⠀

chapter forty nine ━ this magic moment
season eight, episode eleven

❝ it's probably all that bleach in her head,
makes her a little delirious ❞

⠀
⠀
⠀

"Practice, practice, practice until it is perfect, people. This is a long, complex procedure with many parts, therefore many opportunities for error." Owen Hunt spoke to the operating room full of doctors, nurses and anaesthesiologists, who were all listening to him, intently.

Like they had done for the past two weeks without fail. The countless times stood in this very OR, listening to every single speech he threw their way had prepared them for this day. Where they were actually going to operate for real this time after this one final practice.

Though, prepping for the conjoined twins' surgery did provide Aliya with a very welcomed distraction from what had happened two weeks ago.

The past two weeks since the ambulance crash and Henry's death passed in a blur, so much in fact that if someone were to ask her what she had been up to for the past fortnight, she wouldn't tell them.

She would probably lie and say everything was fine but in all honesty, these past two weeks were hell.

The first two days, Aliya was forced to stay off of work, recovering from her concussion, prescribed with pills to manage the headaches that still occurred even now. But, that was probably stress-related rather than the result of a concussion.

And, she hated everything about staying at home.

Though, when she said everything, she didn't hate staying at home with Zola, where the Levine woman had created numerous made-up games the two of them could play.

Though, Zola didn't fully understand the premise of the games, but Aliya didn't care seeing as she saw Zola as the light at the end of the tunnel.

After Henry's death, she couldn't stop crying. But, when Derek and Meredith came to see her in the hospital, Zola in their arms, the tears turned to tears of joy, and the dust settled, giving her another thing to focus on.

She held onto her distractions like prized possessions, and every time the tidal wave of sadness hit her shores, she threw herself into her distractions.

Whether it was work, entertaining Zola, baking, painting—

Well, and funeral arranging of course, which really was proving to be a pain in the head (also not conclusion-related). Mainly because she wanted to give Henry the funeral he deserved, and she couldn't distract herself from him forever.

"So, we're gonna go over this again." The trauma surgeon continued, taking his place by the small gurney they had in the middle of the operating room. "Team leaders, let's get in place."

"All right green team, over here please." Derek ushered his team, with green bands attached to their scrub caps, over to one side of the room.

Aliya glanced across at him, with his green band across his head. "Red team is so gonna beat green teams ass." She stated, seeing as her own scrub cap was adorned with a red band.

"They're conjoined twins," The Shepherd man pursed his lips at the brunette, who had recently cut her outgrown bangs to hide where her head lac was currently healing (beautifully, Jackson would add). "It's not a competition."

"Let's go red team." Arizona hustled her team together, and the two rivals parted ways to their respective sides of the OR, which was probably for the best.

"We've offered this family every pro bono dollar, every surgical hand, every resource this hospital has, so I'm asking you for every resource you have. Be sharp, be present, be focused. Dr. Robbins has been caring for these children since the day they were born. They will each get a new life today. Our actions will decide what kind of lives they will be." Owen pulled back the sheet that was laid out on the gurney, where two dolls representing the conjoined twins were there, ready for practice. "Let's begin—"

However, before anyone could begin the practice, the door to the operating room flew open, and a nurse holding a mask to her face entered, her eyes scanning across the room. "Sorry to interrupt, Dr. Levine, there's a call for you."

Every single pair of eyes in the room looked directly at her, and she locked her own with Jackson's.

Owen crossed his arms, looking unimpressed from underneath his mask. "We're kind of in the middle of something here, can't it wait?"

"It's— uh—" The nurse stuttered, her hands burying into her pockets. "Urgent?"

Aliya raised her brow, because that girl looked like someone who had just been black mailed, which meant Aliya knew exactly who would be on the other line when she inevitably went to take the call.

Because if she didn't, her mother would probably send pigeons flying through the OR.

Owen sighed. "Make it quick, Levine."

"Will do." Aliya nodded, disappearing out of the operating room with the nurse in tow, who was leading her to the phone. "Were you threatened? Held for ransom? Did she verbally berate you?"

"I'm not sure I—" The nurse gawked at the Levine doctor as she stopped outside the nurses station door, gesturing to the landline with her brows knotted up. "I don't think I understand?"

"Blackmailed?" Aliya, unconvinced, raised a brow.

"No— I—" Though, the nurse was definitely trembling, so Aliya decided to let her off the hook as she stepped into the station.

The brunette sat at the desk, taking a deep breath to psych herself up before picking up the phone. "Hello, I'm sorry but the person you called is unavailable—"

"What?" Molly Levine's shrill tone echoed through the microphone at the automated voice Aliya was pretending to do.

"Kidding," Aliya said before her mother could throw a fit, though she probably would regardless. "Mom, it's me."

"Aliya?"

"No, your other daughter." She replied back, but she knew her mother would much before to speak to Eliana rather than her. "You called the hospital I work at, of course it's me. Unless Eliana's getting a brow lift."

Molly's theatrical sigh sounded, and it did in fact cheer Aliya up slightly. "I'm actually calling to discuss a very important matter, Aliya."

"And, that important matter is?" She prompted her mother to continue.

"Lilies or carnations?"

Aliya blinked. "Come again?"

"For Henry's funeral." Molly cleared up.

"Ah," Aliya made a sound, picking her fingernail as she leant back deflated in the chair. "Well, I've already arranged the flowers, Mom. Seeing as his funeral's in two days. I've gone with lilies."

"Right." Molly replied, her voice monotone, which Aliya knew ultimately meant that of course her mother disagreed with her choice of flowers.

So, naturally, Aliya waited for her mother to carry on with some sort of snide comment.

But surprising, she didn't, catching her completely off guard.

"And?" Aliya prompted her to say something.

God, she was actually dangling the bait in front of Molly's nose, all she had to do was take it.

"Not gonna say lilies are tacky? That I should've picked a different flower?" The brunette woman interrogated into the phone speaker.

"No." Her mother denied, rendering Aliya speechless. "I was actually going to suggest lilies."

For the first time, Aliya didn't actually know what to say.

The whole idea of her mother actually agreeing with her felt foreign.

They were standing in no man's land, not one of them saying anything.

Until, Aliya cracked. "How's Trent today?"

"He's—" Her mother paused, and Aliya thought she almost heard her mother gulp. "Terrible, actually. I can't get him out of bed."

