waltzmatildah: (greys: izzie one last)
[personal profile] waltzmatildah
Title: And in the end we lie awake...
Characters/Pairings: Izzie mostly, but Lexie too (implied Alex/Izzie, implied Alex/Lexie).
Word Count: 1800
Rating: PG
Spoilers: The season six finale.
Summary: Izzie finds out.
Author's Note: Lyrics from “Out of My Hands” by Dave Matthews Band. Title from “Death and all his Friends” by Coldplay.


 
Out on my window ledge
I don't feel safe
And I stay
Looking down on you

It's out of my hands for now



She hears about it on the radio. It's the lead item on the three o'clock bulletin.

The first sentence of the newscast is crystal clear. Like no other sound exists beyond the announcer's gravelly staccato and the slightly static hum of her car speakers. A vaccuum of sorts.

After that it all gets a little hazy. Every second word drops out. Her vision smudges to blue and pink at the edges.

She tears through a stop sign without a second glance. Horns scream. Brakes squeal. Hers. Front tyres mount the chipped curb at the shoulder of the road as she slams to a halt. Chin rebounding off steering wheel. A glancing blow.

She thinks her heart stops beating. If only for a second or two. It might be a minute.

It feels like an age.

She wrenches the door open and dry heaves, her elbows leave muddy dents in the soft grass.



- - -



She drives with all the windows rolled down and still has to pull over every seventeen minutes to breathe.



- - -



She remembers leaving. Remembers it vividly. The colours and the smells and the bitter taste of his goodbye on her lips.

She forgets the sound of his laugh. It was rare. Though that she does know.

Fingers rake through strands of matted blonde. Over and over and over and over... Miles tick by, the gas guage points ever closer to empty. Mocking and obstinant.

Freezing sleet stings lips that are long since numb.

She'll drive all night if she has to.



- - -



Her cell phone is flipped open on the passenger seat. No one is answering.

She's not expecting them to.



- - -




She fiddles constanty with the radio dial. Switches from one station to the next, obsessively searching for more information.

For confirmation of what she already knows. If she's honest with herself, she does already know.

And she is honest these days. It's the one last thing he gave her and she's held onto it with both hands, breathed it in deep.



- - -



“...can confirm that at there are at least seven casualties, though that figure is expected to rise as the afternoon goes on...”

She jabs a finger roughly at the dial. Channel surfs the freeway in a direction she never thought she'd head.

“... critically injured have been evacuated to Seattle Presbyterian Hospital...”

At least, not like this.



- - -



She stops at a gas station three miles from the hospital. The oily teenager behind the counter regards her with a curious sideways glare. The muted television behind his head streams reel after reel of horror and carnage.

She watches without blinking for eight minutes. A twenty dollar bill clenched in her fist. Long forgotten money for gas she never manages to pump.

A gurney flies across the asphalt. Mark Sloan and Lexie Grey flank its sides. The camera work is unsteady, loses them momentarily as a police cordon shoves the operator back behind orange crime scene tape.

It's like a hollywood blockbuster.

Until it's not.



- - -



She screams.

Down on her knees. In the dust and the faded footprints of strangers.



- - -



In the fog and flow of televised information she turns and heads back two blocks. Abandons her car in the lot at the gas station as her twenty dollar bill skids and dances in the breeze. The sun is setting, it's all coming to a close.

The finality in that is terrifying as she stumbles, staggers her way over cracked sidewalk. She catches her reflection in a store window, stops to stare back into her own eyes, runs a tacky finger down the glass, splitting herself in two.

Before and after. And after that.



- - -



The hospital is unfamiliar, corridors and exits and endless sets of stairs.



- - -



She pushes through heavy swinging doors. Nobody stops her.



- - -



She doesn't want to touch him. Knows with grim defiance that if she does she'll never let go. She doesn't need to touch, she just needs to see.

To see for herself.

Then she can go again. After that, she can go.



- - -



There's a figure in front of her. Achingly familiar as her whole body rocks to the thud of her pounding heart. The figure simply stands there, a faded silhouette at twenty paces.

“Mere?”

She's tentative, the word barely registers; whisper soft and cautious. Her feet are heavy, blood pulses noisily through her veins in a slow motion wave. They meet, clinging together, somewhere in the middle, not quite half way, re-join in folds that are molded and safe as they sink, fluid-like, to the cool tile beneath their feet.



