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The weight rack clinked as Maya slid the last barbell into place, but the sound felt distant, muted by the dull ache that had settled along her jaw sometime during the last set of exercises. She straightened, one hand moving automatically to touch the left side of her face, fingers pressing against bone and muscle as if she could locate the source of the discomfort through pressure alone. The sensation wasn't sharp or overwhelming, just persistent and wrong in a way she couldn't quite name.
"You good, Captain?" Travis asked from across the training room, coiling a length of rope.
Maya dropped her hand. "Yeah. Fine."
But she wasn't fine, and the self-acknowledgment sat uncomfortably in her chest alongside the nausea that had been building for the past twenty minutes. She'd pushed through harder workouts than this, had functioned on less sleep, had performed under more stressful conditions. This routine training session shouldn't have left her feeling like she'd run a marathon while fighting the flu or run a 10K with a sprained ankle.
She bent to retrieve the resistance bands from the floor, and a wave of dizziness made her pause halfway down. Not dramatic enough to make her fall or even stagger, just enough to make the room tilt slightly before righting itself. Maya finished the movement, stood slowly, and walked to the equipment cabinet with careful steps. The bands went on their designated hook. The clipboard with the training log went back on its shelf. Everything in its place, everything normal, even as her body insisted that something wasn’t quite right.
The fatigue was the worst part. Not the good kind of tired that came from pushing her limits, the satisfying exhaustion of muscles worked to their capacity. This felt heavier, like moving through water, like her body had decided to operate at half speed without consulting her first. Maya had spent her entire life learning to read her physical condition, to understand the difference between pain that meant stop and pain that meant push through. This didn't fit either category. It just existed, persistent and puzzling.
She made it through the rest of her shift by focusing on tasks that required less physical exertion. Paperwork. Equipment inventory. A meeting with the battalion chief about next quarter's training schedule. The ache in her jaw didn't worsen, but it didn't improve either. The nausea came and went in unpredictable waves. By the time she drove home, Maya had almost convinced herself it was nothing. Almost.
The house was quiet when she entered, the kind of peaceful silence that usually helped her decompress after a day at the station. Carina was in the bedroom, propped against the headboard with a medical journal balanced on her knees and reading glasses perched on her nose. She glanced up when Maya appeared in the doorway, offered a warm smile, then returned her attention to whatever article had captured her interest.
Maya changed out of her work clothes, moving through the familiar routine on autopilot. The ache persisted. The exhaustion weighed on her shoulders like physical pressure. She sat on the edge of the bed, still in her sports bra and underwear, and stared at her hands resting on her thighs.
She should mention it. The thought circled in her mind, uncomfortable and insistent. But saying something out loud would make it real, would transform vague discomfort into concrete concern. Maya had built her entire identity on physical capability, on being strong enough and fast enough and tough enough to meet any challenge. Admitting weakness, even potential weakness, felt like betraying something fundamental about who she was.
Behind her, Carina turned a page. The soft rustle of paper seemed loud in the quiet room.
Maya's jaw ached. The nausea stirred in her stomach, not quite threatening but impossible to ignore. The fatigue pressed down on her, and she realized with sudden clarity that she couldn't shake this off or push through it like she used to do in the old days. Something was wrong, and pretending otherwise wouldn't change that truth.
"Carina," she said quietly.
The page-turning stopped. Maya knew, without seeing it, that Carina's attention shifted fully toward her, that complete focus that made people feel like they were the only thing in the world that mattered. It was one of the things Maya loved most about her wife, and right now it made the vulnerability of what she was about to say even more acute.
"Something's wrong."
The words hung in the air between them. Maya kept her eyes on her hands, watching her thumbs move against each other in small, repetitive circles. She heard the journal close, heard Carina set it aside on the nightstand, heard the shift of fabric as she moved across the bed.
"Tell me," Carina said, and her voice held no panic or alarm, just calm invitation.
Maya's jaw tightened, then she winced as the movement aggravated the ache. "I don't know exactly. My jaw hurts. Has been hurting since this afternoon during training. And I feel nauseous, but not like I'm actually going to be sick. Just wrong. And tired in a way that doesn't make sense."
She finally looked up, turning to meet Carina's eyes. Her wife had moved to sit beside her, close enough that their knees almost touched but not crowding, giving Maya space to maintain her composure even while offering proximity.
"When did it start?" Carina asked.
"During the workout. Maybe an hour into the session. I thought it would pass." Maya touched her jaw again, that same automatic gesture. "It didn't pass."
