This is very dark, twisty, depressing and (hopefully) set a in very AU. If you don't like angst or the concurrent SL for Japril at Grey's, then I encourage you to NO READ! I don't want any of this happening on the show, so FOR ME it's a coping mechanism to write the worst possible scenarios. Okay?

"I've seen fire and I've seen rain. I've seen sunny days that I thought would never end.
I've seen lonely times when I could not find a friend, but I always thought that I'd see you again."

Fire and Rain.

Fall started early that year and the leaves covered everything. The park was almost empty, and April was getting a little cold since she didn't bring more than a light sweater.

"Darling stop it," she called her daughter.

Emily was beyond ecstatic, her little body couldn't handle the excitement of her first play date with a friend of her new school. She was running around her mother, making April a little ditzy.

April couldn't help but smile at the enthusiasm of her little six year old. There had been difficult times for them, with the moving, the new city and new school. It was the first time (in what it felt ages) that Emily was smiling.

"Darling, you need to calm yourself a little," April gently said and caught her daughter by her wrist.

Emily stopped and suddenly a serious look crossed her face. The same face as her father.

"Mommy, it's late, why Dan isn't here?"

April looked at her phone and checked the time.

"They are just ten minutes late sweetie, he'll be here," April answered, thought she was starting to feel a little uneasy.

What if the kid stood her kid up? April had just seen the boy in a couple of occasions when she picked Emily from school. She really didn't know him. Emily had said they liked the same books, he sat at lunch with her after one particular mean girl made fun of her and his parents were also doctors. Dan's mother sounded pretty polite and nice on the phone when they agreed to arrange a play date for their kids. Yet, April had never seen the kid's parents.

April bit her lip, she didn't want her kid to suffer more than she already had.

"Look, mommy, there he comes!" Emily screamed and pointed between the swings.

A black boy was running towards them with sincere enthusiasm. He was wearing a gray hoddie and pants and a pair of neon bright nike sneakers.

"Dan!"

"Sorry, Ems, dad couldn't find his keys."

Emily smiled at him.

"Hello Doctor April," the boy greeted her.

"Hi sweetie, where're your parents?" April asked as she noticed the boy was alone.

"Dad is parking the car."

"Come, let's go the swings," Emily ordered and Dan followed her without thinking it twice.

April sighed with relief, she liked Dan, he made her think of…

"April?" a deep voice asked behind her back. She didn't need to hear it twice, her brain, her heart, her skin, knew immediately who was the owner of that voice.

It took only a second to turn around but for April it felt like ten years of her life.

There he was, Jackson Avery, stood in front of her, looking at her like he had just seen a ghost.

April opened her mouth to say something; anything but what can you say to your ex-husband in a middle of a park when you run into him by accident?

"DAD!" she heard Dan scream. He and Emily were back, running towards them.

It took several seconds to April to understand that Dan was referring to Jackson as his dad.

"Mommy, are you sick?" Emily asked with fear. April eyes were full of tears, out of the sudden.

"I'm okay, sweetie," April lied to her daughter.

"My dad is a doctor, he can help," Dan suggested. Unaware by the fact that Jackson was also in shock, looking from the little red head to her mother, like he was seeing a hallucination. "Right dad? You can help Emily's mom, right?"

"Right," Jackson smiling at his little boy.

"It's okay kids, I'm okay," April faked a smile. "You go and play. Come on."

Reluctantly, Emily nodded and called Dan to go to the slides.

He was Dan's dad. He was someone else's dad.

Jackson was the first to recover from the initial shock. Just like he always did.

So, he was the first to speak, "Hi, April. It's been a long time."

"Hello, Jackson," April said smiling while she tried to buried at the feelings that were fighting to emerge.

"Wanna seat? Emily's still staring at us like you're about to fail."

April nodded and followed Jackson to the bench. April sat and Jackson sat next to her, memories about them sitting on the bench at the ER bay came to her like flashbacks from another life. April glanced at the kids, and Emily seemed a little more relaxed and stopped looking at them and go back to play with Dan.

"She has your same expression of concern," Jackson pointed at Emily. "I can't believe I didn't notice the resemblance before, she… she is you."

April politely smiled and refused to look him at the eyes.

"I never asked for Dan's last name but when I saw those sneakers…I should have know," she teased.

"Like father, like son."

Ten years earlier.

