I wasn't scared at all. Okay, false. My tonsils were the size of Donald Trump's ego. Hyperbolic, but true. I knew going to Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital would probably stir something up. True.

I wanted something to stir up. True?

Alexa

Have you ever really wanted something, like so badly that you actually envision your life around it? Your future is literally impossible to see without this thing happening because you are so sure it's going to happen. Same. Only then that thing didn't happen and you have to come crashing back to reality.

Yeah. For me that thing was getting into Dartmouth College and majoring in chemistry on the pre-med track. For some odd reason, I thought I was good enough. I was in the top 7% of my class, had great test scores, did a few extra-curriculars. But I was nowhere near the Ivy League threshold. Still, I'd lived in New England my whole like, so the University of New Hampshire became my crashing reality. I didn't hate it.

Have you ever really wanted something so badly, but this time you know it's impossible, so you try to spend your life not imagining it? Same. Only then that thing actually does happen and you have to come crashing to a new reality.

Yeah, that one happened too. When I found out I was adopted, which meant my "mother" was not mine at all and it was fathomable that I hated her. It meant there was someone out there who cared enough about me that put me first to make sure I had a better life. They couldn't possibly know the woman who would adopt me was a total bitch who I would never connect with, leaving me longing for a mother figure who actually felt like a mother. So when I found out, I secretly jumped for joy the way a high school senior might jump for joy when they found out they were admitted to Dartmouth College.

After I found out, pretty much nothing changed. I went to UNH in the fall. I still lived in Massachusetts with my "mother" who had left my "father" that year. My "sister" had different biological parents than me. We found out together. I got their names, I Googled them, and I got the idea that they probably weren't going to want anything to do with me anyway. So. Those things that you really think are going to happen, and the ones you think never will, should be considered long and hard before you go around imagining you near future so much that it hurts to be living a crashing reality.

Amelia

I twiddled the ring on my left ring finger. I contemplated taking it off, because it was distracting and worrisome but I knew that would upset Owen. I had kind of been hiding it all day. When people talked to me my hand instinctually went to my pocket. I briefly thought of my last engagement, and the one before that… and panicked.

"Amy?" I felt a hand on mine and Derek's familiar voice sent a chill down my spine. As he came into view I wrenched my hand back out of his grasp. He opened his mouth and shut it again. "Owen proposed?"

"Shut up, if you value your 'favorite brother' status at all you will stop talking so loudly." I punched his arm.

"Ow! You act like it's a bad thing." I stuck out my jaw a little and gazed at my brother intensely until he caught up. "Oh, Amy…" he leaned in. "Just because… that doesn't mean…"

"Whatever, shut up, we're not talking about this here." I picked up a tablet and browsed an imaginary chart, waiting for Derek to stop being so big brotherly.

"Well, someone's going to find out eventually, and you'll have to face it then."

For some reason, the words out of Derek's mouth stung, although I was pretty sure the déjà vu I was having was from a time when my mother was talking. "Uhh… no." My voice rose at the end, as if I were asking a question. God, I hated the way Derek could always break down whatever wall I trying to put up. "I asked him to be quiet about it so I could tell people at my own pace," I quickly finished as Meredith approached us at the nurses' station.

"MVC five minutes out. Lots of head trauma. You in?" Meredith looked at me. I smiled slightly. Meredith wasn't one to give bullshit small talk or unwarranted advice, unlike my brother.

"You bet. Page Edwards," I said to the nurse behind the counter.

"I'm offended, you didn't choose your own husband for this surgery!" Derek said, smiling, and kissed Meredith. "Well, I guess this can be our engagement present to you, Amy."

"What?" Meredith looked between Derek and me.

"You are so freaking lucky I don't have a scalpel in my hand right now, Derek."

"What, like you were gonna have girl talk with Liz, Nancy, Kathleen and Ma? It's just Meredith. I won't tell anyone. She won't tell anyone. Well. Barring Cristina. But she's on the other side of the world, basically," Derek said smiling as he tried to charm his way out of trouble.

"Derek-"

"Goodbye, favorite sister and favorite wife." Derek chuckled to himself before running off. I looked to Meredith.

"Owen proposed… kay. This is… good," Meredith said as she nodded as though she were trying to convince me, and probably herself.