Carina was watching her with professional assessment layered over personal concern. Maya could see her processing the information, sorting through diagnostic possibilities, but she didn't immediately jump to conclusions or offer reassurances that might be empty.
"Does it hurt worse when you move your jaw?" Carina asked. "When you chew or talk?"
"No. It just aches. Constant and dull."
"And the nausea. Is it connected to eating or any specific activity?"
Maya considered the question. "I don't think so. It comes and goes without any pattern I can figure out."
The admission felt strange. Maya was used to understanding cause and effect, to identifying problems and implementing solutions. This lack of clear explanation frustrated her almost as much as the symptoms themselves. She wanted to have answers, wanted to present Carina with a complete analysis instead of this vague collection of wrongness.
"And this is unusual for you," Carina said. It wasn't quite a question, more an acknowledgment of what they both knew. Maya didn't complain about discomfort. She'd once finished a shift with a dislocated finger and hadn't mentioned it until someone noticed her taping it hours later.
"Yes. It’s strange and I can’t figure out what’s wrong, but all I know is I’m not fine."
I’m not fine. The sentence carried weight. Maya was always fine, she rarely admitted vulnerability, rarely asked for help with anything, and certainly never made vague complaints about feeling off. That she was doing so now spoke volumes about how concerned she actually was beneath her carefully maintained exterior. It also spoke to the growth she had done over the years.
Carina reached out slowly, giving Maya time to pull away if she wanted distance. When Maya didn't move, Carina rested her hand lightly on Maya's knee. The touch was grounding, a small anchor point of connection.
"We'll figure this out," Carina said. "Tomorrow, we'll get you checked out properly. But tonight, if anything changes or gets worse, you tell me immediately. Okay?"
Maya nodded. Some of the tension in her shoulders eased slightly, not because anything had been solved or explained, but because she'd spoken the truth out loud and been met with acknowledgment instead of dismissal. Carina hadn't told her she was overreacting or imagining things. She'd simply listened and responded with the quiet certainty that they would address this together.
"Okay," Maya said.
She didn't feel better physically. The ache persisted, the nausea lingered, the exhaustion still pressed down on her. But she'd taken the first difficult step of admitting something was wrong, and for someone who'd spent her life pushing through pain and refusing to acknowledge weakness, that admission felt simultaneously terrifying and liberating.
Carina squeezed her knee gently, then stood. "Come lie down. You need rest regardless of what's causing this."
Maya complied, sliding under the covers while Carina moved around the room, turning off lights and setting her phone on the nightstand within easy reach. When she finally settled beside Maya, she left one hand resting between them, palm up in silent invitation.
Maya took it, threading their fingers together. The contact helped. Not with the physical symptoms, but with the underlying fear she hadn't quite articulated, even to herself. She'd said something was wrong, and Carina had believed her. That had to count for something.
Maya's heart beat steadily, her jaw ached dully, and her wife's hand held hers in the darkness. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but the wrongness followed her down into uneasy rest.
The clinic smelled like antiseptic and recycled air, the kind of medical facility that handled routine cases without the intensity of a hospital emergency department. Maya sat on the examination table with her hands folded in her lap while the doctor reviewed her chart, pen tapping against the clipboard in a rhythm that suggested routine rather than concern.
Carina occupied one of the two chairs against the wall, present but not hovering, letting Maya maintain her independence while still being available. They'd arrived early for the appointment, had filled out the intake forms in the waiting room while a television played morning news no one watched. Now they were here, and Maya was about to explain her vague symptoms to a stranger who had no context for how unusual it was that she'd sought medical attention at all.
"So, jaw pain, nausea, and fatigue," the doctor said, looking up from the chart. She was middle-aged with graying hair pulled back in a practical ponytail, her white coat crisp and professional. "When did these symptoms start?"
"Yesterday afternoon during a training session at work," Maya said. "They've been persistent since then."
"And what do you do for work?"
"I'm a firefighter. Captain at Station 19."
The doctor nodded, making a note. "Physically demanding job. High stress environment. Are you experiencing any chest pain or shortness of breath?"
"No."
"Dizziness?"
Maya hesitated. "A little. Yesterday. Not severe."
The blood pressure cuff tightened around her arm, released, tightened again. The doctor checked the reading, made another note, and moved on to temperature and pulse. Everything performed with efficient professionalism, the kind of practiced routine that suggested she'd done these same movements thousands of times before.
"Your vitals look good," the doctor said. "Blood pressure is actually on the low side, which is common for someone in excellent physical condition. Heart rate is steady. Let's check your lungs."
