Had I known How to Save a Life

Now or Never

Chapter 21
*Meredith POV*

When faced with trauma, you have to think about which disaster to tackle first. Because, in the real trauma's there's never just one thing going on. We live in a "now or never" kind of world. Where if we don't fix the problem fast, our patient will die. In the real world, now or never is something that will change your life.

I stand in the ambulance bay. Waiting for the trauma to come in. It's really bad but they wouldn't give us anymore details.

Callie and Maggie are waiting with me. We wonder what the trauma is going to look like when the ambulance pulls up. The paramedics open the doors and the 3 of us are shocked by what we see.

A man has an axe in him that went through him. "Page neuro, he might have spinal cord damage." Callie says.

"Jake Michael, 31 years old, obvious foreign object penetrating through rib cage and abdomen." The paramedic says.

We grab the gurney and take him to trauma room 2.

"Jake, I'm Dr. Grey can you hear me?" I ask.

"Please save me. I was building a treehouse and it wasn't stable. I fell through and the axe broke my fall." He says.

"We're going to do our best okay?" Callie says to calm him down.

"O-okay." He responds.

Amelia comes into the trauma room for the Neuro consult.

"Jake, Hi I'm Dr. Shepherd I'm a neurosurgeon. Can you wiggle your toes for me?" She asks.

Only the toes on his left foot are wiggling. It's not the worst possible thing that could happen but it's not the best.

"Alright, let's get him into the Lodox. Find out what all needs fixing." I say.

We all love using the Lodox. It takes 13 seconds to get all the information we need.

There's some blood around his spine, causing the paralysis. The axe is what's keeping him from bleeding out. So we need to work around it.

We all look at the scans. "I don't know if I'm going to be able to save the lung. But as soon as we get in there and get this axe out of him, his lung might collapse." Maggie says.

"I can repair his broken ribs after y'all are done so page me after." Callie says.

Owen and I are going to try and save his colon and spleen. Hopefully that damage isn't as bad once we get in there.

Amelia says the paralysis needs to be fixed immediately or else it'll be permanent.

"First we need to get this axe out of him." I say.

He starts to get hypotensive, "Well, while you all tend to your own little repairs, I'm taking this man into the OR because it is now or never!" Maggie yells at us. We kinda needed it so that's good.

"Alright so, where are we starting?" Owen asks.

"First we need to get the axe out. We have to stop the bleeding." I say.

"Let's get started." Owen says.

*Callie POV*

I'm about to do something. Stupid and crazy. And I think I'm going to regret it. A lot. But what the hell. I don't think I have anything left to lose. This has been on my mind of a while. Particularly since Derek almost died. But until now I've been ignoring it. Because that's what I do now when I'm in love with somebody. I ignore it. Not anymore though. Not anymore. I see her and her blonde hair and her magical smile. It's like I'm falling in love all over again.

I begin to walk up to her until I get paged.

*Meredith POV*

We almost have the axe out. It's going to be a horror show when the bleeding starts though. I have Wilson in here for when we need suction.

"Alright people, 1..2..3," Owen says and we pull the axe out.

In that moment I have no idea what I'm going to do. Blood spews out of the body all over us. "Wilson get in there!" Owen yells.

I quickly to a splenectomy because it was shredded. Now it's time to save to colon. Maggie is working on the lungs.

"When we're done here, someone page plastics. I don't want this guy to have a reminder of this every time he takes his shirt off." Amelia says. She got the pressure relieved off of his spine so hopefully he will have feeling in both feet.

Owen and I find a way to repair the colon. Maggie is having trouble with the lung.

*Callie POV*

I finally have free time again. So I go to find her. I see her. I walk up and grab her arm and pull her into an on-call room.

"Callie what the hell?" She says.

"Shut up. I need to say something. And I need you to listen. Okay? I need you. I want you. I-I love you okay? I freaking love you. I go on dates with other people just to ignore the fact that I love you." My heart is racing out of my chest.

"I-I don't know what to say." Arizona say.

I just poured my heart out to her and she doesn't know what to say. Instead of walking away, I walk up to her and kiss her. Then I'm getting paged for my axe guy. So I leave.

*Meredith POV*

Maggie ended up saving the lung. I am really happy about the save I want to tell Derek about it. Now that I think of it, I haven't seen Derek all day. I was on call last night so I stayed here. He went home. He brought the kids into daycare and apparently picked them up.

I'm scared. Last time he went AWOL, he almost died. But I know right now it's just my hormones raging. So I sit down in the attendings lounge. And I try not to worry. I text him. On Derek's phone you can see if he's read the message. I'm not on call so I head home.

I walk inside and no ones anywhere. Derek's not in our room. I have no idea where my kids are.

I hear laughing coming from a guest room I nudge to door a little and I see Derek, Zola and Bailey. My hearts rests. Thank God.

"Surprise" he laughs. He was building the nursery for Ellis. "I know we were going to do this together, but I figured now or never." Derek continues.

"Thank God, I thought you were dead. You didn't answer your phone." I laugh.

"Oh...about that. Zola might have dropped my phone in a cup a of juice." He tells me and I laugh.

Author Note:

I don't know on the show if Callie or Arizona will ever get back together, but in my story, Callie is telling Arizona that she loves her. Does Arizona feel the same? Find out in the next update, which will be up in the next few days. Sorry it took me a little bit longer to get this posted. I was really busy, plus Monday I turned 15 so I'm getting ready to get my Learners Permit, probably next week.

~Erin :)