"Can we please not talk about it?"

"Right. Let's go get prepped for the trauma."

Alexa

I had been sick for two weeks but still, nobody was calling it mono. Which was weird because mono is supposed to be a big college thing. But I was blood tested three times and it still wasn't coming back positive, although the nurse practitioner at health services told me it still could be mono.

I wasn't eating, I slept all day and my throat hurt like hell. It was a viral thing, they said after a few weeks. It takes time to heal. Everyone's different. The works.

When it came around to be my first semester of sophomore year, off to UWash I went. The National Student Exchange pretty much took care of everything, so it was actually pretty easy to convince my parents to let me go. My mother, really, had no choice because my father's rich mother was paying for all my schooling and she thought it was a wonderful idea. My health was more or less the same but it was clear my incompetent pediatrician wasn't going to be doing anything else about it.

The important part is, I would up in Seattle with more than enough reason for picking UWash as the campus to travel to.

Amelia

After a long surgery on one of the MVC victims, I was in the attending's lounge when Owen came in and smiled upon seeing me. My heart skipped a beat, or maybe stopped altogether. I couldn't tell the difference.

When he sat down next to me, I stiffened. Still, he didn't seem to think anything was wrong and kissed my forehead gently. "I heard you had a pretty big surgery. How'd it go? Did Derek try to take it from you?" He raised his eyebrows and I could tell he was genuinely interested. That was one thing about Owen; as much as he maybe wasn't great with verbalizing his thoughts, you could always tell at least how he felt.

I sighed. "Derek let me take it. He said it would be his engagement present… is that even a thing?"

"So you told Derek?" Owen smiled and ignored my question.

"Kind of. Yes. He and Meredith know. I just… I don't know if I'm ready to really tell anyone else yet…"

Owen's mouth fell into a straight line. "Should I be worried about that?"

I maybe paused for a second too long. I doubt it registered. "No," I chuckled in spite of myself. "I just… When I came to Seattle it was to start over. I came to build a new life, or at least one that wasn't necessarily tied to everything in LA. And now…" I nodded my head as if that would be sufficient explanation. "Now…"

"You envisioned yourself alone," Owen said as he took my hand. He wasn't wrong, but he wasn't right. It wasn't just that I hadn't expected to become engaged. Again. It was also that Owen wasn't even aware that this wasn't a first time thing for me. There was a lot he didn't know about me, and it wasn't trivial things like my favorite movie or ice cream flavor. It was a whole part of my life. In LA I lost a friend, lost a baby, lost a fiancé and ran from another one. I had mentioned the baby once. Not the best track record.

"Yes…" I wasn't making eye contact, but this time I knew he sensed it.

"Hey, hey, nothing has changed except for now we have a tentative plan to someday get married. All that's different is you have a ring on your finger now."

"About that…" I started, and he looked concerned as if I had lost it or decided it was ugly. "I think I'm going to leave it at home tomorrow. You know, until it's time to tell people."

Owen sighed but kept his face level. "Whatever you need." He smiled half-heartedly and I felt a little better. "You aren't the first wife I've had to warm into marriage."

I felt my face drop. "Right. Cristina…"

"Come on, Amelia, I was just joking."

I was looking at the ceiling, trying not to let the unexpected tears that had welled in my eyes fall down my face. Why was I about to cry? "Yeah, um, okay, it's just that I am constantly trying to live up to standards left by others. I'm in Derek's shadow for sure, something he never lets me forget. And Meredith, God, she hardly lets a day go by without bringing up how Cristina and you were married before and how she thinks it's her civic duty or something to make sure I don't ruin you, because Cristina still needs to watch over you apparently. So to get it from you, too, is just a little much right now." I stood and was about to exit, but he reached for my arm.

"Amelia, please, you know me, you know I wasn't trying to be hurtful, I just…"

"Do I really know you, Owen? Has it ever occurred to you how much we don't know about each other?" I was letting the words fall out of my mouth with no regard for what might happen later. Though I was aware that this was happening, which briefly made me think of Violet and her incessant "Filter!" chant.

"Where is this coming from?"

"I don't know," I said in a hushed tone. "But it doesn't change the fact that it's true. And just so you know, you aren't my first fiancé either." I knew my words would hurt him but I said them nonetheless, wrenching my arm from someone's grasp for the second time today.