The stethoscope was cold against Maya's back through the thin examination gown. She breathed when instructed, deep and even breaths that felt normal except for the nausea that stirred slightly with the movement. The doctor moved the stethoscope to several positions, listening carefully, then came around to check from the front.
"Lungs are clear," she said. "Now I'm going to run an ECG just to get a look at your heart rhythm. It's a standard precaution given your symptoms."
The electrodes felt strange against Maya's skin, small stickers placed precisely on her chest and ribs and shoulders. She lay back on the examination table and stared at the ceiling tiles while the machine recorded data. The process was quick, impersonal, and oddly intimate all at once. She was aware of Carina in her peripheral vision, sitting quietly and watching with the trained observation of someone who understood exactly what each step meant.
The ECG paper fed out of the machine in a long strip. The doctor tore it off, held it up to examine the tracings, her eyes moving along the peaks and valleys with practiced assessment. Maya couldn't read her expression, couldn't tell if the silence meant concern or routine confirmation of normalcy.
"Everything looks good here," the doctor finally said, setting the strip aside. "Your heart rhythm is normal. No irregularities."
Maya felt something in her chest tighten that had nothing to do with her heart. She'd expected that, maybe even hoped against hope that the test would show something concrete, something that would validate the wrongness she felt. Instead, she had a normal ECG and a doctor who looked relieved rather than concerned.
"So what's causing the symptoms?" Maya asked. Her voice remained level, professional, the same tone she used when debriefing after difficult calls.
The doctor pulled over a rolling stool and sat down, positioning herself at eye level with Maya. It was meant to be reassuring, to create a sense of partnership in the discussion. "Based on what you've told me and what I'm seeing in your test results, I believe your symptoms are consistent with anxiety. The jaw pain is likely from clenching your teeth, which many people do unconsciously when they're stressed. The nausea and fatigue could easily be your body's response to overtraining combined with the psychological demands of your job."
Maya sat perfectly still. She processed the words, sorted them into categories of what made sense and what didn't, and came up with more questions than answers. But she didn't voice those questions, didn't push back or argue. She just absorbed the diagnosis and felt it settle wrongly alongside the continued dull ache in her jaw.
"You mentioned you're a Captain," the doctor continued. "That's a leadership position with significant responsibility. You're managing a team in life-threatening situations on a regular basis. That kind of chronic stress takes a toll, even when you don't consciously feel anxious. Your body keeps the score."
It sounded reasonable. It sounded like something Maya might have said herself if someone else had presented these same vague symptoms. Stress was part of her job, had been part of her life since childhood when her father's demands had shaped every aspect of her training and behavior. She knew what anxiety felt like, knew how it could manifest physically. This should make sense.
Except it didn't quite fit.
Maya shifted slightly on the examination table, and a wave of nausea rolled through her stomach. Not violent or overwhelming, just present and unwelcome. She pressed her lips together and waited for it to pass, maintaining her composed exterior while her body quietly insisted something was wrong beyond stress or overtraining.
When she was certain she could speak without her voice betraying any discomfort, she said, "So what do you recommend?"
"Rest," the doctor said immediately. "Take a few days off if you can. Reduce your training intensity. Consider some stress management techniques. Meditation, yoga, anything that helps you decompress. I can refer you to a therapist who specializes in first responders if you think that would be helpful."
Maya nodded. She was aware of the doctor not looking at her now, writing notes in the chart. She was aware of Carina in her chair, sitting very still. And she was aware of her own hand moving to touch her jaw, fingers pressing against the ache that the doctor had explained away as teeth clenching.
She dropped her hand when the doctor looked up.
"Your symptoms should improve with rest and stress reduction," the doctor said. "But if they worsen or if you develop chest pain or significant shortness of breath, go to the emergency room immediately. Don't wait."
The ‘go to the ER’ line, the standard warning that covered liability while reassuring the patient that nothing serious was actually expected. Maya heard it for what it was and filed it away accordingly.
"Thank you," she said.
The doctor smiled, professional and warm. "You're welcome. And try not to worry. Everything appears normal. Your body is just telling you to slow down."
Maya's eyes found Carina's across the room. The look that passed between them held volumes of unspoken communication. Carina's expression remained neutral, the polite attentiveness of someone observing a colleague's work, but Maya saw something else underneath. Doubt. Question. The same uncertainty that sat in Maya's own chest, refusing to be explained away by reasonable diagnoses and normal test results.