"Yeah," Aliya frowned at the ceiling tiles above her. "April mentioned that. I'll swing by before the funeral if I have the time."

"Their guest bedroom is awfully messy." Molly stated in distaste.

"Mom, Henry's just died, and they're planning a wedding." Aliya deadpanned, glancing across at the clock on the wall to see how long she had been on the phone. "Kill them if they don't have time to tidy. And, they're the ones doing you and dad a favour so you didn't have to get a hotel."

Molly huffed, clearly finding April and Trent's home not up to her tastes. "I would've preferred a hotel. Have you moved out of your hostel yet?"

"I really have got to go—"

"Wait," Her mother said desperately, her voice weirdly high pitched. "You haven't—"

"Bye, Mom." Aliya said, her tone light and breezy before she promptly hung up the phone.

Besides, she couldn't spend all day conversing with her mother out of all people. She would much rather chat to a brick wall, labelled a crazy person by every single one of her peers.

"Everything okay?" Jackson asked her when she entered back into the operating room, his voice lowered.

"Oh, you know," She shrugged her shoulders lightly. "Just the usual."

He nodded his head, knowingly, as if he knew exactly what she meant. Seeing as her mother had been ringing her about funeral plans for the past week. "White or green tablecloths?"

"Close," Aliya grinned from beneath her mask, which made people question how she could even smile after the death of a close friend. Though, the response they would be met with was that Aliya had thrown herself into funeral planning and the conjoined twins. "Lilies or carnations."

"The burning question." The Avery man joked, light-heartedly. "You know how many sleepless nights people have over flowers?"

"I'm assuming quite a fair few?" Aliya guessed, watching the practice take place. "I bet my mother takes up a vast majority of those numbers."

Jackson snorted, earning a pointed look from both Robbins and Hunt just from making a noise unrelated to the practice happening. "How is your mother?"

Aliya raised a brow, slowly turning to him. Quite frankly because never in his whole existence has he ever wanted to know how her mother was. Ever. "You want to know how my mother is?"

He paused, his hand on his jaw in thought as he clearly understood what he had actually asked her. And she was right, he had never asked that question in his entire existence. "No, not really. Scratch that. I couldn't care less how your mother is. How are you?"

"I'm fine." She said with a sigh that implied the polar opposite.

Jackson, the man who could see right through whatever walls she put up, looked at her sceptically. "And, the real answer?"

"Flaps are inset and viable." Mark announced from where he was practicing his procedure.

"Oh, wow look," Aliya nudged into Jackson's arm, angling her head over towards the dolls. "The flaps are inset and viable!"

Jackson pursed his lips from behind the mask in an attempt not to smirk at her.

"We are looking at, at least, eighteen hours, so come and go if you need to, hydrate, eat, but be here at least their minutes before your procedures." Owen told the doctors.

"All right. Next up, general surgery." Arizona announced, stepping forward with the rest of the doctors. "First we need to establish each baby's blood supply to the shared colon."

Another doctor came to stand opposite her, the other twin's leading general surgeon. "Then we separate the colon, making the first incision—"

"I will make the first incision." Arizona corrected him sternly, narrowing her eyes at him. "We'll separate the colon."

Derek and Aliya seemed to make eye contact at that exact moment, wondering what was going on between the two surgeons. Seeing as you could most definitely cut the tension with a kitchen knife.

"Okay," David, the pediatric surgeon, carried on, ignoring whatever Arizona was implying with her tone. "And, now I'm checking the displaced kidneys—"

"To make sure they're intact and functioning." Arizona added on, with a glare directly completed at David of course.

The man in question sighed, and every single doctor watched the exchange closely. "That's implied."

"I don't care." Arizona bit back. "Say it."

David, a real trouper, continued on without batting an eyelid. "Checking the kidneys to make sure they're intact and functioning."

"Man, she's wound up right." Richard Webber said under his breath from where he was standing behind them.

Alex glanced at him over his shoulder. "Thought you were off work today."

"I won't see another one of these in my lifetime." The chief, who wasn't actually the chief but everyone still thought of him as one, explained, looking closely at what the two surgeons were practicing. "You're doing the flip, right, Karev? With Robbins?"

Alex made a sound of confirmation back, and the brunette eyes the chief, cautiously.

Was something in the water today? Why was everyone acting so damn suspicious?

"The flip's a critical part." Richard commented, keeping his eyes on the back of Karev's head, as if watching to see if he'd break a sweat. "You ready?"

"Yes, sir." Alex replied back, looking across at his friend with his brows knotted, as if asking her if she saw how suspicious this was.

She most definitely did.

"You forgot to cauterise." Arizona's voice distracted them for a moment as she snapped at David, her blue eyes watching his every move. Or, more accurately, his every mistake. "You want this baby to bleed out?"

"Do I?" David replied back in surprise. "No—"

"Yeah, I should think not." Arizona snapped back, just before Richard continued on with whatever angle

"Look I know this procedure's her baby, but she keeps nitpicking everybody, she'll destroy their confidence." Richard observed the Robbins woman proceed to lecture David on how he shouldn't want babies to bleed out on the operating table. "Don't let her do that to you."

Alex shook her head, and both Jackson and Aliya were now watching this thing. "No, sir."

Richard cleared his throat, straightening his back. "Good, because if this flip goes wrong, she's gonna blame you."

Aha. Aliya thought to herself, he was trying to psych him out!

"It'll go on your record," Richard taunted. "And they have boards coming up, it's not gonna look good—"

"Stop psyching him out," Aliya cut in before he had a chance to say anything else to throw Alex off of his game. "He's got this."

"Okay, it's time to flip them." Arizona announced to the OR, and Aliya was pretty sure Alex was officially sweating from his brow.

"Karev, you're up." Derek called out, and Richard patted the Karev man on the back, sending him on his way with as much care and support as a reversing dumpster truck.

The whole OR switched around, and everyone who was on the flip with Robbins approached the table.

Arizona looked around at her selected team, eyeing them each up individually. "Ready?"

The Levine woman was ninety percent sure he saw and heard Alex gulp, before saying: "Yeah."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

ABOUT ONE MINUTE LATER...
⠀

"Karev, you rushed it! You're like two steps ahead of me!" Arizona protested, her eyes widened at the dolls in her hands, in a tangle of wires and doll limbs.

