how to save a life

arizona began to reconsider asking for help. perhaps she ought to just go with things like she usually did - get in too deep before asking so that no one could say no to her. “i just need you to make a few arrangements. not even that- you just have to pick up the cake and go to the store with this receipt-” she rifled around in her pocket to find what she was looking for. “and the box in the trunk of my car. it was sofia’s birthday present but it’s broken and callie told me not to buy it so she can’t know it’s there and i checked your schedule so i know you can. twenty minutes. maybe thirty in traffic. please?” she smiled in a way that was supposed to be encouraging. a moment passed. “i will owe you one favour. one. and it can’t be weird. or really difficult. or expensive. but one favour.”

“of course it does.” gabriela loved her sister, but there were some things that she was better off staying out of. ignorance was bliss, and when luciana started her latest online venture, that’s when gab took a slight step back from the details. at least diego’s cousin was able to keep something of an eye on her. “and you think i’m going to have the key to all of your present problems?” she asked, still barely looking up from the file in her hand. she let the question hang for a second, too much of a perfectionist to now ignore the request. “when do you need it by? how long do i have to figure it out?” 

diego stared down at gabriela as if her rhetorical question wasn’t so rhetorical. in the short time he had known her, there hadn’t been a single thing she hadn’t been able to fix or do for him. this wasn’t an exception. he tilted his head, thinking of how long was until his tía’s birthday. “a week and half?” he tried his luck. “two weeks tops. you know how badly post office works.”

despite the time that had passed, some things didn’t change. but if you’d told addison a few years prior that this might be where she’d end up, then she might not have believed you. there had been too many factors at play for her to consider that perhaps she might be happy in seattle, with the practice, able to share a bottle of wine with mark sloan. “there are a lot of things i might have thought i’d never see.” she said, smile carving out on her face with the smallest of laughs. she paused, hand wrapped around her wine glass, gaze lingering on his face. “do you ever think about how things could have been different?” she asked, a wave of nostalgia washing over her as her mind was flooded with memories. “how else things might have turned out?” the mention of us went unsaid. 

sofia hadn’t expected amelia to open up to her so quickly, if she was being honest. she’d of course heard things through the grapevine –– how could you not, when you worked at seattle grace mercy west? gossip was like a currency, especially amongst the other nurses, and learning things about the people you worked with came even if you didn’t want it. she’d never pry though, never want her friend to feel as though she had to tell her anything that she wasn’t ready to talk about. everyone had their chapters they didn’t talk about. sofia was no different on that front. “yeah, i heard.” there was a soft expression on her face, one that would have told amelia that this was a safe space if she wanted it. “that’s –– that’s awful, amelia. i’m so sorry.” a hand reached for the others, giving a gentle squeeze. “it’s a horrible way to lose someone.” there was a pause of her own this time. “i lost my best friend in a fire. it’s not quite a fiance, and it was years ago now but –– i know the hurt. i know how much it sits with you. so if you ever need to talk about it ––” the sentence practically finished itself. 

peter’s already-limited confidence faltered at her initial reaction. he opened his mouth to backtrack - only he didn’t have to. his smile was immediate, but he dampened it down, not wanting to seem too eager. “if… if you want it to be a date. it doesn’t have to be. but it could- it could be nice. fun. a fun date.” he swallowed back his nerves. “is that- is that something you’d be interested in?”

Walking in he frowned. “Swim lessons?” He raised an eyebrow. “Hell, dad just threw us in the water and said good luck kids!” Justin laughed at the thought. “Whatever, if that’s what Tommy wants then so be it but I still want to see my niece.” He smiled. Grabbing the beer from his sister he sat down. “No, I didn’t kill someone. My attending did.”

juliette laughed along with holly, the coincidences of their lives seeming to add up more and more, not knowing that they were actually talking about the same person as if they were separate individuals. though not for long, with jules continuing to talk about bradley. “i don’t know if we can figure anything out ––” she started, sighing as she thought about her latest conversations with him. “–– brad’s just good. and i’ve been a lot worse than good to him, he just deserves a lot better, you know? better for him if i just stay away, probably.” she explained, though even she couldn’t ignore the slight pang in her chest as she thought about it. her face morphed into one of slight surprise though, as she was filled in on the information she’d missed out on since she and holly lost touch. “oh holly, i’m so sorry. do you mind me asking what happened? you guys seemed like you were set when i saw you together.”

