I couldn't start my morning without coffee.
"One large vanilla latte, no whip, please," I ordered.
"Coming right up," said the barista at the coffee cart in the lobby of Seattle Grace Mercy West with a smile.
I took a deep breath as I took out my staff ID- doctors got discounts. I felt indescribable glee and panic at that, officially being a doctor. Med school at Johns Hopkins had been the furthest thing from easy, but I had made it. Top of my class, too. Now I was a doctor… and weirdly, for the first time in my life, I felt like an actual adult. Here I was, thousands of miles from my family back home on the east coast, reporting for an internship at one of the best hospitals in the country.
"Don't think I've seen you around here," the barista said casually as she put the lid on the Styrofoam coffee cup. "You new?"
"Yeah, surgical intern, it's my first day," I admitted sheepishly. "My name's Ally Tate."
"Dr. Tate, nice to meet you, I'm Felicia Stewart."
"Ally is fine," I said, slightly embarrassed.
Felicia shook her head and laughed. "Eight years of post-high school education, you earned that title. And since it's your first day, this is on the house. Take a muffin or something too."
Felicia waved away my money and practically threatened to call security if I didn't take the coffee and a doughnut and leave. After thanking her profusely, I headed to the intern's lockerroom.
It was a cramped room with as many lockers as space allowed. A door at the far end led to toilets and showers. I found the locker with a duct tape strip labeling it 'A. Tate'. Inside was three pairs of light blue scrubs, a white lab coat, and a light blue surgical cap. After changing and clipping my ID to my scrubs, I started listening to the conversations around me.
"Anyone else's resident Dr. Lexie Grey?" A strong-looking girl with brown hair and bright blue eyes asked.
I grinned. "Me," I said.
She gave me the once over and smirked. "What did the blonde say to the police officer when he pulled her over?"
I knew this was in reference to my dark blonde hair. With a snarky grin I replied, "Officer, I confess, I killed the brunette."
The woman laughed hard. When she could breathe, she said, "I'm Raegan Ellison, Princeton."
"Ally Tate, Johns Hopkins."
"Nice to meet you. So you're with Grey, too?"
"That's right."
"Tate, Ellison, Eckerton, Ridge, with me!" A tall brunette woman, also in light blue scrubs, half-yelled, half-stuttered. It was like she was trying- and failing- to be tough. She seemed excited and nice enough.
Raegan, me, and two boys walked forwards and followed her as she walked out the door. We paused outside the nurses' station. "I have five rules. Memorize them. Rule number one, don't bother sucking up, I already hate you. That's not going to change. "
The bright smiles fell off of all four of our faces.
"Trauma protocol, phone lists, pagers."
My fellow interns and I all quickly snatched up the pager with our name on it and a little booklet that had the trauma protocol and the phone numbers in it. I started to glance through it, but Lexie started to talk again and she was walking away, so we all hustled to keep up.
"Nurses will page you. You answer every page at a run. A run, that's rule 2. Your first shift starts now and last 48 hours. You're interns, grunts, nobodies, bottom of the surgical food chain. Run labs, write orders, work every second and night until you drop and don't complain." She threw open a door at the end of the hall. "On call rooms, attendings hog them; sleep when you can, where you can. Which brings me to rule 3: If I'm sleeping don't wake me unless your patient is actually dying. Rule 4: The dying patient better not be dead when I get there. Not only would you have killed someone, you would have waked me for no good reason. Are we clear?"
We all nodded. She didn't look impressed.
"What, did they give me the mute idiots? I said five rules, that was only four."
Right then, all of our pages started going off. She yelled, "Rule 5: When I move, you move."
We were off then, running past doctors and nurses and gurneys, down three flights of stairs, and finally bursting through the double doors leading to The Pit, or the Emergency Room.
"I've got what looks like a four-year-old female, found bleeding in the streets. It appears she's been there for a few hours," called a nurse as Lexie and the four of us interns threw on gowns and gloves."She's about three minutes out."