"Oh, god," Aliya grimaced at the scene unraveling before her eyes. "You know when you pass a car crash?"

Jackson nodded his head, also gawking at what was going on. "Yeah—"

"You can't help but look away." The Levine woman stated, because now she was pretty sure the twin's anaesthesia had just been disconnected, which was sure to raise a lot of issues. "And, you slow down just a little when you pass it."

"Oh, of course." Jackson agreed with the point she was making. "You've gotta see what's going on."

"No, you over me?" Alex countered, waving the doll's foot in the air to convey his point. "Yours over mine, everything's fine. Mine over yours, babies in the morgue. That's how it works."

"That's your mnemonic device?" Arizona replied back, horrified at Alex's attempt at poetry. At least he got the rhymes right. But, he should make it his full-time job.

"Great." Owen crossed his arms from where he was observing the chaos ensue. "Now Brandi's wounds are exposed, and little Andi's gone without oxygen for a whole minute."

"Ah, okay—" Arizona raised her hand in the air in surrender. "Can we start over?"

"No," The trauma surgeon shook his head, but not even a trauma surgeon could fix whatever this train wreck was. "There's no time. Let's just finished this practice, and try the flip again. Next."

Aliya side eyed the Webber man beside her, because this man was now gloating, his chin up in the air in some superiority. "You wanted this to happen?" Her voice lowered in shock.

He slowly looked towards her, acting completely innocent in this. "I have no idea what you're talking about, Levine."

"Oh, drop the act." Aliya hissed, a little harsher than she had actually intended to sound. "You want in on the surgery. You're going for the weakest link."

"You may wanna get that head of yours checked out, Levine." Richard pointed out, tapping his own temple with his index finger.

"Low blow." She scowled at him, her arms crossed.

"Neuro, ortho, you're up." Owen said with a wave of his hands.

"Okay," Derek approached the dolls on the gurney, Aliya opposite him, seeing as she was operating on Brandi as the lead neurosurgeon, and Derek was operating on Andi. "We will access and separate the conjoined spinal canal."

"Separate the bony elements of the spine." Callie added from beside Derek, seeing as she was on the green team too.

Was Aliya somewhat nervous to fly solo on a freaking spinal separation on conjoined twins?

Yes, yes she was. In fact, she was terrified.

But, she had practiced this procedure countless times that she had started falling asleep doing it.

She separated spines in her dreams.

When she was in the shower, when Jackson was driving them to work, when she was making coffee—

She had practiced this procedure so much in fact that she could do it blindfolded. She knew every single step, she knew what to do if any complications rose. She knew the procedure inside and out.

So, you could say it wasn't terror, not in the slightest.

She was confident she could get this right.

Despite the whole 'she's mentally unstable!' accusations.

Who cares if they were true? Because, in the OR, she was the calmest person there.

"Spinal separation complete." Aliya announced once the had ran through the steps.

"Okay," Derek nodded, calmly. "I'm now prepared to separate the completely."

"Wait. Hold on." Arizona stepped forward to stop them, her brows knotted together. "What about complications? I mean, what if there's a double hemivertebra, or a tethered cord?"

The neurosurgeon looked up now the practice was well and truly finished. "We will cross that bridge when we come to it."

Owen raised a hand, haunting the operating room to a stop, mainly Arizona to a stop. "We're done here."

"I'm sorry?" She replied back, shocked. "What if we're standing on that bridge right now?"

"Dr. Robbins, I said—"

"No, no, no—" The blonde interrupted him in a blind panic. "We haven't even separated them yet. We haven't gone through the post-separation surgeries!"

When you thought about it, surgery was very similar to a theatre production.

No wonder operating rooms were called operating theatres. You were expected to put on your outfit, to play your part perfectly with no errors.

You had to know everything off by heart, and one mistake— god, if you made one mistake on that stage with every single light on you, sometimes there was no coming back.

"Dr. Robbins, stop." The trauma surgeon insisted, forcefully. "We're done practising. We've practiced our parts not only here in this OR, but in the shower, in your drive to work. We're ready. You know what to do. Now we just have to do it."

The neuro and ortho team took a step back, so the rest of the OR could prepare for the arrival of the real twins, rather than their doll counterparts.

"Do you feel ready for this?" Alex approached the brunette as she stepped back, cornering her so she couldn't escape.

Besides, she could barely avoid him asking her that in the cramped operating room.

"Yes, as ready as I'll ever be." She confirmed.

The Karev man nodded slowly, though he watched her carefully. "And, the concussion?"

"Under control." Aliya replied back, her voice cool and calm as she focused primarily on her breathing rather than any intrusive thoughts about Henry. "I take my pills."

"If you need a break—"

"I'm fine." Aliya tried to convince him, which proved difficult nowadays. Because last time she said she was fine, she was severely concussed and passed out in the middle of the ER. "Jackson, will you please tell him I'm fine."

"Are you though?" He quirked a brow, proving to Aliya that he was definitely the wrong person to ask. "Have you taken your pills? Drank enough water? Did you have breakfast—"

"Oh for the love of—" She pressed her face into her palm with a groan. "Stop fussing! Okay, I promise you, I had my pills, I've had litres of water, and I had a bowl full of cereal."

Before they could add on anymore, the door of the operating room flew open, and in came the twin's. You could've heard them from a mile away though, seeing as the babies were screaming bloody murder.

"Ladies and gentleman," Owen gestured his hand to the babies, theatrically. "I present to you Andi and Brandi Edwards. Let's give them new lives. It's show time!"

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"Raising the skin flap, Avery are you there?" Mark asked once they had begun operating on the twins, and first up was plastics.

Or, the plastics posse, so they demanded to be called.

Jackson nodded from where he was working on Brandi. "One step ahead of you." He replied back.

Anyone could tell from a mile away that Mark Sloan was in fact smirking from beneath his mask, eyeing up his protégé with a question on the tip of his tongue. "You want to race?"

"This isn't Mario Kart." Aliya informed him, pointing out the obvious.

"No, no, no." Arizona jumped in, her index finger extended in warning. "No racing."

"That was fun last night." Mark strategically changed the subject away from any potential races, seeing as Arizona would throttle him if he even thought about that again. "Did you and Mer have a good time? I know Julia had a good time."

