The room was full. Other Attendings stand with Meredith Grey behind Dr. Mitchell. Tall, uninterested Dr. Mitchell who stands over his friend James but has no idea that's who the patient is.
Lucy stands on the other side of the table looking down at someone she knows. All of the other interns are with her and this is OR 1.
"This afternoon Dr. Grey assisted me in a Pectus Excavatum. Mid surgery his liver and heart went into failure. We were able to revive the liver but his heart is dying. He needs a new one, and fast. Each attending has began a project. Each project requires a lot of research and experimentation. This is where you come in. When a subject is about to die your job is to save them. If your project fails you are out of the program." Dr. Logan Mitchel explained to them.
A hand went up in the air. It was Lucy's.
He looked at a chart in his hand, "Yes Dr. Stone."
"What happens if our subject dies." Her face was serious. No one was laughing because in any other circumstance it might be funny but here it is seemingly imperative that they know.
He clears his throat with a gruff and says, "Unless you can find a replacement... your team fails."
Quillard looked at her very crossly. Was it jealousy?
James was lost in his head. Memories of three weeks ago flooded his mind.
A hotel suite, shared with female representative. She was so what his young brain craved alone in his sheets at eleven. Someone touching him that looked like that. How could he not?
His wife, dear God, what would she think?
When the representative asked him this on her knees, such expensive clothes to just toss on a floor. It's a Stanton luxury carpet so who cares right? His watch cuts his wrist and he rips it off.
Of course he'd tell a woman who has her hands wrapped around his cock, "I don't care."
Her on his lap, bright pink panties dividing his nakedness from hers. Thick throbbing member in her grasp, she owns him.
His phone is beside them on the bed and she picks it up. She's his representative so she has access to any and all of his secrets. So his pinpad isn't really a code breaking experience. She hits the send call button and her velvet lips make their way down his muscular chest. The tan on tan and the wet hot slip are an echo from his lips as his wife answers the other end of the line.
"Hi honey, what's wrong are you hurt?" She asked.
He gasps, "I'm fine. Just got out of the car. I just slammed my hand in the door."
She whimpers. Her kind, loving, nurturing voice carries through that motherly like concern she reserves for their kids.
A hand on his shoulder, James is pulled from illusion and he's in the hospital bed. He has a room in the hospital. Room 74. His friend Cierra Bravo is looking at him in her own gown. She's got a machine attatched to her veins she has to roll around and she looks weak and derranged, "James."
"Cierra? What's happening? Why did Logan cut into my fucking chest?" He's shivering.
A shrug in her shoulders, "You should know there are no answers this early in a mess. Why even bother asking?"
He notices her wheel chair. A cast around her leg. The crash comes back to him. A single tear falls down the left side of his face.
"I cheated wife Cierra." He said.
She nods and places a palm over his chest where his heart is and the warmth is enough to ease some of the pain, "I know. Carlos told me."
He furrows a brow and looks at her. He never told Carlos. Then it hits him what she's referring to, "Me kissing Carlos is not what I'm talking about. I fucked my representative in the hotel suite in New York. While I was on the phone with my wife."
She pulls in a deep breath and sighs, "Carlos... also got a call that day."
He followed her eyes to the pull out table between them against the wall. Upon it, among a newspaper from years back and a bucket of cool water, lay a broken apple watch. Fear swipes over his face, "That's why he hasn't been wanting me to touch him. I love him Cierra, you must know that."
"Not the way he needs to be loved." She says sweetly.
Then there's a knock at the door and Kax is standing there, "Hi. Ms. Bravo it's almost time for your scans are you ready?"
She sighs, then turns to look back at James for one final statement; "Logan is a good person. We must trust that whatever chaos is going on he can sort it out."
"Dr. Mitchell is the best one for this project. Trust me. I wouldn't be here if I didn't think so. You're in good hands Mr. Diamond." Smiles Kax as he comes in to push Cierra's chair out into the hall.
James looks down at his hands in concern. Diamond? He's not his character. He is James Masslow, an adulterous monster. James Diamond would never have hurt anyone. He's too much a friend to Carlos Garcia to be that kind of person. Out here, in the real world, off the screen, he's ruined any chance at all of being friends with Carlos. Where is he anyway?
Then determination finds it's way into his features. Play the role! Says a voice. Only whos?