Hi finally up with the chapter.

Due to work and personal commitments that have recently developed I have decided to end this story at Season 8. I think ending the story around Season 8 gives the character and the story closure and I am able to finish this story before any commitments I have become to much of an issue for me to update. While I have enjoyed this story immensely and all the positive feedback I think that the last episode of Season 8 gives me chance to bring the characters to the end of a story a lot quicker than in the show and also allows me to change the end of a very angsty ending for some characters.

Therefore I will have Japril together by the end of Season 8. This chapter lays the foundation for the rest of Season 7 and then when we get to Season 8 the relationship will develop a lot more quicker.

Disclaimer-Nothing is mine,

Please Read and Review.

Little Lion Man

Chapter 36-7x16-Not Responsible.

As Jackson and Lexie work together on a complex procedure, he must work out whether or not to take a shot with Lexie or lay out all his cards with April. Meanwhile April learns that there is another side to Doctor Stark. Hugo attempts to tell his father about his girlfriend while Jackson himself wonders what Hugo would think of him dating seriously for the first time since his mother.

Hugo had been planning to tell his father about the fact that he and Charlotte were now the equivalent of boyfriend and girlfriend. However what that meant at fourteen he wasn't sure. He knew that he wanted to go out with her and hold her hand but he wasn't sure why. Sure he had pulled a shard of glass out of her leg and they had both survived something horrible but Hugo had never had a girlfriend before, hell he had never had any girl interested in him before. He wasn't sure what to do.

However his Dad had been acting, well, strange, stranger than usual. Whenever April came in the room he would jump about five feet in the air and then go a strange colour. Hugo would have teased his Dad about whatever the hell was going on with him but he had his own confusing problem. When did girls go from being just girls to being...well girls that you date?

He could go to anyone other than his Dad he knew that, Hugo spent half his time in a hospital with Doctor's that knew his Dad and were friendly with them and living in a house with a load of relatively young people meant that he knew things and more importantly saw things that most people didn't see...at least not until their first mug of coffee.

Owen, Webber and Derek were all strictly off limits simply because Hugo couldn't have a conversation with them about girls to save his life, Alex and Mark would both grin idiotically and then give him some advice that Hugo wouldn't listen to unless he wanted to get arrested or probably become scarred for life. The bottom line was that the only person he had ever really talked to about girls was his Dad and even then he didn't have a girlfriend then who held his hand in the hallways and during class.

Crap. When did everything become so complicated?

Unknown to Hugo his father was thinking the exact same thing.

Jackson had been working on a transplant pair of lungs for Doctor Altman with Lexie who was sending secret little smiles at him that Jackson knew he was interpreting right. It might have been a while since he had gone on a date but he was still aware of when someone was interested in him. This life, the life of a surgeon took away the flexibility that came with the life that a normal person had and then when he had chosen to have and raise Hugo whatever had been left had always been spent on his son.

Hugo…Hugo was fourteen however, he was older now and it seemed in maturity he had aged a decade over the last few months. Jackson was completely confident that if he left his son alone he would not burn the house down. Well…he did live in a house with about six other people so there was that. But…Hugo had never really seen him with any woman other than…well April and that was a road that Jackson wasn't sure if he could go down right now…well not at work and certainly not sober.

The case they were working on took a horrific turn when Altman ordered the lovesick patients to break up. Jackson personally did not think that was going to do anything. Love was love and Altman he thought couldn't give the lungs away based on a relationship, no matter how destructive and dangerous it could be. But the look on the older woman's face was so severe that he wasn't sure if he could broach the subject without getting his head bitten off.

Hugo came in around the end of the school day with that far off look he'd been sporting recently coupled with that little smile that made Jackson suspicious. He would have asked Hugo what made him look like that but then again he wanted to talk to Hugo first. Regardless of whether it was April or Lexie he damn well wanted Hugo's approval before he took anything any further.

"Can I ask you something?" Hugo said coming up to meet him just as Jackson was finishing his charts. He chewed his bottom lip before releasing it. "Sure kiddo?" Jackson said closing the chart. "I kinda have to ask you something myself"

Hugo tilted his head to the side narrowing his eyes. He had never really been in a situation where he had ever seen his Dad look that nervous. Except maybe in the aftermath of the shooting when he had tried to get him to go and see Andrew Perkins.