"Yeah, we did." Derek nodded his head, though Aliya caught him glancing at someone from behind her, and she looked over to find Lexie, glaring at this conversation. "You got enough length there for coverage?"

"Yeah, I'm dissecting from the base to the midline." The Sloan man narrated as he carried on with his procedure, though he hadn't quite understood Derek's attempt at changing the conversation away from Julia. "Did Mer say anything about Julia?"

"She liked her." Derek replied back, simply.

"Jackson, slow down." Arizona said from where she was hovering behind his shoulder.

"And Zola liked Julia, too?" Mark questioned again, as if searching for some sort of validation.

"Yes, she did. Everybody liked Julia. Anyone else here meet Julia?" Derek looked around the operating room. "Did you like her? Show of hands if you liked her."

A few hands in the operating room raised, and somehow Aliya's kept hers down.

For starters, she hadn't even properly met Julia. So, she had a neutral opinion on the woman.

But, Lexie however had made it so blatantly obvious that she still loved Mark.

And, Aliya had been there before. So, she couldn't help understand exactly what she was going through right now.

"I'll update the parents." Lexie announced, promptly escaping the operating room.

"Hunt," Arizona gasped at Mark and Jackson's hands as the pair sped up and eyed each other. "They're clearly racing. No racing!"

"We're not racing." Mark denied the accusation.

Arizona scoffed. "We have been rehearsing this for months, and now they're gonna jeopardise the patient—"

"Robbins, you take care of your team, I'll look at the bigger picture." Owen cut in before she could start to panic (again).

Even though the blonde was in fact panicking.

"Done!" Jackson announced, placing down his tools and jumping up from his stool.

"I win!" The Sloan man said shortly after, holding his hands up in the air.

And, that received a very cutting glare from the pediatric surgeon herself. Proving her theory correct.

Mark looked across at Jackson. "And by that, we mean ready for the colon resection. Cafeteria?"

"Race you there." Jackson challenged, and before he could even finish him sentence, Mark was already off. Though, before leaving he turned over his shoulder towards his girlfriend. "Want anything? Coffee? Juice? Sandwich?"

Aliya grinned, waving him off. "I'm all good. Go. You're losing him."

And at that realisation, Jackson ran out of the operating room after his mentor.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"I leave for coffee for five minutes," Aliya gawked as she entered back into the operating room after her quick coffee break, just in time to witness the flip. "And, I come back to this?"

She stared wide eyed at Alex, who wasn't doing the flip, in fact none other than Dr. Webber was in his place.

Aliya didn't want to act smug, seeing as she saw this happening from a mile away. But, make it know that she was gloating on the inside, proving her point that she's an excellent judge of character.

"You let him psych you out! Shame!" She said, outraged at him for letting this opportunity slip away. "You folded like a cheap deck chair!"

"One, two, three—"

"I know," He grumbled under his breath, frowning as he watched Richard and Arizona do the flip before his eyes. "I'm pissed, I hope he—"

"Don't you dare say that, Karev!" She warned him, because she knew exactly what was going to come out of his mouth. "You've been practicing the flip for freaking weeks! You let him get in your head!"

His brows lowered as he snapped his head towards her. "I did not—"

"You did too!" She stopped him before he could even try and deny it. "Why? Why did you let him get in your head?"

"I don't know— I—" He sighed, placing his hands on his hips. "I don't know! I don't freaking know!" He repeated those three words in different tones several more times, which made Aliya raise her brow at him.

The whole OR descended into claps straight after, and Aliya hadn't even noticed that they had done the flip successfully, so naturally Aliya joined in with the clapping, her lips pursed at her friend.

"If I find out Webber screws you over again," She raised her index finger at him, her nose scrunched up from beneath her mask as she casted him a warning. "Got it?"

Alex quirked a brow. "You didn't say what you would do—"

"Got it?" She interrupted him, because she was currently deciding on whether she would either drag him by the ear to the psych ward, or lock him in Derek's trailer with a wild bear.

Alex nodded, curtly, still clearly pissed at the whole situation as he looked disgusted at all the claps in Webber's praise. "Yes, ma'am."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"Excuse me, excuse me." Meredith squeezed through the crowded gallery to get to the seat Cristina had saved for her. Because, now they were on the separation part of the surgery, seeing as the flip went well. However, before she sat down, she gestured to the baby, now legally hers, in her arms. "Okay, look at this face. Seriously, look at this face."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Super cute." Cristina said to satisfy Meredith, so she could concentrate on the surgery happening below instead. "They're in the spinal cord now."

"Bailey spent the last two hours telling me how crappy my life is, but look at this face!" She gestured down at Zola, now sucking her thumb with a great big grin on her face. "Zola, look. There's your daddy. He's about to repair a myelmemingocele with Auntie Aliya. Can you say myelmemingocele?" She held her daughter up higher so she could see what's going on down in the OR.

Though, she was more interested in Jackson's apple slices than anything else.

"What an ass." Alex muttered through his mouthful of food.

"Hey, language!" April warned him, accompanied with a look of disgust.

Cristina looked over her shoulder at the Karev man, gesturing towards Zola. "Baby here."

"He pretends he's all gentle and sad with the Alzie wife at home, dispensing zen wisdom from his half-century of being a surgeon." Alex glared at Richard, where a few interns and nurses were now gathered around him as he demonstrated how he did the flip with the dolls. "Well, guess what? Yoda down there, biggest shark of them all. The guy is dangerous, and mean."

April leant forward in her chair with a sigh. "I think what Teddy's doing is mean."

"It's fine." Cristina brushed her off, staring straight ahead to try and ignore it.

"No," The red head shook her head, leaning back into her chair in the gallery. "It's horrible. It's horrible and—"

"You know what else is horrible?" Jackson countered, waving his apple stick around matter-of-factly. "Having a dead husband."

"You know what, you don't know, okay?" The Kepner woman sighed, rolling out her shoulders from being in surgery all afternoon and morning. "It's not right. Teddy's OR, it's like— it's like a morgue."

"Well," Alex tilted his head in thought, his eyes remaining trained on the surgery. "Altman's husband died on Yang's table. Payback's a bitch."

"Will you just shut up? It's fine." Cristina rolled her eyes at them and their bickering. "I can handle it."

"Well, it has been two weeks of this." Meredith pointed out as she bounced Zola carefully on her knee. "It must be getting to you."

