Two days had past since Izzie's birthday and today she was enjoying her day off. It was supposed to be a day of relaxation but she got bored with that after a few hours, there was only so long she could sleep, even with her dreams there was a limit to it. Now she was sitting at her dinning table with fellowship applications spread out in front of her. They were all due at the end of the week which meant she needed to get them finalized and in the mail today. There were six of them in total, one for each of the major hospitals in Seattle as well as one in Huston, one in Miami, and the one in New York Meredith had told her about. The New York one was the one she wanted, more than anything she wanted that one, the others were just her safeties. The Huston and Miami ones incase she still needed to leave the city, the Mercy West, and Seattle Presbyterian ones incase she couldn't leave the city but needed a new hospital and the Seattle Grace one because she couldn't get safer than home. Dr. Montgomery had all but told her she would get a fellowship there, the other hospitals weren't so certain but she was hopeful. Dr. Montgomery had written her the most amazing recommendation letter, reading it had almost brought her to tears and when she'd approached her to say thank you she'd almost cried again. She blamed the hormones and everything for the display of waterworks; Addison just smiled at her and changed the subject.

She needed more than a good recommendation letter though; she needed to ace the applications. Some of the questions were hard though, they didn't just want her to talk about the medicine, they didn't just want to know about what she'd achieved medically, they wanted to know about her, about what made her a great doctor. She didn't know how to describe that, she didn't know how to talk about herself and she didn't want to. She didn't want to get too personal.

"Okay," She said to herself. She picked up her pen and she started to write. She tried to answer the questions without getting personal but that wasn't the point of the questions and to write a truly great answer it wasn't possible. Reluctantly she began writing about why she wanted to be a doctor, she began writing about her experience leading up to her decision, about the moment she knew that was what she wanted. She avoided writing about the last five months; she didn't want to be the woman with the dead husband when she arrived in her new city. She tired to convince herself that it wasn't important, she'd been a great doctor before then, it didn't make her a great doctor now. She didn't want that to be what defined her but at the same time, what had happened played a great deal in making her the person she was now. It had changed her and she was still trying to work out how.

"I can't do this." She said to herself after another half hour of trying to write something amazing. It wasn't coming out the way she wanted it to and she couldn't seem to word what she wanted to say. She needed a break so she slowly stood up and began walking towards the kitchen. As she stood she felt a slight twinge in her back, a dull ache which she knew would only get worse over time. She was getting bigger now and hiding her pregnancy was almost impossible. With a big enough pair of scrubs she could conceal it from some people, she was still a lot smaller than most women at twenty weeks but there were some people, mainly the expectant mothers she was working with all day who could see it written all over her. One woman said she could tell because it looked like her face was glowing, another picked it by the hand she seemed to be placing on her back all time. It had surprised her the first time one of her patients had said something to her, at first she wasn't sure how to respond because it wasn't something she was talking about a lot, but then she'd worked out how to use it to her advantage.

Often the women asked her if her baby was healthy, there was often a slight bitter tone to their voices, the women she worked with didn't have healthy babies. Her baby wasn't one hundred percent healthy though, he was small and while she was trying to ignore it because everything else seemed fine it was still a concern. She talked to the women about her own fears and it seemed to calm some of them, it seemed to give her an extra level to communicate with them on. She couldn't explain that in words though, not words the people reading her application form would understand.

In the kitchen she opened the fridge and pulled out the block of cheese, she cut herself a large slice and lent back against the counter to eat it. She let out a slow breath and tried to get her head around what she was doing, what she needed to do to get the job done. She rested one of her hands against the small mound of her belly and began rubbing large circles over it.

"I'm doing this for you." She started saying. "I'm soughing myself out for you."

She rest her hand on her belly and closed her eyes, she tried to visualize her baby inside of her, her little Alex. That's what she sometimes called him, she was certain she was having a boy, on some level it was almost like he was his father reincarnated, she sometimes liked to think this was Alex's of way of always being with her, of making sure she wasn't alone. She tried to picture him moving, almost will him to move. He moved a lot, when she had the ultrasounds there was always movement, sometimes it was hard to get a good reading, but she hadn't felt it yet, she hadn't felt him move. With her eyes closed she tried to picture it and then she did feel it. Like something churning in her stomach but the feeling wasn't unpleasant, it was amazing. A smile began to creep over her face and she waited to feel it again. A minute later she felt it again and she almost wanted to jump out of her skin. She was excited and a warm feeling began to run through her, she wanted to tell someone but then she realized there was no one else there.

She grabbed her phone and started dialing numbers, no one answered though, everyone was busy. In that instant she felt alone but she still couldn't shake the warm feeling and the need to share this with someone. She cut herself another piece of cheese and walked into her front room. She lay down on her sofa, she wasn't really tired but she thought maybe she'd be able to reach Alex if just tried. She closed her eyes and willed herself to Alex.

-8-8-8-8-

When she thought about it hard, when she wanted it, it didn't take long for her reach Alex.

"Can you feel that Iz? Can you feel it?" Alex's voice asked loud and clear into her ear. "She's moving around a lot today." He said, "She's going to be strong, a real fighter just like her mom."

Izzie opened her eyes and he was there sitting beside her. Alex was smiling down at her, he had one hand resting on her belly and with the other he was stroking her cheek. "Can you feel her?" he asked her again and she smiled. She let a huge smile spread across her face and she nodded. She could feel her baby moving and Alex was there, he could feel it too.