FINALLY FREE, grey's anatomy

⁶ˣ⁰¹. ᵍᵒᵒᵈ ᵐᵒʳⁿⁱⁿᵍ

season six, episode one

John Doe had died. George O'Malley was dead. Ryan hadn't been able to process the death of the beloved resident who had passed away by a bus dragging him as his and Derek's patient, Izzie Stevens had coded in her husband's arms as Alex Karev held her.

"You can't tell her."

Alex Karev shook his head from where Ryan was inside talking to Derek's patient before coming out of the room, "I don't think you should tell her," Ryan agreed with Alex, "She coded in his arms," Ryan stated when seeing the look his sister was giving, "Mer. She died, ok? She needs some time to process what she went through and then, when the time is right, we'll tell her,"

Meredith stared at her brother, "When is it ever the right time to tell someone that their friend has died?" Ryan ran a hand through his brunette hair, "It's just not the right time." Meredith sighed looking into Izzie's hospital room.

"I'll tell her. I'll tell her when she gets stronger." Alex told his friend who looked at him, "Alex." The cancer patient looked at the back of her husband, who came into the room with Ryan, Meredith and Cristina following after him, "You ok?" Alex asked his wife, "I had a dream.." Izzie told them all.

Ryan looked at Izzie, with the clipboard in hand, "He was in his uniform." Izzie replied as Ryan looked confused, "What?"

"George is gonna die in the Army if we don't stop him." Ryan frowned at that, "Hand me my phone. I need my phone." Ryan's face fell at Izzie's words knowing what she wanted to do.

Callie paged the intern who immediately came running out of Izzie's hospital room and into the scrub room where Callie was against the sink with tears streaming down her face, "Hey."

Ryan brought Callie into his arms, letting the ortho resident cry into his shoulder at her ex-husband's passing, "Who said that's George? Why do we think that's George?" Lexie questioned when coming into the scrub room, "Meredith said— I don't know." Callie sighed.

"That's not George." Callie pulled back from Ryan's arms turning back to look into the OR room, "Look—look at his feet, look at how tall he is. That's not George." Lexie repeated to them.

____

"He wrote in my hand."

The surgeons who was either friends with the Army surgeon or worked on George, was in front of the OR room where the calm and collected resident laid died inside, with Meredith standing in front of them telling them what George had wrote in her hand.

"What do you mean he wrote?"
"What did he do?"

Ryan looked at his older sister from beside Mark, "He grabbed my hand and squeezed it and he wrote it with his finger." Meredith said looking at the doctors in front of her, "He wrote with his finger?"

"You know—" Meredith said when nobody was believing her, "in my hand, he wrote double 0 seven," Meredith said as Ryan's hand came to his head.

Dr Miranda Bailey stepped forwards taking Meredith's hand, "Ok, what'd I write?" The resident questioned her fellow resident, "Joe." Meredith said sure as Ryan sighed, "No! No, I did not write Joe!"

"Are you serious?"
"You mean this may not be O'Malley?"

Mark chuckled from beside Derek and Ryan who stood behind their fellow surgeons looking at Meredith who was getting yelled at by Miranda and Callie, "This is funny." Ryan sighed, "Did anyone try and call O'Malley? Can we get him on the phone?"

"I'm telling you, he squeezed my hand." Meredith repeated about what happened when George had squeezed her hand after writing Double 0 Seven, "I could've sworn it was George."

"I got voicemail."
"He's not answering."

Callie looked at them, "He has a freckle in his right hand, it's shaped like Texas." She said as the doctors all turned to look at her, "I used to tease him about it. I'll check." Ryan stopped the resident, "Cal, are you sure?"

Callie looked at Ryan knowing what the intern was trying to do, as she nods her head side of what she wanted to do, "I'll check." She repeated as she went inside the OR going towards the John Doe male's right hand.

And when Callie crouched over crying, that's when Ryan and everyone else outside of that room knew that it was George O'Malley.

Their pagers went off, "You people answer your pages." Ryan stood still looking inside the OR room at where Callie Torres cried over her dead ex-husband's body, "George O'Malley jumped in front of a bus today. He knew what he was doing and he did it anyway, and he did it to save a life." Their chief said to them, his hands on his hips looking at his employees, "So I'm not gonna allow you doctors to stand here. There are lives on the line, there are lives we can save. So let's go."

Ryan looked at his half sister knowing that Lexie had a close relationship to the O'Malley male since the two had lived together in their shared apartment.

____

George O'Malley's funeral wasn't something that Ryan Grey would have expected with the priest versing classic rock lyrics as the girl he saved, Amanda cried from beside where Ryan stood in his black suit.

His eyes went down to the casket where the rest of George O'Malley's body laid inside, sitting there until they put the casket six feet underground.

The male Grey turning his head seeing Izzie walking away as her husband followed close behind with Cristina and Meredith going as well as Ryan considered moving until Lexie held her brother's hand in hers.

Ryan looked to his sister seeing the tears fall down Lexie's face, looking back to the casket again as the priest had stopped versing the classic rock as Louise O'Malley looked at everyone who had came with Ryan setting down a red rose upon George's casket before moving away going towards his car.

"It's ok." He reassured his sister who cried into his shoulder, "It's ok, Lex." Lexie shook her head, "I was—I was such a bad friend to George. I abandoned him when he needed me. I left him." Ryan frowned at his sister's words, "Lexie, you liked him and he didn't reciprocate the feelings back," He admitted to his sister, "He was busy, you were busy. It's nothing you could've done, Lexie."

Ryan held his sister, "George knows about our intern exams." He told his sister, "He was busy with patients and paperwork, and we are busy with our exams and our attending's paperwork. It'll be okay," He reassured her once again.

"It'll be okay." He repeated once again. Well at least he hoped it'd be okay.