Alexa

I am reminded of the lesson on sleep apnea we had in AP psychology senior year when I think of how my roommate described what happened the night I was admitted. She said I would be fine and then my breathing started to get raspy and labored. A few times I woke myself up and repositioned so I could breathe better, but hardly any relief came. Sometime in the morning, I lost my airway and was basically choking so my roommate drove me to the hospital. I can't remember if we ended up at Grey Sloan by coincidence or some farfetched bull shit I came up with on the spot. I'm not a clever person. Probably the former.

I don't remember much at all about the rest of that night. When I woke up, the magnitude of the event hit me.

I was in Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital. Where my biological parents worked, at least according to Google. I supposed it was possible that they had relocated since then, but I hoped it wasn't true. Whether or not I was nervous, I knew I had to meet them before I left. I would just introduce myself and see if they took the bait. It was most likely that they would tell me to go screw, in which case I would. No harm done. At least I would know.

"Who's presenting?" came the voice of my ENT doctor, Dr. Avery. He was nice enough.

One of the members of his entourage stepped forward. "Alexa Lane. Nineteen years old. Admitted early this morning with a blocked airway due to tonsil obstruction. The ER doc performed a tracheotomy."

Dr. Avery rolled his eyes. Maybe a tracheotomy was not the way to go. Sure, it sucked that I couldn't currently speak but I was breathing so it was good enough for me. "Right," he said. "What's the course of treatment?"

"We'll remove Alexa's tonsils in surgery later and keep her for observation… maybe put her on prednisone to keep the rest of the throat from swelling too much."

Dr. Avery touched my shoulder. "Your surgery is scheduled for this afternoon. Do you have any questions?" He motioned to the white board one of the nurses brought me.

I wrote quickly and eagerly. How long will I be here after?

"Probably a few days, as long as there are not any complications. I don't foresee any. Normally it'd be an outpatient procedure but because of your probable mono and the tracheotomy I'd like to see it through for a little longer."

I nodded and wrote a new question. How long until I can talk?

Dr. Avery smiled at that one. "Soon after surgery. Granted, you will be in pain but without the trach you should be speaking just fine while in recovery." I smiled and nodded, and he reciprocated and led his team away.

So, I was going to be in the hospital, able to talk, for a few days while recovering. It seemed like things were going to work out for me. My mind was wandering and it was hard to keep track of what was in the realm of possibility and what I could only wish was true. I wasn't scared at all. Okay, false. My tonsils were the size of Donald Trump's ego. Hyperbolic, but true. I knew going to Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital would probably stir something up. True.

I wanted something to stir up. True?

Amelia

Though I had unofficially been living in the trailer with Owen for a long time now, I couldn't bring myself to go to that home. Instead I slipped in the front door of Derek's place, the real house on the property. I suspected that he and Meredith wouldn't mind as I had been staying there before; my room was unchanged as far as I knew.

"Amelia?" Meredith said as she came out of the playroom with Bailey on her hip.

"Hi. I was… well I was going to stay in my room tonight. If that's okay, I mean."

"Is everything okay with Owen? I thought you'd be consummating your… engagement." Meredith chuckled genuinely and I felt a weird urge to open up to her. I started by taking a seat at the counter. While I really appreciated Meredith as a sister unlike the ones I already had, this was one area that was touchy between us because of her relationship with Cristina.

"I don't know. I said some stupid things. I also said some true things. It kind of seems like the only things I didn't say were the ones he needed know." I was being cryptic on purpose.

Bailey was tugging at Meredith's hair so she went to the fridge to get a bottle for him. "When I first met Derek, he didn't mention the wife he had on the east coast. I'm sure whatever you've got isn't that bad."

"If you only knew…"

Meredith raised her eyebrows, as if she was challenging me. "Let me go put Bailey down. I'll be back in a minute."

I sat and pondered how much I really wanted to tell Meredith right now. She would no doubt think I was a horrible person. Maybe that would be enough to show me that I hardly deserve Owen anyway. I thought long and hard about whether or not Addison would be welcoming if I showed up in LA. I even briefly thought of starting over, again, on the east coast. Derek could have his job as head of neuro back, and Owen would find someone who he actually knew and related to. Even Meredith would be better off without the awkward sister in law thing who was currently engaged to her best friend's ex-husband. Yeah.

