Lies, Love, and Deception {Grey's Anatomy}

If Tomorrow Never Comes

River POV

"MEREDITH GREY GET YOUR ASS UP!" I yelled as I walked out of the door after hearing Izzie and George complain. I was satisfied after I heard the thud of two hands catching somebody before they face plant and walked out the door.

I saw both Meredith and Cristina come in late, "Let me guess McDreamy," I pointed to Meredith, "and McDickwad" I pointed to Cristina, they both kind of nodded, trying to keep quiet over the fact the two of them were late. Alex and I went ahead to the patient's room, "Hello, Ms. Conners were here to get you ready for Dr.Bailey," I said. "Oh, please call me Annie," she said.

When we came back Alex had said, "Good morning, Annie. How are you? This is Dr. Bailey and our fellow interns," then Bailey had looked over at Alex, "Dr. Karev, we refer to patients as "mister-"'

"I told them both to call me "Annie". "Miss Conners" makes me feel old and fat, which I am, but why feel that way," Annie interrupted. Burke came in and introductions were made and Bailey turned to me to start, "Annie Connors is a 43-year-old woman who presented last night with progressive shortness of breath for the past three months. Found to have a very large tumor of unknown origin pressed against her diaphragm. Stable vital signs. Scheduled for CT this morning, sir," I said.

"Thank you, Dr. Blackburn," he turned to Annie, "Are you at all claustrophobic?"

"I've been housebound for the last year. How claustrophobic could I be?"

"All right then. Dr. Stevens is going to take you up for a CT. It'll give us a better look at the tumor, and we'll know how to proceed," Burke explained.

"Could someone tell my mom? She'll worry if she gets back and I'm not here,"

"Yeah, of course. Of course," Burke agreed.

"And would it be possible for Alex to take me instead? I mean, he... He's fun to look at,"

"Annie," Alex laughs. When we all left Annie's room, I was a bit annoyed that my fellow interns were talking about Annie like an object and not a person making me slightly glad that Annie couldn't hear.

We then enter the room of shaking Edward Levangie, "Who's presenting?" Bailey asked.

"Edward Levangie is a 63 year old man admitted for pain management for Dyskinesia. He's been stable since last night, and responding to the bolus injections," George said.

"Izzie, possible treatments?"

"For Parkinson's disease?" cue my urge to smack my own forehead, "Um, deep brain stimulation has shown..."

"Not for Parkinson's, for spinal pain." Shepherd interrupted.

"Oh, um..."

"Intraspinal catheter. That way, he can have constant pain medication," Meredith spoke up. "Excellent. This is Dr.Grey. She's gonna prep you for the procedure and assist," was Shepherd's response. His pager goes off as he excuses himself and Bailey runs after him, I knew she was on to him about Meredith after finding them together. As I left the room Meredith had been stopped by Levangie's daughter so I continued on.

Later I was walking by and Burke said, "Prep Annie Conners for surgery, you're scrubbing in with Cristina," he said as he passed while I had a chip halfway out my mouth. I walked into the room a few minutes later to find an upset Annie, "What's wrong?"

"I heard Alex call me names and criticize me because I didn't come in sooner," she said.

"Well first of all Alex is an idiot because I'm sure you had a reason for not coming in," I said. She nodded, "Every time I went to the hospital, someone died. All four of my grandparents, then my dad. My best friend's mom, my baby sister. They all went in, never came out. So I put it off," she explained.

I nodded, "It's understandable to hold off something because of fear, even if knowing the consequences because of it. Now I need to recheck your labs and get an EKG, so I just need to take a little blood. Dr. Burke and Dr. Bailey will do the best they can, you have no reason to be afraid even though it is understandable," I told her. She smiled and let me take some blood. "Besides I have a roommate that is in love with another roommate and he won't say anything about it because she has a thing with someone else but it's like you never know," I gossiped and I knew she liked hearing about something other than her tumor.

Later I found the others, smacked Alex on the head for Annie, watched them talk about the theory of Cristina and Burke and how much of an ass Shepherd is, even though Cristina and I shared a look saying Meredith may be angry now but she will not stop talking to him. When Cristina and I were scrubbing in and Cristina spoke up, "If they pull this off, I'm totally calling Oprah."

Bailey came in, "You two been working out?"

"Kind off," I said and Shepherd entered. "Why?" Cristina said.

"See that large pile of tumor? You're going to be retracting it for the next 14 hours, so I'm just saying I hope you have strong backs," Bailey said. Meredith had peaked in and mentioned Levangie agreeing to a surgery and he left and then Bailey went off on Meredith on how she gets affected by the Meredith and Derek relationship while Cristina and I quietly stayed away.

During the surgery, I noticed Cristina's back was hurting her, well so was mine, we are both bent down, holding a very big tumor, it's a bit expected. "Look at the size of that artery," Burke finally said.

"My God. It's as thick as a thumb. You ever seen a vessel this size?"

"No. This thing's just feeding on all her blood,"

"We need more O-negative," Bailey called. I had stretched a little, almost dropping the tumor but I caught it. Burke gave me a look, "Sorry," I muttered. Shepherd soon joins the surgery since his was finished. Soon panic began because a blood vessel burst and we were all urgently waiting for blood. CPR began as we were quickly losing Annie. Unfortunately it was too late, and Alex who came in with the blood came in just after we lost Annie.

At home, talking on the phone, "My arms and back huuuuuuuuuuuuuurt!" I complained resulting in a certain male on the other end to chuckle. "Well, if I was there then I would be giving you a massage right now," I groaned again, knowing I wouldn't be getting one. He chuckled again, "Fuck you," I said.

"Oh, can't really do that over the phone unfortunately," he replied, and I could practically hear the smirk through the phone.