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some of the world's top trauma specialists have proven that our brains may forget the traumas we survive, but our bodies, especially our nervous systems, always keep score.
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maggie is sat at a table in joe's across from bradley, a resident at the hospital. from behind bradley, maggie can see lia watching her in disbelief from her seat, next to mark, at the bar.
"so... why the heart?" bradley asks maggie. "why biology's crown jewel?"
"you mean why did i go into cardio thoracics?" maggie raises her brow.
"come on. share. share with bradley," he smiles, and maggie briefly darts her eyes to lia who is staring with her mouth slightly agape.
"it was the headset with the magnifying glasses that tipped the scale for me," maggie jokes.
"and the woman has a sense of humour," bradley laughs, and lia gestures to him with wide eyes, as if to say, 'what the hell are you doing?' "i like that."
there is then a moment of silence between maggie and bradley as lia exhales deeply, shaking her head. this is then followed by the sound of bradley's pager ringing.
"oh. work stuff. um, as if you didn't know," bradley picks up his pager and stands from the table. "i'll just be a sec."
when bradley steps away from the table, lia places her drink down on the bar before walking over to maggie, followed by mark.
"is he dying? is that why?" lia asks with amusement as she takes bradley'a seat.
"oh, come on. grow up," maggie rolls her eyes. "he's nice. he asked me out."
"want me to fake a heart attack?" mark offers from where he's stood beside lia. "i do a great fake heart attack."
"here he comes," maggie tells them in a lowered voice.
"carry on," mark nods, pulling lia up from her seat, and back to their seats at the bar.
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memories are stored in our shoulders, spines, stomach or hands, without us ever knowing. we assume a painful backache or shaky hand is something harmless, random, but it could be more.
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"what do we got?" derek asks richard as he meets him in the ambulance bay, followed by bailey and callie.
"high school bus crash," richard reveals, pulling on a yellow trauma gown as another ambulance pulls into the bay. "bunch of kids just came in. we got more on the way."
"tricia hale, seventeen, vital signs stable," one of the paramedics announces as he opens the ambulance doors, and begins to lift the gurney out. "sustained a large facial laceration, trauma to the buttock area and an open fracture to the lower right leg."
"okay, trauma room two," richard nods, handing her chart to callie.
"it's still bleeding," tricia panics as she touches her face, noticing blood on her hand when she pulls it away. "my face is still bleeding."
"alright. we'll get to that in a minute, okay?" callie assures as she and the paramedics wheel her gurney towards the hospital.
"we?" trivia's voice raises an octave. "no, try the head of plastic surgery. no one is touching my face until i've spoken to the head of plastic surgery- no one."
■ ■ ■
"you better be able to fix my face," tricia warns as mark cleans up the wound, whilst lia and callie tend to her other injuries, with the assistance of deluca. "i have pom statewides in a month."
"you're a cheerleader?" callie raises a brow.
"i'm a pom," tricia scoffs.
"cheerleaders just jump around. poms are dancers," mark explains, and lia and callie both look to him in bewilderment. "i was on the football team."
"yeah, i'm not sure you're gonna be doing any dancing in the next month," callie admits.
"you better be lying," tricia turns her head slightly to frown at callie.
"not lying," callie shakes her head. "you have very serious knee and leg fractures, not to mention a cracked coccyx."
"what the hell is that?" tricia winces.
"that's the bone at the bottom of your spine," andrew tells her.
"huh?" tricia's brows knit together.
"the bottom of your bottom," lia simplifies for her.
"my ass?" tricia's eyes widen. "i broke my ass."
"that's one way to look at it," deluca shrugs.
"don't look at it," mark shakes his head.
"okay, you're gonna need surgery," lia informs. "but the good news is that we'll put you under so that we can fix the bones and dr. sloan can fix your face all at the same time."
"you better be good," tricia turns to mark.
"baby, you're not gonna find anybody better than me," mark assures and lia scoffs, rolling her eyes.
■ ■ ■
lia, mark, and maggie are all sat eating lunch in the cafeteria when maggie notices some of the girls from the bus crash looking over.
"is it me, or are there teenyboppers staring at you?" maggie uses her head to gesture to the girls, and both lia and mark turn to glance at the giggling teenagers.
"i get that a lot," mark boasts, nonchalantly. "it started when i was their age, never really went away. how else do you think i got your sister to marry me?"