Cristina sighed, because even though she was denying it, it must be getting to her, having to recite how Henry died twenty times a day. "No more than it did yesterday, or the day before that, or the day before that."

"Does Aliya know?" April asked, pointedly, glancing down at the woman in question, who was now operating with Derek on the spinal cord.

"She can't know." The Yang woman responded simply, and for starters, Jackson didn't really like the sound of that idea.

Though, no one could blame Cristina, if Aliya knew she would go crazy on Teddy. Certifiably crazy.

"Damn it." They all heard Derek mutter from down in the OR over the intercom.

Aliya leaned in to take a look, to see if she could see what he had saw. She narrowed her eyes, taking a breath as she saw it. "That's a spinal dermoid cyst, right?"

"Yeah," Derek nodded, also leaning in to take a closer look at what he was dealing with. "It's all tangled up in the spinal root."

"Yeah, there's a lot of scarring in there. I don't see a clean approach." Callie observed, now noticing exactly what both Aliya and Derek were seeing.

"Well, no. You have to take it out, because the cyst could be malignant." The Robbins woman protested from where she was watching every single move they made, from about half a metre away from the pair.

"Yes, we're aware. Thank you." Callie responded back, her tone laced with sarcasm directed straight towards her helicopter surgeon of a wife.

"Maybe if I can come in from an angle like this." Derek theorised, demonstrating which particular angle he meant.

"But, then we risk the contents spilling out." Aliya pointed out, chewing her lip to try and think of a better solution to this problem.

"Which could cause meningitis." Arizona also informed them helpfully, some might say sarcastically add seeing as everyone was thinking the exact same thing as her.

"Dr. Robbins," Callie warned, clearly getting annoyed at the blonde's nitpicking. "We've got this. What if we stretch the nerve root here?"

Arizona shook her head in disbelief. "Well, that might paralyse Brandi."

"Yes, Brandi might end up paralysed." The ortho surgeon's voice snapped back, causing both Aliya and Derek to share a look over the twin's. "Yeah, no one understands that better than we do, which is why we will be making this decision, okay?"

The Robbins doctor made a noise, opening her mouth to speak, but Callie got there first.

"Us." Callie said forcefully, gesturing her head to the surgeons actually doing the operating. "Not you. Us. You all right with that?"

The blonde sighed, her heel digging into the operating room floor"Just make sure that—" She trailed off when she saw her wife shooting daggers at her with her eyes. "Yes, I'm okay with that."

"No more talking from anyone in this OR." Derek, who quite frankly had had enough, spoke up. "We need complete silence from now on."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"Okay, we're ready for the final cut." Derek announced once they had fixed the cysts some time later.

The brunette glanced up at him, racking her brain for some helpful advice, but she knew he knew exactly what he was doing, so instead she opted to lighten the tense mood around them. "Don't screw it up."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." He replied back to her, though he was in fact smirking from underneath his mask, so Aliya took that as a win as the whole operating room descended into silence as they all watched Derek make the final cut to separate the twins, quite frankly the most nerve racking part of all of this.

The neurosurgeon then handed his scalpel to the scrub nurse, and everyone held their breaths.

"All right." Callie nodded her head at the handiwork. "Separation complete."

Everyone in the room began to clap their hands at the news, however they weren't out of the woods yet, and Derek snapped his head up. Call him superstitious, but he didn't want to celebrate anything until he knew for sure. "No, no, no. Not yet. We still need to check motor function. Let's do two milliamps of stimulation on Andi first, please."

The OR tech nodded his head, turning the dial on the machine up, and everyone kept their eyes on Andi's foot, waiting for her to make any movement at all.

Which she did, and everyone breathed a sigh of realised as her foot moved.

"All right." Callie nodded her head slowly. "Let's try Brandi now."

"Two milliamps of stimulation. " Derek ordered, and the tech turned up the dial, and all eyes turned to Brandi, waiting for any sign of movement.

Though, Brandi didn't move her foot like her sister did.

After a while of waiting for something to happen, Derek said: "Let's go up to three milliamps, please."

"Come on Brandi," Callie murmured as the dial was switched up to three. "Just give us some kind of movement, anything."

Aliya's heart began to crash in her chest as Brandi still didn't move an inch. "We should try four milliamps."

"Yeah," Derek agreed. "Let's go to four."

Everyone in the gallery hunched forward in their chairs to look down into the operating room, willing Brandi to just move her foot, to react to the stimulation, to give them a sign that they hadn't screwed this surgery up.

"C'mon Brandi—" Aliya whispered, her eyes wide as she stared at the baby, and when her foot finally moved, the brunette exhaled the breath she had been holding. "Oh, thank god."

"Hey!" Callie cheered, and the whole OR and the gallery above clapped their hands. "There we go!"

⠀
—✩—
⠀

MOLLY LEVINE (6:32pm)

I've messaged April but she's not
replying. I think she must be in
surgery. Can you ask her where
she keeps her corkscrew?

⠀
ALIYA LEVINE (6:35pm)

six pm bottle of wine?

⠀
MOLLY LEVINE (6:35pm)

It's not just for me, it's for Trent
and your father too.

I'm not an alcoholic, Aliya if
that's what you're implying.

⠀
ALIYA LEVINE (6:36pm)

fine i'll go ask her now
⠀

The brunette slipped her phone into her pocket with a sigh from where she everyone was watching Brandi's kidney transplant surgery from the gallery.

After the separation surgery, Brandi went into kidney failure so she needed transplant. So, they decided that they could use one of Andi's kidney's for the transplant, seeing as there was no need for immunosuppressants, and additionally, no risk of rejection.

"I'll be right back, gotta see a girl about a corkscrew." She told Jackson who was sat beside her, pushing herself up from her chair to go to the Teddy's operating room, seeing as April was on her service today.

Though, seeing as the location of a corkscrew wasn't exactly a pressing matter like someone's limb hanging off, she took her time walking to OR three.

And besides, surely Trent knew where his own corkscrew was in his own house?

When she reached the OR door, she reached for a scrub mask, holding it over her mouth as she pressed through the door. "Hi, sorry to interrupt I just—"

"However, Henry's haemorrhaging was so severe that—"

Aliya blinked in awe at the scene before her, and what she had caught Cristina saying before she negated the room.

