Izzie ran into a supply closet and shut the door. She leant back against it and closed her eyes. She let out a long slow breath and slid down the door. Once on the floor she allowed herself to completely lose it. She let the mask she'd been wearing fall and crumble and she began sobbing.
She cried until her chest ached, until she couldn't breath and she started hyperventilating, she cried until she forgot why exactly she was crying, until she felt numb and empty. Eventually the tears dried up, she couldn't cry anymore she didn't have the energy for it. She stayed in the room for a while longer, she liked the darkness, it had a calming effect on her. But it also brought back a lot of memories. It hadn't been this supply closet but it had been a supply closet where her and Alex and first truly connected, where he calmed her and told her everything would be alright.
Just thinking of that day now made her laugh, she could laugh about it now, everything turned out to be okay but at the time it had been so intense, so scary. Alex had been there to help her, hold her, now he was the one who was gone.
"Alex where are you?" She whispered to herself. She needed him, she needed him to hold her and tell her everything would be alright but he wasn't there and that was the problem, everything wasn't alright, and it wouldn't be. She closed her eyes again and tried to picture his face, she tried to picture him beside her telling her it was okay. It took a minute but eventually she had hold of him, she let a smile spread across her face as she wrapped her arms around herself. He was with her, he was holding her. She let herself get lost in the moment so much it almost felt real, but it wasn't and the moment was broken by someone knocking on the door.
-8-8-8-8-8-
"Izzie," Meredith whispered as she pushed open the supply closest door. Someone had paged her a few minutes earlier and told her Izzie was in there. They'd said she'd been in there for over half an hour, and they'd heard her crying but it had been quiet for the last ten minutes. They said they'd hoped she'd come out on her own but she hadn't so they thought they should do something. She was their something, calling her down to take care of things was their idea of doing something. "Izzie," She whispered again as she slipped inside the room and closed the door behind her.
She could just make Izzie out on the floor, she was sitting in the corner with her back pushed up against the wall and her knees pulled to her chest. Izzie looked up at her for a moment, on her cheeks she could see the glistening of tear then she buried her face back into her knees. "Izzie," She began as she sat down on the ground beside her. She was getting good at dealing with Izzie but this kind of thing still made her nervous. "What happened?"
-8-8-8-8-8-
Izzie looked up at Meredith again, she looked worried, she wasn't supposed to be worried, she was supposed to be…she wasn't sure what she was supposed to be but she wasn't meant to be making her friends worried anymore. "Nothing happened." She began, the words coming out of her mouth barely louder than a whisper. "It was just this patient, he kept talking and it got me thinking about Alex and…" Her voice trailed off for a moment and she felt Meredith wrap an arm around her, "I started crying and I couldn't stop. I tried to but I couldn't." She blinked her eyes, she could feel the tears coming again.
"It's okay." She heard Meredith telling her. "You're allowed to cry."
"I know." She sighed as she wiped the now falling tears from her eyes. "I just wish it didn't hurt so much. I wish this was easier."
-8-8-8-8-8-
Meredith pulled Izzie tighter to her side and tried to smile at her, she could see and feel her friend was hurting. "This isn't meant to be easy." She tried to comfort. "If this was easy it wouldn't be…" Her voice trailed off as she ran out of words. They sat there in silence for a while, she was trying to think what to say next. "You're doing well." She said, finally deciding encouragement was the best option. "You're trying, you're trying to keep moving."
"Thanks," Izzie tried to smile as she wiped more tears from her eyes. She began letting out a long slow breath, she seemed to be trying to compose herself. She didn't say anything else though, for a while they sat in total silence, the only sounds were that of the hospital moving around them.
"Izzie," Meredith began after a while. "What do you want to do? Do you want me to take you home?"
-8-8-8-8-8-
"No." Going home wasn't what Izzie wanted. Going home would be like going backwards and she didn't want to do that. She had to keep moving forward. "I want to say."
"Okay." Meredith wasn't sure what to do now. Going home would have been the easy end to the situation. "Do you want to stay down here in the pit? Or do you want to go around with me for a while?"
"I don't know." Izzie, let out another slow breath as she tried to work out what she wanted. The pit had its comforts, she could choose her work, stick to the safe things, the repetitive things, but there she was alone. "Can I stay with you?" She finally said, deciding that being with someone was what she needed most right now.
"Of course." Meredith smiled at her and she began standing up. She held out her hand to help her up. "We should get back to work. There are patients I need to check on."