This story will imagine a teenage Amelia, Meredith and Maggie meeting in an adolescent psychiatric unit. I couldn't find a definitive answer for where Amelia's age is supposed to fit with the other Grey's characters but one source suggested she is a year or two younger than Meredith who is about 10 years younger than Derek so, at the start of this story, I am assuming Amelia is 15, Meredith 16, Maggie 11 and Derek and Addison in their 20s.
Amelia - Before
'Excuse me? I had a phone call? My daughter was in an accident? Amelia Shepherd. She's only 15. Please. Can you help me?' The harassed looking woman at the reception desk ran her fingers through her hair, looking around frantically as the receptionist searched through the computer records. He looked up, sympathy in his eyes. 'Yes, Mrs Shepherd, we have her. She's ok. She's in the ER. Your daughter in law is with her.'
A fellow intern of Derek and Addison's showed Carolyn Shepherd to the cubicle where her daughter was. Amelia looked so young and fragile lying there with her eyes closed and an IV drip in her arm. Addison sat by her, stroking her hair. It was obvious that she had been crying.
'Addison!' What happened to her? Was she driving?
Addison jumped to her feet and hugged the older woman close to her. 'Sit down, Carolyn. It's not good,' she said. 'Amy took Derek's mustang. It's a write off. Physically, she's just got a slight concussion and some bruises but …' her voice trembled … 'we've paged for a psych consult.'
'Psych? Why? Was she … Addie, was she high?'
Addison nodded slowly and took her mother in law's hand. 'Her bloodwork shows high levels of oxycodone and cocaine. And … Carolyn, did you know Amy is hurting herself?'
'Of course I know that. She's been pulling crap like this for nearly 2 years now. Every day I dread the phone ringing with news like it did today. I'm terrified of what she's going to do to herself but I don't know how much more I can do. And I don't think bringing a therapist down here will do any good. Amy never speaks to them.'
'I don't mean with the drugs,' Addison replied hesitantly. I mean she is self harming. And has been for a while by the look of things' Addison lifted the sleeve of Amelia's hospital gown to reveal dozens of cuts and scars running up and down the length of her arms. Carolyn's hand flew to her mouth and she began to cry, wondering how on earth she hadn't known how much trouble her youngest child was in. 'Oh God,' she sobbed stroking her daughter's hair. 'Amy, what are you doing to yourself, honey? What are you doing to all of us?'
'She's doing what she does best – making everyone miserable,' Derek said as he came into the room with another doctor, his words and tone harsh but his eyes full of pain. 'This is Dr Taylor, she's our paediatric psychiatrist.' Derek moved to hug his mum as Dr Taylor sat down by Amelia's bed and lightly shook her shoulder. 'Amelia, can you open your eyes for me, please?'
Amelia moaned and rolled over. 'I know you're tired and confused and upset but we really need you to talk to us.'
'I'm not confused or upset. I know what happened and I really don't care. I just want to go home,' came the mumbled reply.
'Right, that's it!' Derek lunged forward and knelt by his little sister's head. 'Amy, everyone else might be tiptoeing around you and feeling sorry for you right now but I'm not playing. You are acting like a spoiled, selfish little shit right now. You repeatedly take money to get high on God knows what, you're cutting your arms to ribbons for what – kicks? - , you take my car and total it, you've got mum and Addison in here crying over you and wondering what *they've* done wrong but no, you 'really don't care.' Typical. Fuck you, Amy. I've had it with you. Do what you like for all I care. I'm done.' And with that he stormed out of the cubicle, Addison following him.
'Dr Shepherd!', shouted Dr Taylor fruitlessly after him.
'It's fine, whatever,' said Amelia, her voice low and carefully controlled to prevent herself from crying. She pulled herself up into a sitting position, wincing in pain as she did so. 'He's right. I don't deserve to have anyone worrying about me'.
