❝𝐅𝐎𝐎𝐋'𝐒 𝐆𝐎𝐋𝐃❞ ɢʀᴇʏ·s ᴀɴᴀᴛᴏᴍʏ

CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.

"She kicked me out!" The office door opens, and Lexie bursts in, noticeably upset and with red cheeks, probably from a mixture of embarrassment and helplessness. "Apparently my resident and Meredith have decided to swap interns, and to my surprise I get to be with Meredith today. I thought it would be a great opportunity to finally talk! I just want to show her that I'm a good person, that I have nothing to do with the father who abandoned her. But after telling me yesterday that I'm someone she doesn't want to know, today she goes and sets me up. She wanted me to intubate a man who ended up dying. She could've warned me that nothing more could be done for him! She had to do something for him! Then she kicked me out of the ER and sent me to the clinic with Bailey. She hates me. My sister hates me, Maddox."

The young woman lifts her head to look at her and blinks. "How did you know I was here? I purposely hid."

"What?" Lexie frowns. "Oh, yes. I was walking down the hall and saw you through the window."

"The drawn blinds didn't give anyone a clue that I'm busy?"

"Oh," Lexie murmurs. "What are you doing?" Maddox stares at her again, but since she knows she's not going to get to be alone much longer, she ends up huffing. "Paperwork?" She asks when she sees a couple of sheets in front of her.

Maddox is quick to hide the papers she has stacked up, as if she wants to hide the contents of them. "Exactly. Being a resident is harder than I thought. Dealing with the legality of deaths is something I didn't expect to deal with."

"Can I help you with something? I don't want to go back to the ER with Meredith and I'd rather give you a hand here than spend my time sewing stitches in the clinic," Lexie gives off a sheepish smile, trying to keep Maddox from being able to refuse her requests.

"Sewing, cleaning up kids' drool and doing labs, as much as they're unglamorous chores, is how you learn the most. So no," Maddox sentences. "I can't assign you to my shift even if I wanted to. That's a request you'll have to take to Callie —Dr. Torres. Or well, to Bailey. We all know she's the real boss."

Lexie shrinks back in the seat, hiding her head in her arms, and Maddox feels momentarily sorry for her. They're not so different, maybe that's why she empathizes with her so much: they both have siblings they don't talk to, their fathers are present but not too much, and they've both lost their mother in some ways. "You used to be more fun."

Maddox lets out a short laugh. "I wasn't one of your bosses before."

The door opens again, and Maddox snorts again. Cristina lingers in the frame, arching an eyebrow at both the brunette's welcome and the presence of one of her interns in Maddox's company. Then she decides she doesn't want to ask, so she shrugs, takes a seat to Maddox's right and rests her legs on the table, adopting a relaxed posture.

"Really?" Maddox laments aloud. "You shouldn't even be here," she adds, turning to Cristina.

"I need a break from my interns. How do you think Bailey held up? If they ask me another stupid question I'll have no choice but to hang myself in the locker room," Cristina curses, letting out a big sigh. "Ah, hello, two. Or was it three? I don't remember anymore."

"Her name is Lexie," Maddox chides her. "And she was just leaving."

"What are you writing?" Cristina questions when she sees the folded papers on the table.

"My will," the brunette says with an impassive expression.

"Your will?" Lexie inquires, her tone horrified.

"Cool," Cristina nods. "What are you leaving me?"

"For my great friend Cristina Yang I'm leaving the toaster that my great friend Cristina Yang gave me in exchange for a surgery that ended before it started, because the patient died in his room exactly one hour and twenty-three minutes before she got to the operating room," Maddox pretends to read from her paper, and fake-smiles at Cristina.