invasion ↠ jackson avery ✓

9

[BELLA LEDFORD]
Seattle, Washington

˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚

Long night after longer nights. Bella could do it. She could handle it. Anything to keep her job, right? Because she didn't want to lose this. She worked way too hard. And she was finally accepted by most of the surgeons. Being on speaking terms with Yang. Nodding and smiling terms with Grey. That was good, right? She was making progress.

Not to mention, the fantastic threesome became fantastic foursome. Bella was the glue holding the group together. She had to be the anchor, otherwise she'd lose all of her friends. Which means she'd have no one to pull back her victim card all the time. No one to steal her lunch. Because even though it annoyed her, she missed when they couldn't eat together and she had to have all that food on her own. Yep. She purposely got more food so they could all eat from one plate if needed.

But she also chose to branch out. That meant she was more than willing to stay at the hospital for the whole night and plan. With Shepherd. And Kepner.

A very pregnant Kepner. Not visually. But she was hormonal. And she got tired very easily. Still, she continued to stand on her feet after being with the two neurosurgeons all night and she exhaled, cracking her knuckles while saying, "It's gonna work, right?"

"Of course," Derek nodded.

"Yes, what the hell?" Bella looked at her friend like she was insane to even suggest it wouldn't. "It will because—see?" she pointed to the white board with her pen. "If derm cuts a fellow, and then cardio skips the TED conference, plastic slash ortho shares, uh, lab facilities, we'll get a little bit here, a little bit there."

"Exactly, so we'll have enough saved to keep the ER alive," Shepherd backed her up.

"Oh, they're gonna be mad about the TED conference," Kepner sighed, stepping from side to side like the nerves couldn't stop jumping around in her body. She most likely needed the toilet and Bella knew this because for the entire night, she kept sneaking off there.

"Oh, they're gonna be pissed about everything," Shepherd looked at both of the women in the room.

"But that's okay!" Ledford told them both. Calming the situation. Calming herself. "It's gonna work."

"Yes. That's the spirit!" April emphasised.

"Do we have a reply yet?" Derek wondered, stepping over to the laptop they had open since the email was sent. Bella had been on typing duty until April took over.

"Uh, no," Ledford said as she refreshed the page. "Not yet—but that was the subject line?" she looked to April.

"Wh—wha—what, is that bad?"

"Well," Bella took a deep breath just so she wouldn't end up laughing. "Would you open an email that said 'Proposed Budget Cuts'?"

"Don't tell me that's what you two put!" Shepherd groaned, leaning down to read the screen.