Dr Taylor spent a long time with Amelia and her mum, trying to get the sullen young girl to open up but got nowhere. Eventually, she spoke to Carolyn outside, telling her there was no cause to admit Amelia but that she urgently needed regular therapy and probably some time in a rehab facility. 'I can't send my 15 year old to rehab,' gasped Carolyn. 'There are specific centres for teenagers,' Dr Taylor informed her. I don't know how regularly Amelia is using but I would hazard a guess that this is pretty serious. And has been going on for a while?'
Carolyn sighed. 'She was 13 when I first got called to school to take her home because she was obviously high. It's not all the time but she's been going further and further off the rails ever since.'
'And the cutting?'
'I didn't know she was doing that,' Carolyn replied, her voice shaking slightly. 'I'm sorry. I'm a terrible mother.'
'I know from Derek that that is definitely not the case,' Dr Taylor soothed. 'Now, I'm not getting anywhere with Amelia tonight so I'm going to discharge her and I've made an appointment for her to see me on Monday after school, if that's ok? In the meantime, I'm calling some adolescent rehab centres for advice and to see if they might be able to take her for a few weeks.'
Nobody spoke on the drive home. By the time Amelia had been ready for discharge, it was the end of Addison and Derek's shifts so Carolyn took them all back to hers for dinner. Derek sat in the front, staring stubbornly out of the window, his posture taut with anger and fear. Addison was in the back with Amelia, holding her hand and attempting to talk but getting no response. Amelia seemed to have disappeared into her own world.
As soon as they got out of the car, Amelia fell to her knees and was violently sick on the driveway. Carolyn knelt by her in a panic. 'Is it the concussion? Do we need to go back to the hospital.'
'No,' Derek answered stiffly. 'Look at her, she's sweating. She's on a come down, that's all. Druggies get like that. She needs some food in her and she needs to sleep it off.'
'Derek, don't called her a druggie,' Addison remonstrated with him gently.
'Why not? It's what she is, isn't it?' And he walked quickly into the house, not looking back.
It was around 3am when Amelia woke up. Addison was asleep on her floor, having decided to stay with the young girl in case she was sick in the night. Amelia sat up, hugging her knees to her chin and resting her still aching head on them. She felt agitated, shaky and desperately in need of pills. Addison and her mum had turned her room upside down to find her stash but Amelia knew one place where they wouldn't have looked. Cautiously, so as not to wake her sleeping sister in law, Amelia edged herself out of bed, crept out of her room and into her sister Kathleen's old room.
At first, Amelia smiled to herself in amusement at the thought of her psychiatrist sister's face if she found out her room was being used to hold her drug addicted little sister's emergency supplies but then she found tears rolling down her face and she sat against the bed, sobbing desperately but quietly. She didn't want to ruin her family's lives, she really didn't. But she felt so alone, out of control and powerless to fix it. Even her brother, the one she depended on to be on her side no matter what, had given up on her now. And she knew she had nobody to blame but herself. She scrabbled at the loose floorboard under Kathleen's bed, pulling out a box containing a bag of small pink oxy pills, 2 miniature bottles of vodka, various other tablets she had taken from around the house, scalpels and first aid supplies. She tried to look at the contents through her family's eyes and took a deep breath. She could get rid of it all and try engaging with that doctor who, after all, had seemed pretty nice. Yes, she decided. She wouldn't hurt her mum and Addie any more, even if none of her siblings cared what happened to her. But as she picked up the bag of pills to flush it away, her resolve snapped. Waves of panic and self hatred washed over her and she curled up in a ball, shaking and sobbing. She couldn't get rid of the feeling that she would always mess up and that her family would be so much happier and better off without her in it.
Trembling, she stood up, sat on Kathleen's bed and opened the bag of pills. She took two, chasing them with half the bottle of vodka, then another three, more vodka, another three and the rest of the bottle. In the back of her mind, she knew she had taken too many but she didn't even care. She just wanted to hurt herself. Punish herself. Maybe even take herself right out of the picture. She grabbed at the scalpel and cut almost blindly at her arms, much more deeply than she ever had before. She watched as blood poured down both arms and onto the floor and felt almost peaceful as she hit the floor, rolling off the bed and taking a lamp with her that fell with a crash.
She lost consciousness as, distantly, she heard her brother scream her name.
