A/N: Thank you all for sticking with me, now we're on to part 3 of this story. Where I go with it from here, I'm not entirely sure, but I hope you all enjoy it. Don't forget to R&R! –R.

I've always been a firm believer that love is never enough. It can't pay the bills, it can't communicate; it can't solve the world's problems. It makes you feel better; it makes you feel like you can survive in this big bad world. But when you have love taken away from you, it's the worst feeling in the entire world. It's like you're broken and you know exactly what the cure is, but you can't reach it; you'll never be able to reach it. Because we can't turn back time, the freaking carousel never stops turning.

"Edwards! Deluca! We have an incoming, car accident," April Kepner shouted. She had been back at work for a while now, and nothing seemed to be stopping her. She was different from before, surer of herself and slightly meaner. She didn't take crap from anyone and if you didn't know whom she was before you wouldn't even recognize the change, but to her old friends she was a stranger with a wall built up around her. She had thrown herself into surgeries as soon as Torres and Shepherd cleared her, thankfully. Her hands were missing being inside of someone else; she missed the rush, the thrill of saving a life. It was certainly more entertaining than sitting in physical therapy learning how to walk again. The ambulance sirens were almost deafening to the average ear, but Kepner was used to the loudness and abruptness of war, so they were like music to her ears.

"What do we got?" She yelled to the paramedic.

"Car accident, driver got caught under a semi," the paramedic started to explain.

"A semi? Caught under?" Stephanie Edwards questioned.

"Edwards, not the time," Kepner snapped, "Go on?" she motioned for the paramedic to explain the patient's injuries further.

"Ahem," he coughed, "Patient is Anderson Carpenter, 36, was conscious in the field. He has skull fracture, pneumothorax, and some lacerations on his face, arms, and legs," the paramedic explained.

"Okay, Deluca, what do we do?" April asked, he was an intern and she had always taken a liking to the little guppies. They were scared out of their minds whenever anyone gave them a task besides telling a patient their name or anything having to do with the rectum, but Deluca wasn't like the others. He had a strong head on his shoulders, after graduating from Colombia he had to. He respected April, but he never kissed her ass, something the other interns and residents could learn from. April liked being the boss, but she never liked questioning whether people respected her because she commanded said respect or because she was simply their boss.

"I'll page neuro, cardio, and plastics," he answered.

"Good."

"Should I page Dr. Sloan or?" his voice trailed off.

"Sloan. Page Doctor Sloan," April quickly responded.

Dr. Sloan came barging through the trauma doors a few minutes later, Dr. Deluca had been instructed to not page him 9-1-1, but as a guppy he forgot that small bit of information.

"What do we have Kepner? I was paged 9-1-1," Sloan said as he made his way towards the patient.

"It's not a 9-1-1; Derek's page was a 9-1-1; he just has a few lacerations on his face that need suturing up and I didn't want a resident to do it," April explained coldly.

"Why couldn't Avery do this?" April gave him a harsh look with her eyes and before she could open her mouth to explain, Derek Shepherd came running in.

"Kepner, what do we have?"

"From the x-rays we took here, he has a skull fracture, and we're pretty sure a brain bleed, I've already ordered the CT," she told Dr. Shepherd confidently.

"Good, okay, let's wait and see. You up to scrubbing in to a neuro procedure for old times sake?"

"It would be an honor, Dr. Shepherd," she smiled at him. The two had become quite close since he had worked with her on her physical therapy. They were never friends before, but now April Kepner could say with confidence that Derek Shepherd was her friend.

The patient made it out of surgery, alive, thankfully. April normally developed strong attachments to her patients, it was just a part of her nature, and so when she saw a patient who clearly had the will to live she especially wanted them to make it through.

"You did really well in there Dr. Kepner, ever think about changing your specialty?" Dr. Shepherd asked.

"And take another two years to do a fellowship?" She scoffed, "No, I'm perfectly happy where I am working in Trauma," she smiled, "Well, I'm going to go and check on Mr. Carpenter see if he's going to wake up any time soon."

"Okay, good work tonight Dr. Kepner," Derek called out.

"You too, Dr. Shepherd, now go home to that wife and kids of yours." Derek gave her a half smile, but didn't respond as he watched her turn the corner to make her way towards Mr. Carpenter's room.

"Meredith, you shouldn't be on your feet, how long were you in the O.R. for, doesn't Bailey know that you're due in three weeks," Derek rambled.

"Derek, I'm fine. She's fine. Everything is fine, don't worry."

"You need to slow down, I don't want anything to happen."

"And if it does, this is the perfect place for it to happen, I work in a hospital for Christ's sake."