"This needs to end, April, this needs to have a ending. Because, I can't take it anymore, babe, I just-"

Jackson was not screaming, or trying to be mean. He was telling the truth. Ten months have passed since the day they heard their baby had OI stage III, and April was not giving signs of getting better or trying to get better. She didn't talk to him anymore, was starting to get recognition as the new nazi at the hospital, every single collage hated to work with her, Owen grew tired of fight for and with her when she mistreated residents. She stopped going to church, she stopped being sweet and kind. In other words, she was lost.

The straw that broke the camel's back was a fight she had with Alex Karev, she screamed at him in the middle of the ER that he was a despicable human being and not deserved to be a father, all because he forgot to go and check a patient.

Jackson took April to an empty on call room and tried to talk with her. She was there but he was not sure she was listening.

"April this needs to stop."

April tried to open the door and run away, like she had been doing since forever. But he stood in front the door.

"April, stop, please," Jackson begged and suppressed his tears. "Stop running away from me."

He tried to hug her, but she stepped back.

"I'm in pain, Jackson."

"And what about me? What about what I'm feeling… you never cared about me. It's all about you, right?" he said, finally his feelings were starting to get over him. He loved her more than anything in this world, and his protective instinct towards her was the only thing that kept him moving but now he was starting to feel the pain.

April started to cry.

"I'm so sorry," she said.

His pager went off. It was a 911.

"Let's talk at home, okay?" she said.

"Okay," he said, relieved that for the first time she was the one proposing to talk. He gave her a quick kiss on the lips, she timidly smiled and he leaved the on-call room.

But that night she didn't arrive home.

Dan was helping Emily to climb the slide from the front. April was looking at them with apprehension, her little girl was very clumsy with physical challenges and she was having problems climbing the slide. Dan was encouraging her and finally Emily did it.

April let a sigh of relief scape.

Jackson chuckled.

"What?" she demanded.

"Nothing."

"Tell me."

"I'll tell you if you tell what brings you back to Seattle."

How on earth was that they could still talk like nothing had happened, like old friends?

"I'm sure you heard Mercy West Clinical Center opened, again," he nodded. "Well, they offered me the position to run the ER as trauma chief."

"Freakin' chief of trauma. Congratulations."

"Thank you."

"But…why did you came back from Ohio? You got the same position there."

April looked at him with curiosity, she didn't know he was so aware of her life. She looked at her shoes, there were mommy shoes, like Emily liked to call them. April debated a little about talk and told the truth or said nothing. She felt Jackson's eyes on her and a hot spot in his stomach burned.

"Well, Emily's dad…my husband, he had lupus. He was well controlled, until-well, he was not controlled anymore. His kidneys stopped working, Emily was the only match and she was too young. He died four months ago."

As she told her story, she didn't cry.

"I'm so sorry, April," Jackson said.

"He was a good man. He loved Emily more than anything and wanted her to be happy. Emily was not being happy in Ohio with everything remembering him, so, this work came and I decided move. You know me…always running from my problems."

The irony in April's voice let him know she was really having a hard time deciding what was the best for her kid. It was also a memory of what happened with them. An awkward silence invaded the atmosphere until she spoke again.

"Tell me, how's everyone at the Grey Sloan? Since Arizona and Callie moved to Tenesse I don't know anything about the people."

"Well, Owen is still running the surgery department," he said. It was the only thing that crossed his mind that wasn't going to hurt them.

"How's Alex?"

"He and Amelia are having baby number two this winter."

"Really?" April said with surprise.

Jackson nodded.

She knew for Arizona that Jo got a fellowship in Oregon and went there, leaving Alex with a broken heart. Little she knew about Alex having a relationship with Amelia and having kids. She was glad for them.

"Mer and Derek are still being Mer and Derek, and I'm sure you know Richard Webber married my mother long time ago."

"Yes, I do." She had been invited to the wedding. Of course, she didn't attend.

"And that's it."

"What about Stephanie Edwards?"

Jackson went mute for a minute.

"She's Dan's mother."

"So, first you yell at me and now you're leaving your husband. Very brave of you Apes."

"Shut up, Karev. Let me pass."

Alex was the only with the enough courage –or bravado- to face April. Every one at the hospital knew she was leaving Jackson; after she decided to not go home a month, she stopped talking to Jackson, and quit her job the same week. One afternoon she went to HR to fill some forms and she bumped into Karev.

Alex tried to make sense on her.

"No, I'm not letting you pass."

April pushed him, but he didn't move.

