Brown sugar and Lavender

Chapter six: Ten tiny toes to never touch ground

Addison's POV:

The next week flew by pretty fast. The twins were doing amazing, which meant that they could be delivered soon, Derek and I had been on two more dates and to top it off, Meredith had been being really helpful with all the cases that came in.

"Addison!" I heard Bailey yell. I was walking through the hallway to go see if I had anymore patients, with Meredith close on my heels, when I saw Dr. Bailey.

"Always a pleasure, Dr. Bailey" I smiled.

"Yeah, yeah whatever" she said quickly "a woman came into the ER about an hour ago, she's thirty weeks pregnant and she fell off the treadmill at the gym. She needs some stitches in her chin, that fall was pretty bad, but she also needs you to check in on her. She happened to land smack on her bump"

"It's probably nothing more than a little bruise, but I'll run down and check up on her anyway. Meredith can stitch up her chin while we're down there"

"Great, great" Bailey said, hurriedly rushing away.

"How does someone fall off a treadmill?" Meredith asked.

I shrug "maybe she was going to fast, she should've known better than to run while THAT pregnant" I sigh, as we get to her room.

"I'm Dr. Shepard, this is Dr. Grey, we're going to be checking in on you and your baby today" I smile, and snap some gloves on.

"I'm Angela, Angie, but Angela" she says.

"Well, Angela, we were told you took a pretty bad tumble off the treadmill?" I ask, as I lift up her hospital gown to examine her belly.

She nods "it wasn't going fast, I was walking pretty slowly. I just didn't want to be a complete couch potato while pregnant, Ya know? I've been walking on it through the whole pregnancy but this is the first time I've slipped"

"Is this your first pregnancy?" I ask, sizing up the bruise right by her belly button.

"Second, well, third" she says "my son was born four years ago, happy and healthy. Two years after that, we had a miscarriage at nine weeks" her eyes start to tear up, and I can tell she's nervous.

"I'm sorry" I say, as I start to get the ultrasound machine ready.

"It's okay, I'm okay" she says taking in a deep breath "so how's my bump?"

"Minimal bruising, which is good, but since you landed smack in the middle by your belly button, id like to run some tests" I explain, as I start the ultrasound.

"I don't know what I'm having yet" she tells us "my husband didn't want to find out, he wanted to wait"

I looked around on the ultrasound. There was no bleeding, and everything looked okay. Now, if I could just find a heartbeat.

"We picked a name. Avery, for a boy or a girl. We did that with our son, too. His name is Jessie"

No, no, no! I thought, as I still couldn't find a heartbeat. It shouldn't take this long, not nearly as long.

"Angie!" Her husband burst in through the doors, frantically running to her side "sorry I'm late, I had to drop Jessie off at my Mom's I figured you could use a little quiet"

She smiled gratefully, as I cleaned the gel off of her belly and switched off the machine. I felt a wave of emotions coursing through me. On that screen was a picture of a tiny little human who wouldn't get to have a life. She was so tiny, so fragile, and she wouldn't even get a chance to take her first breath.

I thought of the firsts she'd never get. First steps, first words, first day of school, first dance practice, first boy girl dance, first boyfriend, first love, first everything.