In Which Addison Enjoys the Chase
I am a double board certified OB/GYN and neonatal surgeon with a subspecialty in maternal-fetal medicine and I have completed a fellowship in medical genetics, specializing in cystic fibrosis. I am one of only eight people in the world who can perform OB/GYN, perinatology, and neonatal surgery on a world-class level. I am in charge of a world-class NICU and state-of-the-art OB/GYN wing and I am one of the highest paid surgeons in Northwestern United States. People consider me as "the Meryl Streep of Maternal-Fetal Medicine." So please, tell me why my soon-to-be ex-husband, who says he fell in love with me because of my brain, has yet to even call me. It's been nearly a month.
As I stand here looking at myself in the mirror, I realize my marriage really is over. Now I just can't wait for him to sign the papers and I can officially move on with my life. Even if he did want me back, I've fallen in love with someone else; someone I think actually wants me back. Although she's making it incredibly hard for me to get to her… but it's okay because I like the chase. I knew the moment I laid eyes on her, although I was too intoxicated to actually remember that night, she was it for me. It's something about Meredith Grey.
I pull up at the hospital and I have 45 minutes to spare. I decide to walk down the street to that coffee stand on the corner and see if I can get the barista to make my juju. The sun's out but I can't say it's hot out however it's pretty warm for Seattle. I still have to wear my trench coat due to the morning breeze but I have to admit it is a beautiful day. As I'm walking back towards the hospital and I spot Dr. Bailey standing on a street corner looking confused. I join her. "Mornin', Dr. Bailey."
"Shut up," she says holding up her hand as she continues thinking.
"You realize that I'm an attending and you're only a resident? That you work for me, right?"
"Ssh, I know, I've forgotten something," she shushes me again and I'm baffled, "Something is happening today. I know I should know what it is, but I can't…"
"Alright, nice talking with you Dr. Bailey."
"It's right in front of my face," she says not even hearing what I said.
I begin to walk forward to cross the road, when I hear Dr. Bailey gasp and grab me as several bike riders race past and two crash. "Whoa."
"Watch out. Watch out," she says as more bikers fly by and another crashes near us.
"Dead Baby Downhill Bike Race, how could I forget that?" She questions herself as the race seems to fly past us and we finally cross the street. I hope whatever this Dead Baby Bike Rice is, doesn't include actual dead babies… That sounds pretty horrid.
As Miranda and I walk into the hospital, we overhear the interns talking about what I can only assume is the race. "Fools on bikes killing themselves. Natural selection is what it is. Now get to work."
I hear Alex ask another intern if Dr. Bailey, whom they refer to as the Nazi, is off her medication. He must know just about as much as I know about this race. I'm new to Seattle so I have no clue what's going on. I stop at the Nurses' Station to pretend I'm going through charts as I listen in.
"You don't know about the race?" an intern starts. This one must be George… the one they're calling 007. I've only seen him in passing.
"The Dead Baby Bar," Meredith explains to a confused Alex, that intern who irks my nerve… So incompetent.
"Every year, they hold this underground bike race," says George again.
"Don't you wonder why someone would name a bar something so disgusting?" Izzie says and I honestly have to agree with that one.
"Keep your panties on, Nancy Drew," another intern speaks up. I'm assuming this is Cristina. I see her and Meredith together all the time. They must be good friends.
"The race is completely illegal and—" George chimes in before he's cut off.
"Crazy," Meredith exaggerates by using her hands, "a bunch of bike messengers racing against traffic trying to beat each other for free shots of tequila."
"All-out, no holds barred competition. Sounds like fun," says the incompetent Alex.
"Yeah, you would think that," says Izzie. I really did pick the right intern for this job.
"The race, the race doesn't even have any rules. Except eye gouging. No eye gouging." George says as Izzie laughs.
"We're gonna be trapped in the pit band-aiding idiots when we could be up in the O.R." Cristina speaks up. She's so blood thirsty. I like her.
"What kind of people engage in a race that has, as its only rule, is that you can't rip out the eyeballs of another human being?" George asks.
"Men, Georgie, Men," Alex smirks in his response.