- - -



They're pulled apart. Forcefully. It's all she can do not to blindly swing her fists. Meredith's fingers are twisted in the soft cotton of her shirt and she's sobbing.

Sobbing.

She gets it then. The enormity of what has happened. Of what she has been spared. Cancer and divorce and bus drivers who failed to see, to stop, to see and stop in time. All of it latching together in a way that means she has been spared this.

She gets it then.



- - -



Amid a cacophony of chaos and unbridled fear she finds his room.

The part of her that had been convinced she was on the wrong floor, that he didn't need a room, that she was too late, dissolves into and onto itself. She's to the bone cold. Shivering with an intensity that chatters her teeth and numbs her toes.

From the doorway she can see that he's not alone.

He's alive, there are machines seeing to that.

And he's not alone.



- - -



Their fingers are twisted tightly together, even in sleep. Lexie's jump with a regularity that tells her she's far from relaxed.

There's blood in her almost unrecognisably blonde hair and a salt track of tears to her chin.



- - -



She makes a noise. She doesn't mean to.

Lexie startles awake, eyes terror-wide and unseeing as she launches her upper body across and over Alex, the mistaken, horrifying, desperate belief that he still needs protecting.

The motion, it is instinct. She can barely bring herself to imagine the unholy hell that brought it to existence.

She raises her hands, palms out. Surrendering.

It feels like she's giving up so much more than that.



- - -



“Lexie, Lexie, Lexie...”

She's whispering.

“It's okay, it's okay, it's okay...”

It's not. It's not even close. Lexie sinks then, collapses onto Alex with one hand clawing at his covers, the other pushed into her mouth. Muting the wailing screams that she's trying, failing to hide.

She's seen hysteria before. But this is raw. Open and bleeding. A tightrope of what is and what could have been. Lexie is staring at her, blank eyes and bellowing lungs and only a heartbeat away from a melt down.

She should know.

She wraps her own fingers around Lexie's wrist. Pulls her fingers from her mouth before she can choke on them completely. In a bear hug she pulls while Lexie struggles half-heartedly, too tired to put up a decent fight. A blanket comes with them and as her back meets the wall behind her she slides them to the floor, Lexie between her knees, trembling and defiant and so much like the sister that never wanted her.

Until she did.



- - -



She'd offer Lexie her bathroom floor if she thought it would help but she knows from personal experience that it only offers a temporary reprieve.



- - -



Lexie falls asleep wrapped in her arms. Her ex-husband's new girlfriend. She'd laugh but the notion is not as instinctive as it used to be and her muscles ache with a tiredness that threatens to overwhelm her.



- - -



Through conversations she can hear out in the hall, muted and dull but echoing in her ears nonetheless, she learns about it all. About the horror. And the carnage. And the heroes who pulled together in the face of the unspeakable.

They found him in an elevator. Mark Sloan's voice reverberates low and ragged, “I thought he was dead.”

They inserted a chest tube while he was conscious and screaming. Bleeding to death on a conference room table.

She closes her eyes, burries them in Lexie's hair as she sleeps, and cries silently.

Reed Adamson is dead. Executed. They've put the pieces together, they think Alex watched it happen.

Cristina saved Derek's life. The cardio goddess that no one questioned she probably already was.

Owen Hunt was injured. He's already been released.

Charles Percy died with his head in Dr. Bailey's lap. The image of that so much sadder for the delivery. Even through the walls she can hear the tears in her voice as she recounts her tale to the gathering audience.



- - -



She bought him coffee once. Dropped it at his feet instead.

She'd give anything to take that back.



- - -



Alex stirs. He's not awake but he's close.

The almost imperceptible change in his heart rate has Lexie jerking awake and reaching for him before she can register where she is and what is going on.

Lexie, with her hands on his face, in his hair, adjusting sheets and tubes, with her hands twisting in his, turns. Opens her mouth to speak.

She raises a hand, surrendering once again with a slow shake of her head.

“It's okay. I'll go.”

Lexie nods dumbly. Her thumb tracing unconscious circles around the base of his.

“Call me though? Please?”

Her voice breaks on the please. It's pleading, desperate.

Sad.

“Please let me know he's okay.”

Lexie's image shimmers as she backs out of the room. Blends as one with Alex behind a blurring film of tears.

“Please let me know he's okay...”