Lexie immediately started barking out orders, and she sounded more impressive now than when she was bullying us. "Eckerton, Page Dr. Robbins, now, then call child services, tell them we need someone here. Ridge, Ellison damage control, Tate, run the portable x-ray." The sirens started getting louder. With something like pity on her face, she turned to us. "This is going to be hard to look at. Hurt kids always are. But remember, freaking out will only make it worse. Odds are, this is a case of child abuse."
My stomach dropped through my butt. With a determined nod, I told myself, "Let's do this."
Lexie looked at me and gave a small smile. I hadn't realized I'd said it out loud.
The ambulance pulled into the bay, and before the vehicle even stopped, paramedics jumped out and started rattling off her vitals- which were terrible, I didn't know how this girl was still alive- and how she was found. "We got a call, little girl bleeding with what looked like her arm almost hacked off, she's lost a lot of blood, we've started her on some O-neg, but she's losing it fast, I don't know how she didn't bleed out. We gave her some morphine, but I don't know how she kept so quiet, the wound looked to be several hours old. She would have had to been in serious pain." He and his partner got the gurney out of the ambulence and I nearly puked at the sight that awaited me.
The girl couldn't have been older than four years old. Her blonde hair was stuck to her face because of dried blood, which came from a cut over her forehead and- this drew eyes like a dead body- her left arm hanging on by a thread of skin and muscle. I stumbled forward as she started to scream- she had to have been in terrible pain already, and had already been crying, but the jolting of the gurney as they brought her into the ER must have been too much. I grabbed her good right hand she looked at me and started screaming, if possible, even louder, but she squeezed my hand.
"Hey, hey, hey, My name is Dr. Tate, I'm going to help you feel better, alright?" I said confidently, giving her the biggest smile I could manage. She nodded and squeezed my hand so hard I nearly gasped in pain. For such a small child, she was strong. I had to let go of her hand as we scanned her body with the amazing emergency scanner Chief of Surgery Owen Hunt had gotten (this one thing secured Seattle Grace Mercy West as a Level One Trauma Center), but she grabbed my hand as soon as I came near her.
"Page Torres and Shepherd, book an OR, we need to get there now!" Came Arizona Robbins' voice. Lexie, you stay. Get someone to babysit your interns!"
Lexie nodded. "Okay, guys, go with Miranda Bailey or Meredith Grey, get someone to page them_"
As I let go of the little girl's hand, she screamed louder. "Dr. Tate, don't leave!" she said, and she began sobbing, if possible, even harder.
Dr. Robbins sighed. "Okay, fine, baby surgeon_"
"Dr. Tate," Lexie inserted quickly.
"_ you can stay, but stay out of our way while we're saving her life!"
Dr. Robbins, Dr. Lexie Grey and I rushed towards the elevators, and as we wheeled the gurney out onto the OR floor, a man with amazingly styled brown hair and a Spanish beauty met up with us... must be Shepherd and Torres, no clue which one was which.
"Shepherd, girl has a head injury, looks like blunt force trauma... Callie, what's our best option for this arm?"
"Amputation would be easiest..." Torres muttered as we came to a halt outside the OR. They had to scrub in, but a nurse tied a surgical cap around my head and re-gloved my free hand.
"Easiest, or giving this patient the best quality of life?" I asked, temporarily forgetting my place. "She's young, she can relearn how to use her arm! If it can be salvaged, even the slightest chance..." The attendings all looked at me, and I looked down at my feet. "I'm sorry, that was out of line."
"Yeah, that was. Who's the baby surgeon?" Asked the woman currently checking out the little girl's arm and shoulder.
"Dr. Tate. And while you get points for advocating for the tiny human, don't act like the Head of Orthopedics doesn't know what she's doing," Dr. Robbins snapped.
They went to the scrub room, I went into the OR.
