A/N: Apologies for the delay! Let me know what you think of this chapter and prepare yourselves for the final few.
Lexie hadn't had time to process April's words. It felt as if she was having an out of body experience and nothing could ground her. She had tried to get a flight but the next one was hours away, so Jackson had arranged a private plane for her. Sunrise was fast approaching, and so was her own personal hell.
It wasn't every day that someone drowning in debt from med school had the privilege of sitting in a luxurious, money-fuelled jet owned by the Harper Avery Foundation. In any other circumstance, she'd be soaking it up and drinking champagne until she was tipsy enough that she needed assistance stepping back onto the tarmac. This wasn't one of those days.
Having spent the past five hours staring out of the window and ignoring the security team that had been sent to accompany both her and the plane, Lexie was on another planet.
In an ideal world, she was on her way home to Mark and a lifetime with him. They were going to share the life that both of them had dreamed of for so long and she was going to have the kind of love she'd always read about as a little girl. The kind of love she'd seen in the movies that she'd begged Mark to watch so many times.
If she had stayed, if she had compromised and sacrificed her plan, she wouldn't be about to land in Seattle for a second time without having the comfort of knowing that Mark was waiting for her.
With the pilot announcing that they were beginning their descent, Lexie was pulled back to reality and it was the last place she wanted to be because in this world, the one that was the opposite to the one she escaped to, she didn't know if Mark would even be alive to give her a future.
The sight of April and Jackson waiting right outside the plane with a car hit her hard. This was happening. There was no more putting it off, no more pretending that he was okay.
"Thank you for, you know." Lexie gestured to the plane behind her, not capable of saying a whole lot else. April pulled her in for a hug, stroking her hair to soothe her.
"It was no problem. You ready?" April let her go so Jackson could have his turn.
The three of them hadn't got off on the right foot during the merger with Mercy West but over time, had found common ground. They had been her biggest supporters when it came to Mark, never once doubting her intentions or his.
"How can I be ready for something like this?" Lexie swallowed the lump in her throat as she stepped into the car, gripping onto April's hand once they were in motion. Her mind running wild, she was unable to stop theorising the severity of the accident. "You would tell me if it was too late for him, right?"
"Of course we would, Lexie." Jackson sounded like he was about to burst into tears and his eyes told the same story as he looked round from the front seat at her. "I promise."
"We don't know much, but we do know that he's alive and they're working on him. Meredith said she'd call if anything drastic happened before you got there, so take the lack of a phone call as a good sign. Hold onto that little bit of hope you've got, okay? We'll be at the hospital soon."
—
Her heart pounding in her chest, Lexie had the door open before their driver had even finished parking up and her legs were carrying her to the entrance of the hospital twenty steps ahead of April and Jackson.
Coming to a halt right outside, April bumped straight into her. In her haste, she had momentarily forgotten what she was about to see. Mark, with unimaginable injuries. Vulnerable, most likely unconscious and nothing like the man she had left behind. Nothing could ever prepare her for it but she had to do it. She had to be by his side.
"Go on up, don't worry about waiting for us." Jackson reassured her as she found the courage to continue inside, but the three of them were moving towards the elevator side by side regardless.
Mark was Jackson's mentor, his best friend in close second to April, and the younger doctor was finding this equally as difficult to process. That was the thing about Mark, he was an incredible person and since falling in love with Lexie, he had been one of the most approachable, generous doctors in the hospital. He didn't hold his power over anyone or belittle the less experienced staff and had even made a solid effort to include April as a friend, ignoring the fact that the two of them couldn't possibly be more different.
Her focus on the red numbers rising above the doors, Lexie was growing impatient. She was trapped in reality now, no going back.
"Lexie!" As if she had been watching the elevator doors like a hawk, Callie rushed to the brunette immediately and held her close. Lexie looked over her shoulder, frozen. Everyone was here.
All of the people Mark loved, even Derek's Mother, were hovering outside of a hospital room on the left side of the corridor. The arrival of the woman who broke Mark's heart had caused a stir, a sea of whispers. Addison was stood in the doorway with Derek, both of them looking shattered.
"Is he…" Her voice startled the pair of them as she closed in on the crowd of people, clutching the sleeves of her coat.
"He's in surgery." The redhead stood up straight, feigning confidence as she placed her arm around Lexie's shoulder. "You must be Little Grey. I'm Addison. He went in a couple of hours ago and things are looking good so far."
