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odd-birds-and-booksellers · 4 years ago

Text

TWO GHOSTS

We're not who we used to be

We're just two ghosts standing in the place of you and me

Trying to remember how it feels to have a heartbeat

The rain poured down against the concreted outside, the strong winds making the windows shake as the storm raged on but none of it was enough to drown out the noise of the hospital. Halloween always brought chaos, call it dark spirits or whatever you wanted but personally Alex thought it was drunk idiots and sugar-high kids that brought the hospital into its own storm, however, tonight...tonight was different.

Tonight the noise of the hospital was drowned out by the quiet beeps of the machines around her. Her pale skin, almost paper-thin, she looked too fragile to hold all the wires that had been placed on her, dry blood staining her skin from where they’d been inserted, The tube covering her nose the only thing keeping her breathing, it was all much noisier than the chaos around her.

Too small.

Too cold.

Too fragile.

But a fighter.

She looked so fragile, wrapped up in the protection of the incubator, like a precious diamond being guarded. Her tiny fingers, barely big enough to hold onto his finger, oh she was beautiful, just like her mother.

He wants to scream because it's not fair, it's all not fair. While she's upstairs fighting for her life, she’s down here curled up on her own. It’s not right, she shouldn’t be alone, not when she's so incredibly loved already.

She shouldn’t be alone.

So he stays.

Even though it’s wrong, even though he has no right to, he stays. He sits by her, one hand holding onto her own, he makes sure she knows she’s not alone and that she's loved beyond measure because deep down he knows no matter what anyone says, that is what Jo would want.

For the first few hours, she's quiet, while the storm rages on around them, her little chest raises in steady breaths...until it doesn't anymore.

The machines come to life, as he calls out a code, his heart racing as presses two fingers down on her chest. Don’t go. Please don’t go, not yet...it’s too soon, she’s not seen you yet, she hasn’t held you yet and I promise once she holds you, you’ll stay.

“Don’t leave her, everyone leaves her...I left her but you can’t leave her, she loves you, and you’ll love her I promise, stay with me.”

Eventually, he gets the bleeping to stop, her little heart hammering against her rib cage as she settles in his arms, he can’t fix her. He’s never felt more hopeless in his life because he can’t fix her. Because she deserves better, they both do. He can’t stop the hurt, he can't protect the women he loves, he can’t unbreak her heart but he could do this right? he could save this tiny life, this part of her that he loved so dearly just because it was hers.

There’s nothing to do and no one here, and he knows if she was here, she’d hold her, she’d want her to feel loved and safe and all the things she never did. So that’s what he does, as the hours tick by he cradles her close to her chest, her little breaths ragged as she tries to breathe on her own. He shushes her slowly, pressing a light kiss to her head as he waits for her mother's outcome.

“You’re a fighter…” He whispers, as the new day starts, the hospital having grown quiet now as he rocked gently in the chair beside her incubator, her heart rate slowly improving as he holds her against his warmth. “Hey, beautiful you’re a fighter, don’t go just yet. Your mommy's waiting to meet you, so hold on a little longer. I know you can. See I know you can fight this because you are half her, and she's the strongest person I know.” He mumbles ignoring the way his voice cracks as he speaks. He believes in the science, deep down he knows no wishing or wanting will get you there but he’s praying just this one time to be proven wrong, just for one miracle, isn't he owed that? Is she not owed that?

So he waits for a miracle.

And it comes.

It’s hard to look at her face as he places the breathing tubes back in, her little lips a faint shade of blue but she’d miraculously survived much longer than anyone had anticipated. She’s the spitting image of her, the woman he loves so dearly. “It hurts...I’m sorry it hurts little one, I’d take it all away if could, oh if I could you’d never hurt at all...I promise you you won’t remember all of this okay?”

“Stay with me...wait for her.” She whimpers as he lets her go, and it kills him, too see her little face scrunch up but if there’s a chance she’ll make it then he’ll do it, he sighs stoking a finger across her delicate cheek. “Wait for her...she’s worth it...I promise.”

He would trade places with her in a second.

He was meant to be on a flight back home, he’d promised to arrive in time to join his own babies on a haunted hayride but the storm had stopped all of that, grounding him firmly to exactly where he should be. The image of her blood-soaked skin as he burst into the OR on the emergency page seared in his memory, he barely had a moment to register her almost lifeless body laid out on the table before the new life had been thrust into his arms. Her hazel eyes trained on him, the sparkle he’d always seen now dull and dark as the oxygen mask covered her face, he could’ve sworn relief flashed through her eyes as she fell into the deep abyss.

As the hours tick by and the sun rises and like some miracle you can only read about her stats start to rise, her heartbeat steadies and she begins to breathe on her own, he’s not sure how he’s never seen anything like it in all his years on the peds floor. He’s not surprised though, she’s her mother's daughter, of course, she’d survive it’s in her DNA.

Meredith appears as the day starts, the hospital buzzing back into life again.

She’s alive...for now.

Weak and barely holding on but still alive. He makes the call at eight to wheel the tiny life up to her floor, his hope that together they’ll both start to heal like if they’re reunited they’ll know what they’re fighting for.