"Amelia?" Meredith asked, seemingly not for the first time. I hadn't even notice her come back in the room because I was so caught up in an escape plan. "Do you want some coffee?"

"Sure."

Meredith busied herself with the coffee preparation for a minute, but then turned to me with a serious look on her face. "I get that I'm not the best sister in the world but I'd like to try. So go ahead. You can tell me. I have to warn you, Derek has told me some things that he found out from Addison, but I have no preconceived notions."

I somehow doubted that but let the big, deep dark secret that I hated even thinking about hang in the air between us. "I had a kid. In LA, yes. But I'm not talking about that." Meredith cocked her head. It was apparent she thought she already knew everything from Derek. Surprise, I'm worse than we all thought. "I had a child when I was sixteen. With… with Mark Sloan."

"What?" was the reaction I was expecting, except it didn't come from Meredith. It came from Derek, who was apparently on his way to the kitchen as I began talking.

Alexa

When I woke up, I was in way more pain than I had expected. Before, swallowing and talking and yawning and breathing had hurt. That was nothing. It felt like there had been an explosion in my throat. The nurse in my room asked me if I wanted water and I was too afraid to speak so I just nodded. After I forced a sip down, I tested my voice. It was raspy.

"Is Dr. Avery going to be in again tonight?"

"He should be, but I can answer any questions you have," the nurse answered.

"None, I was just curious."

"He is a handsome little devil, isn't he?" the nurse smiled at me. I resisted rolling my eyes.

Later, when Dr. Avery came by, it was past dinner time and it seemed like he was wrapping up for the day so I took my chance. "You're a plastic surgeon too, aren't you?"

"I am."

"So you know other plastic surgeons, probably," I was trying not to dive right in but I wasn't sure how willing he was going to be to give me information.

"Why, are you looking for a tonsil reconstruction?" he joked.

"No I just… are you really close with the doctors here? Do you know a lot of them?"

"Well, I am a member of the board of this hospital so I don't really have a lot of time to know every doctor. But I do know a lot of surgeons. What is this about?"

"Do you know Amelia Shepherd, well, Dr. Shepherd?" I decided to ask about my mother first. My father was a plastic surgeon, too, so it was way more likely that Dr. Avery knew him. This gave me somewhat of a cushion to regain my nerve. Unless he and Dr. Shepherd were best friends, in which case this was getting worse by the second.

"Yes, well, kind of, I'm closer with her brother. Do you know Dr. Shepherd?" Dr. Avery was clearly getting agitated. I debated my next words for a minute.

"I think… I think she's my mother."

Dr. Avery stared at me for a minute. Then he laughed, as if I were playing a joke on him. When I didn't laugh myself, his face turned serious again. "And you came to this hospital to tell her…"

"I came to this hospital to get my throat fixed. But I knew they worked here."

"They?"

"My parents."

Jackson put his hands up defensively. "I don't even want to know who the father is. That's Shepherd's business. Listen. I'll page her and you guys can talk if she's willing, but leave me and the hospital out of it. She's… she's faced a lot of scrutiny here and the last thing she needs is to be part of another scandal." He seemed to have no problem calling me a scandal.

I almost told him to forget the page, because it was clear that I might be doing more harm than good, but couldn't seem to find the words.

Amelia

"You and Mark had a baby? Amelia? When you were sixteen! Mark was way too old for you! Is that even legal? God, Amy, you think you might have mentioned this over the past couple of decades since then," Derek was yelling with a ferocity I hadn't ever seen before. With reason. He wasn't supposed to find out like this. He wasn't supposed to find out at all. "You think Mom might have said something. Did Ma even know?"

"Derek, you're going to wake up the kids-" Meredith started but I cut her off.

"Of course Mom knew." I could tell he was waiting for me to elaborate but I wasn't going to give him anything else.

"Yeah? And what about Liz and Kathleen and Nancy? Did they know? Did Mark even know?"