- - -



She makes it three steps outside his room before reaching for the wall. Sliding until her chin is on her knees.

Conversations around her slam to a sudden stop. Her own sobs are all that break the still silence. They're shocked she's there, they were not expecting her to come. No one was expecting her to come.

But for the life of her, she can't begin to imagine how she's ever going to leave.



Looking down from here
It's outta my hands for now
Out on my window ledge
It's outta my hands for now
So let me in
Let me in

 

Date: 2010-05-23 04:21 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] slybrunette.livejournal.com
My initial reaction: OMFG WHY DO YOU FEEL THE NEED TO MAKE ME CRY.

SO SO FUCKING GOOD. Like seriously. Like your imagery breaks me. Like if I don't see this on my screen (and, hey, I won't, so this threat should be fun) I'm going to kill someone. IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL. AND HEARTBREAKING.

Lexie? She's perfect. And that image of her and Izzie and Alex in that bed and WHY MUST YOU DO THIS KIND OF STUFF TO ME? WHY?

I think I worship you. Just a little bit.

Date: 2010-05-23 04:49 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
EEP! Sorry? (Except not really).

I really wanted to have Izzie completely freaking out and then getting to the hospital and realising it's actually not about her anymore.

I'm glad you liked Lexie and her instinctive protectiveness even after the fact. I read from Shonda that there was 18 minutes of filming cut from the final edit and, in it, there was a scene where a freaking out Lexie was kicked out of Alex's ambulance as he's evacuated to Seattle Pres. I really wish they'd included that scene.

Also, you may not have the imagery down, but I can't do dialogue for shit... so we're totally even!

Hey, if you're gonna kill someone, head to Seattle. I hear their PD is pretty freakin' woeful!

Date: 2010-05-23 04:51 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] foibles-fables.livejournal.com
there was a scene where a freaking out Lexie was kicked out of Alex's ambulance as he's evacuated to Seattle Pres.

OMG WUT *pitchforks*

Date: 2010-05-23 05:06 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
I know, right? Apparently it's included in the season 6 DVD release. I think I'm gonna have to invest in it when it comes out. Even though I hate that, because she no doubt said it so that people would buy the DVD. Grrr.

Do you think they cut it because it would have pointed to a more Alex/Lexie ending than they wanted? Maybe the ambiguity of the triangle wouldn't have been quite so... ambiguous? I dunno... just a thought. I'm too mad at the moment to think about it logically!

Date: 2010-05-23 05:30 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] foibles-fables.livejournal.com
I don't even care if it's a ploy, COLOR ME EXCITED.

Well Shonda ~really downplayed Alex/Lexie in the blog and whatnot, so maybe that's the reason.

Date: 2010-05-23 05:33 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Yeah, her blog post is what makes me think it was too Alex/Lexie for her...

(maybe I'll write the scene myself and see how close I can get it to the truth. We can compare and contrast when the DVD is released).

Date: 2010-05-27 01:02 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ovariesofsteel.livejournal.com
I'm just going to DITTO THIS POAST b/c OMG.

Date: 2010-05-27 01:19 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
THANK YOU! It was an awesome review so I'm most pleased that you agree with it.

Also? I totally hope that your POAST typo was deliberate because I'm just a little bit in love with it!

Date: 2010-05-27 01:39 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ovariesofsteel.livejournal.com
Yes, the typo was deliberate!

And I really couldn't have reviewed better myself.

Date: 2010-05-23 04:49 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mrsfjl66.livejournal.com
omg omg omg IZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Date: 2010-05-23 04:50 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Is that a good omg?

I'm gonna say that it is so, thank you! Hope you liked it.

Date: 2010-05-23 04:57 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mrsfjl66.livejournal.com
OF COURSE IT WAS GOOD!

(SORRY, SEEM TO BE STUCK IN CAPS TONIGHT)

Date: 2010-05-23 05:02 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
CAPS IS FINE! IT SEEMS LIKE, SINCE THE FINALE, CAPS HAS BEEN MY NATURAL STATE!

Date: 2010-05-23 04:50 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] foibles-fables.livejournal.com
I'M A BLUBBERING CAPSLOCKING IDIOT ALREADY RIGHT NOW AND THIS FIC DID NOT CHANGE THAT, OMG.

