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

25 | A Living Hell

"My arm!" I heard the screams from down the hall as I rushed towards them. "What did you do to my arm?!"

As I ran into the recovery room, Skylar was sitting in bed, bawling her eyes out and screaming bloody murder. Multiple nurses stood around, trying their best to calm her, but I knew that they wouldn't have much luck. Skylar wouldn't calm down until she knew every last detail of what happened, so, I asked the nurses to let me talk to her and they happily agreed, practically skipping out of the room. 

With me in the room, Skylar had stopped screaming, but tears continued to stream down her cheeks as she stared at the bandaged nub that was once her arm. The nub was small, as the amputation had been made above the elbow.

 "Sky." I pulled up a chair beside her bed and sat with her. "It's going to be okay. Everything's going to be okay."

"My . . . my arm." Skylar sobbed, clearly out of shock by now and feeling all of the emotions from the accident at once. "What happened?"

Sighing, I leaned closer to her and rested my hand on her leg. "Do you remember the car accident?"

Skylar nodded. "Yes."

"Well, when you got hit, your car flipped and it crushed your arm," I explained to her. "When the paramedics got there, your arm was barely even attached anymore. The surgeons tried their best to re-attach it, but it was so mangled and full of debris that the safest option was to amputate. I'm sorry."

Once I finished speaking, Skylar seemed to be able to breathe easier. Lifting her right hand, she wiped away the tears from her face and drew in a few deep breaths. "So, what's new with you?" she asked, her voice squeaky from her raw throat. 

"Skylar." I sat back and sighed. "You don't have to. We don't have to talk about me."

"No, I want to." Skylar insisted and looked down at her arm once more. "I don't want to think about it. And besides, it was my left arm. I mean, what does a left arm even do anyway?"

I thought for a second. I wasn't sure if I should encourage Skylar to work through her emotions in a healthy way or if I should just support her decision to cope however she wanted, which in this case, was moving on and trying not to think about it. "Good point." I chose the ladder. 

"I'm not a lefty." she pointed out, suddenly having completely switched emotions. "Anyway, enough about me. Tell me something to distract me. How's Sam?"

"She's fine," I said, trying my best to think of something to say about my friend. "She has a new boyfriend named Jake; I've only met him once but he seems okay."

Skylar nodded. "That's good. What about you, any boyfriends?"

"Well . . ." I paused. "There is this one guy . . . Jackson."

Skylar smiled wide, clearly eager to hear more about my love life, but before I had the chance to elaborate, Alex knocked on the door and poked his head in. "Hey, uh, Derek's doing the consult on Hayley now," he said. 

"Oh, okay." I nodded. "I'll be right there."

As Alex closed the door again, Skylar wiggled her eyebrows at me. "Is that Jackson?" she asked.

"No, that's Alex." I chuckled as I stood up. "I have to go now. Are you going to be okay?"

Skylar nodded. "I'll be fine. I mean, I don't think it can get much worse than losing an arm."

Chuckling once more at my sister's dark humour, I shook my head slowly. "Have you called Mom and Dad yet?"

Skylar's smile faded. "No. I don't know what to say . . . I don't want them to be mad."

"They won't be mad," I assured her. "They will want to know that you're okay. You should call them." 

Skylar just shrugged lazily, and with that, I exited the patient room and stepped out into the hallway where Alex was waiting for me. "That's your sister?" he asked.

"Yup," I replied as we started down to hall toward Hayley's room. "She's definitely something."

"Seems like it." 

By the time we got to Hayley's room, Derek was already standing out in the hall with her parents, discussing the diagnostic plan he had put in place to find out what was wrong with Hayley. "I'd like to run some tests on Hayley, " Derek told them.

"More tests?" Hayley's dad seemed unsure. "Look . . . we-we've been to doctors, okay? Hayley is schizophrenic. She was diagnosed months ago."

The mother nodded. "Ken's father was schizophrenic. He killed himself when Ken was eight."

As we spoke, Arizona joined us since it was technically a peds case. "Look," Alex sighed. "Doctor Shepherd, it's just a few more tests, and . . . and she wants them."

Derek thought for a second, trying to decide between believing the parents or having some blind faith in Hayley. "Mr. and Mrs. May, believe me, I understand your frustration but it's possible something was missed."

"Honey, please." Hayley's mother turned to her husband. 

"Fine, okay. Okay." the father agreed.

"Thank you," Derek nodded, and with that, we started down the hall to order the tests. "I want to run an EEG and cat-scan . . ."

Minutes later, we were watching over Hayley as she laid in the cat-scan machine. While we waited for the results, I couldn't help but think about Skylar. What kind of tests had they done on her? Who was there to watch over her if it wasn't me?

"You think she's schizophrenic?" Alex asked when he noticed I was starting to zone out a little.

Snapping back into reality, I shrugged. "Maybe."

"I think she threatened to stab a syringe into her own heart," Arizona replied. "So I'm leaning towards crazy, yeah."

With a small beep, Hayley's scan loaded onto the computer screen in front of us. "Scans are up," Alex said as we all started to look them over, meticulously searching for anything that could be causing Hayley's symptoms. 

"They look clean," I commented after a minute or so. 

Derek nodded. "There's nothing in the frontal lobe."

"Or the temporal-parietal region," Arizona added. "Occipital lobe's clean, too."

"Crap." Alex sighed.

Arizona shook her head. "Told you. Crazy."

"We tried, Karev." Derek turned to Alex, who was really rooting for this girl. "All the tests are negative. Okay? Let's go inform the parents and turf her up to psych."

As we all stood up to leave, Alex stopped us. "Look, this isn't right," he said. "I know crazy. I-I grew up with crazy. I dated crazy. And I don't think this girl is crazy. Just give me some time."

"Do you have a specific diagnosis in mind?" Derek asked.

Alex placed his hands on his hips. "No, but-"

"She's suicidal, Alex," Arizona stated. "What you and Ellie did in the ER, you saved her life. But those parents have been through hell."

"Look, you say it's our job to advocate for the patient," Alex argued. "The patient, not the parents. So whatever hell the parents have gone through, her's is worse."

Arizona just nodded. Alex was using her own words against her, so she couldn't exactly argue with that. "I do say that, advocate for the patient."

"You've got until my board meeting is over." Derek gave in. "Four hours. Go dig."

As Derek and Arizona left, Alex turned to me. "You in?" he asked.

"You bet." I agreed. "If there's a chance she isn't crazy, we've got to find it."

When we looked through the window into the scan room, the nurses were sitting Hayley back up again. She was shaking and obviously scared, and even from where we were standing, were could still see the scratches around her eyes.

Watching as a tear fell down her face, I knew I had to help this girl. There was nothing I could do to save Skylar's arm, and now the rest of her life was going to be affected; but maybe if we tried hard enough, Alex and I could save Hayley from this hell she was living in and give her the life she deserved.