"Mark knew. He gave me money to go get it aborted," I spat. Meredith looked like she didn't know where she should be. "Addison was the one I told. Because she wasn't going to spread it around like the family gossips our sisters are. Addie made me tell Mom, and Mom told me it was my decision if I wanted to tell anyone else. I think she suspected I would, but I knew I wasn't going to. I mean, look at the way you're reacting now. Imagine your reaction when it was actually happening. So we set up a private adoption. And that was the end of it."

"Amy, are you serious right now? God, I can't even look at you."

"Derek-" Meredith tried again to calm him down but he was getting out of control. He was always a yeller. Me? I learned the best way to deal with him was to be the calm one, because at least then I could look back and say I was probably more rational than he was.

"No, Meredith, don't even say anything right now, because the only sister you've ever had to deal with, you pushed away until she was dead!"

Meredith caught a wild look in her eye. "You know that's not true and right now you're just saying things to be hurtful. But you don't get to just do that! To be quite frank, you're severely overreacting."

"Oh, yes, I'm overreacting. God, Meredith, why are you taking her side when half the time you act like you hate her?"

Meredith looked at me. "I don't hate her. I think she knows that." I was grateful for what Meredith was doing but I felt tears welling up anyway.

Derek and Meredith continued to yell for a minute until there was a knock on the door. Derek answered it, and a familiar voice almost sent me into hysterics.

"I heard yelling… is everything alright Shep?" Owen stepped inside and saw me practically crying. "Amelia." He walked over to me and put his arm around me but I shrugged it off. "What's going on?"

"Why don't you ask your fiancée there," Derek's eyes were narrowed. I glared at him.

"Derek." Meredith warned.

"Have fun building a life with a liar, Owen, you might want to save yourself the trouble."

"Derek!"

"Amelia, what is he talking about," Owen was getting mad. I was panicking. As much as Meredith wanted to help, she wasn't. It was just me.

My pager went off.

"I… the hospitals paging me. This isn't a good time. Owen…" I reached for the pager but he grabbed it from my bag first.

"Avery is paging you? What, is he that other fiancé you mentioned earlier? Are you cheating on me, Amelia?" Owen looked more hurt than angry at this point.

"Probably," Derek said. Meredith's jaw dropped.

"Enough!" Meredith yelled. "You," she pointed to Derek "are being an absolute jackass right now, and need to go settle you children again because you woke them up with your temper tantrum. And you, Owen… you just need to trust that Amelia is not cheating on you with Avery, who, by the way, is happily married to April Kepner, a close colleague and friend of yours. Amelia, I'm going to drive you to the hospital. Owen, you need to go back to the trailer, and Derek, for the love of God, get the kids to bed and go to bed yourself because you're out of control and it's enough." With that, Meredith grabbed her purse and mine, ripped my pager out of Owen's hand and with her empty hand, grabbed my arm and led me out to the driveway. I tried not to cry on the way.

Alexa

Dr. Avery was standing outside of my room, waiting for Dr. Shepherd. I somehow knew it was her when she first arrived. She talked to Dr. Avery for a minute before she entered my room. Immediately I could tell she was distraught. Her eyes were red and puffy and walked was another woman with her who was still talking to Dr. Avery outside. I wondered who she was.

Dr. Shepherd pulled a chair up to my bed. "So, you're…"

"Your daughter," I said. As hard as this was for me, it seemed like it was probably a lot harder for her.

She bowed her head in defeat. "God, I…"

"It's okay," I said, suddenly regretting my decision to open my mouth. I was clearly causing pain for no reason. "I don't want anything. I just wanted to meet. After all this time, I just wanted to see who… I mean, where I came from. I'm nothing like my adoptive parents."

She looked up at me. "Do you like them?" She was biting her bottom lip. It was a habit I also had.

"I mean, yes, they're my parents, well, you know… I'm having a hard time with my mother. We just don't connect. I know it's selfish, but I've always wondered what it would be like to connect with my real mother."

"It's not selfish. Selfish is giving a perfectly healthy baby up so that you don't ruin what plans you had for your future. I know that now. I… I was pregnant a few years ago and the baby was born without a brain," she choked back a sob and sniffled. "And you… I gave you up. So it has always seemed like kids won't be in the cards for me. Which sucks, because my fiancé has always wanted kids and divorced his last wife over that fundamental issue… I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm saying all of this. I've had a rough night. Actually, my brother just found out… about you."

