Sister, Sister¹

Months After

Ivy takes a deep breath and exits the elevator. It's suprising that she doesn't have someone with her. Since the crash, she's had to be committed to psych twice and was just now coming back to work. Although, she wasn't working today.

She walks to the nurses desk and sees Meredith and Bailey talking, "Hey."

They turn to her and smile, Meredith quickly walking forward and giving her a hug, "Hey, how are you? When did you get home?"

"Jackson picked me up last night and I'm- I'm doing fine. Fully functional and ready to work. Tomorrow," she says, looking down.

Meredith and Bailey study her. She's not the Ivy Shepherd they had known before the crash. That version was confident, a great leader. This one. Doubts herself, quiet, downtrodden. They worry about what will happen today and how far back more it will set her.

Bailey nods, "Yeah. We're ready to be working with you again. Are you on your way into see him?"

Ivy nods, "Yeah. I'm also going to try and watch Callies surgery today."

"Good. I miss seeing you in that O.R. or down in the E.R. Plus, I think it's your turn to deal with interns," Meredith jokes.

"I'll take them tomorrow. Only way to fully heal, is to get back to my roots. Thats the E.R. and O.R.," Ivy tells them, smiling.

They nod at her and she turns and heads to Marks room. Bailey turns to Meredith, "How do you think the interns will react to her?"

Meredith smirks, "If I have any say in it, they'll respect her the same way my class did."

"Good. See to it," Bailey tells her.

○○○○

Ivy decides to make a pit stop in the E.R. She sees Callie yelling at Jackson to stop staring at her as well, "He better not be staring at you. I just got back."

Callie smiles and hugs her, "Oh, my ortho goddess. Welcome back."

"Thanks Callie. I just wanted to see if the interns had burned down the E.R. yet. Seems to be still working," she jokes, looking around.

Jackson wraps his arms around her from behind, "I wasn't staring. I was... observing."

"Very convincing, Dr. Avery," she tells him as Derek comes up.

"Hey. You're back. How are you feeling?" He asks, carefully approaching her.

"Der, I'm fine. I understand why you had to do it and I'm not mad," She tells him, giving him a hug.

He hugs her back, "Good. I just wanted you to be okay and I didn't know what else to do."

She nods, "I understand. Now, I'm going to go see Mark. You have a consult to do."

With that, Ivy finally makes her way to Marks room. Sitting in the chair next to his bed, she holds his hand. The sleeve of her shirt rides up, showing her burns. Quickly, she pulls it back down and sighs.

She hadn't been in Marks room since he went into this coma. She couldn't. The last time she tried to, she freaked out and had to be sent back to psych. But this is her last chance, "Hey, Mark."

○○○○

Callie soon joins her and talks to her and Mark about Derek operating today, "I mean he says he's ready. And his nerve graft seems to be ready. So I guess today's the day he's gonna operate... with his brand new hand. And it is gonna work. It's definitely gonna work. You think it's gonna work, right?"