His blood runs cold as he catches sight of her, her chest slowly rising up and down, her pale skin cold to the touch as he sits beside her. It’s all a blur as he moves the crib beside the bed, holding onto her hand tightly as cold tears begin to flow down his face wondering how the hell they got here.

“Do you have a name intern?” - “Jo Wilson.” - “I’m gonna marry that girl…” -“Cause I love you but we should have space just for us.” - “I’m in your corner Jo…” - “I’m married to a man who...” - “you are my home and you are my heart” - “I do…” - “I super do” - “I love you...” - “Goodbye”

The last time he’d seen her still burned in his mind, she was wearing his t-shirt still half asleep tucked up under the covers as he’d pressed a kiss to her head, slipping away before she could even notice, whispering I love you when he wasn’t even sure she’d heard him.

Slowly he removes the newborn bundle from the crib, lifting her up to lay against her mother's chest, one hand holding her steady, watching as the little one seems to snuggle closer to her mother.

“The roads have cleared…” Her voice breaks through their quiet moment, awkwardly standing in the doorway, a sympathetic smile on her face, and he knows what it means.

“He’ll be here soon...it’s time to go.” He, the man that loves her, the man who looks after her and keeps her safe. Alex has almost forgotten it wasn't his place, that they weren’t the rings he gave her and sat on the bedside table, that this was the first time he'd seen her in five years.

A cold hand wraps around his shoulder, pulling him away from the little bubble they’d created. “Alex it’s time to go.” She whispers, her face stone cold as she looks over the image in front of her, swallowing deeply, as she pats his shoulder before turning to leave.

“She’s not out of the woods yet.” He croaks as she gets to the doorway, he’s trying to hold on to anything, anything that will keep him here with her. He can’t leave her not now...he’s not sure which one he's even talking about but he can’t leave them.

“We’ve got her...you can’t be here when she wakes, he’s gonna be here when she wakes.. they're his family Alex.”

He nods slowly, letting out a shaky breath as he tears his gaze away from them for a just second to meet Meredith's eyes, ‘they're his family Alex...not yours.’

“I know.”

He waits a moment more, his heart constricting tightly in his chest, as he rises from the chair beside them, hesitantly leaning over the sleeping baby on her chest as he presses a kiss to her forehead, his tears splashing against her skin as he tries to hold back his cries, brushing her hair back to get a good look at her face, she as beautiful as she always been. He’s not sure how he can find the strength to walk away from her now he's seen her again but as the little life stirs in between them he knows it's time. Slowly he steps back reminding himself she is someone else's to love now.

He walked these corridors a thousand times but today the walk feels longer...heavier like he’s leaving a part of himself in that room and every part of him is screaming for him to go back in there and get it, never leave it behind, never leave it again. But it’s all too late now. He watches as a man exits the elevator, rushing past him in a frenzy as he bolts down the corridor.

They’re okay, they’ll be okay. He keeps telling himself this as leans his head against the elevator wall, finding a quiet moment for the first time in the last twenty-four hours. He makes no attempt to hold back his tears this time, flowing down his face, struggling to breathe as he gets further away from her. He ignores the way the icy cold rain coats his skin as he exits the hospital he once called home, slowly making his way over to the rental car. Once he was safely inside he pulls his wallet from his back pocket...brushing past the stupid store cards, and crappy vouchers, there in between the loose change, his silver wedding band. It’s not as shiny as he remembered, most likely from years of being ignored and hidden away. All their broken promises wrapped up in old rings no longer worn.

*****

When she woke she was so overwhelmed with love, so overwhelmed with the way her heart cracked right open for the little life that had been growing inside her that she felt no pain at all. Everything she’d ever heard about love was true when she looked into her tiny eyes, when she felt her tiny hands wrap sound her finger and hold on tight.

It was only a week later when she felt strong enough to read through the charts and see what had happened that night that she saw it. His name scrawled out in between the doctors that had treated her daughter. She thought she’d imagined him, she thought that in the moments where her body was failing her his face had appeared, but he’d been there...really been there. He’d saved her daughter and saved her...there was no way she’d have survived without this little life beside her now.

In the quiet of the night, while her husband and baby sleep beside her she cries, she cries for all that could’ve been and would’ve been and she cries for him. She misses him beyond comparison and she always will. She wants to call him, she wants to say thank you. She wants to hear his voice...after all this time...just for a moment, just for a second she wants to see him. She wants to tell him she understands, that she knows now why he couldn’t stay, how she understands that love he must've felt seeing his children for the first time. She wants him to know that she understands now and that she’ll love him forever...but she can’t. He’s gone...they’ve gone. They're ghosts now...they're not who they used to be.

A day that was once reserved for him, a day where she remembered their love was now the day her daughter was born, a day her daughter survived, a day she survived. So she doesn't call instead her baby girl wakes up, crying out for her and all thoughts of the man she loved are brushed away as she holds her close. She doesn't need to call...he knows, whether he is, he knows.

Day 1 of the THE HAPPY FREAKIN’ HALLOWEEN JOLEX FIC CHALLENGE done.

Can’t wait to see what you all come up with and come back tomorrow for FLUFF day!!!

#jolex halloween #jolex #alex karev #jo wilson #jo karev #greys anatomy #greys abc #greysanatony #greys #justin chambers #camilla luddington #jolex fanfic #jolex fanfiction

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