The little girl had no idea what was going on around her, and she was now crying so hard she was hyperventilating.
"Hey, kiddo, it's going to be okay. I promise. Dr. Robbins and Dr. Torres, they're the best. And Dr. Shepherd is gonna make your head feel better okay? And I'll stay right here."
Doctor Shepherd, Torres, Robbins, and Grey walked in and started to get into position, with Shepherd and Grey working on her brain, Torres working on her arm, and Robbins monitoring everything. The anesthesiologist put the child under, the four other surgeons started to work, but I kept holding her hand until Dr. Torres demanded I scrub in and come over to suction. I was thrilled, of course, but I felt a guilty about breaking the promise.
Dr. Robbins didn't just let me just suction, though, she kept me involved- quizzed me like crazy over bone structures, what normal vitals looked like, showed me what was going on as Callie fixed the girl's arm and Shepherd and Lexie fixed her brain bleed. She seemed impressed by me; I did not answer a single question wrong. What did she expect, for me to be a complete idiot? I wasn't top of my class at Johns Hopkins for nothing.
Although at first the girl's outlook didn't look good, somehow, amazingly, even though the girl's arm was mangled, the brachial artery had stayed intact. Callie said the chances that she could save the arm were good, but it would take a lot of physical therapy and high doses of antibiotics to fight the probable infections. The brain bleed was tricky, but Dr. Robbins pointed out to me what Dr. Grey and Shepherd were doing, and it looked good. Near the end, I noticed something terrible.
"Dr. Robbins? Sorry to interrupt. But... are those puncture wounds teeth marks?"
Torres, Robbins, Grey, and Shepherd all looked at me and then at girl's inner forearm, which a nurse had just cleaned off so Dr. Sloan (who I had just been informed was probably the best plastic surgeon in the country) could fix her up with little to no scarring.
Finally, Dr. Shepherd said grimly what we all knew. "This little girl... was mauled by a dog."
Twelve hours later, we emerged from surgery victorious. Unless if she caught a post-op infection, she would be just fine.
"Dr. Grey? What do you want me to do now?" I asked her as we peeled off our gloves, surgical caps, gowns, and masks.
"Actually, Dr. Tate, you will be on my service until she is discharged," said Dr. Robbins with a smile. "You advocated for her, she trusts you, and if this is what we think it is..." she grimaced. "She's going to want you to be around her. Welcome to PEDs."
I was sixteen hours into my first forty-eight hour shift. I helped save a girl's life today, Dr. Robbins had said. Now, I needed to wait for this girl to wake up, to see if she would talk about what happened to her. There were no missing child reports, and even if there was, we didn't even know her name. That was my job now, to find out what I could from her, to let her believe she was going to be okay.
"Hey, your name is Ally, right?" said a voice from the doorway. Raegan, the only other intern I had really gotten to socialize with, was at the door. Behind here were two men, Eckerton and Ridge. One was tall, with short, icky colored brown hair but bright blue eyes. The other was of medium height with shaggy, dark blonde hair, warm brown eyes, and a cocky expression. This one was holding a burger and fries.
"Hey, we ate earlier, but when we heard you got out of surgery, we brought you this. If you don't like it, James can eat it, and we'll get you something else..." He didn't need to continue as I ripped the burger out of his hands, tore the wrapper off, and began to wolf it down. "Or, we can go get you another one."
I chewed and swallowed, then with an embarrassed grin, said, "Thanks! I'm sorry... I didn't realize how hungry you get standing and having questions fired at you for twelve hours straight. My name is Ally Tate, what's yours?"
The blonde haired boy was Adam Ridge, the brown haired boy was James Eckerton. I found out quickly why they had brought me food; they wanted me to tell them all about the surgery. I told them everything, in as much detail as I could. Though I knew they were my competitors, they also would be working alongside me to save lives. I knew that most of the interns didn't think along those lines. But seeing what I saw in the OR this morning and afternoon, I couldn't help but learn one of the most important lessons in surgery and in life; that working together would yield better results than going it alone. Dr. Robbins, though she was, as she said, a 'tiny human' doctor, could not have saved the little girl alone. She needed Shepherd, Grey, and Torres. And then she needed Sloan to make sure this girl would not have scars when she was ninety.
