xv. the winner takes it all

(song by abba)

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When she woke up that morning Nina felt oddly more energized than she had felt in weeks, so much so that it took her a couple of seconds after yawning and stretching to realize she wasn't in her own bed again. Groaning and throwing the covers off her body, she sat up and looked around. And then it hit her.

All the memories from the past night came rushing to the front of her mind. Shooting tequila with Miles while they waited for Leo to show up at Joe's, getting way too drunk and flirty with the latter and leaving for his apartment, heavily making out with him in the cab, learning that Leo lived in a very crappy studio much like hers but that his bed was surprisingly comfortable… And then the way she rushed to the bathroom dry heaving when she realized exactly who she was straddling, Leo profusely asking if she was alright before the crying began…

"Kill me now." She mumbled to herself, getting up and leaving what she assumed was Alex's bedroom.

As she crossed the hallway into the bathroom to at least make herself a little more presentable, she remembered the events that followed. She wasn't sure why she chose to take a cab to Alex's place instead of her own apartment but she was confident that it had 90% something to do with yelling at him for calling her a whore and getting her mad enough that she drank that much to begin with, and then 10% for needing someone to confide in. She was certain, however, that Derek Shepherd, Meredith Grey and Lexie Grey becoming aware of the mess she put herself into was completely coincidental.

"Sneaking out?" Alex's voice came from the side of the stairs as soon as she reached the last step.

"Trying to."

She had considered the options and it had been the best one. Even if she seemed ungrateful, she couldn't imagine handling the awkwardness and embarrassment of seeing Derek, Meredith or Lexie that early after last night. Alex chuckled at her honesty and stepped forward, closer to her so the people in the kitchen wouldn't hear.

"I'm sorry." He started. "I shouldn't have called you a whore. I was mad… And I was wrong and I shouldn't have said it."

"Ok." She nodded after sighing. "I guess we have more in common than we thought, huh?" He frowned and she rolled her eyes, stepping towards the door and opening it. "Just seeing a family member makes you act out."

"Oh." He laughed. "Yeah, my brother, that was it."

"I'll see you at the hospital." She grinned. "I need a shower… And… I'm probably gonna have to burn these clothes."

It's a general belief that anything can and will happen suddenly and unexpectedly; life comes at you fast, it's what people say. There's probably some truth to the concept... Even though most things in life happen gradually and the only reason we think it's sudden is because we choose to ignore the things that make us uncomfortable.

Once she got to the hospital, the only thing Nina was sure of was that she needed to avoid Leo at all costs. She knew she'd have to apologize to him, obviously, but just the thought of seeing him that soon made her entire face burn bright red. The horrified look on his face as she, sobbing on wobbly legs, fled from his apartment would forever be engraved in her memory. There were no expectations on having a good day but damn, she had no idea the day ahead was going to be one of the worst ones she had ever had.

It was a couple of hours of stealthily walking the corridors, ducking behind nurse stations and suspiciously looking behind her shoulders before Derek paged her 911 saying they had a trauma chopper coming and he wanted her with him. Almost made her think that maybe the day wouldn't be so bad, as naïve as it sounds.

"It was a fishing boat accident and two patients - one with a head lac and abdominal pain, the other, they said something about a fish hook being stuck somewhere." April explained to Derek, Meredith, Jackson and Nina as they took the elevator to the top of the building.

"Why would they send a chopper for a guy with a fish hook?" Derek asked with a frown, it didn't sound that serious and urgent.

"Uh, I'm pretty sure they said fish hook, Chief Shepherd."

"Okay." He nodded, walking out of the elevator with April following him quickly.

"I'm pretty sure they said fish hook, Chief Shepherd." Jackson teased with a girly voice, making Nina smirk. "But if I'm wrong, you can spank me."

"Shut up." Meredith complained with an annoyed smile.

"Oh, Chief Shepherd, I do hope I'm wrong."

