so no trauma?

“You can’t break a hundred?” Gabriela asked, her voice sharp and impatient as she thrust the crumpled bill towards the barista. She’d been waiting in line for her coffee for far longer than she would have hoped to be for being in the hospital this early. For whatever reason she’d been fed this time, she had to be in the hospital for a 7.30am start which in her books wasn’t a good sign when it came to the world of law. Only bad things happened that early, and she’d be damned if she didn’t have a hazelnut latte in her hand when it happened. “Well can I come and pay you later? I’m one of the hospital lawyers, I’m hardly going to run away and never come back.”  (@traumasstart​)

Jo tapped her foot impatiently as she waited in the never ending line. The coffee was always worth it, but sometimes she just wanted to grab the carafe herself, pour the cup, and move on with her day. She was always nice to the workers, but other people in line...they irked her. Especially on a morning where she hadn’t had time to eat breakfast. She sighed under her breath, waiting for the woman in front of her to pay for her beverage. Something about carrying around a hundred dollar bill always screamed privilege to Jo. But, then again, she had lived in her car. “You know what?” Jo said, forcing a smile onto her face as her impatience took over. “I got it. It’s on me.” She said, putting her money down on the counter quickly. “I’ve got her, uh, latte and just a coffee please. Strong. Strong coffee. Thanks.” She turned her body towards the woman a bit. “You’re probably going to want to break that somewhere else. I don’t any of the carts here have enough change to, uh, break a hundred.” 

“Thrilled to see all three of us annoying her all day.” She smiled. “For once. Not really, I convinced my friend to move into the apartment next to mine. I go on a lot of Tinder dates but other than that nothing.” A lie of course. Her life was crazier than ever before. “I actually have it quite pathetic. So sounds like I need to make you food, too.” 

"Oh, she’ll love it!” Jo said, grinning wide. Bothering the Lincolns was a skill she hadn’t gotten to exercise in a while. Of course there was a lot of time she had to make up for. “You’re on Tinder? I tried some of those apps when I was in Portland, but I swear it’s so hard to find someone who is both flexible and not too interested in the fact that you cut people open for a living.” She tucked some stray hair behind her ear. “I’m not...going to say no to that...I can never say no to food. This is pretty perfect. Link has offered to assemble my furniture, you’re making me meals, I’m gonna love Seattle.” 

Ariana had been in Seattle for a few days getting herself and her kids settled in and today was her first day at the Seattle Grace Wellness Centre. She grabbed a coffee on her way and when she arrived she took a sip and the lid of her coffee had come loose and soaked her in coffee, all over her brand new white blouse. “Crap!” She exclaimed trying to wipe it to the best of her ability. Great start, Ariana. She went into the main hospital, empty coffee cup still in hand to see if she could find something to clean herself up with. “Great first day, right?” She spoke as she scrubbed her top with some paper towels as she felt a presence beside her.

Walking through the front doors of the hospital had finally begun to feel like a habit rather than something out of place. Jo had finally begun picturing Seattle Grace when she referenced her place of employment. No matter what else she had going on, at least she had stopped feeling so much like the new kid in school. Waltzing into the hospital, Jo had an incredible vantage point to watch the disaster unfold for the woman a few feet away from her. Like a train-wreck, she couldn’t tear her eyes away as the woman’s beverage went from hand-to-shirt in a matter of seconds. “Ouch.” Jo remarked to no one in particular, chuckling a little bit to herself. She looked around, wondering if she should be a nice person and offer some assistance or shrug it off like the rest of the world was doing. She decided some karma points wouldn’t be the worst thing for her. Jo stepped over, about a foot away from the woman furiously scrubbing her top. “Yeah, that’s not going to do it.” She straightened the strap of her bag on her shoulder. “Well, welcome to Seattle Grace. You’re off to a great start.” She pointed over the woman’s shoulder. “And there’s a bathroom over there if you want to try and save the shirt. Or at least, maybe a little bit of dignity?” Jo joked. 

     He laughed slightly. “I’ve only worked at Seattle Grace for three years but I’ve lived here for nine, so I’ve heard and seen some of the things this place had to hold,” he informed her, thinking about how he had been in university when some of the more major events had happened and to the few that had happened during his employment… Seattle Grace Mercy Death was certainly an unfortunately fitting nickname. “You want to step into a psychiatrist’s office… willingly?” he sounded amused, “I might need to get that in writing.”

She tilted her head. “So a lot of the stories are true.” She shifted in her chair, leaning a bit more on her elbows. “That kind of sucks. I mean, you hope they’re just exaggerations, but I guess to get a nickname like that...sucks.” There wasn’t a more eloquent way to put it. Jo had obviously done some research into the hospital before arriving, but there were always things that didn’t make the paper. The brunette took a sip of her drink, almost choking a little bit as Emmett spoke. “Me? God no. I mean, I’ll go lie down on your couch for sure, but I’m not going to lie down on your couch.” She emphasized the words as she spoke. Jo did not see herself in therapy, even though she knew it helped many people. Great. Awesome for them. It just wasn’t for her. “But I will gladly come hang out in your office anytime. Especially if I need to hide from my interns.” 