Teddy, April, Cristina and the scrub nurses all looked over at her as she entered, pausing in shock in the doorway because, she couldn't quite frankly believe her ears.

The scrub nurses looked at her longingly, as if they were secretly begging her to get them out of whatever mess they were stuck in.

"What's going on?" Aliya asked, cautiously. Not wanting to believe that this is where Cristina had been for the past two weeks.

Because, the Yang woman wasn't even operating, she was simply stood opposite Teddy in the OR, reciting the way Henry had died.

"Levine," Teddy spoke calmly from where she was operating on her patient, and April was stood opposite her, looking the same colour as the white ceiling tiles above. "Is there anything we can help you with?"

"Yes actually," Aliya felt sick, looking from each doctor to the other. She knew exactly what was going on, and she needed someone to validate it for her. "What the hell is going on here?"

Both Teddy and Cristina stayed silent, though April looked as if she was going to crack.

The brunette noted this, so obviously she had to go for the weakest link — she was just as bad as Dr. Webber. "April?"

Teddy seemed to shoot April a look of warning, as if willing her to stay silent, but Aliya forced her hand, giving her a pointed look. "Cristina's—"

"Kepner—" The cardio surgeon's tone was cutting.

"No!" The red head snapped, interrupting the warning Teddy was trying to give her, leaving the blonde furious. "I've been made to stand by all day, listening to the way my fiancé's best friend died! It's too much!"

"What? Cristina?" Aliya's eyes darted over to her in questioning, because even though April had just confirmed it, Aliya didn't want to believe it to be true. "How long has this been going on for?"

Cristina looked to the floor, avoiding her question but it seemed April had had enough of this for a lifetime, letting up all the information. "Two weeks."

"Two weeks?" Aliya gasped, her jaw dropping to the floor, her stomach dropping along with it. "You've been torturing her for two weeks?"

"My husband is—" She tried to get the word out, but it was proving difficult.

Aliya couldn't exactly blame her. It was impossible to comprehend that someone you cared for was gone. That the person you had made plans with for the future wasn't by your side anymore, leaving you completely alone.

When Andy first died, she couldn't even say her name, let alone accept the fact that she was dead.

How was a four letter word so impossible to get out?

"I know you're hurting, believe me. I know." Aliya sympathised, her tone softening. But quite frankly, despite how badly she felt for Teddy, she couldn't fathom how heartless it was when Cristina already felt guilty enough. "But, you can't do this to Cristina. She was the one who operated on him and I know it sucks, but none of this is her fault. You need to stop torturing her, this isn't right."

The whole operating room was silent, except from the gurgling of suction, the beeping of the monitors, the heavy breathing of a grieving woman.

Teddy swallowed, accepting a clamp in her left hand. "When did you say his funeral was?"

"11:30 on Friday." Aliya answered, surprise because this was the first question Teddy had even asked in regard to the funeral, seeing as she had happily let the Levine family handle everything. "Then we're going back to Trent and April's for the wake."

"Okay." Teddy reached for another clamp, her head nodding slowly.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

TWO DAYS LATER...
⠀

Aliya had been to many, many funerals in her twenty nine years on this planet.

So many that her numbers reached the double digits.

In fact, she had been to so many funerals that she had a mental list of things she'd want at her own funeral, not to sound sinister or anything.

Though, despite the mass amounts of funerals she had attended, each one felt like a punch to the stomach, knocking the wind right out of her.

Which was why she was led out on Trent and April's bed with the yellow floral bed sheets (which was in stark contrast with her black dress), her hands braced across her stomach as she stared up at the ceiling as if it were the night sky.

But, really she was looking at the shadows of the lamp shade, mentally preparing herself to go down to the wake.

The conjoined twins proved at a handy distraction, but now their surgeries were over, it forced Aliya to face reality. That Henry wasn't going to be on the other end of the phone, or coming to visit at the hospital, or inviting her for dinner.

He wouldn't ever go to med school, like he dreamt of doing right before he died.

That thought alone seemed to cause Aliya to press her palms into her eyes, needing five minutes away from it all.

"Hey," Jackson appeared in the doorway, his arms crossed as he leant into the doorframe. "I thought I'd find you up here."

"Oh, yeah." Aliya breathed deeply, her voice strained in an effort not to cry. "I just need a couple minutes to refresh."

"Take all the time you need." The Avery man advised, moving into the room and dropping down on his back beside her in the bed, accompanying her. "You might want to, your mother is lecturing the caterers about the appetisers."

The brunette laughed, her shoulders shaking so much that the bed started to shake with her. "Only she could cause a drama over appetisers at a funeral."

"We could just stay up here?" Jackson suggested, which proved music to Aliya's ears, because that was exactly what she wanted to do right now, seeing as every bone in her body craved to just lie still. "Not much is happening down there anyway."

"You've just read my mind." She smiled fondly at the man who had been holding her together for the past two weeks, shifting close to his side and wrapping her arms around his waist, burrowing her head deep into his arm. "Has my mother thrown a butter knife at your head yet?"

It wasn't exactly a joke. It was actually a genuine question, seeing as she expected nothing less from Molly Levine if Aliya was being honest.

Jackson chuckled, and the brunette smiled into his shirt jacket, his voice like pure honey to her ears. "No, but she nearly threw a canapé at me."

"Throw one back at her, I wouldn't mind. I'd cheer you on." Aliya informed him supportively, because she would actually pay good money to see that happen. "She's still not too thrilled about us, you know."

"Yeah, I gathered." He said with a sigh, but it didn't really seem to bother him at all, which only made Aliya's heart do tiny summersaults in her chest. "She looks at me like we're seventeen and I've just climbed through your bedroom window to take you away on my motorcycle."

The Levine woman snorted at his analogy, and she could almost imagine it. "You'd get the whole neighbourhood chasing you down the road. The people of Malibu are very passionate about motorcycles."

"Oh, I can imagine." Jackson kissed her hairline, his hands tracing stars down her arms. "They contribute a lot to noise pollution. All the mothers in the neighbourhood would be clutching their pearls."

That seemed to make Aliya laugh even harder, which contrasted massively to the overall mood of the day, because she could just imagine her mother standing on the porch, clutching her pearls tightly at her neck. "Have you met Eliana yet? Has she tried to borrow money off of you?"