JUST...AGH, HOW? I can't even...just...OMG, I feel like I'm going to break in half now. YOU ARE A HERO AND I LOVE THIS AND I LOVE YOU.

I don't even know what else to say that can do this justice. Beautiful.

Date: 2010-05-23 05:01 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Thank you! Thank you HEAPS.

(As I was writing the Izzie/Lexie interaction I was so wondering what you'd think of it...)

I love you too, chickie and you can capslock all you like.

Date: 2010-05-23 05:22 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] foibles-fables.livejournal.com
Your Lexie/Izzie interaction was PERFECT. So perfect, in fact, that I wish I had an icon with them to use.

SPEAKING OF ICONS, YOURS THERE...OMFG *explode*

eta because of icons, it fits
Edited Date: 2010-05-23 05:22 am (UTC)

Date: 2010-05-23 05:34 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
I love my icon, too. Now I want lots of stills of Lexie watching Alex sleep in the hospital at the start of next season to add to it...!

Is it September yet?

Date: 2010-05-23 11:39 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rorylie.livejournal.com
That was completely beautiful. I'm not a huge Izzie fan by any stretch of the imagination, but one of the things I thought about after the finale ending was her finding out, and you did such a phenomenal job with the idea.

Date: 2010-05-23 11:54 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Thank you so much. I'm really glad that this works for the non-Izzie fans out there too because there are a lot more of them than there are Izzie lovers.

I must admit that I love Izzie. Have done since day one and her relationship with Alex was always my OTP. Until it wasn't. Until Lexie came. And before the finale I thought I was over her.

So, thank you so much for the review.

Also: WHERE DID YOU GET YOUR ICON??? I haven't been able to find any Alex/Lexie finale icons... Where? Where? Where?!

Date: 2010-05-23 11:58 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rorylie.livejournal.com
I had moments where I loved her when she was with Alex, which I mostly attribute to his magical powers (and mad charms).

I actually made that one (and this one, and all my Alex/Lexie icons, I think).

Date: 2010-05-23 12:05 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Really? Wow. I can not even begin to imagine how to make icons! Haha. I am a moron when it comes to things like that.

Do you let people use them if they credit? Or are they for your own use only (which I'd totally understand).

Also, Alex's mad charms and magical powers? They get me every single goddamn time!

Date: 2010-05-23 12:09 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rorylie.livejournal.com
I'm pretty far from a professional here, but I can (mostly) do a good enough job to suit myself. They're not fancy, but they suit my purposes.

You can absolutely use them if you want to! I'm actually flattered than anybody would want them.

And since I haven't said it in a couple of days, oh Alex.

Date: 2010-05-23 12:13 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Thank you!

Also...this.

Oh, Alex.

Also: is there anything in particular that you'd like to see fictionalised from the finale? A scene they didn't give us? Something in the aftermath? I really wanna write some more and I have a gazillion ideas but none of them are particularly coherent.

Date: 2010-05-23 12:23 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rorylie.livejournal.com
You are more than welcome. Enjoy!

Hmmm...so many options, I want to see everything. Lexie getting kicked out of the ambulance, Alex waking up (and what he remembers, which I'm guessing is not much), either Lexie's internal reaction when he asks for Izzie or her dealing with it sometime later...or anything, really!

Date: 2010-05-23 12:38 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Okay. Thanks for the ideas! I definitely wanna do an Alex waking up fic. In fact, I already have a couple started! Haha. I also have one started from Mark's point of view. I haven't started the ambulance one, but it's definitely on my to do list.

Also *points to icon*. Thank you!!!

Date: 2010-05-23 12:47 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rorylie.livejournal.com
I need so much post finale fic, I'm sure there's a thousand more things I want to see I just can't think of. So I'm very excited for any and all.

Eee, icon!

Date: 2010-05-23 01:13 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] leobrat.livejournal.com
Oh- oh...

See, when I read this? This is how I want the world to be. I want Izzie to run to his side, because (and I can't say this enough)...

NOTHING WILL EVER COMPARE.

Date: 2010-05-24 11:11 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
You know what? I'm A/I since day dot. Lexie has 100% grown on me, and in the absence of Izzie, I've really come to love her with Alex.

I thought I was over Alex and Izzie.

Turns out I was wrong...!

They way he says "Iz", breaks my heart every damn time.

