No Time | Grey's Anatomy // Book 1 // COMPLETED |

5 | The Holidays

 *New Year's Eve*

By the time New Year's Eve had finally rolled around, we still hadn't found a heart for Kelsey. With every spare second we had, we were checking the ER and scouring floor after floor for organ donors, but it just wasn't looking good.

As Altman entered the room to check on Kelsey, Cristina and I were going over her charts, trying to hide the disappointment in our eyes at her rapidly declining state.  "Her kidneys are shutting down," Altman whispered. "We need to find a donor. We needed to find one yesterday."

Cristina and I nodded in agreement. "It's New Year's Eve, Dr. Yang." Kelsey smiled wide, her optimism, shining through her sunken eyes and pale complexion. "You said I just had to make it to New Year's Eve."

Cristina put down the chart and tried her best to look cheerful. "Drunks all over the roads. So yeah. Tonight's our best shot."

Exiting the room, Cristina and I shared a hopeless look. Before we had much time to wallow in our pity, however, a man shouted at us from down the hall. "Yang!" the red-headed chief of trauma that I had only met once or twice thus far motioned us over. "Head-on MVC! Could use your help too, whatever your name is!"

"It's Forrest." I tried to tell him, but he was much too busy sprinting through the halls to hear me. "Nevermind . . ." I sighed before high-tailing it after Cristina.

As soon as the two of us stepped foot in the trauma room, we already knew the situation was dire. People were rushing around and nurses were shouting things left, right, and center. "Vitals are low, too low!" a nurse announced."She's crashing!"

A crash cart was ordered, but in the seconds it took to arrive, the patient had flat-lined and died. Her injuries had been far too serious for anyone to have saved her, even if the crash cart had been in the room. Cristina called the time of death and did a quick examination. In the process, she confirmed that the patient, who was an eighteen-year-old female, was, in fact, brain dead. 

"Someone go tell her dad," Cristina said as I followed her out to the nurses' station. "She's a match for Kelsey, so at least there's that."

I smiled softly but tried not to look too thrilled about the death of a young woman. "Thank God for silver linings."

Paging Altman, Cristina made a few phone calls in the meantime while I filled out some preliminary paperwork. "You paged?" Altman greeted us.

"We just confirmed brain death on an eighteen-year-old female involved in a head-on MVC earlier this evening," Cristina explained. "She's a match for Kelsey. So I called UNOS and they gave me the go-ahead for a directed donation. Now Dr. Bailey will do the organ recovery, and I set up OR two for Kelsey. That is why New Year's Eve is my favourite holiday!"

"Stop it!" Altman snapped, perturbed by Cristina's blatant joy. "This is not a celebration. Come here." Altman led us over to the room where the girl had been confirmed brain dead. Inside, a man, who was most likely her father, was weeping by her side.

"No!" the father sobbed. "No, no, no. Not my baby! Please, not my daughter. Oh, my . . . I can't-"

"This is not a celebration," Altman's tone was stern, hoping beyond hope that she was getting the point across. 

Despite the sudden wet-blanket thrown over the single silver lining of a bad situation, Kelsey's surgery was performed later that evening and it couldn't have gone better. I was given the opportunity to close up—most likely because Altman was still a little pissed at Cristina for being so happy earlier—which meant that I had to stay late, but I wasn't like I had any other plans anyway. Once I was finished, Kelsey was taken back to her room to rest for the night.

                                                                              *New Year's Day*

"Your kidneys have stabilized and your vitals are stable, and everything looks great," I told Kelsey once she had woken up from her surgery the following day. All things considered, she looked a million times better than she had before the transplant. 

"Feel." Kelsey put her hand over her heart and turned to her boyfriend. He put his hand where her hand had been and smiled. "Awesome, huh?" Kelsey was overjoyed by the fact that she had a heartbeat again. 

"Um, I can only really feel your boob, so . . ." he replied, a sheepish smile spreading across his face. 

"Hey!" Kelsey moved his hand away and laughed. She then turned to Cristina and I. "You wanna feel?

Cristina picked up the stethoscope, "Uh, no. But I will listen."

As Cristina listened to Kelsey's heart, Kelsey's boyfriend bent down on one knee and pulled out a small box from his pocket. "Oh, my God. What are you doing?" Kelsey asked.

"Oh, my God. What are you doing?" Cristina repeated, hearing Kelsey's heart rate increase through her stethoscope. 

"I know it's only been a couple of months." he smiled and opened the box to reveal a beautiful engagement ring. 

"And four dates." Kelsey reminded him, her breathing fast and eyes wide. "It's technically been four dates."

He just smiled.  "You amaze me . . . every day. And we went through a war together. We went through this together, and we came out the other side. And I think if we can get through this, we can get through anything. So marry me. Please."

Kelsey nodded and grinned from ear to ear. "Yes. Of course."

Kelsey's now-fiancée slipped the ring onto her finger and they hugged. As Cristina and I left, opting to come back and finish the examination later, Cristina made a sharp right turn and walked away quickly. Shrugging to myself, I headed off to an on-call room.

With my first official patient successfully done, I was beyond ready to get some sleep.