“I’m the chief resident, I gotta know when there’s a new one of you running around the place.” April said with a laugh, flashing the other a cheerful smile as she moved with purpose through an increasingly busy ER. “Keep that enthusiasm Wilson, if this trauma is as bad as I’ve been told it might be, we’re going to need enough positivity between the both of us to get through it. Get then gown on like 30 seconds ago and meet me in the ambulance bay.” She instructed, pausing for her next remarks. “You’re not an intern any more. You’re a resident. Which means you get a little bit more responsibility with every year, and it’s important you know what you’re doing. I take it I can trust you?”

Jo chuckled to herself. She hadn’t exactly ever been labeled as positive before. Although, surgery did have the power to make her practically ooze with excitement. And the promise of an incoming trauma had her beaming on the inside.  “Oh absolutely, Dr. Kepner.” Jo said, forcefully grabbing the gown and starting to throw it on. “How bad is the trauma? I mean, if you’re letting me switch services, it has to be something good. Well, not good....traumatic, of course, just....big?” 

addison took a deep breath while trying to gather her thoughts towards the whole situation, before looking back at the resident. “you don’t know her story dr.wilson. you have no RIGHT and are in no position to judge her for leaving him here at the hospital which could actually be the safest place possible for him.” addison hated being stern with interns and resident, but there was always a time and place when it came to patients and how they were supposed to be treated. “i agree that we need to advocate for the patient, but you do realize that she was your patient too? do you think it was easy for her to make the decision to just leave her baby here and walk away from a person she carried for nine months? we don’t have a choice in whether she decides what’s best for her and the baby, all we can do is talk to her about her choices and help her along the way.” 

Jo scoffed, albeit involuntarily, but she couldn’t believe the words that were leaving the attending’s mouth. “She is still writing her story right now. Writing her baby’s story. And you know what it says on the first page of that kid’s story? It says my mother abandoned me.” Breathe. Jo took a deep breath in, not finding the intake of air to calm her much. She had compassion. She had empathy. She did. She was that doctor for so many of the patients that she saw day in and day out. But this mother? How could she have compassion for her in this moment? She couldn’t empathize with her choice. “You’re right, I’m choosing to advocate for the newborn baby who can’t speak for himself. He is the patient that needs me. Maybe it wasn’t easy for her, but do you think it’s going to be easy for him? Do you really think he’s going to be better off because when things got hard, the woman who gave birth to him decided to walk away? You really think that’s better?” Her nails pressed into her palms like a siren going off. “Because it’s...it’s crap, Dr. Montgomery.” 

“Psychopaths, duh.” He answered  her argument of who didn’t like waffles.  “Hey, I can do that. I put that bookshelf together in my apartment? The one that we had to buy beer and Playboys for that old neighbor to let us borrow his truck to get?” He said and paused to look at his watch. “Okay. wanna join me in a hip replacement? I know it’s not fun or cool but the wife of the patient makes good cookies and said she baked some for me.” He didn’t need help, but he thought they could catch up and hang out on old times. “Unless you’re too busy doing resdient stuff.”

Recalling the memory made Jo shudder. “Ugh. I swear that guy didn’t even own a real shirt. He only ever wore those muscle shirts.” He wasn’t anyone too worth remembering, but he served as another reminder of the memories she had made with Link. The opportunity to make more excited her. “Seriously?” She playfully swat his arm. “You’ve been holding out on me already. The only ‘resident stuff’ I actually want to do is get in on cool surgeries, duh.” Jo shook her head. “But your hip replacement will have to do for now. As long as I get cookies too.” 

Larissa rubbed at her temples, her feet propped up on the desk of the nurses station in front of her. Somehow she’d managed to be closest nurse for the last four codes in the cardiac ward, and that in combination with what felt like the longest shift of her life, the brunette was exhausted. Her eyes had found themselves closed as she took a moment for herself, an attempt to somewhat centre herself, knowing there were still a couple of hours left before she would be able to go home. The feeling of another hovering near her had her looking up slowly, her eyebrows coming together in a slight frown. “Did you need me for something, or just watching a girl rest her eyes?”  (@traumasstart​)

Jo’s first rotation on cardio at Seattle Grace has been interesting to say the least. She’d done cardio rotations before, but the multiple patient codes mixed with the constant bellowing of the woman in 604 really started to wear on her. The sun had set ages ago, but from within the walls of the hospital, it was very hard to tell what time of day it was in the outside world. That’s something Seattle Grace and Vegas has in common. Her need for caffeine was pressing, and if there was anything she had learned over the past year, it was always keep the nurses working the late shift with you happy. They are not enemies you want to wake. Plus, Larissa had pretty much been a godsend so far on this shift. Jo set the coffee down on the desk, about a foot away from where Larissa’s legs were. “As much fun as that would be,” Jo said, leaning against the desk, “I thought you’d enjoy a coffee much more. I’m not sure how you take it, but since the coffee cart’s closed, there isn’t much hope of finding a non-expired coffee creamer in this place.” 

