fifteen

Derek asked Mark and Allison as he walked inside the conference room, "Alzheimer's research."

"I hate you." Allison spoke up causing Derek to look up at her with frowned eyebrows, "You let all the other residents except me and Mer try to get into your clinical trial." Derek was about to speak but Allison beat him to it, "And you said you would let me help!"

"You spend too much time on Neuro." Derek said. "And I said maybe."

"I have a liar of a best friend." Allison told Mark, "And Yang spends too much time in Cardio she is married to it, like I'm married to Neuro."

"She's right. She's like the other Yang but with Neuro." Mark nodded, "Also, Callie's pregnant, she's having my baby."

"Thank you." Allison smiled as she was ready to brag to Derek how Mark was on her side when Mark's word processed in her head, "What? Callie's pregnant?"

"What?"

"Right?" Mark nodded with a smile, "Best news of my life." He tilted his head as he looked down, "At least it would be, except for the fact that Lexie wants a baby about as much as she wants a root canal. I-I guess I could tell her I'm the baby's uncle, but I don't want to be the cool uncle. The cool uncle is only cool till the kid's like, nine, and then the cool uncle's just creepy." Derek chuckled, "I'm the dad. I want this..and I want Lexie."

"Uh wow."

"I don't know. What to do I do?" He asked his two closest friends in the hospital.

"Tell her the truth." Allison softly said. Mar quickly shook his head, disagreeing with her.

"You're the man with the answers." Mark looked over at Derek, "What do you think?"

Derek tilted his head as he glared at Mark. "How could Meredith and I try for months and not have any luck, and you look at somebody and a baby appears?"

"Sloans are unusually fertile." Mark shrugged.

"You're a classic example of failing up." Derek said.

Mark sighed, "Not exactly the advice I was looking for."

"Well," Derek got up and grabbed his charts from the table, "You got it." He raised his cup of coffee at both of them, "Cheers."

"Hey! Here's a crazy suggestion." Allison spoke up once Derek left, "Tell her the truth, Mark, it's the only answer."

Mark's pager went off as he walked away as Allison stared at her hands.

***

Allison continued to write down on charts as she looked at her watch seeing the time. She began to write down the few things the chart needed before closing it.

"My next uh, Alzheimer's surgery is tomorrow at seven." Derek commented, as he walked by hand-in hand with Meredith.

Allison raised an eyebrow, "Came here to gloat, Shep?"

"Put your name on the board." Derek smiled before walking away with Meredith.

Allison smiled as she organized the charts and walked to the O.R. board and wrote down her name.

***

"Several moments ago I asked you to remember three words. Can you tell me what they were?" Allison asked the patients who looked at her.

"Truck. Cabin. Spoon." The man said, as Allison nodded her head as she smiled.

Allison and Meredith were the two residents on Derek's clinical trial, and they had come up with a routine for someone to evaluate the possible patients in the morning—this morning was Allison's turn. While Meredith will be in the O.R. assisting Derek for the surgery.

***

Meredith took the opportunity to sign herself up to take over the ER for the night in hopes of proving she could be Chief Resident. The ER is swamped as Lexie goes to dismiss a patient, and Meredith checks up on other patients.

"Hey can somebody do something about this?" A man spoke up, causing everyone in the ER to look at two men drinking from beer bottles. One of them has a knife stuck in his head.

***

"I can check the discharges if you want, Mer, your plate is full." Allison offered, since Meredith has been running around the place.

"Please." Meredith nodded.

Allison nodded as she made her way to the nurses station, "Can I get the discharges from the last hour, please?" Tyler nodded as he grabbed the clipboards. "Dr. Grey informed me that the boy in bed seven with the broken leg, Nathan Englundar, can we check on his status for the O.R. please."

Allison looked at the discharge paper as she noticed something with Lexie's patient from earlier, "Is this Lexie's patient with the headaches? Mitch Turner?"

"Yeah."

Allison looked back at the paper and then at Tyler, "How long ago was he discharged?"

"Not long. A few minutes ago." Tyler shook his head.

"Did he leave? Did he already leave?" Allison didn't wait for an answer as she ran outside of the ER.

It was quick to find Mitch, since he was having trouble opening his car. "Mr. Turner!" Allison yelled, hoping to grab his attention, once she reached to the couple she let out a breath, "Mr. Turner, I need you to try and smile for me, please."

"Who the hell are you?" The girlfriend asked.

Allison ignored her, "I need you to try to smile for me, please." Mitch tried to smile as Allison nodded her head, "Okay, can you lift your arms above your head like this?"

Allison raised her arms above her head to show how Mitch should do it.

"Dr. Carter, is everything all right?" Tyler asked, as he came to view.

"No, it's not." Allison said, "We got a code C.V.A Let's get a stretcher out here, stat." Tyler ran off to follow her orders, "Can you repeat after me? The dog chased after the cat."

"The—The dog ch—chased af—" Mitch tried to repeat before he closed his eyes ready to fall to the ground.

"What's going on? What's happening to him?"

"We need to get him on the ground." Allison told her, "I need your help."

Allison grabbed a hold of Mitch's arm as the girlfriend did the same on the other side. Gently laying him down on the ground, "Get your purse under his head, quickly, please. And help me secure his arm hold it like this."

"Why—Why are we doing this?"

Allison took hold of her flashlight "Because he's having a stroke."

Back inside the hospital Allison talked to a fellow doctor,  "Unsteady gait, slurred speech, asymmetric smile. His symptoms started no more than 20 minutes ago, so we should be well within the golden hour."

"So the stroke team has taken him up to C.T. We're going to see if he's eligible for the clot-busting medicine. We caught the stroke early which is very good." Allison explained to the red head on the phone.

She let out a sigh of relief, "So—so on a scale of 1-10. Ten being I might have to cancel our Aspen trip in a week, how is he?"

Allison mentally rolled her eyes at how careless this girl is being, "You should cancel the trip."

***

"Lexie, Lexie!" Allison yelled as she knocked on the bathroom door, "I need to grab my hair brush, can I come in!"

"Uh...Yeah." Lexie yelled, as Allison walked inside to grab her brush.

"Thanks, Lex! You're the best." Allison called out as she walked out of the bathroom.

Jackson who was on the bathroom ground with Lexie's hand on his mouth as he heard Allison he looked back at Lexie.

Allison doesn't share the same feelings as him, he's moving on—or that's what he's been telling himself, she decided the two should be friends, so he has the right to move on. But why does it feel wrong?