In Your Dreams

10.

My day wasn't getting any easier as it went on. I knew that the life of a neurosurgeon wouldn't always be cut in black and white, but a few days here and there like that would be nice. I was starting to get the hint that living life in Seattle under a constant cover of gray clouds rubbed on people. Here I was in the x-ray room staring at CT films of nothing. Well not nothing, it was a 15 year old kid's brain, with nothing wrong. Yet for some reason she was having seizures, grand mal seizures and I had to find out why.

It wasn't a clear cut answer. A lot like the other questions hanging over my head. I saw a skinny white finger rest against the screen in front of me and my eyes slowly followed it back down the skinny long arm to the light blue scrub shirt, and then to the honey blonde hair that was pulled up into a thin pony tail. Her green eyes looked open and greeting as they stared at me.

"Why?" I mumbled vulnerably "Why are you doing this to me?"

There was a slight movement across her forehead, causing a crease of confusion. She stared at me as if I should know the answer, as if I should somehow see the answer in her face. She didn't speak, she just stared.

"You can't talk." I assumed. She gave me a simple nod "Great...just great!"

There she was finally within conversation distance and here I was talking to a mute..or a ghost, or a mute ghost. She looked at me incredulously, studiously, as if she was wondering what I was thinking or why I seemed to be so irate in my frustrations. She's not real Derek, she's just a figment of your imagination. She tapped her finger against a spot on the CT scan, I sighed with defeat.

"What are you saying?" I asked "Why are you haunting me. What do you want!"

"Dr. Shepherd?" I heard behind me and felt myself jump. I'd been caught.

"Yes Dr. Shay?" I turned around to see my resident looking around the room speculatively.

"Who are you talking to?"

"Um." I stuttered, I needed to lie, he obviously couldn't see the dead woman in the room like I could "I'm just thinking out loud. Do you have the family history?"

"Right here." He said as he held up a folder of information.

"Great, put that in the chart. I'll check for an update in a while."

"Do you have any answers from the CT yet?"

"Not yet." I sighed. I didn't like not having answers, and I didn't like digging for nothing either.

He nodded and turned to leave the room. I turned back to the test screen, expecting to see her gone but I was wrong. She stood there looking at me with an amused smile on her face. Her shoulders swayed in a teasing manner and a spark in her eye made it feel as if she were making fun of me.

"Oh don't give me that look." I scoffed. "It's not funny."

Her lips pulled back into a grin and her eyes moved to the screen as her finger tapped on the same spot it had before. I sighed, why the hell not? I walked closer to the light board and squinted to see where her finger was holding down. It was a speck of a spot, but it was a speck of a spot that shouldn't be there. The gray clouds rolled away and suddenly I saw in black and white.

"I'll be damned." I mumbled "It's minute but it's there."

I turned towards her and relief softened her face. God I could look at her for hours, just stare. She was dead and most likely a sign that I was losing my mind or was sick, but when I was looking in her eyes I didn't give a shit. Her eyes widened, almost in a flirting manner as her arm dropped to her side.

"Thank you." I mumbled.

She dipped down, almost like it was a curtsey but more than that. Like a plié of a ballerina. She was trying to tell me something again. And I still didn't get it.

"What is it?" I asked softly "What are you trying to say...I don't...I don't understand."

**********************************
Derek is not crazy trust me!