Cristina found Owen shortly after Peyton had been taken into surgery.

He was sitting outside the OR doors and she sat on the ground next to him.

"So you're into 16 year olds now?" she said bluntly

"What?" he looked up, his thought of worrying about Peyton broken," what are you talking about?"

"Your little friend Peyton!" "Meredith told me everything," Cristina blurted out

"Everything huh? I'm sure she knows the whole story…" Owen's look softened

"Peyton's not… Cristina, she's half my age we're... well we used to be friends sort of…" Owen was trying to look for a way to explain his and Peyton's relationship, but he found that he couldn't.

"I looked out for her, helped her when she needed it, and took care of her when she got hurt, that is until I left for Iraq"

Owen shook his head in disbelief

"Then she, she ends up here five years later, I haven't see in her in five years… so much has happened since them, it feels like a lifetime."

Cristina looked at him and was surprised to see that he was smiling; she nudged him with her shoulder

"What are you so happy about?"

Owen leaned his head back against the wall," I remember the first day I met her"

His eyes suddenly got sad and he turned toward Cristina," she was just a kid Cristina, maybe 11, or 12, she shouldn't have had to deal with anything that wasn't ponies and Barbie dolls, but when I met her, she was practically middle aged because of the way her life was going."

"Tell me about her" Cristina said suddenly," tell me everything" she moved closer and led his head into her lap as he began to talk.

"We met at Green Lake Park, my family used to live around there and I was visiting my mom, Beth and I were still together then and we went over for dinner. It was getting late, and I decided to take a walk to get some air and I ended up there. She was sitting in a bench looking in a mirror, clearly crying and doing something to her face, I went in closer and asked if she was okay and she promptly responded with, "screw you creepo"

Cristina laughed and though that maybe she and Peyton had more in common than she had realized.

Owen smiled up and her and continued,

"When I moved in closer, I was able to see what she was doing; she was stitching up her own face!"

" It was crazy, I mean, imagine this 11 year old girl crying her eyes out, no anesthesia and stitching up her own face. I told her I was a doctor and could help but she said no she was fine and I should just go mind my own business. "

He closed his eyes then and Cristina saw a hint of a smile creep on his face.

"I sat down next to her, I don't know why I did, but something told me to and I asked her how she got those injuries, and she said, I quote"

"Would you believe me if I said I fell down some stairs?"

"I laughed and shook my head and she said, Fine, well let's just say I fell up them."

"She told me her name was Peyton and wouldn't tell me her parent's names or where she lived. I asked her to come back to my mom's house with me because she looked hungry and my mom loved taking in strays, and so I could examine her cuts in the light because she was a little tight with the stitches. "

Cristina started to lightly stroke Owen's hair

"We walked back to my mom's house together and got her some food and I re-stitched her. It turns out she swiped the supplies from Seattle Grace and took the supplies she needed from there on a regular basis."

"She wouldn't tell me anything else about her and she left in a hurry. The next day though, she was sitting on my porch at 8 am, and when I came outside to see what she had to say, she told me that she was bored and had nothing better to do than visit me, and that since I had helped her, I was the closest thing to a friend she'd ever had, so I was going to get the pleasure of her company for the day."

"We've been friends ever since, and she would come by the house every day, some days with new injuries and I would always grill her as to how she was getting them, but she would never tell me." So I would just fix her up, and keep her with me as long as I could, to protect her from whatever was harming her"

"I used to tell her everything, then when I joined the military, she was so mad, she didn't talk to me for a week, she just kept asking me why I was leaving her alone, and wasn't she a good enough friend, that if she asked me to stay, I would do it."

"I couldn't though, and on the morning of my flight she somehow made it to the the airport with a bag in her hand and told me if I was going to Iraq to be a doctor, so was she."

"She claimed that she was at least half a doctor, because she had to diagnose and treat the injures she'd acquired over the years, and she said that if they would let me in to the army, there was no reason why they wouldn't welcome her with open arms."

I don't know why I left… she needed me to protect her, her bruises were getting worse and I noticed, I tried to stop myself from it, but I saw, I should have stayed and helped her and now…now she's in OR 3 and I'm on the outside, helpless, telling her story like she's already gone"

He looked up at Cristina whose eyes were closed, deep in thought.

"How did she get the bruises?" Cristina asked quietly.

"She never told me, but I'm pretty sure it was her mom."

"She knew everything about me, but all I knew about her, were the things that needed to go on her chart, blood type, birthday, ethnicity, past injuries, she never even told me her last name."

He chuckled, "she would claim her name was Peyton Doe, she told me that Jane was a sucky name, but the Doe part wasn't so bad, and it stuck, whenever I would help her at the hospital, that's the name we would write on the paperwork…Peyton Doe."

The OR doors suddenly opened and Callie Torres and Derek Sheppard stepped out holding their scrub caps in their hands.

Owen and Cristina stood quickly and the smile that was on Owen's face disappeared, worry replacing it.

"How is she?" "How did the surgery go?"