Maya knew her body better than any test results could reveal. She knew the difference between normal fatigue and this heavy exhaustion. She knew what teeth clenching felt like, and this jaw ache didn't quite match. She knew anxiety in all its forms, had lived with various types of stress her entire life, and this felt different.
But the doctor had spoken with such certainty, had backed her diagnosis with normal vitals and clean test results. Who was Maya to argue with professional medical assessment based on nothing more than a feeling that something wasn't right?
She got dressed while the doctor printed out discharge instructions and a prescription for muscle relaxants to help with the jaw tension. Carina accepted the papers, thanked the doctor politely, and waited by the door while Maya finished tying her shoes.
They walked out together without speaking. The clinic doors closed behind them, sealing away the antiseptic smell and the reassurances that everything was normal. Maya's jaw still ached. The nausea still lurked in her stomach. The fatigue still pressed down on her shoulders like weight she couldn't shrug off.
"Bambina," Carina said quietly as they reached the car.
"She said everything's normal," Maya replied before Carina could continue. "The tests were clear. It's probably just stress."
She got in the car and closed the door, ending the conversation before it could begin. But she'd seen the doubt in Carina's eyes, and it matched her own. The doctor had been kind and professional and thorough, and she'd missed something. Maya didn't know what, couldn't name it or prove it, but the certainty sat in her chest as solid as the ache in her jaw.
Something was wrong, and being told otherwise didn't change that truth.
Three days after the clinic visit, Maya braced her hands against her knees during a ladder drill and tried to breathe through the nausea without anyone noticing. The jaw ache had become familiar, a constant companion that she'd learned to work around, but the waves of sickness that came and went without warning were harder to hide.
"Time!" Travis called out, and Maya straightened, forcing her breathing to steady.
The rest had done nothing. The muscle relaxants sat unused in their bottle at home because Maya hated taking medication unless absolutely necessary, but even if she'd taken them religiously, she suspected they wouldn't have touched this persistent wrongness. She'd reduced her training intensity as instructed, had attempted meditation one awkward evening that left her feeling more frustrated than calm, and had taken two full days off work. The symptoms persisted regardless.
"You good, Bishop?" Gibson asked, walking past with a coiled hose over his shoulder.
"Yeah," Maya said automatically.
She moved to the next drill position, one hand pressed briefly against her jaw before she caught herself and dropped it. The gesture had become reflexive, a tell she couldn't quite eliminate. Her fingers sought out the ache as if touching it could somehow identify its source or make it make sense.
The training session continued. Maya pushed through it with the same determination she'd applied to everything in her life, but her body felt wrong in ways she couldn't explain to anyone who asked. The fatigue was different from normal exhaustion, heavier and more complete. It was the difference between muscles tired from use and a battery slowly draining toward empty.
She made it through the shift without incident, without collapsing or failing to perform her duties, and she told herself that meant the doctor was right. Anxiety. Stress. Overtraining. Nothing serious. Just her body asking for rest in insistent ways.
Except Maya had rested, and rest changed nothing.
Carina had been watching her. Maya felt the observation even when her wife wasn't physically present, knew that Carina was tracking patterns and making mental notes with the same clinical precision she applied to her patients. It should have been comforting. Instead, it made Maya feel exposed, like her body's betrayal was on display for analysis.
On the fourth day, Carina stopped by the station during lunch. She brought food from the Italian place Maya liked, and they ate in her office while the rest of the crew gave them privacy. Maya appreciated the gesture, appreciated the normalcy of shared lunch, but she could feel Carina's attention piercing through.
"How are you feeling?" Carina asked.
"Fine," Maya said.
The lie tasted wrong, but she didn't know what else to say. The symptoms were there, unchanged, but saying so meant admitting the doctor's diagnosis hadn't helped, meant acknowledging that something was still wrong when all evidence suggested nothing was.
Carina set down her fork. "Maya."
"The tests were normal," Maya said quietly. "Everyone thinks I'm overreacting."
She didn't add that she'd started to think the same thing. That maybe this was all in her head, a manifestation of stress she wasn't consciously aware of, her body creating symptoms where no real medical problem existed. The doubt had crept in slowly, accumulating like sediment until she couldn't quite see clearly through it anymore. At the same time it was quite frustrating and even ironic that the only time she decided to admit something was wrong and seek help, nothing came out of it and her symptoms had been dismissed as soon as every test came back normal.
The next day, at lunch, Carina went to see Maya at the station. She looked exhausted in a way that went deeper than physical tiredness.
Carina sat down beside her without asking permission. "This isn't anxiety, Maya."