The three walked out, right behind Derek and April, to see Miranda joined by Alex and Lexie already rolling out the first patient who was a teenager with the head laceration and crush injuries. Their patient was the first one's father, a 50 year old male, who seemed to have been stabbed somehow with a giant shark hook. Yep, now they understood the urgency.

The patient, Walter, had a tracheal deviation and a depressed skull fracture, along with the penetrating shark hook inside the right side of his chest. They decided to leave the hook inside him until the surgery, while Derek asked for a head C.T. that Nina eagerly volunteered to take the man to.

"Caught a big one, huh?" Richard walked into the room as Nina and Derek sat, watching the screen.

"That's funny." Derek smiled. "He's got a small hematoma." He commented, reading the scan. "Hey, can I ask you something?" As Richard nodded, he continued. "Why did you hire Altman? What'd you see in her?"

"Well, what do you see in her?"

Nina kept quiet as she frowned at the questions, she had no idea Derek was planning on replacing Teddy. And more importantly, no idea that decision had the potential to brew a storm right above her head.

"I think she's good. She works hard. I feel bad even looking. I'll feel worse, though, letting a stronger candidate pass us by."

As Derek asked Richard for directions, to which he responded with a very cheap fishing metaphor implying he had to decide for himself, Nina waited until he left to placate her curiosity. Even if Derek was Chief now, he was still Derek to her; but Richard would always be the imposing Chief Webber in her eyes and that usually made her bite her tongue and control her words around him.

"You're thinking about replacing Dr. Altman?"

"She has a temporary contract." He explained with a sigh, looking older than before. "I was under the impression she was looking elsewhere. I had to run a search, make calls…" He was talking to her but looking beyond her. "Now Jacob King, I mean… He's won a ton of awards…"

"Jacob King?" Nina interrupted him, her voice higher than before.

"Yeah." Derek continued, not noticing the look on her face. "Not to mention how many times he's published…" He shook his head and looked at Nina fully. "He's doing a bloodless CABG later today." He told her with a small smile. "You should ask Cristina to scrub in too if you can, tell her I said so. It's no neurosurgery but it should be an interesting learning experience."

"Uh…" Nina nodded shakily. "Sure." She got up fast, making him look at her oddly. "I have to… I've got to go."

It wasn't hard to find him; she only had to ask one of the nurses if they'd seen Cristina Yang and shortly after Nina was standing on the other end of the same corridor as him. He looked the same; his blonde hair was styled upwards like she teased him about so many times before and a sweet smile on his face as he listened to Cristina speak.

She didn't realize she had begun walking in their direction or that she had been staring too hard until she was startled by the way his eyes looked up to find hers. A loud gasp escaped her throat before she could prevent it and she took a step back, she hadn't planned on him seeing her. Not that soon, not by surprise like this… Turning her back as fast as she could Nina ran from the scene, wanting to put as much distance as she could between them before she threw herself into a bathroom on another floor and emptied her stomach in one of the stalls.

Choosing to ignore a problem doesn't make it go away, usually it just stays right where you left it but on occasion it can worsen. The decision to leave Chicago and everyone in it behind wasn't a sudden one for Nina, as a matter of fact it had been a long time coming. For months she played over scenarios in her head, plagued by the severity and weight of what leaving could come to mean before she, finally, packed her bags and left. That was six months ago.

Untied knots come back to haunt us, Kahlani. Her nana, her dad's mom, used to say it all the time when she was younger and didn't want to do her homework or her house chores. It never sounded more appropriate than now, when the loosest knot she had ever left behind came back. Jacob King was in Seattle Grace Mercy West and she was freaking out.

"Thought I'd check to see how far along we are."

She heard Derek's voice as she and April followed him into the O.R. where Owen and Teddy were operating on their fish hook patient, Walter. Her brain registered that people were talking and that someone must have made a joke because there were laughter but she wasn't there. Physically yes, but mentally she was the farthest she had ever been.

Was he here for her? No, he was here for the bloodless CABG, it was one of his favorites. How did he know where she was? Abbie, it had to be Abbie. Was Derek really going to hire him? No, he wouldn't do that to Teddy. What could that mean for her? Everyone was gonna know and judge her. Would she have to leave again? She liked Seattle so much.