"Reed knew I had a wife, so I'm sure you knew I had a wife with cancer and she left me," he said with bitterness. "Izzie left me, I stood beside her all her treatment, in the good ones and in the bad ones. She died in my arms and I didn't go away. I stayed and when she decided to leave me…she was a coward. She left me because she was a coward. Don't be a coward, Kepner."

"It's different," she said.

"It's not. If you leave, he'll find another person. I did. But you won't Kepener, because he's the one you gotta be with."

With this said, Alex stood beside and let April follow her path.

Dan cut her knee and was bleeding a little.

"You are gonna be alright buddy," Jackson comfort him. The boy was having hard time containing the tears in front of Emily.

Jackson give his kid a quick pat on the head and encourage him to back go to play.

April was still recovering from the shock to hear that Stephanie was Dan's mother. She talked with her at the phone…they never exchange names, or recognized each others voices. Or maybe Stephanie did?

April didn't know if she had the right to feel betrayed or pissed. It was not like Jackson cheated on her. He had all the right to put back together the pieces that April broke.

"So, you married Stephanie," April finally said breaking again the silence.

"Well, no, we didn't get married but we lived together for four years."

April hide a smile when she heard he was talking in past tense.

"You ordered Arizona to not tell me?"

"Actually, Arizona told me you never asked about me, so she didn't need to hide anything from you," he said hurtfully.

He was right, April never asked for him. She liked to believe he was living a perfect life, that he was being happy, had found the love of his life and was having healthy children and having a perfect family.

April studied him for a minute.

"Are you happy?" she asked Jackson.

Jackson looked at his son. Dan had forgotten his injury and was laughing at something her little redhead friend had said. His kid was in love with Emily, as much as a six year old can be from a girl.

"I am," Jackson honestly said.

A big heavy pain left April's chest.

"I'm glad."

"Are you happy?"

April let a big tear scape her eye.

"Emily is my world. If she's happy, I'm happy," she rationalized.

"I'm still thinking about him, you know?"

April looked at him with surprise. It was the big elephant in the room, but she didn't expect to Jackson to talk about him.

One day at year, April got locked in her bedroom and cried until she felt sleep. One day at the year, Emily had to share her mommy with a brother she never knew.

April finally decided to look Jackson's eyes. The color, the shape, they were the same. Just like April remembered. The same eyes she looked when she did love for the first time, the same eyes that told her they loved everything about her, the same eyes that told her, her first kid was having a incurable disease…

"I think about him too," she said and gently took his hand that was resting next to hers.

"Jackson?" she called him.

She was not sure about what she was doing there but Karev's words moved something inside her. She was not gonna do what Izzie have done, she was not going away just because she could, she was not leaving because she was a coward. She was leaving because she wasn't happy. She had heard many stories about what happens to couples when they lost their child, but living it was so different…

Jackson was in the bedroom, their bedroom, his bedroom. He was not looking good, April knew she break his heart in every single way.

He looked at her. His spirit was broken. She was the only one who spoke this time; he didn't have the strength to do it.

"Jackson, I love you. You're the love of my life, I love you more than anything in this world but I'm broken. I can't- I can't help but run away from you and I know that's breaking you apart. I can't do this to you anymore. You deserve to be happy."

She knew he was perfect, in every single way. That was why he deserved to find someone to be happy. Not her, no the remaining pieces of her. She loved him so much…. so much that she needed to be away from him. They needed to stop being Jackson and April in order to him to be happy. She had been so self-centered and forgot about him.

"I love you," was the last thing she said to him before leaving.

Emily was tired. She rested her head in her mother's lap and fighting herself from falling sleep. Dan was also exhausted. Jackson was tying his shoelaces while he was seated in the bench next to Emily.

"That's it champ, we need to go," Jackson said when he finished.

"Can Emily go to dinner?"

Jackson looked at April, she smiled and nodded.

"Of course she can, but other day. Okay? Right now she's tired."

The little kid nodded.

"Say good bye, Emily," April ordered.

"Good bye Dan, good by Mister Avery."

"Good bye, Emily."

Jackson smiled at April.

"Bye, Jackson."

"Bye, April."

Jackson took his kid by the hand and started their way back to the car.

As April saw Jackson walk away with his son, she wondered how different things would have been if she have decided to stay. There was no point in hide it, she was still in love with Jackson Avery, after all those years. After an other man she loved, after having her girl, she was still in love with her best friend.

He was the love of her life.

But he was happy, she could never made him happy.

"I like doctor Avery, he's funny," Emily declared.

April chuckled and bent to kiss her daughter's cheek.

"I know baby, I know."