Maya didn't look up. "The tests were normal."
"I know what the tests said. I'm telling you what I've observed." Carina kept her voice steady, clinical even as her heart raced with the fear she'd been carrying since the clinic appointment. "I've been tracking when these episodes happen. They don't follow any pattern related to stress. You've had symptoms during completely relaxed moments at home. You've had them when you're actively engaged at work. They appear regardless of your emotional state, regardless of your activity level or how much rest you've had."
The symptoms didn't correlate with emotional triggers. Carina had been tracking them, noting when they appeared and what Maya had been doing at the time. They hit during quiet moments at home. They hit during active work situations. They hit first thing in the morning and late at night. There was no pattern related to stress or anxiety or anything that would support the clinic doctor's diagnosis.
"Everyone thinks…"
"I don't care what everyone thinks," Carina said firmly but gently. "I care about what I know. And I know that your symptoms don't correlate with anxiety or overtraining or stress. They're too consistent, too persistent, and they don't respond to any of the interventions that should help if that diagnosis was correct."
Maya finally looked at her. The exhaustion in her eyes went beyond physical fatigue, touched something deeper that looked like doubt and fear mixed together. "But the tests were normal. The doctor said everything was fine. Everyone thinks I'm overreacting or pushing myself too hard or imagining things because I'm stressed."
"But the truth is," Maya continued, her voice dropping lower, "I'm not fine."
The admission hung between them. Carina heard the weight in it, the fear and frustration and barely contained anger at a body that refused to cooperate with professional assessments and normal test results.
Carina reached out slowly and took Maya's hand. "You know your body better than anyone. Better than any test results, better than any doctor who spent twenty minutes examining you. If you say something's wrong, I believe you."
Something shifted in Maya's posture. Not dramatic or obvious, just a subtle release of tension she'd been carrying since the clinic visit, maybe longer. The relief of being believed, of having someone trust her assessment of her own body, was visible in the way her shoulders dropped slightly and her breathing deepened.
"I'm scared," Maya said quietly. It was possibly the most difficult admission she'd ever made, this woman who'd built her identity on being fearless and capable. "Not just about the symptoms. About what they might mean. About what happens if something is actually wrong and we missed it because everyone said it was nothing."
Carina squeezed her hand. "We're not going to miss it. If something is wrong, we'll find it. But you have to stop doubting yourself because other people can't see what you feel."
"What if I'm wrong?"
"Then we'll figure that out too. But Maya, you're not someone who imagines problems. You're not someone who complains without cause. The fact that you're saying something is wrong means something is wrong, regardless of what any test has shown so far."
Maya turned her hand over, threading her fingers through Carina's. The contact anchored her, gave her something solid to hold onto while the rest of her world felt uncertain and wrong. She'd said something was wrong, had been dismissed and diagnosed with anxiety, had started to doubt her own perception. But Carina believed her, and that belief felt like oxygen after days of holding her breath.
"Okay," Maya said finally.
"Okay?"
"Okay. Something's wrong. I'm not imagining it, and I'm not overreacting. Something is wrong with my body, and we need to figure out what it is."
Saying it out loud with certainty instead of doubt felt like reclaiming something she'd lost. Maya had spent her entire life learning to trust her physical capabilities, to read her body's signals with precision. The clinic visit had undermined that trust, had made her question whether she could distinguish between real symptoms and imagined ones. But sitting here with Carina's hand in hers, hearing the steady certainty in her wife's voice, Maya felt the doubt begin to crack.
The symptoms were still there. The jaw still ached, the nausea still came and went, the exhaustion still pressed down on her. Nothing had changed except her certainty that these symptoms meant something, that she wasn't wrong to be concerned, that being believed mattered more than any normal test result.
"Thank you," Maya said quietly.
Carina leaned her head briefly against Maya's shoulder. "You don't have to thank me for believing you. First thing tomorrow morning, we'll go to the hospital for a full check-up.”
It wasn't a solution or a diagnosis, but it was something solid to stand on while they figured out what came next.
Later that day, Maya's hand closed around the inventory clipboard mid-sentence, and then she gasped, a sharp intake of breath that didn't sound like exertion or surprise but like pain. Her other hand flew to her chest, fingers splayed over her sternum, and her eyes went wide with something that looked like shock.
She crumpled.
The collapse was sudden and complete, her body going from upright to falling without any transitional loss of balance. She hit the station floor hard, the clipboard clattering away across concrete.
