Chapter Thirty-Four

"I have one last thing to say." Hunt said as he began to wrap up the attending's meeting. "Some of you, uh, may run into Arizona Robbins today. It's her first day back. So if you see her, just make her feel welcome."

"Or maybe ... maybe just don't make a big deal at all." Callie spoke up from where she was standing next to me. "It might be better."

"Noted. Thank you." Hunt nodded as everyone began to stand up to leave, but he quickly stopped us. "Oh, oh, hold on. I just want to address one more thing. Um, most of you are aware that a group of our doctors have filed a lawsuit against our hospital. Some of you may be wondering what this all means and how it's gonna affect our staff. I'd like to be clear. It doesn't ... at all. Let's just let the lawyers worry about that. That's their job. Our job is to continue to work together and support each other in giving the great standard of care that we have always given. Let's not let something like this get in the way of that. Thank you."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"Howards, I heard you dropped out of the lawsuit." Webber commented as soon as I walked over to the nurse's station, finding him and April both there, looking over charts.

"Yes." I gave a short nod as I handed some discharge paperwork over to a nurse.

"Why?" He asked, not letting my simple answer go.

"I don't think this is something we should be discussing here at work." I tried to sound as polite as possible as I said this, not wanting to come off as rude.

"Well, I'm glad your sister likes the view, but I'm the one who has to put on the poufy dress. You know what? This conversation is over." All of us looked towards Bailey as she headed our way, her arms full of charts and her cell phone to her ear. "Well, I love you, too." She paused for a comment, a small smile making its way onto her face. "Red panties and a lace bra." She glanced back at us to find our eyes on her and her eyes widened instantly as she ended the call. "He wants to have a Christmas wedding ... in a-a rustic mountain lodge with red ribbons and mistletoe and a tree with ornaments made of our photos."

"Aw." April smiled at the idea. "That sounds beautiful."

"No, it's stupid." Bailey disagreed instantly. "What kind of self-respecting man cares this much about a wedding?"

"I did." Webber pointed out, looking at her with raised brows and his arms crossed.

"Yeah, but I did the wedding thing before." Bailey shook her head, trying to come up with an excuse. "I'm gonna make all those people who showed up the first time sit through another ceremony because, uh, maybe I'll mean it this time? You were there with Adele. You got me a set of ramekins."

"And I'd be happy to get you another set." He offered.

"He'll get the ramekins and I'll get the cliché his and her towels." I grinned.

"I want to get married in a field with wildflowers everywhere and butterflies that are released when I say "I do." Oh, and I want to have these little mints that say "Mint to be."" April smiled at the thought of a wedding of her own. "You get it? 'cause they're mints ..."

"There will be no mints." Bailey shook her head. "We're going to the courthouse, have a little cocktail party after."

"Yeah, we'll see about that." Webber scoffed. "A man who puts down a deposit is a man who means business."

"Well, he has till the twelfth to get his money back. That's two days." Bailey told us as she walked away. "He'd need two years to get me to agree to a wedding With Santa Claus running around."

"You have to admit that she has a point." I spoke softly enough to make sure that Bailey wouldn't hear me as she continued to walk away. Webber just shook his head in silent laughter as he walked away himself.

"Wait, today's the tenth?" April looked up from her papers with widened eyes, panic shining clear in them.

"Yeah, why?" I asked. Instead of answering me though she hurried off, as if there were fire licking at her heels.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"You paged?" I asked Meredith as I joined her and Derek in radiology.

"We have a male with a prominent grasp reflex." She informed me.

"What do you mean?" I raised a brow at her.

"He has a mesio-orbital frontal lobe tumor." Derek pointed out on the scans.

"Clemens claims that it's too far along to operate, he wants us to send him home. I wanted both of your opinions." Meredith added, a frown pulling down at her lips.

"If Clemens said that it's inoperable-" I began to say at I looked over the scans myself, but she quickly cut me off with a shake of her head.

"No." She refused to accept it.

"Meredith, Bria is right." Derek tried to tell her.

"He's a father. His whole family's horrified to be around him." Meredith tried to explain to us, but I didn't take my eyes off of the scans. Looking at them I could feel my brows furrowing. "I thought we could help him, but Clemens says it's inoperable."

"Clemens is wrong." I spoke up, causing Meredith to look over at me with wide eyes while Derek only nodded in agreement.

"He is." Derek voiced his agreement.

"I thought so." Meredith smiled widely at the news.

"All right, I'll page Clemens, let him know that he's an idiot." Derek told her. "After that Bria can operate on this guy, if she needs any help I'll be there to walk her through it."

"Derek, I can't do as well of a job as you can." I pulled his arm to keep him from following Meredith out into the hall and made him look at me. "While Clemens is wrong about that tumor being inoperable, I'm not the best person for this surgery. Someone else should operate."

"Like who? Clemens? Nelson?" He scoffed.

"No, but not me either." I tried to get through to him.

"Why not?" He pressed. "Bria, I've seen you operate on tumors that are more complex and intricate than this one. Why are you saying that you can't operate on this one? What is it?"

"Derek, that was years ago, over half a decade ago." I reminded him.

"And?" He asked. "Bria you were a brilliant surgeon. You are a brilliant surgeon. No matter what happens that can't change, you can't lose that. Your skills are a part of you. They can't be taken away. So what is the real reason for your not wanting to do this surgery?"

"That's the point, I'm not the same person Derek. I'm not the surgeon that I once was." I shook my head, feeling the tears that were starting to fill my eyes. "I'm not the same girl that you left behind in New York. I'm just not, I've grown. I've had my heartbroken. I've lost pretty much every person that I've ever cared about. I've become the role model for a teenager. I've gotten pregnant. I've had more breakdowns then I can count. And I've changed. I'm not the Bria that you left behind when you decided to pick up and move to Seattle to try and forget your old life. I'm just not that girl."

With every word that I spoke the tears began to escape my eyes, slipping down my face like the dripping of a leaky faucet. Within seconds I felt Derek's arms wrap around me, pulling me into his chest, hugging me tightly. I just cried silently, burrowing my face into his chest and letting the tears fall onto his scrub top, dampening the dark material.

In that moment I felt as though the past six years of my life had never happened. It felt as though Addison had never cheated on Derek, that none of them had ever moved across the country, leaving me in New York. It felt as though I'd never gotten that phone call that had sent me to my knees, crying out for Dylan as I struggled to breathe. It felt as though I had never given up operating in the first place. It felt as though I had never been abandoned, cheated on, forced to grieve, or struck to the core with the type of news that people had nightmares about. It felt as though I had never been forced to face my greatest fear. In that moment everything seemed to be frozen, stuck in a second of familiarity.

.

But, just like every other second of bliss it had to come to a crashing halt. It had to be left behind for the cursed thing in life that everyone dreads.

.

"I can't do this surgery." I whispered, my words slightly muffled by Derek's shirt. "I can't."