"Subdural hematoma?" Afraid that she was about to break, she pleaded for medical details although she knew there wasn't enough information yet. It had been seven hours maximum since the accident, and most of that time had been spent in the OR.
"Yes, but Amelia is doing the surgery. He's in safe hands." If it weren't for Addison's reassurance, the physical contact between them, Lexie might have lashed out. Why wasn't Derek doing this? Derek was a neurosurgeon, the best there was.
"Derek?"
"I can't do this, Lex. He's my best friend, he's family. I'm sorry." He couldn't look at her but the resentment faded when she saw the tears falling from his face.
"Is Amelia as good as you?" She needed to know for sure that she could trust another Shepherd sibling to save him.
The Amelia Shepherd she'd met years ago was more interested in dragging the Grey sisters out to bars across the city than dedicating her time in Seattle to medicine. Lexie also knew of her history with drugs and how she'd operated after taking something back in Los Angeles, and it wasn't giving her much faith. How much had she changed in such a short space of time?
"My sister might even be better than me. She's sober, she's level-headed, confident and she will do everything it takes to get him through this. Lexie, I would not let her in that operating room if I wasn't five thousand percent sure she was capable of doing this."
—
Lexie had taken up residence in a chair outside what would soon be Mark's room, and she had yet to utter another word. Nobody was talking, not even about something other than how his surgery might be going. Meanwhile, she was dwelling on the accident itself.
"Can someone tell me what happened leading up to the crash?" She knew she sounded like she was a police officer asking for a report, but she needed to know this more than she needed to know the statistics and the medicine.
"This can wait, Lexie. Just wait for him to come out of surgery." Callie pleaded with her.
"No, I need to know."
"It's okay, I'll tell you." Arizona was sat on her right. Edging closer and putting her hand on Lexie's knee, the usually bubbly blonde was solemn. "He came over to Meredith and Derek's for dinner and drinks and saw your wedding invitation. He took off."
"H-he was drink driving?" Her stomach dropped. Mark was not a reckless guy unless sex was involved, which meant that she'd well and truly messed him up. She had ruined his life and now she was at risk of taking it away from him entirely. His daughters might not have a Father and it was because she couldn't make a decision about whether she loved him enough.
"I know what you're thinking and I'm going to stop you right there." Meredith knelt down in front of her sister and took hold of her face, forcing her to look at her as she spoke. "This is not your fault. Mark is a grown man and there were a lot of factors involved. He made a choice. Yes, the invitation triggered him to act on impulse but he started drinking and he knew his limits. He knew better."
Meredith's words did nothing to stop the guilt consuming her. She was angry at herself and at Xavier. She wasn't ready for him to send invitations but he had taken control. If he had just held back and asked her first, Mark wouldn't be laying on an operating table with his life in someone else's hands right now.
"Was anyone else hurt?" The thought of her killing Mark was heart wrenching enough but if there had been another person involved, she didn't think she could live with it.
"No, he hit a tree. Thank god, at least he won't spend the rest of life hating himself." Callie's attempt at optimism didn't go unnoticed.
It was no secret that she was strong but this was next level. Her best friend, the father of her child, had his life hanging in the balance and she was acting as though he was absolutely going to make it. It was admirable, but Lexie was a realist.
The elevator doors opened for the hundredth time, but it wasn't another false alarm. They were all face to face with the exhausted, desperate faces of Webber, Bailey, Amelia with an unconscious Mark Sloan laying in a hospital bed. The closer they got to the group, the more terrified Lexie became.
"Lexie, I'm glad you're here." Bailey lead her into the room after Mark and his doctors, gesturing for everyone to follow. "You can go sit next to him." All of the standard professionalism was gone, the older doctor holding her ex-resident's hand tightly. She pushed Lexie further towards the bed but her legs stopped working.
She couldn't bring herself to look at him but from the corner of her eye, saw Derek moving to be by his friend's bedside. Lexie desperately wanted to join them, but not without knowing his fate.
"You can all relax, we placed him in an induced coma. He just needs a little time." Chief Webber announced, and the tension in the room was lifted. Looking at each of the doctors with so many years of experience, Lexie was astounded.
These people should know better than to trust the human brain. What if Mark was taken out of his coma and he didn't wake up? This had happened countless times in her career alone, and she was taking it more seriously than ever now. They were allowing themselves to drop the ball, and the only one still letting the fear eat away at her was the one who had caused this.