Carina had been waiting for Maya to finish up in the kitchen area thirty feet away, coffee cup in hand, discussing obstetric protocols with Ben. The sound of Maya’s collapse reached her ears, and her body moved before conscious thought caught up. The coffee cup hit the counter, liquid sloshing over the rim, and she was running.
Maya lay on her side, unconscious, her skin already taking on an ashen quality that Carina's medical training recognized immediately as insufficient oxygenation.
Carina was the first to arrive, dropping down and rolling Maya onto her back.
Her fingers found Maya's neck, pressing against the carotid artery and finding nothing. No pulse. Carina's other hand moved to Maya's chest, feeling for breath sounds or chest rise. Nothing. Cardiac arrest. Her brain supplied the diagnosis with clinical precision even as terror flooded her system.
"Get the AED!" she shouted at no one in particular.
Her hands positioned themselves over Maya's sternum, fingers interlaced, arms locked straight. Compressions started immediately, hard and fast, pushing down with the force necessary to manually circulate blood through a body whose heart had stopped doing its job. Carina counted automatically, the rhythm ingrained from years of medical training, but her eyes stayed on Maya's face.
This was Maya. Her wife. The woman who'd admitted something was wrong only to be told she was anxious and stressed. The woman whose symptoms had persisted while everyone dismissed them as nothing serious.
Ben appeared with the AED. He immediately took over, his larger hands pushing Carina gently but firmly aside. "Let me," he said, not unkind but absolute.
Carina stumbled back. She was a doctor, she knew resuscitation protocols, she'd performed countless emergency procedures in her career. But she was also Maya's wife, and Ben was pushing her out of the way because having family perform resuscitation was dangerous for both the patient and the person performing it emotionally.
"She’s in V-fib. Clear!" Ben's voice rang out.
Maya's body arced off the ground as electricity shot through her heart, forcing the chaotic rhythm to stop, to reset, to hopefully restart in a pattern compatible with life. Carina watched from three feet away, close enough to see everything and far enough to be useless.
Ben went immediately back to compressions. Someone else was doing rescue breaths, timing them with the compression rhythm. The station had transformed into controlled chaos, everyone moving with purpose, but Carina stood frozen and watched her wife's face stay slack and gray.
"Come on, Maya," someone murmured. Maybe it was Carina. Maybe it was someone else.
The AED analyzed again. Still V-fib. Ben called clear and delivered it. More compressions. More rescue breaths. Time stretched and compressed simultaneously, seconds feeling like hours while the whole nightmare played out in what was probably less than five minutes.
"We've got a rhythm," Ben said suddenly.
Carina's knees went weak. She caught herself against the wall, one hand pressed flat against concrete while her body tried to decide whether to collapse or stay upright. Maya's heart had restarted. Her body was circulating blood again. She wasn't conscious, wasn't breathing well enough on her own yet, but her heart was beating.
The paramedics arrived moments later. Carina watched them load Maya onto a gurney, watched them secure an oxygen mask over her face, watched them work with efficient speed while calling ahead to Grey Sloan Memorial. She should ride with them. She needed to ride with them. But her legs wouldn't move, and someone's hand was on her shoulder, grounding her.
"I'll drive you," Ben said. "You can't ride in the ambulance. Not for this."
Carina nodded. She let Ben guide her to his car, let him navigate traffic while she sat in the passenger seat and stared at her hands. They'd been doing compressions on Maya's chest minutes ago. They'd felt Maya's heart stop beneath her palms. They still shook slightly with adrenaline and terror.
Grey Sloan Memorial swallowed Maya into its trauma bay. Carina was allowed in long enough to see Maya stabilized, to hear the emergency cardiology team called for immediate catheterization, to watch them wheel her wife away toward the cath lab before anyone could stop to answer questions or provide explanations.
And then she was alone in the corridor outside the cath lab, and Maya was somewhere behind those closed doors while doctors Carina worked to diagnose what had been missed by the clinic doctor who'd said everything was normal.
The corridor was quiet. Not actually silent, because hospitals were never truly silent, but the sounds felt distant and muted. Carina had performed medical procedures under pressure countless times. Had delivered babies in impossible circumstances. Had made split-second decisions that meant life or death. But this was different. This was Maya behind those doors, and Carina had no control, no authority, no ability to demand answers or information or even basic reassurance.
A nurse passed by, gave Carina a sympathetic look, and kept walking. The overhead speakers announced something about a code blue in another part of the hospital. A gurney rolled past with a patient Carina didn't recognize. Life continued around her while her own world had narrowed to these closed doors and the uncertainty behind them.