"All right, nobody move but Dr. Hunt." Derek's voice woke her up again and she blinked, lifting her eyes from the floor she had been staring at.

"On my count." Owen started, getting ready to pull the hook from the patient. "One… Two…"

And Teddy sneezed, startling Owen who moved too fast causing the hook to snag an artery. As Teddy apologized and they worked fast to stabilize the patient before Derek could evacuate his hematoma and plate his skull fragments, Nina couldn't help but worry more. The smallest of mistakes Teddy made today would only drive Derek to pursue Jacob harder and the intern wasn't sure how that would play out for her.

Avoiding Leo also meant avoiding Sarah and Miles, which made her sit down with Alex and Meredith to eat lunch. She was fidgety, keeping her head down, looking behind her shoulder like a sinner in church but thankfully Alex and Meredith seemed to think she was being weird because of what happened the night before and didn't comment on it.

Instead they steered the conversation to the cases they were working on, fish hook man and his teenage son who may or may not have hooked his father on purpose. It all changed as soon as Cristina came to the table and started raving about how incredible working with the Jacob King was. He was brilliant, in her opinion, and the surgery was an amazing success. That was all Nina could stomach to hear before she rushed into a standing position, to the absolute confusion of the three residents still seated, and left almost running after mumbling she had just remembered something Derek had asked her to do.

Hearing about Jacob King so much, after so long, made her head spin uncomfortably. Funny enough, she didn't know that same decision would bring her into his path as he stood at a nurse station looking over a chart. She thought about turning around again or maybe sneaking behind him but sighed, knowing she was being childish and walked towards him. He looked up before she got too close and gave her a small smile before lifting his hand, offering it for a handshake.

"I don't think we've met." His voice came out steady and the little smirk he always wore became present but his eyes seemed different, duller. "Jacob King."

"What are you doing?" Nina frowned, ignoring his hand until he lowered it and looked around.

"Well…" He sighed. "Following your lead, I thought you were pretending you didn't know me." His voice was colder than she remembered. "Or that I don't exist at all… People here think you're single."

"Jake, I…"

"I mean, I've asked around…" He continued in a lower voice even though no one else was close enough to hear them. "About you. Interesting theories." His smile was bitter, it didn't used to be. "Uh, some people think you're gay. Others think you're sleeping with the Chief. Who's married, by the way. Quite scandalous." She shook her head, wanting to shout at him that the rumors were untrue but her voice failed her. "But there are a few who think you're actually…" He looked behind her. "Sleeping with the intern who's coming this way right now."

It was Leo. While talking to Jake, she momentarily forgot to make herself sparse. Looking from one man to the other, one wanting her attention and the other walking away, almost gave her whiplash. Leo opened his mouth to talk when her pager went off and she mumbled an excuse to get away from one more uncomfortable conversation she was definitely not ready for.

Walter had become lethargic and febrile, coughed up blood and his sats dropped out, his x-ray showed there was a large hemothorax where the hook had been taken out. Teddy wanted to rush him into surgery while Derek was hesitant without a C.T. to confirm what the issue was, but she convinced him after telling him that he needed to trust that she knew what she was doing. Unfortunately, she had been wrong this time. They had just scrubbed in when Lexie Grey rushed into the O.R. saying Doug, the teenage son, had Klebsiella pneumonia and that Walter most likely had it too seeing how contagious it could be when living in close quarters. Shortly, both patients were moved to the I.C.U. to start their treatments with antibiotics.

Fear stopped her from seeking him out again despite wanting to. She didn't want to talk about their past, about the in-and-outs of what happened between them because many months had passed and she still hadn't prepared for it in a way. But foremost, it terrified her to think about their present apart. It was shameful how much she dreaded the idea of his life without her because she was the one who left. She had no right… No right to think he wouldn't move on, no right to want to touch him like she used to, no right to be upset that he looked good while she felt miserable.

"Can I talk to you?"

