Stop treating me like some fragile, little- Why wouldn’t you be fragile? And why wouldn’t I worry about that? It’s been almost two months. Every day, I wake up and remember, and have to fight just to pull my crap together. So if it’s that hard for me, I gotta figure it’s way harder for you. So you know what? I will watch you. I will worry about you. I’m not gonna apologize for that. It’s kind of what I’m here for.I just… I just want to be myself again. I just… I just want to feel like me. I know. I was just saying, you don’t seem like you. I am! I am! This is me! Trying to give you space- I don’t need space! I am telling you, I don’t- Of course I want to have sex with my wife…
If we used our best judgment and listened to our hearts, we’re more likely to see that we chose wisely. And avoided the deepest, most painful regret of them all… The regret that comes from letting something amazing pass you by.
GREY’SANATOMY| Take It Back (10.13)
dcbicki: If we used our best judgment and listened to our hearts, we’re more likely to see that we chose wisely. And avoided the deepest, most painful regret of them all… The regret that comes from letting something amazing pass you by. GREY’S ANATOMY | Take It Back (10.13)
Jackson had taken to pacing the length of April’s room. He’d done what he could for Deluca on an initial assessment, but he couldn’t focus on a thing – not when his wife ex-wife was in the state that she was currently in. He still couldn’t believe what he had heard on the sound. He wasn’t sure that he would ever get the sound of her screaming and the heavy, haunting sound of silence on the other side of the phone out of his head. It felt like he had lived through it.
Sneakers paced back and forth against the linoleum, waiting for April to wake up. Arizona had fixed everything up inside and given him her word that she was going to be fine, that she would be just as healthy as the baby in his arms. A little girl. He could hardly believe it. He was the father of a daughter. A little mini April.
“She’ll be fine.” The words are repeated more to soothe his own anxiety than the occasional fussy noises that came from the newborn. One of the nurses, Karen, had come by a few minutes ago and offered to take her up for the night. But he couldn’t say yes. April would want her in the room when she woke up. He knew that. He still knew her like the back of his hand.
“She’ll be just fine,” he sighed out once more, giving her a little bounce. “She’s so strong. Everything she did, she did for you.” The little girl in his arms was infinitely more important than either one of them. “You’re going to be just strong like her, I know it.”
“…Jackson?”
His head snapped over to the side to see April just barely beginning to stir. She was paler than he had ever seen her before – face nearly a ghost of the woman that he had loved from all of the blood that she had lost. He couldn’t even begin to imagine what Meredith’s kitchen must have looked like when the paramedics had walked in on the scene between her and Warren. But her eyes were opened, beginning to focus. The numbers of her monitor ticked up just a little higher, confirming that she was definitely awake and conscious.
“You’re awake.” Sheer relief washed through him, pacing ending only so that he could step closer to her.
“Is that…” she’s unsure what to say for a moment. Him? Her?
“It’s her,” Jackson smiled. “Yeah.”
Tears welled up in the corners of her eyes as April’s eyes took in her daughter’s precious little face. Jackson stepped closer to the mother of his child, adjusting her in his arms so that she could see everything that she wanted. “She’s beautiful,” she gasped out. The large smile that quickly adorned her features was enough to wash out the draining image that the tragedy and surgery had left on her, the toll that it had seemed to take seemed to just disappear. “Look at her, Jackson. We did that.”
“You did that,” he pushed the credit onto her. “She’s here because of you, April. Because you were so, so brave.” A beat passed. “Brave and reckless. I don’t know what I would have done if I had lost you.” For a moment, there was a glint of tears in his own gaze at the thought. Divorced or not, it didn’t matter. April was always going to be his person.
“Can I hold her?” Her gaze met his, something equally vulnerable caught in the hazel swirl.
“Yeah,” he nodded his head. Ever so gently, paternal instinct easily kicking as he cradled their daughter’s head, and motions slow as to not jar her body from the major surgery that she had been through, he placed their daughter down in her arms so that April didn’t have to move to hold her. Her arms instinctively curled around their little girl. “She looks just like you.” He beamed proudly.
“No, she looks just like you.” April disagreed.
Each one of them saw the person that they immensely loved in the little bundle of joy – each other. For a handful of moments, it felt like the rest of the world had stopped around them.
“Happy birthday, ladybug,” April murmured affectionately to her daughter. “I love you.”
Jackson placed his hand on top of April’s head, thumb running gently over her hair. “I love both of you.” His gaze sought hers out, corner of his mouth turning up in a smile. She didn’t hesitate to meet his eyes and return the smile.