A colleague from the OB ward found her eventually. Jo Wilson, who Carina mentored and had worked with for years, appeared in the corridor with coffee and quiet presence.
"Carina," she said gently.
"She collapsed," Carina said. Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, too level and clinical. "V-fib. Ben had to shock her twice. They brought her here for emergency cath."
"I heard. I'm so sorry."
"Did my wife just have a heart attack." Carina said it with certainty, even though her hands were clenched at her sides and her heart was racing. "Whatever the clinic doctor didn't see, whatever the tests didn't show. They'll find what was wrong now."
Jo didn't offer empty reassurances. She just stood beside Carina and waited, providing presence without demanding conversation. Carina was grateful for that, for the respect of silence when words would have been meaningless.
The doors to the cath lab remained closed. Behind them, Maya's life was being examined in real-time, catheters threaded through her arteries to see what had caused her heart to stop. Carina could imagine the procedure with perfect clarity, knew exactly what they were doing and why. But knowing didn't give her comfort, didn't provide control, didn't change the fact that she was standing helpless in a hospital corridor while strangers tried to save her wife.
She'd believed Maya. Had told her that the symptoms meant something, that she wasn't imagining problems or overreacting to stress. And she'd been right. But being right felt hollow now, tasted like fear and regret that they hadn't pushed sooner and harder for answers before Maya's heart had stopped functioning properly.
The doors stayed closed. Maya remained somewhere beyond them. And Carina could only wait, powerless and terrified, while time moved forward without certainty or comfort.
Maya looked small in the ICU bed, which was wrong because Maya never looked small. But pale and disoriented with monitors tracking her newly stabilized heart rhythm, connected to IV lines and oxygen, she seemed diminished in a way that made Carina's chest ache with residual fear.
Carina sat in the chair pulled close to the bed, one hand resting lightly on Maya's forearm just above where the IV entered her skin. The contact was gentle, barely more than presence, but she needed it. Needed the confirmation of warmth beneath her fingers, the physical proof that Maya was still here, still alive despite her having collapsed on the station floor.
Maya's eyes were open but unfocused, drifting around the room without really landing on anything. The sedation from the procedure hadn't fully worn off yet, leaving her somewhere between conscious and not, aware but not quite present.
The cardiologist entered with a tablet in hand and a neutral expression that could have meant anything. Dr. Kim was someone Carina knew by reputation, a skilled interventional cardiologist who didn't waste time on unnecessary bedside manner but delivered clear information without condescension.
"Mrs. Deluca-Bishop," Dr. Kim said, acknowledging Carina before turning her attention to Maya. "Maya, can you hear me?"
Maya's eyes tracked toward the voice. She managed a slight nod.
"Good. I'm Dr. Kim. I performed your cardiac catheterization. We found a significant constriction in your left anterior descending artery. Ninety percent occluded. You also showed signs of microvascular dysfunction that had likely been developing over time."
Carina's hand tightened slightly on Maya's arm. She'd suspected something cardiac, had known in her gut that the anxiety diagnosis was wrong, but hearing confirmation didn’t give her any comfort, on the contrary. Ninety percent blockage. That meant Maya had been walking around for days, maybe weeks, with blood flow to her heart muscle critically reduced.
"The symptoms you were experiencing, the jaw pain, nausea, fatigue, those are all consistent with cardiac ischemia," Dr. Kim continued. "Particularly in women, who often present with atypical symptoms that get missed or misattributed to other causes."
There it was. The acknowledgment without actual acknowledgment. The symptoms had been real, had been significant, and they'd been dismissed as anxiety by a doctor who'd run standard tests and stopped there. Dr. Kim wasn't apologizing or assigning blame. She was just stating facts, laying out the clinical reality of what had been missed.
"We placed a stent to open the artery," Dr. Kim said. "The procedure went well. Your heart function should improve significantly over the next few weeks as blood flow is restored to the affected muscle. We'll keep you here for observation and start you on medication to prevent future problems."
Maya's fingers moved against the blanket, a small gesture that Carina recognized as her way of processing information when she couldn't fully engage in conversation. She was listening, understanding, even if she couldn't respond coherently yet.
"Are there any questions?" Dr. Kim asked.
"Prognosis?" Carina said. Her voice came out steady despite the turmoil beneath her professional composure.
"Good, with proper management. The stent is in place, blood flow is restored. Maya will need to be on anti-platelet therapy, likely for life. We'll monitor her closely, but assuming she follows the treatment plan and makes necessary lifestyle modifications, there's no reason she can't return to full function."