"is that so?" lia challenges, raising her brow.
mark uses his hand to beckon the girls over, and one of them, emma, stands immediately, but her friend, jamie is hesitant. emma pulls at jamie's arm to encourage her, but she continues to protest before eventually giving in.
they both then giggle, their arms linked, as they walk over to the doctors' table, stopping a few feet in front of mark.
"what can i do for you ladies?" mark asks with a charming smile, and lia rolls her eyes.
"tell him," emma urges.
"no, it's- it's embarrassing," jamie shakes her head.
"you can tell me," mark encourages and lia shakes her head.
"you look exactly like her dad," emma reveals, and jamie nods to confirm.
mark's expression immediately changes, becoming shocked as his mouth falls slightly agape. lia and maggie both laugh as the two girls walk away from the table, giggling.
"swing and a miss," lia chuckles.
■ ■ ■
lia is helping tricia to settle comfortably into the bed in her patient room, as her friends, molly, ariana, and courtney stand watching.
"will she be able to sit on her butt again?" molly asks lia. "or will she have to carry around one of those toilet seats for the rest of her life?"
"she'll have full use of her butt in a few weeks," lia assures as she moves from tricia's bedside to the foot of the bed so that she can update her chart.
"i am so, so honoured to be filling in for you as captain," molly steps forward to tricia's bedside.
"you're filling in for me as captain?" tricia furrows her brow.
"i prayed on it, and god seems to think it's the right move," molly explains, and lia frowns.
"oh, okay," tricia hesitantly shrugs.
"oh, and i don't want you to worry. i called randy, and i think i might have convinced him to still take you to homecoming even though your face and your butt's all messed up," molly reveals, and lia shakes her head, but keeps her eyes on the chart in front of her.
"i bet he'll take you," courtney adds. "he's classy that way."
"okay, so now that we've established that randy's a classy guy, visiting time is over," lia shuts the chart and turns to tricia's friends.
"bye, sweetie," courtney says.
"i hope they don't ruin your face," ariana offers a half smile.
"go!" lia orders, and the three of them all turn and walk out as tricia's eyes begin to well up. "kinda sucks, huh? little manicured vultures."
"my life is over. my life is over," tricia sobs, and lia steps back, looking at her with slight horror and bewilderment.
■ ■ ■
"you think she'll recover full function of her knee?" deluca asks during tricia's surgery.
"i hope so, 'cause if she doesn't get back on the pom-pom brigade, her life is totally over," callie changes her tone for the final part of the sentence to imitate tricia.
"man, you'd think the way they treat her, she's be ready to ditch the whole thing, but no," lia adds.
"of course she's not gonna walk away from that. it her life. it's her identity," mark defends, but doesn't take his eyes off his work in front of him. lia and callie, however, turn and give him a look, but he doesn't notice. "it's the only way she understands herself in the world."
"mm-hmm," lia chuckles. "callie, did you know one of the, uh, sweet young things told mark he looked like her dad today."
"harsh," callie laughs.
"what does that have to do with anything?" mark frowns.
"well, you just seem really empathetic to her plight, you know? loss of identity, shattered self-image," lia explains, but mark doesn't respond he just scowls slightly at his wife and her best friend.
"you have a hot wife, dude. what does it matter what a couple of teenagers think?" deluca shrugs, not taking his eyes off the patient, so he doesn't notice the look mark is giving him or callie trying to stifle her laughter.
"i really don't like this kid," mark shakes his head.
- - -
it might be our bodies reminding us of what we've endured and warning us not to let it happen again. trauma doesn't tell time. it can't tell if we're eight or fort-one, if our kids have the chicken pox or if we have the biggest surgeries of our lives to perform.
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lia and mark are sat across from maggie, his arm draped around her shoulders, at a table in joe's when bradley enters and approaches them.
"cardio twins. dr. s," bradley greets. "how are we this evening?"
"hiya, bradley," lia smiles, and looks at maggie with amusement, but maggie doesn't share this expression.
"maggie, do you think i just could talk to you for one quick minute?" bradley requests.
"yeah. have a seat," maggie nods, and lia and mark both stand up with their drinks, enabling bradley to take lia's seat.
"remember, heart attack," mark mouths to maggie from behind bradley whilst tapping his chest, before lia pulls him towards the bar.
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and when it sneaks up on us, it's easy to think we're right back at square one. but the truth is, even when our brain convinces us we're lost, if we try hard enough, our bodies always remind us there's a way back. and prepares us for whatever fight lies ahead.
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