➡ MOODBOARD 002: JO WILSON & ATTICUS LINCOLN

“ the sun is gonna shine again. you just gotta get twenty minutes east of wherever you are. ”

     “If Seattle Grace was going to shut down it would have happened a long time ago, so I can say that you don’t have to worry about that,” he assured her, though he looked at her more closely at the remark… but that was a question for another day. “Emmett Layton,” he introduced himself, “I would say my office isn’t cushy, but it is, but I was hoping a change of scenery would be enough of a procrastinator combatant, clearly it’s not doing the job properly,” he shrugged slightly, “but that isn’t your fault.” he quickly added. 

“Mmm,” Jo took a bite of her sandwhich, only taking a moment to try and chew through before she spoke again. “When I matched here, people kept saying the nickname for this place was Seattle Grace Mercy Death. I thought they were kidding.” She took a sip from her drink. “I hoped they were kidding... how long’ve you worked here?” Stability. She just needed a little stability. The resident leaned back in her chair. “I’d say you can tell me to leave, but I am not squandering the only real meal I’ve had in the last 48 hours.” She quipped, shrugging her shoulders. “Unless you want to stay here and I’ll go hangout in your cushy office. That I’ll gladly do.” 

“Don’t we all need caffeine? She’s going to be very busy.” Ryleigh laughed. “Correct. It’s definitely hell, it gets really confusing.’ She shrugged. There had been plenty of times where they had paged the wrong Shepherd. “I am absolutely successfully avoiding the drama. Oh, definitely not. Although, beware of the on-call rooms. Just knock before you enter.” Ry raised an eyebrow. She had made that mistake one too many times. “Of course. See, but you are also a resident so i’m not surprised. He has no excuse.” 

"Lucky, lucky Harriet! She’s going to be so thrilled.” Her eyebrows twitched up. "I’m thrilled you’re avoiding the drama...anything not-so dramatic going on in your life? C’mon Ry, I have to live vicariously through someone, and you’re one of three people here I actually know.” Just because Jo didn’t have much of a social life didn’t mean that she couldn’t pry into other people’s. “Have you ever seen me try to use the stove? I think hee and I are, tragically, hopeless in this area.”

“You were.” He agreed. Jo was like another member of his family, and they even blamed him, thinking it was his fault that he “scared Brooke away”. “They were the best. I liked how we had waffles for meals instead of whatever crap they called food in college or cheap ramen.” He wrinkled his nose at the thought of having to ever eat ramen again. “I’ll help you. I’m great at putting things together! I am an ortho god after all.”

Jo lightly smiled as she looked down. The pause between them lingered for a moment. You were. Past tense. Just like her friendship with Link and her connection to his family. She’d let that disappear. Maybe this was her chance to get it back, but she wouldn’t ever really forgive herself for letting it go in the first place. “I don’t know why anyone wouldn’t spend their time eating waffles. It’s cheap; it can be part of any savory or sweet meal...we were honestly on another level, Link.” She laughed. “Yeah, something tells orthopedic surgery isn’t necessarily equal to assembling Ikea furniture. But I will buy you beer if you can figure out how to put a bed frame together.” Jo was actually looking forward to the idea. Hanging out with Link again might be exactly what she needs. 

➡ MOODBOARD 001: DR. JO WILSON

“They’re good. Still divorced, you know, typical parental things. They ask about you.” He said. His parents loved Jo - sometimes he felt like they liked her better than him,m like with how his mom made him sleep on the couch so Jo could have his bed whenever Jo came over. “Well, I was their older brother, they knew I could easily hurt them more if they hurt me. “ He knew that was half true, his sister could easily team up and take him over. “Well, if needed, you could always crash at my place. I have a roommate, but he’s okay. I miss your waffles.”

Jo pouted, moving her hand to her chest. “They ask about me? Ugh, well I was always their favorite.” She grinned. She should reach out to them now that she was reconnecting with Link, but the thought of explaining and re-explaining the whole Brooke/Jo thing made her anxious. “Oh, that damn waffle iron drove me crazy. I think I just kept using it out of spite. I did end up learning to make really good waffles though. Even if they weren’t always…whole.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I’ll eventually buy furniture…I think. But I’d love to see your place; meet your roommate; make fun of your decor decisions.”

For a moment, Jo thought her heart was going to jump out of her chest. Even being a doctor, she wondered if it might actually happen. She took a beat before turning around. “What do you mean?” She smiled, shrugging it off. “You know practically everything about me, Link.”