Stitches of Life

Time After Time

Chapter Thirty-Five: Time After Time

"Heterotopic transplant. He is upping his game." Cristina muttered as she followed Meredith into the locker room one morning. I didn't have to ask to know that she was talking about her ex, Colin Marlow, who was in town, being seen as a possible candidate for Chief of Surgery once Webber retired. Ever since he had shown up he had been trying to stir trouble up between Cristina and Burke, despite the fact that they were engaged, set to get married next month. "I need a gambit. I need to force him into the defensive. Take his queen. You've never played chess?"

"I'm not a geek." Meredith shrugged as she got into her locker.

"Chess is not just for geeks." I spoke up from where I was laying on the bench in front of her locker, already dressed in my scrubs since I had came in a couple hours early. "Besides, I always protect my knights, they're the key pieces, not the queen."

"How long have you been here?" Meredith asked me.

"Since four." I yawned.

"I've got to crush him." Cristina leaned back against her own locker, still stuck on Colin. "I've got to annihilate him at his own game."

"So it's weird, right, that Susan keeps stopping by like this?" Meredith glanced between us, still having problems with her stop-mother constantly stopping by, ever since her mother had died on the day of the ferryboat crash. "I mean, we just became friends or semi-related or whatever you call your estranged father's wife."

"Step-mother." I supplied the term for her.

"You may be confused since you were basically raised by wolves, but this is what mother's do." Alex spoke up from his locker. "They stop by, they stock the fridge. Hey, dude, you think she might do our laundry?"

"Hey, get your own fake mom." Meredith frowned at him.

"Iz, you look nice." Alex let out a low whistle as Izzie walked into the locker room, all dressed up.

"Did you just come from confession in a church?" Meredith asked her.

"Shut up." Izzie shook her head.

"Izzie Stevens does penance. You did something bad." Alex smirked at her.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"Smile." Alex told the Jane Doe, Ava, from the ferryboat accident as Sloan removed the final bandage from her face, having operated the other day to help correct some injuries from the accident. We all stood at the end of her bed as Alex took a picture of her. "Oh, come on, man. That's not a smile."

"Can I see?" Ava asked, taking the camera from Alex. "That's me? Oh, my God. I know this is gonna sound terrible, but I'm not bad-looking."

"I think beautiful is the word you're looking for." Meredith spoke up, a smile on her face as we all watched Jane smile at her picture.

"I was gonna say hot." Izzie said.

"I was, too, but I think I would've gotten in trouble." George told Ava.

"You would've." Bailey nodded.

"Still a little swelling." Sloan told her as he looked her over. "In a day or two, I'll raise that hot to smokin'."

"Then shouldn't we wait to take the "after" pictures?" Ava suggested, referring to the picture that we were going to release to the public in order to try and find her family.

"We could, but the sooner we take them, the sooner we get them out there." Bailey told her.

"Your picture's gonna be everywhere- the police, the news, the internet." Sloan said.