"Meredith," he scolded slightly, "Promise me you'll slow down. No more 8 hour surgeries."

"Okay," she agreed with her husband, "Except if they're really cool, once in a lifetime surgeries," she teased.

"You're never going to stop are you?" He pestered.

"I think you already know the answer to that, now come here," she pulled her husband next to her and kissed him.

"Dr. Grey," he yelled.

"That's Dr. Grey-Shepherd to you," she laughed before he turned out the lights.

The halls of the hospital were quiet, especially at night when the patients were sleeping and the doctors and nurses were supposed to be at home, but April enjoyed the quiet. It had become so unfamiliar for her, the quiet. The ability to sit and be at peace with her own thoughts, silently. Her world never seemed to stop, never seemed to give her a break, and as much as she loved parts of it she hated others. She missed her freedom, and she hated missing it, because it made her feel like she resented her daughter. She didn't resent her daughter, she loved her, but something never felt right. Jackson and her had bonded for years before she came back, then she was injured and couldn't really bond with her, now it'd been eight weeks since she and Jackson had been together in his car and she still felt like a stranger in her daughter's life. An outsider who didn't belong there and who didn't know if she wanted to belong there.

"Kepner?" Alex Karev asked, "Why are you pacing?"

"Not pacing, Karev, just thinking," she replied.

"You really should go home, haven't you been here for like 48 hours?"

"I have patients Karev, I don't need to go home."

"Do you not need to or do you not want to?" She stopped pacing and looked him straight in the eye. She and him had never seen eye to eye, he always thought she was annoying while she found him to be particularly crass. But he had developed a sort of 'big brother' relationship with her, he cared about her and he tried to protect her even if she didn't want to admit it.

"Alex, I told you I have patients," she tried to divert the subject.

"I have an extra bedroom if you want, if you ever need it," he offered.

"Thank you, Alex, but that won't be necessary," she tried to get the words out but she couldn't, not before she started to ball uncontrollably and he immediately took her in his arms, "Where did I go so wrong? Why is everything spiraling out of control?"

"It's okay, April, it's going to be okay," he soothed her as she sobbed into his chest.

"I don't know if it's going to be, I mean look at me, I'm a mess," she breathed heavily, trying to get her sentence out.

"Kepner, you're a solider. So, you're going to wipe your tears off, go get some sleep at my place or wherever else you want, and then you're going to come back here and be a doctor."

"Thank you, Alex. I don't know why it's always you comforting me, it's sort of embarrassing," she laughed.

"It's because you're too afraid to talk to the one who you really want comforting you. When are you going to tell him?" he asked.

"Tell him what?" He looked down and she immediately knew what he was referring to, "I'll find a time. But not now, I need more time."

"Tell him before he figures it out," Alex warned, "And tell him before you decide to run away again."

"I'm not running away, Seattle is my home. This is my penance, this is what I have to deal with."

"April," he began.

"Yeah," she inquired.

"You don't deserve to be punished. Never have and never will. I may not understand all of your actions, and maybe neither does Jackson, but you're a good person. You save lives every day; you don't deserve what happened to you. No one does. You have to stop beating yourself up over it."

"I know, Alex. I know."

April had decided to get some rest in the on call room, since driving home would have taken too long and she wanted to make sure she got to speak to her patient as soon as he woke up.

"Good morning, Mr. Carpenter, I'm Dr. Kepner I operated on you last night, could you tell me where you are?" She greeted him pleasantly, for a woman who just got four hours of sleep she was particularly chipper.

"I don't know; I'm assuming I'm in the hospital. What happened?" He wondered.

"Yes, you're at Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital in Seattle. Do you remember the accident at all?"

"No, not really. I just remember trying to switch lanes and then everything went black. Have you contacted my family at all?"

"I can see if a nurse knows about that," she said, "Would you like them to be contacted if they haven't been already?"

"Am I going to die?"

She was confused by his response, "No, you're not going to die. Dr. Shepherd is going to want to keep you here for a few more days, possibly a week, for observation on your head lac. Other than that, you're out of the woods."

"Then no, don't bother contacting them. I don't need them worrying over nothing."

"Okay," she hesitated, "I'll just be going then."

"Thank you Dr. Kepner, I hope I'll be seeing you," he smiled as she left his room.

April grabbed her lunch and headed to the cafeteria like she did every day, even prior to her accident, it was one of the few things that she still did. It was nice to see that there had been minimal changes to the cafeteria, a few more tables were added, and there was a slight improvement to the drink selections, but other than that everything remained the same.

