Everett Ramos is a resident surgeon at Mercy West Hospital in Seattle, Washington. She's on the uphill climb to becoming one of the best orthopedic surgeons in the world, studying alongside her best friends and hoping one day to make a difference...
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THE ACT of drowning is not as difficult as one presumes. You just have to let go. Let the water sweep you under, stop kicking, stop fighting back, and you will be pulled deeper and deeper down by the current, don't even hold your breath, just lay there, soaked through to the very bone, letting the water fill up your lungs, your bones, your veins. Everett sinks further into the bath, letting the water pass over the top of her head, holding her breath until the ache begins in her lungs. She lets out the air held in her mouth and soon her body is screaming at her to fight back, to rise above the bath water that really won't drown her unless she wants it to.
Outside the water, a hand starts to pound on the bathroom door and she shoots up, hair slapping against the bare skin of her back, droplets of rose-scented bath water dripping over the crevices of her face, eyes starting to sting as the soapy water affects her pupils. She lets out a long breath and eyes the inhaler waiting on the shelf of the bath.
She enjoys the burn of her lungs too much.
It's Alex, shouting at her through the door to get her ass in gear because she has a meeting in thirty minutes and the skin of her fingers is starting to wrinkle. She pushes herself out of the bath and the hair on her arms start to rise one by one, goosebumps dancing along the flesh.
Drowning is the worst way to die, because it hurts the most, and it's not so easy to shut off your brain and just let the water wash you away.
She knows that feeling just a little too well by now.
"Jackson Avery really has a bigger say than any of us in running this hospital?" Arizona starts handing out the folders for their first board meeting as a new team, stuck in this brightly lit conference room, pulling at their scrubs, itching to get back out to the hustle and bustle of a hospital they love so dearly. Everett rolls her coffee cup between her hands and holds her tongue, unsure if she should take Jackson's side in all of this or not.
"He's a voting member of the management team and he also represents the Harper Avery Foundation." One of the navy folders lands in front of her, slapping down on the table with all the strength that Arizona can muster, as if Everett is the one who gave Jackson the role that his mother always imagined him being destined for. She flips to the front page. He'd never wanted to be in charge, never wanted to run the show behind the scenes, and she can understand that more than anything, the need to stand in the middle of the rush, to crawl through the trenches and come out of the other side covered in blood and sweat and the glow of surgery that emanates from them all.
