Alex walked down the corridor toward Izzie's room. Everything was quite clam, just like it should be. He was expecting something to have happened, but nothing had happened. Izzie was sitting up in her bed, she had a notebook, a pen and some coloured pencils sitting on the table over the bed. She was practicing writing. She stopped when Alex came in and smiled at him. She wasn't mad at him yet, she didn't know what he'd been doing, she was just glad to see him again.
He gave her a kiss and sat down on the bed beside her. He asked her what she'd been doing; he didn't want to talk about what he'd been doing, not yet. A part of him was sure that Izzie would not be happy if she knew what he'd been doing.
Izzie showed him the pictures she'd drawn and the things she had written. Her occupational therapist has suggested the exercise to help with her fine motor skills. The pictures and the writing were crude. It reminded Alex of something a five year old would do, the lines were shaky and her letters large and ill formed. Alex still said it was great, and it was in a way.
He let Izzie do all the talking. He asked her as many questions as he could think of. He didn't want to talk about himself, what he'd been doing all day. He didn't think Izzie would understand, not at the moment. She was bored, she wanted to go home, she didn't like the hospital. Alex understood, he hated it too, not the hospital as such, but he hated Izzie being there.
She didn't need to be in the hospital, she was well enough to go home, but Alex understood why she was there. These seizures were potentially a very dangerous thing, she was very lucky not to have hurt herself with the last one. They needed to find the trigger and as much as Alex hated the thought of it having to do with him a part of him hoped Shepard was right because then they'd have some answers.
"Has Dr. Shepard visited today?" Alex asked pulling out a backgammon board. It was one of the few games Izzie had managed to grasp.
"Not since this morning." She replied, trying to remember where the pieces went. "Why?"
"I just thought he might have been in to see you." Alex placed his last piece on the board and began moving Izzie pieces to the correct spots.
"Nope. The only people who came in today were the therapists." Alex handed Izzie the dice and waited for her to roll. The conversation died down, she couldn't concentrate and talk at the same time. They played a few moves before the door opened and Dr. Shepard walked in.
He was surprised to see Alex in the room, Alex wasn't meant to be there. "Alex when did you get here?" he asked, making a note on her chart.
Alex looked down at his watch. "About thirty minutes ago."
"Okay." Shepard made another note and walked over to Izzie. He made her sit up and quickly examined her. All her vitals were strong and stable. He told her she was doing a good job and then asked Alex to join him in the corridor.
Izzie let him leave. He'd promised her that everything he was doing was for her so she could go home sooner.
"What did you find?" Alex asked Shepard in the corridor.
"Nothing, everything was normal." Shepard replied making more notes on the chart.
Alex's heart sunk a bit. Normal was good but it was bad because they still didn't have any answers. There was something wrong with Izzie but they couldn't work out how it was manifesting itself. It was possible that they were random and unexplained but if that was the case preventing future attacks would be difficult.
"Does that mean she can go home?" Alex thought the answer would be no but he had to ask the question anyways.
"No." Shepard replied. "I want to run the same experiment tomorrow but this time I don't want you to come back until I page you. I was looking at the data again. You weren't just absent when the seizures started you were late."
/\/\/\/\
Just before 8am Alex excused himself from Izzie's room. He didn't tell her where he was going or why he was going he just said he had to go. She was upset, she complained that the hospital was boring and when he wasn't their there was nothing for her to do. That was probably true but there wasn't anything he could do about it.
"I have to leave." He kept telling her. "If you want to go home, I have to leave." She cried she couldn't understand his logic; the previous day had been so boring she didn't want to do that again. "I'll be back by two. I promise." He told her and he walked out the door.
He'd just lied to her. He wasn't going to be back by two. He told himself it was an okay lie. He was doing this for her.
/\/\/\/\
He walked straight to the NICU. Today he knew what he was going to do. Chloe's surgery was scheduled for 8:30am and he wanted in. All he had to do was find Dr. Montgomery and tell her.
He found her walking out of the NICU. "Karev." She said as he approached her. "I didn't think I'd see you today."
"Me either. I want in on Chloe's surgery."
