Open Heart One Shots (Choices)

Roll With It

Summary: Cassie is determined to pretend she and Ethan are nothing more than Attendingand Intern after his confession in the lab. Fate has other plans.

After a restless night, Cassie Valentine had finally fallen asleep before her alarm woke her up. Groggy and not in the mood for it, she'd hit the snooze button. And kept hitting it until Sienna shook her awake, slightly annoyed at the loud interruptions every nine minutes.

Cassie had dragged her feet getting ready for work, operating on autopilot. Instead of joining the others on the T, she opted to walk, hoping the cold air and double-shot of espresso she grabbed on the way would clear the cobwebs.

It worked. Barely.

When she gathered with the other interns in the resident's lounge, waiting for Ines and Zaid to assign patients, she wished for anything to make the next fourteen hours fly by. Maybe Fate would be kind and recognize that she needed a gimme day.

"Valentine, 504," Zaid called out with his typical dourness, handing her a thick patient file.

It took one glance at the attending physician's name—Dr. Ethan Ramsey—for Cassie to know that Fate was a bitch.

Ever since their kiss in Miami a couple of weeks ago, and his admission in the lab that it wasn't all in her head, they had managed to avoid each other. Except for brief moments in Naveen's presence, of course.

He had reverted to Dr. Ramsey, and she was Valentine the Intern, competing for a junior fellowship spot on his team. Cassie was determined to roll with the circumstances. As long as it meant she didn't have to see him.

As luck would have it, she would have to confer with him on this patient. And pretend the last patient of his she'd treated—the PITA—hadn't resulted in an epic blow-up in his office. Some people just ignited fireworks in each other's presence. Clearly, they were two of them.

Cassie waited until Ines and Zaid dismissed them before approaching Sienna, who was chatting with Jackie, Landry and Elijah.

"Hey, Si, can you do me a favor?"

"If I can," Sienna smiled. "What's up?"

"Switch patients with me?" Cassie asked, unable to keep the desperation out of her voice.

Before Cassie could react, Jackie snatched the file out of her hands and held it up to read the attending's name.

"Huh," she said, giving Cassie a beady-eye look. "I would've thought you'd use this opportunity to suck up to Ramsey."

"It's a patient of Dr. Ramsey?!?" Landry perked up as Jackie spoke, gazing in avarice at the file in her hand.

Cassie found the lingering hero worship in his eyes after all these months a bit unsettling, especially since he never did anything about it. Maybe she should have told Ethan to take Landry to Miami instead. That might have cured her friend of his inclinations for good.

"I'm sorry, Cassie," Sienna was saying, her expression crestfallen. "Ines moved up my ICU rotation. She just told me. One of the CCU interns left the program and they changed my training schedule."

Cassie tried to hide her disappointment, but she knew Sienna was struggling and could use the change in scenery. "It's okay, Si. I found ICU fascinating, and you might too."

"I can switch," Landry said eagerly, reaching for the file only for Jackie to move it away and hand it back to Cassie.

"Are you sure it's worth the drop in ranking?" she taunted. "Patients are assigned for a reason. If Ramsey found out, he might penalize you."