Date: 2010-05-23 05:22 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] javiera.livejournal.com
Ah, this was beautiful. I never liked Izzie that much, except when she made Alex happy, but this

She screams.

Down on her knees. In the dust and the faded footprints of strangers.


This made me ache for her. It's too easy a scene to picture in my head.

I also like that Lexie doesn't "back off" and she keeps "protecting" Alex. I'm a Alex/Lexie shipper and I want them together even if Shonda herself is telling us it probably won't last long, so I like having Lexie and Izzie at the same level (of hysteria? I guess) when it comes to caring about Alex.

She'd offer Lexie her bathroom floor if she thought it would help but she knows from personal experience that it only offers a temporary reprieve

Oh, too sad and too true.

Great fic and I hope there are a lot more to come! The new season is just too far away!!

Date: 2010-05-24 11:13 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Thank you! I've actually had a few people who were ambivalent to Izzie say that they enjoyed this, so, as an Izzie lover, I'm really pleased to hear that!

As for Lexie, yeah. I really wanted to have her instinctively protecting Alex still. I think, after a situation as insanely intense as the one they went through together, it would be a natural and understandable reaction that I can definitely see coming from her.

Thank you so much and yeah, there will definitely be more!

Date: 2010-05-23 06:14 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lovelylytton.livejournal.com
This is really strong stuff, every word is emotionally charged and I really, really like this. it kind of makes me wish that Izzie could come back for 7.01, but then I doubt that this will happen. Anyway, wonderful work of yours!

Date: 2010-05-24 11:13 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Oh man. How I wish Izzie could come back for 7.01. How I WISH! But yeah, I doubt it too.

Thank you so much for the review. You can rest assured, she'll come back in most of my fics!!!

Date: 2010-05-23 10:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] skaterke12.livejournal.com
Amazing fic , so great!
I'd love to see Izzie come back and react to what has happened since she left.But the again I want Addison back too but that's never gonna happen. Unless Private Practice gets canceled...
Love the Alex/Lexie tidbits.
Great work.

GRTZ!

Date: 2010-05-24 11:15 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Thank you!

I'd also love to see her come back and react. Addie too for that matter. Derek got shot afterall. And Alex. She has a pretty significant history with both of them...

Maybe I'll do an Addie finds out fic next?!

Thanks again.

Date: 2010-05-24 09:25 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] skaterke12.livejournal.com
I would love to read that! I always love it when she visits Seattle Grace.
She was hilarious that time in season 4.
I'm all for it. Hope you write it.

GRTZ!

Date: 2010-05-25 12:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
I'll see what I can do!

Date: 2010-05-24 03:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mammothluv.livejournal.com
This is amazing. It's such an interesting tension the way Izzie is very much an outsider but so closely connected both by the obvious love she still has for the people involved (especially Meredith and Alex) and her own past traumas. You found that balance perfectly and packed so much emotion into this piece.

Date: 2010-05-25 12:28 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Thank you so much. I'm really pleased that you picked up on Izzie being the outsider now. I really wanted to have the first half of the piece about her freak out and how hearing what had happened affected her. But, the second half was definitely more about her realising that it's not about her anymore and despite her strong connection to Alex and Mer, she's on the outside.

But then, I really wanted to finish with something redeeming, because I do love her! And I believe wholeheartedly that if either Mer or Alex or any of them really, needed her, she'd be there in a heartbeat.

I love Izzie. *sigh*

Date: 2010-05-30 10:56 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] dariclone.livejournal.com
Poor Izzie. Poor all of them really.

Date: 2010-05-31 03:56 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Yup, poor all of them indeed.

Thank you for reading.

Date: 2010-06-01 05:34 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] badnews-blair.livejournal.com
... holy fuck. Thanks for making me cry.

I can't even...

Reading your writing is like sitting down and watching a movie that you're really looking forward to seeing and just getting completely lost in it, you're truly fabulous.

Date: 2010-06-02 08:45 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] waltzmatildah.livejournal.com
Aw, tears. Tears are goooood!

Thank you so much for the awesome review and the compliments. I really appreciate them and it really gets me excited about writing new stuff.

Thanks again, lovely!!!

PS. Guess what I did this afternoon? Can ya guess?

I re-watched 'Sanctuary'! Haha! And then I rewatched all the Alex scenes over and over and over again... I am truly a hopeless case!

Is it September yet?!!!!

Also, gory icon is gory!

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