I don't know why that intern irritates me so much but I think I have enough information to know this has nothing to do with Neonatal so I don't have to worry. I start towards my office when I run into Dr. Burke and the Chief standing in front of the O.R Schedule board. The Chief starts up excitedly, "Excellent board – well timed, balanced, efficient... If all goes well, we'll have an early night."
"'Dead Baby' Bike Race Day started 20 minutes ago," Dr. Bailey says as she walks by. This seems to send Dr. Burke and Dr. Webber off.
"All right, people! 'Dead Baby' Bike Race Day!" Weber says as he gets paged to the OR. Dr. Bailey and Dr. Burke go rushing towards the ER to prepare. I follow along because this is completely new to me and I just want to see how this is going to play out. Miranda tells the interns that she needs someone to get up to the OR floor, the Chief needs a right hand. Everyone's hands shoot up and Dr. Bailey picks George.
"Okay people," Dr. Bailey speaks out to the rest of the interns, "the rules of trauma. Don't mingle with the E.R interns, they don't know their ass from their esophagus. Sew fast, discharge fast, take bodies up to the O.R. yesterday. And don't let me catch you fighting over patients. Got it? Come on, let's go."
Everyone disperses and I head up to my office to prepare for my day. I look at my schedule and I see that I have six babies that are due today. I have two C-sections and four natural births whose mommies are in labor right now. I wonder if my intern has delivered a baby before. I'm sure they must have in medical school but just in case, I go ahead now and ask Dr. Bailey to send Izzie up when she is free. I'm not sure how long that'll be seeing that the ER is packed with bikers. That race really is ridiculous… They're out there killing each other for free shots of Tequila.
I'm sitting in my office a few hours later after birthing two babies whose mothers just happened to become fully dilated literally minutes after the other was born. As soon as I delivered little Ashley, I actually had to run down the hall to birth baby Nicholas. But with two down and four to go, I decide to use my spare time to go down to the ER and much to my surprise, when I get there I see a patient take Meredith by the face and kiss her as he walks out of the hospital. I walk up to her when I see that he's gone. Meredith sees me and playfully rolls her eyes, "What do you want?"
"You make out with patients now?" I ask putting my hands on my hips.
She smirks, "What, are you jealous?"
"I don't get jealous." I lie through my teeth. It's why I left my husband anyway. I was jealous of all the time and commitment he put into his job and not me.
"We had sex – once," she clarifies as to say that I have no reason to be jealous.
"And we kissed in an elevator." I point out to her.
"And we kissed in an elevator – once," she clarifies again. She's the one who kissed me… I mean I did kiss her back but still, she started it.
"No seriously. C'mon, go out with me." I practically beg. I don't know what it is about this girl but I want to spend all of my time with her. I'd never put anything before her; not even surgery.
"No," she says smiling a little.
"You know, I almost died today. Yeah, I came like this close." I show her with my fingers, "How would you feel if I died and you didn't get a chance to go out with me?" I try.
"Get over yourself already," she rolls her eyes and begins to walk away.
"C'mon!" I follow as she turns around to face me.
"It's the chase, isn't it?"
"What?" her question threw me off guard.
"The thrill of the chase," she pauses then continues, "I've been wondering to myself, why are you so hell-bent on getting me to go out with you? You know you're my boss. You know it's against the rules. You know I keep saying no. It's the chase."
"Well it is fun, isn't it?" I respond quickly.
"You see! This is a game to you, but not to me. Because, unlike you, I still have something to prove." She takes off down the hallway and I continue on about my day. It's filled with vaginas, pregnant people and babies… Luckily for me, no dead babies riding a bike.
I'm coaching Izzie through a delivery which she does extremely well on. I found out that she learned how to do one in medical school but never actually performed one so this is her first. She did so well that I invited her to one of my C-sections later that I'd like to see her perform if not today, then tomorrow. Yes, I say this so casually because literally thousands of babies are born every day. We're bound to get another C-section tomorrow.
Later at lunch in the cafeteria, Meredith comes to me about a patient of hers. It's a harvest that she asked Dr. Burke to do but he won't do it. I find it quite amusing that she's even coming to me after running into her earlier today. "You're asking my advice?"
"Yes."
"Now, who's chasing?" I smirk.
"Not funny. This is important," she says holding the chart close to her.