"What happened now?" he asked already preparing himself mentally for what was going to happen. Surely, to God there was not another catastrophe coming around the corner. There was only so much death and destruction a kid could take for crying out loud.

"Nothing" his Dad said still looking unnervingly nervous. Hugo stared. This was never a good sign. The last time that happened his Dad was telling him they were moving.

That had turned out to be a good thing, he wasn't sure what this was going to be.

"How would you feel" his Dad began "If I asked someone on a date sometime?" Hugo blinked, how would he feel? How would he feel if his Dad wanted to go on a date? Oh shit how did he feel about it. Now he was thinking.

In truth he knew who he wanted his Dad to go out with.

April.

April had been a part of his life for so long that it didn't feel like two years it felt like it was a normal part of his life. Hell she felt like his mother in more ways than one and he could still remember what it was like that day of the shooting and sometimes when the three of them were out walking from the hospital together and people watched them Hugo for once thought that they must think that April could be his mother. He had come to the realisation that he didn't mind that so much.

But still. Hs Dad might not be telling him he was going to ask April out, Hugo didn't want to come out and ask him however, the nurses were terrible gossips and already two were shooting them suspicious glances.

"Is it someone I know?" he asked hoping that would be enough. If It was someone he didn't then...then that was a different story altogether. His Dad nodded turning back to his chart. "Yeah" he said his voice trying to stay normal Hugo could tell.

Hugo shrugged not wanting to get his hopes up but unable to dissuade them. If he was right. If his Dad was planning on asking April out and she said yes…it would be like he was unifying their own strangle little family.

"Then do it" he said shrugging. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask him if it was April but Hugo knew that if he tried to guess this would put his Dad off. It had taken a long time for them to get to this point and Hugo didn't want to scare away his Dad from being happy just for him.

Later that night Hugo was sat at the kitchen when April who had sprinted up to the bathroom to speak to Lexie came back down again with a rather surprised smile on her face. "You look happy" Hugo said staring back down at a nasty equation that he couldn't get his head around. April smiled. "I think Doctor Stark just asked me out" she said shaking her head.

Hugo had not had the pleasure of meeting the newest paediatric doctor yet and according to Alex he was to avoid him like the plague. He was confused. "You spoken to Dad yet?" he asked. Hopefully if his Dad did ask April out she wouldn't be bothered to much about turning this Stark down.

April shook her head muttering something about dinner. Hugo frowned his Dad had come home an hour ago and had then promptly disappeared upstairs claiming he had to research a case and needed some quiet.

He shook his head. He was overthinking it again. Everything would turn out for the best. After the year they had, had the three of them, it would have too.

Meanwhile Jackson was just drying himself off after he and Lexie had finally untangled their limbs and left the shower. The sex had been brilliant and Jackson had been into it with a passion until (and he hated to admit it) April had come into the room. The fact that Stark had asked her out infuriated him even though he knew that it had no right and even if he didn't there was the fact that she was standing in the same room as him while he'd been naked and covered only by a thin curtain. That was something he really didn't want to dwell on, if she'd had pulled back the curtain she'd have seen.

"You coming to bed?" Lexie asked from where she'd found her discarded underwear. Jackson blinked temporarily lost in thought. "Yeah" he said finding his voice again. "Let me go check on Hugo for a sec and then I'll join you"

Lexie smile dimmed a bit but she recovered herself and nodded turning and dropping the towel as she went. Jackson rolled his eyes without meaning to and picked up his jeans that had thankfully been hidden out of sight.

He had done nothing wrong, but still…for some reason something felt wrong. He had a horrible feeling he knew what but he didn't want to dwell on it. He wasn't going to lose his only friend for some feelings he was pretty sure she didn't have for him. No…he looked at himself in the mirror and nodded once.

It was better this way.

(And God help him, he realised much later on while Lexie was sleeping, how he hoped he was wrong)

Next Chapter-7x17-This Is How We Do It-As the competition heats up between the residents Hugo and Jackson make startling revelations about each other's personal lives leading to confusion on both sides and some hurt, also April continues her non-relationship, relationship with Stark leading to some teasing and some more tension and Callie and Arizona go for a drive.

And let me know what you think