The doctor explained more details, medication schedules, follow-up appointments, warning signs to watch for. Carina absorbed the information automatically, filing it away in the part of her brain that knew how to be a doctor even when her heart was still racing with the memory of watching Maya collapse.
Dr. Kim left eventually, taking her tablet and clinical certainty with her. The room settled into quieter routine, just the steady beep of monitors and the occasional sound of movement in the hallway outside.
Maya's hand moved, fingers curling slightly to catch at Carina's. The grip was weak but deliberate, a small signal that she was present enough to reach for connection. Carina shifted her hold, threading their fingers together properly.
"I'm here," Carina said quietly.
Maya's eyes closed briefly, then opened again. The disorientation was fading gradually, leaving behind exhaustion and the beginning of real awareness. She squeezed Carina's hand with slightly more strength.
Over the next hour, Maya drifted in and out of sleep. Carina stayed and let her rest. When she surfaced toward consciousness, Carina was there with quiet presence and occasional words. Nothing profound or dramatic, just small observations about the room or gentle questions about how Maya was feeling.
Carina adjusted Maya's blanket when it slipped. She brushed hair back from Maya's forehead with her free hand, maintaining contact even when Maya wasn't fully conscious. The gestures were small but necessary, ways of reassuring herself that Maya was still here, still breathing, heart beating steadily on the monitors above them.
Evening turned to night. The lights in the room dimmed automatically, creating a small island of privacy within the hospital's institutional space. Maya was more alert now, her eyes clearer even though exhaustion still marked every line of her face.
"Carina," she said, her voice rough from the breathing tube they'd used during the procedure.
"I'm here."
Maya's eyes found hers in the dim light. They looked at each other for a long moment, and Carina saw awareness there, understanding of what had happened and how close it had been.
"I knew something was wrong," Maya said. The words came out quiet but absolutely clear, each one deliberate and certain.
Carina felt something shift in her chest, relief or vindication or maybe just acknowledgment of the truth they'd both known even when no one else would believe it. Maya had known her body, had trusted her own perception despite being told otherwise, and she'd been right. The cost of being right had been catastrophic, but the truth remained.
"I know," Carina said simply.
The weight of understanding passed between them without need for elaboration. What had almost been lost. What the clinic doctor had dismissed. What Maya's colleagues had attributed to stress and overtraining. What had nearly killed her before anyone took her symptoms seriously.
No grand speeches about the failures of the medical system. No dramatic declarations about fighting to be believed. Just the truth, stripped down to its essential components: Maya had known something was wrong, and she'd been right, and that knowledge had come too late but not quite late enough.
Maya's hand tightened around Carina's. The grip was still weak but steady, anchored by intention rather than strength. "I was scared," she said.
"I know."
"Not just of dying. Of being wrong. Of everyone being right that it was nothing and I was just…"
"You weren't wrong," Carina interrupted gently. "And you didn't imagine anything. Your body was telling you the truth."
The silence that followed held the weight of what hadn't been said over the past week. The moments when Maya had nearly given in to doubt. The clinic visit that had provided false reassurance. The days of symptoms that persisted despite normal test results. All of it led to this moment, to Maya lying in a hospital bed after cardiac arrest, to the truth finally being proven in the most brutal way possible.
"I'm sorry," Maya said quietly.
"For what?"
"For scaring you. For collapsing. For…"
"Don't," Carina said firmly. "You have nothing to apologize for. Nothing about this is your fault."
She reached up with her free hand and brushed her fingers across Maya's cheek, a touch so gentle it barely registered as pressure. Maya leaned into it anyway, seeking comfort in the contact.
"You're alive," Carina said. "That's what matters right now. You're alive, and they found what was wrong, and you're going to recover."
Maya nodded slightly. The exhaustion was pulling at her again, medication and trauma and the body's desperate need for rest all combining to drag her toward sleep. But she fought it for another moment, keeping her eyes on Carina's face.
"Thank you," she said, "for believing me."
Carina's throat tightened. "Always."
Maya's eyes finally closed, her breathing evening out into the rhythm of sleep. Carina sat in the chair beside the bed and watched her chest rise and fall with steady regularity. Her hand stayed linked with Maya's, fingers resting against pulse points where blood flowed normally again, carrying oxygen to a heart that had been starved for it.
Maya had said something was wrong, and she'd been dismissed, and she'd nearly died before anyone believed her. But she'd survived. The truth had been proven, even if the cost had been catastrophic. And now they had this moment, this quiet breathing space where both of them were present and alive and connected by linked hands and shared understanding.