Notes: Some of you asked on the last fic if it was a one-shot and the answer is yes, but here is a multi-chapter. Whoohoo! But the thing is, I'm out of practice with this and I'm still working despite COVID and this story is gonna be a helluva complicated, so updates may be slow.

My plan is for Alex and Jo to reunite by the end, but I'm not sure exactly what that looks like. It may be as just friends or it could be something more. I just really don't know right now, but Alex returning to the hospital years later is something I really wanted to explore.

Disclaimer: I have absolutely no rights or ownership related to anything Shondaland or Alanis Morisette. I'm sad about it too ha.

Jo didn't think she would ever get used to therapy offices. Even though she had gotten more comfortable with participating in therapy over the years, she still felt her heart in her throat every time she walked in. Still felt like a failure. She sat on the end of the couch she usually claimed and averted her eyes to take in the décor she had memorized by now. The cushions shifted, letting her know her husband had decided to sit down quicker than he usually did, typically taking more time to walk around and take in environment just as she was to both keep their minds off why they were here.

She turned with her eyes downcast before raising her gaze to meet his. As always, he looked at her with sympathy. She knew her husband and knew he wanted to comfort her, but was waiting for a sign from her that she sought his reassurances. Jo looked away, not wanting physical touch from him now, afraid it would shatter her defenses that she had worked so hard over the past few hours to establish.

Jo looked back over at their therapist, Emma, who was studying her notebook, no doubt looking over her notes from their last explosive session. Jo briefly thought about reaching to hold her husband's hand before Emma shut the notebook suddenly and looked up with a huge smile on her face, "I wanted to start today a little bit differently." She clapped her hands together, "I would like each of you to list three things you admire about the other."

"Like our homework assignment?"

Jo resisted the temptation to roll her eyes, but Emma just smiled wider, "Yes. Dr. Hayes, you can go first."

He gave a crooked smile as he pulled a sheet of notebook paper out of his scrub pocket, "Jo is compassionate. Even when she has no reason to be. It can be people we pass by in the car or a random gofundme page she comes across from people she doesn't know. She gets so passionate about issues that will never impact her. She's so empathetic with the boys and that…" Jo looked up to meet his eyes, hearing his voice catch, "is something I always love and admire and appreciate her for."

Jo smiled slightly before rolling her lips in to bite them to keep the tears at bay, not wanting to break down at the beginning of the session. "Jo? What's your number one?"

Jo unfolded her sheet and pressed it onto her lap, "Mac makes me feel so comfortable to be myself. He's never done a single thing to try to change me. He allowed me into the boys' life with complete trust instead of an instruction manual, he just had such confidence in me to develop a relationship with them organically without any constraints. He supports me even when I'm being irrational. He listens when I talk about my past without judgment." She glanced over at him and nodded quickly, "I never feel the need to explain myself, he just takes me as I am. Mess and all."

"You are not a mess. Not at all." Jo smiled slightly and finally reached for his hand to squeeze it, grateful when he moved to intertwine their fingers and squeezed her hand back.

"I'm going to stop you both there." Jo looked up quickly, having almost forgotten the therapist was there for a moment. "What I'm hearing is more than one thing you admire about each other in both responses." She used her fingers to list off her other observations, "Both of you listed personality traits that were deep. Not 'he's a great father' or 'she's a brilliant surgeon'."

"She's that too," Cormac interjected quickly causing Jo to give him a warm smile.

"My point is this assignment seemed easy on the surface based on what you said; however, both of your sheets look worse for wear. What is that about?"

Jo looked up at the therapist sharply before quickly moving to turn over her sheet, "I just didn't rewrite it."

Her husband shrugged, "It was hard to decide what the top three were. I had a lot of things, but kept changing my mind on what I wanted to put as the top."

Jo smiled slightly in his direction, "Same here."

Emma smiled, "I thought so. But I'm still curious. The energy in the room seems different today and I'm not sure why. Do you want to talk about that or continue with the homework assignment?"

Jo smirked as she pulled her hand away from him and crossed both of her arms over her chest, "That's up to him. It's his issue."

"I don't understand why you think it's my issue; it affects you more than me."

Jo rolled her eyes, "It's your department. It may be my past, but it's your department."

"You know good and well it's not just that. It's Mattie for Christ's sake!"

"Okay, time out." Both looked back at Emma as if she had just reappeared, "I'm out of the loop on something and am unable to follow this. Dr. Hayes, what's happening in your department?"

"Jo's ex-husband was re-hired by the hospital. His first day is next week. He's a peds surgeon, so he will be in my department."

Emma's eyebrows raised more with each word that was said, "Oh…Okay." She turned to Jo, "How do you feel about that?"

Jo's glare turned icy as she looked over with her arms still crossed over her chest, "I don't feel anything about it. He's my ex for a reason and I don't know why this even has to be an issue."

This response caused Cormac to narrow his eyes in disbelief, "Are you serious?"

Jo looked over to glare at Cormack for a moment before turning back to Emma, "He divorced me by a Dear John letter. We had just gotten married again a few weeks before, he found out that his ex-wife had his kids via IVF with his sperm, and he ran back to her without even telling me. Then after weeks of me leaving him messages asking where he was, he sent a letter explaining that to me with signed divorce papers. No last phone call, nothing. And this all happened only months after I had gotten out of rehab for depression after I had first met my birth mother and had a resurgence of abandonment issues."

"Oh." Emma stated softly as she scribbled notes in her notebook, "Well….that's a lot to….um….take in."

"Mac thinks I'm going to see him and go running back, which is nuts."

Emma cleared her throat, feeling the session getting away from her as it usually did with these two, "Would you like to respond to that, Dr. Hayes?"

He sighed deeply, "I'm not worried about that, at all. I just….I'm worried for you. I don't think you realize how hard it may be on you to see him again especially since you won't be able to avoid him on the floor."

Jo rolled her eyes and looked at Emma, "Let's get to the heart of it. There's a really good chance Alex could end up being on Mattie's case."

"That's not going to happen."

Jo turned to Cormac aghast, "What, you'd rather Daniels take her case? Jones? Fleming? Navarro? The fact of the matter is that he's going to be the best qualified and you know it. If he wasn't my ex, this would never be a question so why is it now?"

"I don't want him anywhere near her." He turned to Emma, "I was there when their marriage fell apart and I think Jo has a lot of unresolved issues when it comes to him." He then turned to Jo and gave her a pointed look, "And I think that could interfere with the care Mattie gets and both of our judgments."

"I want what's best for her. I would never suggest he take over if I didn't think he was the best possible surgeon for our daughter. Trust me, he would be on fire knowing who she is. He's already one of the best pediatric surgeons this hospital has seen and he'll be on his A game for her. Just trust me on this."

Cormac sighed, "I just don't know, Jo."

Jo turned to Emma, "This? This right here? This is the heart of the problem. Mac trusts me explicitly with everything…" She looked over to meet his gaze, "Until it comes to the care of our daughter." She turned back to the therapist, "And I just don't know how much longer I can handle that."