“oh, c’mon, jules, i don’t believe you.” sure holly always saw the best in people so it was hard to imagine her friend being a bad influence on anyone. most importantly, she felt like she was still the same person she had connected with back at doctors without borders. “you’re a good person too. a great person, actually.” she said with a convincing smile. “i’m sure if you allow yourself to be truly happy, he’ll surprise you. brad, right?” the name didn’t sit well with her. but there were a lot of brads... could be a short name for bradford? brady? her mind was racing with the likelihood of them talking about the same person.

if tommy wasn’t so invested in figuring out where his- “aha!” he ducked down behind his work bench in the garage and retrieved the fallen saw. the smile of pride on his face lasted all of three seconds. “what? no. we’re not calling diego. he’ll say some shit about how i should have went with his tree guy.” and probably laugh at his predicament. no. he could fix this just fine on his own. besides, he only needed one person giving him ‘i told you so’ eyes.

shaking his head, tommy approached the door into the house, stopping to face his wife in the doorway. he looked at her with the most arrogantly confident look he could muster. “i got this, babe. trust me.” a kiss on her forehead offered little reassurance as he went back to the living room to battle the tree stump. “you can measure floor to ceiling.” since he was the one that made the mistake last time. “then i’ll just-” tommy made a noise imitating a clean cut, motioning towards the tree like he would simply be karate chopping off the offending piece of wood. the boyish glow in his eyes betrayed the fact he was more excited than he should be about this messy change in plans. 

“because he had smaller trees?” brooke was too quick, set on dying on this hill of not needing a 7 foot tree. her serious look lasted all of five seconds until she semi melted under his kiss and rolled her eyes at how annoying he could be. times like this she remembered how stubborn he (they) could be, all the way back to sharing a lab table in biology class. like the one time he was dead set on the start hour for the ac/dc concert they’d gone to as teenagers and they ended up missing half the show.

he glanced over at the moment her head laid on the desk, a chuckle escaping him. however, it was absent of joy. he was getting to her, even if just a little. he wanted to feel a sense of accomplishment in that, but internally, it seemed he wasn’t as tickled by her turmoil as he thought. “quite the opposite, actually.” patrick remarked, snapping back in to their argument without missing a beat. “saw my doc recently, turns out i’m in perfect health. beyond perfect, actually. they say i might live forever.” assuming that fed into some kind of worst-nightmare scenario for talia, he felt that was enough of a retort to her little digs. “yes, i bought it. me. as an investment, not as some pet-project for you to run away to and let sink into fucking puget sound.” he shook his head, hands on his hips as he let out a mocking breath. “and don’t act like i’m the reason you ended up here, sweetheart. i’m not as dense as you’d like to make me out to be.” 

“Jesus.” She jumped. “No, I’m not hiding from anyone. I’m studying.” When Amelia gave her a proposition she set the file down to listen to her. “I’m listening.” She wiped her hands off. “What do you have?” 

she’d thought she had been doing the right thing at the outset –– one last good deed for thomas, to make sure his family the sort of happy memories he wanted them to have before passing. but now, she was stuck. derek had stepped up and done the impossible. “i just don’t want to have to be –– unable to live my life, just because they were able to save his.” she felt selfish to the core, but she knew she had every right to do as she wanted, even if she did just need a nudge from olivia to do it. “i’m not sure he’d ever talk to me again.” jason. “please tell me you have something far less dramatic to talk about?” 

wyatt & eleanor au @seattlites​

“wyatt?” eleanor called into the empty hallway of his house. she had a habit of letting herself in. at least she knew he was home this time, his car was outside and the door had been unlocked. in her arms, she held on tightly to a huge cardboard box. the second she made it to the living room door, she set it down with a heavy sigh. “you should really lock the door when you get home. i could be a thief! or a murderer.” a pause. “i guess i would have to be able to find you to murder- wyatt! where are you?”

she took it upon herself to wander around the house, straightening ornaments and paintings to her liking in the process. “nani sent a care package, i have to give you half!” meaning she had taken out all the good things and left him with the bare minimum; but that was how it had always worked. “i took carter’s car, i need to get it back soon. i’m parked… semi-legally.”

wyatt had always been a romantic. from the barely existent relationships throughout high school and college to meeting the love of his life, it was who he was. probably highly influenced by the film choices of his little sister and not being able to say no to her but it had shaped him into the man he was today. mia however was everything he never thought he deserved. she was intelligent, ambitious, good looking and smoaking hot. she was the complete package and he wondered every day what he had done to be so lucky.