"Oh, yeah." Jackson's tone strained out every last syllable as he moved his free hand up to scratch his jaw. "She's a dream. Pretty sure she has my wallet."

"What?" The brunette spluttered in surprise, angling her head so she could see his face to tell whether or not he was actually being serious.

"Yeah." Jackson shrugged, unbothered at this current moment in time, seeing as he was pretty comfortable on this bed with Aliya by his side. He didn't necessarily want to move to pry his wallet out of the grasp of his girlfriend's sister.

Rolling her eyes, Aliya let her head fall back onto his chest, breathing a sigh in resentment towards her thieving older sister. "It's probably all that bleach in her head, makes her a little delirious."

"Your dad was oddly nice." He announced to her all of a sudden, still in the midst of laughter from Aliya's previous bleach on the brain comment.

"Oddly? Or, overly?" Her brow raised as she questioned him immediately, but then she frowned. This whole thing with her father making an effort was new to her, and she didn't know whether to believe it or not. Most things in her life always felt too good to be true, and she didn't want this to be one of them. "He's trying his best to make an effort. He's been texting me everyday for the past two months."

The rise and fall of Jackson's chest could easily send her to sleep, though she tried her hardest to stifle a yawn. "What are you thinking?" He asked her, his fingertips still rubbing delicately across her skin.

What she really was thinking was that at the end of the day, Travis Levine was her dad. And, she only had one. And though he wasn't innocent, she appreciated the effort, even though it had taken twenty eight years. But, instead of saying all of this, Aliya opted for: "I'm really craving those tiny slider burgers."

He snorted at her sudden change of subject, though by now he expected nothing less from her. "Sorry to break it to you, but I watched Trent eat the last one."

"Damn it." Aliya frowned deeply at the news.

Now with a smirk on his face, Jackson tilted his head to the side. "Anything else you want?"

Chewing her lip, Aliya thought for a moment, before revisiting the whole idea she had pitched to Jackson well over a month or two ago. "I want a garden."

"A garden?" He murmured back.

"Yep." Aliya nodded with a newfound sense of determination. "A garden. A proper one with the planter boxes to grow stuff. I've always wanted to grow my own strawberries, and pumpkins. I think I'd like to grow a couple pumpkins."

"Hmmm." He didn't say it, but Jackson could've said that Aliya could barely keep herself alive, let alone a plant, but he was in no position to rain on her parade, especially after Henry's funeral.

"Oh," Her voice reached a higher pitch as she thought of nothing thing to add. "And, the yard has to be big. So, I can do at least five cartwheels in a row without flying into a bush."

"Of course." Jackson nodded his head, totally understanding exactly where she was coming from. "No one wants to land in the bush after doing a couple cartwheels."

"Exactly. Glad you agree— oh, and I'd like a porch, as I've mentioned before. With a cute porch swing where we can sit every night we have off, and morning too."

"We?" He noted, even though it was obviously implied the house was for the two of them, he just enjoyed watching her squirm. It was a great form of entertainment.

"Well," Aliya cleared her throat, wriggling in the warmth of his arms. "If we're gonna get a house together I'm just laying down a few requirements."

"Garden, big yard, cute porch. Can't forget the fireplace too." Jackson listed off from the top of his head. "Anything else?"

"A nice sized kitchen." She said instantly, without a moment of hesitation.

Though, the man beside her seemed to find this awfully funny, which made the woman shoot him a look. "You don't cook." He pointed out, thinking back to the events of yesterday where she attempted to make carbonara but dropped the pasta noodles all over the floor for Reese to eat.

"Where am I gonna put my coffee?" Aliya protested, she had to get coffee in her system somehow.

"Oh, of course. We need a lot of cupboard space to inhabit the addiction." Jackson agreed, mostly because he was scared of decaffeinated Aliya.

She was a scary person to be around.

"And, the pop tarts too." She added, yawning sleepily into his shirt. "Where would we keep the poptarts?"

"Garden, big yard, cute porch, fireplace, nice kitchen—"

"A bowl to put our keys in." Aliya quickly contributed yet again, though it seemed Jackson had made zero contributions. "What about you?"

The Avery man smiled, contently. "As long as you're happy with our hypothetical house, I'm happy—"

"What! No! Jackson!" She prodded his rib, the corners of her lips downturned as she shifted so her boyfriend could see fury on her face. "That's so lame! What would you like, c'mon!"

He rolled his (perfect, might Aliya add in for the sake of it) green eyes with a huff. "Fine, I guess I'd like a pool table." His announcement was perfectly reasonable, but Aliya's cheekbones against his ribs moved, and he looked just in time to see her scrunched up nose. "You made a face!"

"I didn't." She denied the accusation straight away, pursing her lips tightly in an attempt to not seem too obvious. Besides, she couldn't control her face. "A pool table sounds— lovely."

It was a struggle to get the word out, and Jackson caught on immediately, she couldn't hide anything from him. He read her like a freaking book.

"You're wincing!" With his voice strained, her gawked at Aliya and her disgusted look. "You look like you've just been stabbed!"

"Garage. Make it a big one. Or a renovated shed."

Jackson pursed his own lips this time. "To keep the pool table in?"

"Then you'd have space for the beer." Aliya pointed out enthusiastically, because there was no way in hell she would have a pool table in the middle of the house! It was a safety hazard, in her expertise opinion. "And, the darts board, we can't have darts flying around with kids—"

Shit.

Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.

She physically felt him still from where he was pressed up against her, and she had to gulp back the lump in her throat to stop herself from screaming, mainly screaming at herself because what the hell was she thinking!

The fact was that she wasn't thinking! Not a single one of her brain cells was operating normally.

It was all Henry's fault. He died and now her brain had turned to mashed potatoes.

The word "kids" just slipped out of her freaking mouth!

"Kid" wouldn't have been so bad. But, "kids" implied multiple.

MULTIPLE. CHILDREN.

Oh, god— She felt sick.

Her mind instantly scrambled for a way to save it, and as soon as she found the best solution, she couldn't stop herself. "Because, naturally we'd have a pet goat."

Jackson, knowing exactly what was going through her head, contemplated this slowly. "Oh? We'd naturally have a pet goat, hm?"

"Yes. Of course." Aliya said with a scoff, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "With such a big garden, why not get a goat? We could call it Garry."

