izzie was somewhere, but George... George had been here, watching over her for almost ten years.
"Mer, I don't care if you don't think of me. I wasn't the love of your life or your sister, I was just your roommate, your kinda brother..."
She sighed. "You're here, which means you are important to me. You are. You all are. You will not be forgotten by me."
"Hope not."
Then the love of her life popped in, then and there. He looked younger than the last time she had seen him before he left for D.C. He looked like he had the day they had met.
"What's your story?"
"Nothing, I'm just a girl in a bar."
He had shrugged. "I'm just a guy in a bar,"
"Derek..." She let out, running at him, putting her lips against his. It may have just been a dream, but it was the best kiss they had ever shared. God, she missed him. She missed him and their family and everything they had fought for.
"You need to keep my sister in line. Amelia is a hurricane." He joked, wrapping an arm around Mer. She looked at the four of them. She couldn't believe her eyes. It almost made her forget all of the people on Earth. These were her people.
"Maggie is a great sister." Lexie cut in. "It's kind of funny how you are with her, considering how you were with me." She was slightly hurt by this, but Maggie was nice. It was not her fault Meredith had treated Lexie like crap. It almost made her smile when Meredith had told Maggie she already had a sister.
"You are my kid sister. She will never replace you."
"You have to go back to them. They need you. Tell them about me." Derek begged. "I love you." He kissed her again, and Meredith almost wished she was dead.
...
Mer blinked multiple times to get her vision clear. She saw a blob that looked like Maggie... and another blob that resembled Alex. "Mer? Can you hear us?" He asked, standing from the chair.
Maggie stood up. "We're so glad you're okay!"
Their lips were moving.... so why couldn't she hear them?