"What if he stays in the coma and never comes back to us?"
"We give him more time." Amelia smiled at her.
"He would have thirty days. He stated in his will that if something like this ever happened, he wanted life support to be switched off after thirty days. You can't keep him alive for longer than that, you all know he would never forgive us. If thirty days isn't long enough, we lose him."
Mark and Lexie had always openly discussed their wills and what would happen if one of them was in a life-threatening situation. They shared the same opinion on this particular matter, and Lexie couldn't let them go against his wishes which they were guaranteed to want to do if the time came.
"He altered his will." Callie intervened. "When Sofia was born, he changed it. He said he would want to do everything possible to bring him back to her so she didn't have to grow up without him. He didn't want her to have a childhood without a Father figure because that's what Sloan had and he never forgave himself."
"So…he has a fighting chance. We have options if-"
"Can you all shut up?!" Derek yelled over them, scaring them. Lexie allowed herself to look at Mark then, hoping that by some miracle, the loud noise would wake him up. "You're getting ahead of yourselves. As his surgeons said and as any doctor will tell you, Mark needs time, okay? We will monitor him and bring him out of the coma when he's ready and he will be absolutely fine. He has to be."
He was shaking as he cried, a rare sight. Holding his arm out, he waited for his sister-in-law to close the gap. The two of them held each other, sharing their pain but standing so close to Mark was tearing her apart.
"We'll give you a moment alone with him." Callie held the door open and waited for everyone to leave the room. Cristina and Meredith lead the way, fake smiles plastered on their faces. If anyone was good in a time of crisis, it was those two.
They were left with the sound of their sobs and the beeping of monitors.
"I'm so sorry. I'm-" Lexie choked up.
"I'm the one who left the invitation in clear view." He sighed in exasperation, angry at himself.
"You know, I wasn't even going to send them. I was so close to calling the whole thing off, I guess I just didn't make a decision fast enough."
"I don't know if he can hear us, but I like to think he knows you're here. He loves you, Lex. You're the one for him and he's known it all along, he just wanted you to be ready. There isn't anyone else for him." She had heard this more than enough from when they started dating right up until today but hearing it again while they were next to his motionless body, watching his chest rise and fall, Lexie was starting to think that they weren't meant to be.
"We need him. Sofia, Sloan, Callie, Arizona, you. I need him."
The silence set in, both of them watching Mark. He looked so peaceful, so content. If he could just wake up and see that she came back to Seattle one last time, he could remain content until it was truly his time to go, with his Little Grey by his side. Because she was his. Lexie wasn't one to give so much of herself to a man but this was Mark. He was hers, too.
"Love makes you do stupid things." Derek glanced up at her. "I'm not trying to sound like a character out of one of those crappy movies you like but it's true. You couldn't think straight so you pushed him away, tried to start over. Mark turned to alcohol and sex because the latter was all he knew before he fell in love with you."
"The drinking was a regular thing?"
"Not lately, but when you left for New York initially, yes. He didn't operate for months, let it control his life. Jackson took his surgeries and Mark hardly left his apartment. It wasn't until Sofia came into the picture that things shifted. He started taking care of himself as best as anyone with a broken heart can and he went back to work."
"I had no idea. He was suffering and I was in New York making the worst decision of my life that at the time, I thought was this incredible thing. I thought I was okay without him until I saw him in the crowd on my first day back here." Lexie scoffed, wishing she'd handled it better. "I can't believe I almost married Xavier. How could I have considered a life with anyone but Mark?"
"When have you and Mark ever made good decisions when it comes to your feelings? The leaving, sleeping around, rushing into a relationship with someone else, having a kid with your best friend, kissing, leaving again, drinking. This is kind of yours and Mark's thing." Derek laughed.
"I was so blind to what was right for me. I should've listened to my heart and at least tried with Sloan, even if I didn't think I was ready. I mean, look at her now. She's at college, she's matured and she's respectful. I know he has Sofia now and none of us would change that for the world, but for the most part, leaving was a waste of time. I wasted over a year on a city I don't have time to explore, a man who wasn't Mark. A year that we could've spent together."
"The feelings are still there after all that time, Lex." Her brother-in-law smiled softly, and Lexie knew he was thinking about Meredith. "That's how you know it's real."