"Okay," I think to myself before I speak. "You want to get around Burke? You gotta find a way to get the Chief involved."
I see Meredith thinking and I know she's up to something… so now, I guess I have some part in this too since I gave her the idea. She runs off towards what I assume is the Chief's office as she thanks me.
I come out of the OR exhausted. Dr. Stevens did an excellent job with the C-section. She's one of the most promising interns this year. I see a lot of myself in her and I'm glad I'm the one who gets to teach her. I had an excellent teacher, Dr. Vivian Carlsmith, a world-renowned OB/GYN and pioneer in maternal-fetal medicine. Vivian told me I was her smartest student and eventually I surpassed her skill which proves to you how great of a mentor she was. I want to be like that so I'm breeding my mentee from the start; intern year.
Since I've already showed her every aspect of the OB/GYN wing, I plan on introducing her to my favorite place in the hospital, the NICU. She's my favorite intern, besides Meredith whom I can't stop thinking about. I wonder how things turned out with her harvest patient so I go looking for her without even stopping by my office. I find her in the intern locker room and overhear her yelling at someone. When I hear someone get slammed up against the lockers is when I decide it's best to intervene. Meredith's yelling at the incompetent intern, Alex, and she has him pinned up against the lockers. I should've known it would be him to start trouble however this is interesting so I decide to watch.
"You have got to be kidding me! Okay. I have more important things to deal with than you. I have roommates, and girl problems, and family problems." Alex yawns acting like he is bored by her and it just makes her angrier. "You want to act like a little frat boy bitch? That's fine. You want to take credit for your saves, and everybody else's? That's fine, too. Just stay out of my face." Meredith then grabs Alex's chin so he looks at her directly, "And for the record, you smell like crap!" She turns to go back to her locker and now they both see me looking at them. I walk in a little and look over to Alex. I look at him as if to ask him what happened knowing Meredith may be too upset to speak.
"She attacked me," he says harshly and I see it infuriates Meredith more because now she rushes over to really attack him.
"Meredith, Meredith, Meredith!" I intervene by grabbing her arms before she reaches Alex and she lets me push her back. I turn back to Alex, "You know you might want to leave. Before I change my mind and let her beat you to a pulp with her tiny ineffectual fists."
Finally it's the end of the day and I swear, I don't want to see anymore pregnant people for at least another year. I go by my office to pack up and go home. I wonder if Meredith has left yet. I decide to stop by their locker room and she if she's inside. When I walk in, I see Meredith packing up her things so I walk in shutting the door behind me. I notice she's the only person in here so I start, "It's not the chase."
"What?" she says to me confused.
"You and me." I say looking into her beautiful green, grey-ish blue eyes. "It is not the thrill of the chase. It's not a game." I run my fingers across her knuckles, "It's...it's your tiny ineffectual fists." I run my hands through her hair, "And your hair."
"My hair?" she questions me as she steps a little closer.
"It smells good. And you're very, very bossy," I smile, "It keeps me in line."
She then leans forward and gently takes my cheeks in her hand as she kisses me softly on the lips. It's long and sweet then she looks back up at me. "I'm still not going out with you."
"You say that now," I laugh to myself as she grabs her things and walks out the locker room. I follow behind her and I was going to walk her to her car when Dr. Stevens walks past me, "Wait, Dr. Stevens. Walk with me."
She complies and walks with me to the elevator. She's telling me about her day but I'm not really listening. I'm focusing on what comes next. We go up the elevator and go one up from the OB floor.
"We're not going to OB wing?" she questions me.
"Just wait, Stevens," I say as the elevator opens up. We step out and walk down to the end of the hallway. I open the door to the NICU and I hear Izzie gasps, "This is my favorite place in the hospital and I wanted you to be properly introduced. You deserve it."
I watch her as she walks around taking in everything with awe. "It's my world-class NICU. This and the state-of-the-art OB/GYN wing could all be yours one day if you work hard enough."
"This is amazing," that's all that she could say. I smile to myself pleased that I've chosen the right person. "Could I stay in here for a little bit? Get used to the place?"
"I'll leave you to it," I start to walk out of the room while Izzie stays and familiarizes herself with the place, "Good night, Dr. Stevens."