The intern had just walked out of the locker room, changed out of her scrubs and ready to go home when he intercepted her. It surprised her that he did, his words from earlier in the day didn't exactly paint the picture of someone who would want to talk again, but she nodded anyway and they walked into an on-call room together for more privacy.

As they stood in front of each other, close enough that her hands tingled wanting to touch him again, Nina knew they were committing their faces to memory. It could very well be the last time they would ever see each other and she wanted to remember him. Jake sighed, brushing his fingers through his hair and sitting down in one of the beds.

"I didn't know you'd be here." He started, closing his eyes as he seemed to ponder over his words. "I figured you'd go home… Or at least to a warmer weather."

She had considered it many times, growing up in California made her love the sun, but she had been away with boarding school, college and residency for so long that she didn't miss it as much anymore. Not to mention, being close to her family was one the last things she had wanted to do when she left Chicago.

"This program is one of the best." She explained with a soft voice as she sat beside him and he nodded at her words.

"Your Chief offered me Head of Cardio." He turned his head to look at her and she smiled, already knowing that would happen. "I declined… I don't want you to feel uncomfortable with me here."

"I don't understand…" She frowned before explaining her line of thought. "The idea of you leaving Chicago is absurd to me." He smiled at her words. "Your whole family is there and the hospital… You love working at Northwestern." He laughed under his breath and shook his head.

"Chicago is… Full of memories for me." His wording made her take in a long breath. "Home, the hospital, even the streets…"

"Jake, I…"

"I had to move." He interrupted her before she could ask him to stop, the words falling out of his mouth in a rambling fast speech. "I got this new place, uh, it's very… Well, it sucks." He scoffed at his own words, it was the truth. "It's on the second floor and it's small and close to traffic... It's so loud, you would hate it. I think that's why I got it."

"Maybe we should go." She bit her lips after mumbling it, maybe this was too much.

"I had… Deadlines." He got up as he spoke, standing in front of her. "In my head, I had these dates that I thought would be important to you." He knew she didn't want to talk but he had to say it. "You always liked special occasions, holidays and birthdays… So I thought maybe you'd come home for Christmas… A part of me was hopeful, you know ? The other part of me, of course, knew you wouldn't… But I still hoped. I hoped you'd call or write, just told me something… How you were, where…" They were both silent for a few seconds before Jake looked down at the floor and up at her again. "Our anniversary was the day I realized you were never coming back. I started looking for a new job the morning after."

They stared at each other for a few seconds, both looking to be trying as hard as they could to hold back the tears, before he left the room. She sat there for minutes on end, trying to stop the tears that had started to fall as soon as he turned his back and clutching the sheet to stop herself from going after him. There was no point in it and she knew. It was over and they both needed to learn to live without each other.

Alex was pulling out his clothes from his cubby in the resident's locker room when he heard a noise coming from behind him. Not giving it much thought, thinking it was just another resident coming in to change before leaving, he pulled his scrub top off and his t-shirt on. Only looking behind his shoulder when nobody appeared on his line of sight, he was caught off guard at finding Nina standing near the door. Her eyes were red and she was grabbing at her own arms like she wanted to hug herself. He instantly took quick steps closer to her, putting his hands on her shoulders and looking her straight in the eyes.

"Are you okay?" She nodded quickly, a small bitter smile appearing on her face.

"Can you take me home?" Her voice was almost a whisper and he frowned even deeper. "I don't wanna be alone."

And he did. No question asked, even if he was dying to bite the bullet he didn't want to pressure her if she didn't want to talk about it. They understood each other like that since the beginning, sometimes you just need someone to be there with you in silence. They had been at her apartment for a few hours then, watching The Goonies because it was her feel-good movie of choice and accompanied by a bottle of tequila and barbecue wings they had delivered when she looked up at him with a much more genuine smile.

"You know Jacob King?" She asked in a quiet voice, she needed to tell someone.

"Cristina's Cadio God?" Alex frowned, wondering why she had brought the big shot surgeon up at all, and she nodded.

"He's my husband."