"Wow, Meredith, you look like you're going to pop," April smiled as the general surgeon, along with her best friend Cristina Yang sat down to join her.

"Don't remind me about it, she's been resting on my bladder for over a week now. It was never this difficult with Elis or Bailey, why is she being so difficult," Meredith groaned.

"You just have a little princess on your hands," April smiled.

"Speaking of, how's Delilah doing?" Cristina asked, causing April to almost choke on her food. Cristina was the antithesis of baby lover, so she was shocked that she would ask her about her daughter.

"Uh, she's good," April managed to spit out.

"Still not bonding?" Meredith inquired.

"I'd rather not talk about it," April admitted.

"You know he doesn't hate you right?" Meredith reached her hand out for April's, "You're going to get past this."

"There's nothing to get past," April argued, "He said his piece, I said mine. It's better this way, we're both happier this way."

"Okay," the twisted sisters said in unison, they knew better than to pry since April had only been opening up for a few weeks now. She left to go and check on Anderson Carpenter, leaving Cristina and Meredith to gossip among themselves.

"What the hell did they do to Kepner over there? It's like they transformed her into some kind of robot," Cristina scoffed.

"I think losing her son did that," Meredith suggested.

"I never thought I'd say it, but I want the old Kepner back," Cristina added, "And I bet Jackson does too."

"Hey, you don't know that. It's none of our business, so we shouldn't talk about it." Meredith scolded.

"You know I'm right, Mer."

"Ahhh," Meredith screamed.

"Oh my God, Mer is she coming?" Cristina got up franticly.

"No, she's not coming! That's what you get for gossiping about April. Just give her space, she'll come around, she always does."

"That is so not fair," Cristina moped, "You have got to stop playing the 'I'm going into labor card."'

"It's not my fault you fall for it, every time," Meredith smiled.

"Besides, how's my namesake doing? Kicking up a storm, enjoying the medical textbooks I bought her to read?"

"She won't be able to read until she's five and I was thinking of starting her off with the Magic School Bus, not Grey's anatomy," Meredith responded.

"You can never start, Cristina, too early. Besides, how will she feel when she can't live up to her aunt because he parents didn't push her enough."

"Oh hush. She's going to be whatever she wants to be, so you're going to have to get used to the idea of your namesake not being a surgeon."

"Nope, never going to happen," Cristina made her annoyed face, "That girl's hands are going to save lives whether she likes it or not."

"Cristina Yang, never taking no for an answer," Meredith smiled.

"Never."

"Mr. Carpenter, how're we feeling? It looks like Dr. Shepherd is discharging you tomorrow, do you have anyone to pick you up from the hospital and who will take care of you for the week?" April asked her patient.

"Yeah, my friend Bobby is coming. And you can call me Anderson, Dr. Kepner. Mr. Carpenter is just too formal."

"Okay, Anderson," she smiled, "Can I get you anything else before you leave?"

"I'd actually really like your number."

"Oh, I, um," she stuttered.

"I'm sorry, was that too forward? I uh, just didn't see a ring on your finger so I assumed you weren't married; you're not married are you? I know Doctors have to take their rings off all the time," he rambled.

"No, I'm not married. But I don't think I'm ready to date, the divorce is still fresh," she explained.

"That's okay. But I pity the guy who let a girl like you get away, he must have been a damn fool," Anderson offered.

"Trust me, he wasn't." And then she turned on her heel to leave her patient's room.

Flashback "Jackson, is this what you want? Is this what you really want?" She asked her husband who was sitting across from her with his legal consul in toll. She thought they had made up, she thought they were going to be okay. But then, he saw on her computer that the army had asked her to do another tour and she hadn't told them no. He felt completely betrayed by her; he couldn't even stand to look at her. So, he asked for the divorce and full custody of Delilah, both of which April obliged to.

His silence screamed volumes; April didn't want to get divorced. She didn't want to go on another tour. She only wanted her husband to hold her in his arms, but she was so tired of feeling the way she did. Constantly feeling like a failure and like she couldn't give him what he wanted, what he deserved. He deserved a wife who wasn't a runner, a wife who looked at her daughter with pride and no fear, a wife who put him first. That was who she was, but she hadn't been that girl in a very long time.

"Okay," she muttered, as she grabbed the pen and signed her name. She officially was divorced from the love of her life and as much as she hated to admit it, she felt free. That was until she took a pregnancy test a week later, and it came back positive. Just when she thought she was rid of her old life, it had a funny way of dragging her back in.

A/N: I know that I wrote them happy at the end of the last chapter, but I'm trying to follow a bit with the show as well as my own ideas for them as a couple.