"Garry the goat?" He raised a brow at their hypothetical goat. "Creative."

"Yep." Aliya, now quite fond of the idea of a pet goat, started to run through the list of things they'd have to do to tend to a goat. "Darts are dangerous with Garry and Reese around."

"Besides, Garry would need his own room too." Jackson added on, his eyes still staring up at the ceiling with no intention of ever looking away ever again. "Maybe even multiple."

Aliya, not catching on, found the idea of multiple goat rooms preposterous. "Multiple rooms for one goat? Might as well get him an apartment."

Jackson shrugged, his face softening because he didn't find the idea of multiple goats too crazy, but at the end of the day it was up to her. "We might want more than one goats, but I don't mind. However many goats you want sounds good to me."

Oh.

Now she was getting it.

"I don't really mind how many goats we have," She replied with the shrug of her shoulders, reaching up to play with the chain of her necklace. "But, I do quite like goats. So, should we say three goat rooms? Just to be sure?"

"Smart idea." His breathing hitched, though he quickly regained his composure. "Three goat rooms plus our bedroom, plus a guest room. At least five bedrooms?"

Aliya buried her head back into the crook of his neck, where her head rightfully belonged. "Sounds perfect."

"Here you are." Trent crossed his arms in the doorway of his own master bedroom, April appearing quickly by his side. "I was wondering where you had disappeared off too. Can we join you? Mom's driving us up the wall, and everyone's gone anyway."

"Of course, come on in." Aliya waved the pair into the room, their own room, must it be known.

April dropped happily onto her bed, falling back into the mountain of pillows. "What were you two discussing?"

"Goats." Aliya said, like it was the most casual thing ever.

April exchanged a look with her fiancé. "Goats?"

"Yep." The Avery man confirmed, smiling into Aliya's hair. "Garry, Gertrude and Gerald."

"Okay." Trent nodded, not even wanting to question why on earth they were talking about goats. He wasn't exactly surprised, seeing as it was that particular pair. "Which date sounds better? March 22nd, or March 15th?"

"March 22nd, obviously." Aliya answered without even having to think about it. "You got the double number thing going on. Why?"

"March 22nd." Trent repeated the date out loud for the whole room to hear, then looking over towards April, whose soft smile said it all. "That's our wedding date." He took her hand, kissing the back of her palm gently.

"Oh my god!" Aliya darted upright, out of Jackson's arms as she clamped a hand over her mouth in surprise. "No way!"

Jackson shuffled onto his side, propping his head up with his hand. "How long have you been deliberating the date of your wedding?"

"Well," Trent shrugged, his arm hooked around April's shoulders. "We reserved things for both days—"

"How long?"

"Like," Trent looked over to April for some sort of indication, but even the red head didn't help. "Two months?"

"Two months!" Aliya gasped, the two of them combined proving just an indecisive as Aliya herself.

"We wanted it to sound nice!" The Kepner woman defended, though she was soon to be a Levine herself. Or, maybe she would hyphenated, or just keep her own last name. "March 22nd sounds nice, right?"

"Nice." Aliya nodded her head, leaning back on the bed on her elbows. "I'll be expecting the RVSP."

"You can't RVSP." Trent screwed up his face at his sister's remark. "You're in the wedding. You have to be there."

"But, you need to know my option." She pointed out to him, besides it was fun to receive a proper invitation in the mail. "I don't want fish, so I'll go with the chicken."

"Hey, can I join you?" Now, another body started to hover in the doorway in the form of Aliya and Trent's sister's husband, Arthur. Arthur ran a hand through his brown hair, staring sadly at the ground. "Eliana and Molly are being mean about the appetisers, and I—"

"Join the club, Arthur." Aliya interrupted, beckoning him into the Molly and Eliana free zone. "Join the club."

Arthur stepped into the threshold of the room, not actually knowing whether to squeeze on the bed, or just stand.

So, being the six foot four awkward specimen of a man, he chose to sit rather awkwardly on the floor.

"What are you all doing up here?" Yet another figure who must have followed Arthur stood in the doorway. And, they were all met with Travis, eyeing each of them up.

"Hiding." The five of them all replied back in perfect union.

Travis raised a brow at them. "From who?"

"Who do you think?" Aliya answered the question with a question, because who they were hiding from should be no secret to anyone.

Besides, there was only two people left in this house not scrammed in the master bedroom.

"Great, mind if I join?" Her father breathed a sigh of relief, inviting himself in anyway. "It's getting pretty heated down there."

"What about?" Aliya asked, intrigued. "Which red wine tastes more expensive."

"Close. Who wore it best." Travis announced, and the whole entire room sighed. "If I hadn't taken the oath, I'd ham a steak knife into my eye to put me out of my misery."

"Been there, done that," Aliya said reminiscently as her father dropped down into the armchair in the corner of the bedroom, propping his feet up on the stool. "Ended up in the ER."

Arthur looked positively horrified. "You stabbed a steak knife in your eye?"

"No, Arthur." The brunette woman shook her head, lying back down onto the sheets. "I pretend too, but I dropped the knife stabbed my foot instead."

Something appeared to click in Trent's mind after all this time watching both his father and his younger sister. And, upon realising this, her turned to Jackson, who had seemed to notice it too. "You see where she gets her humour from?"

"Oh," Jackson gasped as she watched both Travis and Aliya Levine tip their heads back as an inhuman cackle escaped their mouths, the exact clones of each other. "It all makes sense now."

Maybe Aliya and Travis had more in common than she had thought.
⠀
⠀
⠀
⠀

( notes! )

struggled to finish this chapter, then i listened to loml & how did it end back to back, stared at my wall for a few minutes afterwards and then wrote the rest of this chapter!! on another note however, get yourself a man like jackson avery. cause miss aliya levine is a certified YAPPER and he just lets her yap at him with hearts in his eyes

jackson & alex being aliya's no.1 protecters will never not make me sob, and the bit where jackson & aliya were chatting about goats THEY WERE ON ABOUT KIDS GUYS I'LL ACTUALLY CRY

also, this is random but i'm thinking about what to make aliya's scrub cap look like SO I HAVE A QUESTION, if you could give aliya a scrub cap, what would it look like?? i feel like i need to give her a proper fancy attending scrub cap seeing as this book is literally called scrub caps!!

( word count! — 10,000 )