She handed a chart to someone at the nurses' station. "Okay. I'll see you in OR two in fifteen minutes." She replied before walking away. Alex let a little smile creep across his face. He was in. Two days in a row he was back in the game.
/\/\/\/\
The surgery just like the previous days was everything he remembered and more. He felt actual joy in saving the babies life. He felt like he was actually achieving something thing.
"That was amazing." He told Dr. Montgomery, as they cleaned up in the scrub room after the surgery.
"I know." She smiled at him. "No matter how many times you do it, it never stops feeling great."
"Yeah." Alex let a smile creep across his face; he was on a surgical high. He wanted more.
"Have you given anymore thought to coming back?" She asked, she could see a spark in his face.
"I don't know." The spark disappeared. He began thinking about Izzie again; he didn't know what he'd do with her. "I don't know if I can."
She reached over and pulled her lab coat from the hook. "You can come back if you want." She began reaching into the pocket. "There are people and facilities available that can help you." She pulled two pamphlets out and handed them to Alex. "The first one I highly recommend." Alex looked down at what she'd handed him. They were pamphlets for an at home nursing company and a type of nursing home facility. "You're a gifted surgeon Karev." She said walking toward the door. "You shouldn't let your skills go to waste."
/\/\/\/\
It was 1:30pm Alex sat alone in the park next to the hospital. In his hand he held the pamphlets Dr. Montgomery had given him. He was trying to convince himself that it was okay to phone them, that he wasn't selling Izzie out by talking to them. He still loved her and he still cared about her, asking for help wouldn't change that.
He was afraid though. He was afraid she wouldn't understand. He was everything to her but she couldn't be everything for him. He'd thought she would be enough for him but he could see now that wasn't the case. He needed more, he needed to be a doctor and he couldn't do that without help.
"Hello, HNS how can I help you?" a woman chirped on the end of the phone.
"Hi." Alex gulped; he was only making an enquiry he told himself. "I want to hire an at home nurse."
/\/\/\/\
Alex was on the phone with the people from HNS for almost an hour. He asked every question he could think of and they told him information he didn't even think of asking. By the time he hung up they'd organized for the resumes of three nurses to be e-mailed to him and interviews were going to be set up in two days.
He'd made more than just an enquiry, he'd practically hired someone. Again he told himself he was doing the right thing, everyone had been telling him needed help, everyone had told him it was okay to get help. He just hoped Izzie would see it that way.
He was still sitting there thinking about what he'd just done when his pager went off. It was time to go back.
/\/\/\/\
Alex walked toward Izzie's room. He was trying to compose himself, prepare himself for whatever might have happened. A page meant he could come back which probably meant something had happened, that could be a good or a bad thing, it could be both.
Shepard stood at the end of the corridor waiting for Alex. He led him to waiting room and sat him down.
"What's happened?" Alex asked knowing that something had happened.
"She had another seizure." Shepard paused, he let that statement hang in the air. "She's okay, she's resting."
"Did you get the information you needed?" Alex knew the seizure wasn't necessarily a bad thing. They'd been hoping she'd have another one so they could map it and find the triggers. That was the whole point of his absence. If they'd got the information they needed, the fear and discomfort Izzie was almost certainly feeling would be worth it.
"Yes." Shepard opened up Izzie's file and showed it to him. The results pointed a very clear picture. Right before the attack she exhibited signs of an anxiety attack. All her reading were normal until two, then they started changing rapidly. "I talked to her after. She doesn't remember much about before the seizure but she kept asking for you."
It didn't surprise him that she was asking for him, she always asks from him. "Can I go see her then?"
"Of course." They stood up and walk toward the room. On the way Alex remembered the one question Izzie was almost certainly going to ask him.
"Does this mean she can come home?"
"I'll need to check a few things but yes, she can probably go home tomorrow."
/\/\/\/\
That evening Alex gave Izzie the good news. She was happy to be leaving the hospital. He didn't tell her about the phone calls he'd been making that afternoon. He didn't want to risk upsetting her, and he didn't want her to guilt him into not following through on what he wanted.
a/n: Thanks for the reviews please keep it up I really appreciate them.