"Well, I'm sorry if I've messed anything else up…"

"No, please don't say that. Getting to meet you… I'm happy you're here. I'm just sorry I'm not a better mother. I'm not someone you want as a mother."

Despite what she said I still felt a strong connection to her. "Well, maybe we could just be… friendly?"

She smiled. "I would like that a lot. I have a lot going on right now with my fiancé and…" she trailed off and it was clear it wasn't a sentence she was going to finish.

"So your fiancé… he's not…"

"Your father? No. Alexa," I shivered when she said my name for the first time. She grabbed my hand. "I'm sorry to tell you this, but your father died of complications that arose after he was injured in a plane crash."

I tried not to let my jaw fall open. "A plane crash?"

"Yes. My brother and his wife… Derek and Meredith, I guess you'll have to meet them at some point. Meredith is the one outside with Dr. Avery. Anyways, they were on the plane too, along with my fiancé's ex-wife, who is Mer's best friend, and Mer's half-sister Lexie, who died on site… and my friend Arizona who I met at Johns Hopkins."

"Wow," I said. "You all work here?"

"Yes," Dr. Shepherd sort of chuckled. "We're all connected somehow it seems."

"You went to Johns Hopkins?" I asked, amazed and another feeling which I could only identify as proud.

"Yes. Aren't you in school now?"

I shrugged. "I go to UNH. I really wanted to go to Dartmouth but I wasn't accepted. I'm doing a semester at UWash, though. Which is why I'm in Seattle."

Dr. Shepherd smiled. "I wish I went to state school for undergrad. It's way less expensive that way, and with good grades you can still get into top level graduate schools if that's what you want to do. What's your major?"

"Chemistry," I suddenly felt shy. "Honestly, I was planning on going to medical school."

Her eyes suddenly welled up with tears. She wiped them away. "I'm sorry, just, wow… I never thought I'd get to hear my daughter say she wanted to go to medical school. I never thought I'd get to hear my daughter say anything." She squeezed my hand. "Well, it just so happens that I'm a neurosurgeon and might have a tip or two when it comes to medical school."

"Dr. Shepherd…"

"Please, call me Amelia…"

"Amelia, it seems like Meredith and someone else are yelling… and pointing at you from outside."

Amelia turned around and sighed. "That's Owen, my fiancé. I'd like to introduce you to him when things cool down… We were fighting before I came here. I should talk to him… I'll be right back." She let go of my hand and gave me an assuring smile even though I could tell she was tensing up. She slid open the door and walked into the hallway.

I was watching their colorful conversation unfold for a minute before I blacked out.

Amelia

"What are you doing here?" I asked. My hands were trembling.

"I came to talk to you because I thought our impending marriage was more important that a surgery you got paged to. You're not even on call!" he yelled, though I knew Meredith had probably briefed him that it wasn't a surgery after all.

"It's not a surgery, Owen. It's her."

Owen looked into Alexa's room. "What are you talking about?"

"She's my… that's my daughter."

Owen gave me a side glance with his jaw open. "Your what?"

"When I was sixteen, I had a child. Mark Sloan was the father. I put her up for adoption because Mark wanted no part in it and I was too busy thinking about myself. That's what Derek was yelling about earlier. I'm actually surprised he didn't tell you when we left. That's the reason I was so nervous about the engagement. You had no idea. And there's some other stuff you have no idea about, still, stuff that's a big part of me. So I thought it wouldn't work."

Owen tried to hold my trembling hand but I pulled back. "Amelia, things can never work if you won't let me in."

"Wait, you guys are engaged?" Jackson said.

"Avery, shut up?" Meredith retorted, and Jackson walked into Alexa's room.

"Owen, my own brother didn't even know about this. It's not something I wanted to share, even with you…"

"Well that's just perfect, Amelia," he said running a hand through his hair. I could tell Meredith was ready to pounce though I thought it was weird that she still wanted to hang around.

"I don't mean it's you, I just mean…"

I didn't have time to finish my sentence because Jackson was suddenly rushing Alexa down the hall. "Grey, can you come with me to the OR?"

Meredith caught my eye and ran after them. "Stay here, I will update you," she called to me. "Avery, what happened?"

"I don't know," was the answer I heard.