"Dr. Tate?" All four of us whipped around at the sound of a little voice.
I flew to her side and held her hand, internally cursing myself. I had promised her I wouldn't leave, and she had woken up and seen I had not been there holding her hand. But apparently, she didn't think the same.
"You didn't leave." Tears began to well up in her eyes.
"No, I didn't," I said honestly. Besides a bathroom break on the way back from the OR to the PEDs ICU, the little girl hadn't been out of my sight. "Sweetie, can you tell me your name?"
"I'm not supposed to say it," she said immediately.
"It's okay, you can trust me," I said immediately. Her eyes darted to Adam, Raegan, and James. I nodded, knowing what she was thinking. "Maybe if Drs. Eckerton, Ridge, and Ellison left the room, it'd make it better?" I asked, turning to them with an apologetic expression on my face. They didn't look angry as they left, which I was grateful for. I could tell already that I would like working with them. "Page Robbins," I added as they left. Raegan gave me a thumbs up.
"Emma..." she said in barely more than a whisper.
"Emma, that's such a pretty name," I smiled.
"Don't say it out loud!" She screamed, and started to cry. "My daddy said that it's a bad name for a bad girl, and I'm not allowed to say it..." she trailed off as she started to shake.
I dropped my voice to a whisper. "Did your daddy do this to you?"
She just kept shaking and crying. I had an idea. "Emma, I can help you. Do you know what doctor-patient confidentiality is?"
She shook her little head, her blond hair going everywhere.
"It means that no matter what you tell me, I won't tell your mommy or daddy. Okay? You're completely safe here."
She seemed to think about it for a few seconds. "I don't have a mommy. Daddy said I killed her... she named me. So I'm a bad girl, and he never said my name after she died, ever."
"Do you know how your mommy died?" I asked with a gentle voice. My heart was hammering. Murder cover up, or jerk for a dad? Definitely jerk for a dad for telling her she was a bad girl and basically stripping her of her name, but... murderer?
"Daddy said I was such a bad girl, her heart stopped," she cried out. "After that, he got mean dogs... and he said he'd rather have dogs than me." Being very careful of her left arm, which was in a sling and cast, I put my arm around her little shoulders. She froze and jumped away from me so fast, she would have fallen off the bed if the railing on the left side wasn't up. Even so, she banged her bad arm on the railing and cried out in pain.
"Hey! It's okay! I promise I will not hurt you," I said quickly. "Your daddy is wrong," I added, looking into those electric blue eyes. "People's hearts stop for a lot of reasons. But a reason wasn't because you were a bad girl, okay? I'm a doctor, and I promise that wasn't the reason."
She started to try to wipe her nose with her good hand, but before she could, I wiped it with a tissue. She flinched a little, but relaxed as she realized that I was only helping her get the snot off of her face.
"What's your daddy's name?" I asked, in what I hope was a casual voice. It was obvious now that the bastard had abused her, and I wanted him to rot in jail.
"Daddy," the girl said with such confidence that it made me laugh. She laughed too because she saw me laugh, and after a second, she relaxed and lay back on her pillows. "Dr. Tate? My head and my arm hurts."
"That's because..." I knew that I had a choice between being completely honest and terrifying her, or bending the truth a little bit. "Do you remember what happened to you to make you hurt?"
She nodded. "Daddy wanted Rosco to fight another doggy, but they needed someone in the cage to be the judge, so he asked me to," she said with confidence.
My heart rate quickened. That complete asshole was putting his daughter in a cage during a dogfight!?
"That's my kid you're talking to." Growled a male voice that made my blood go cold.
