season 7, episode 12 - start me up

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   "HEY GUYS," Jackson greeted when he caught up to Sage, who was walking with Meredith and Cristina. Meredith was in the middle of telling her two best friends that another one of her pregnancy tests had sadly come back negative. Sage was a little annoyed that Jackson had interrupted their conversation, but she decided not to show it.

"Hi?" Sage greeted. "You ok?"

"Yeah, can I talk to Sage for a second?" He looked to Meredith and Cristina, as if he were asking them for permission. Cristina rolled his eyes but Meredith nodded, smiling at Sage. Jackson thanked them before grabbing his girlfriend by the arm and pulling her into another hall.

"What's wrong?" Sage questioned as he led her down the hallway.

"Nothing's wrong," he assured her, and she raised an eyebrow. "Just, y'know how I'm not on call tonight, and you're not on call tonight..." When she didn't respond, he continued, "So I made a reservation at this nice restaurant so we could go on a real date, you know?"

"Really?" The couple had never gone on an official date. It wasn't that they didn't want to, it was just that they were always too tired to or just didn't have the time.

"Yeah," he confirmed, nodding. "I think you'll really like the restaurant. They have a killer lobster."

"Sounds nice." She pursed her lips and nodded. "Can I go home and get ready first?"

"Yeah, of course," he said, smiling.

She opened her mouth to reply when both of their pagers beeped. She sighed, rolling her eyes and grabbing her pager, glancing down at it.

"Come on," she said, putting her pager back in the pocket of her lab coat. The two began walking down the hall again, where they found April, who'd been paged as well.

"What is this, everybody got paged?" Jackson asked when the trio caught up to Alex, Meredith and Cristina. He frowned when Sage moved to walk next to Alex, who immediately put an arm around her shoulders.

"It's that time of year again," Alex grinned, squeezing Sage's shoulders. "The chicks have hatched."

"Is that some sort of code?" April asked, furrowing her brows.

"Those chicks." The group of residents stopped in front of the nurse's station as Dr. Webber and Lexie led a group of what Sage knew to be first year med students into the room.

"Oh, first year med students," Cristina sighed, crossing her arms. "Too dumb to find the toilet." Sage laughed quietly, shaking her head.

"Good morning," Dr. Webber said to the group of residents standing in front of him, "Behind me stand the interns and residents of tomorrow. Today you will show them what it's like to be a surgeon. When you go into surgery, they go into surgery. When they have a question, you will have an answer."

"It's like court-ordered community service," Cristina muttered to Sage and Meredith who were standing on either side of her.

"I'd rather be picking up trash off the side of the highway," Meredith muttered back.

"Agreed," Sage muttered, nodding.

Webber glared at the three residents as Lexie began reading out the assignments. "Fred Wilson, you're with Dr. Yang. Kira Donnelley, with Dr. Grey. Hudson Powell with Dr. Kepner. Laurel Pinson..."

"Mine," Alex whispered when he saw how beautiful Laurel was.

"Mine," Jackson hissed back. Sage turned to her boyfriend, giving him a dirty look. Jackson immediately knew he fucked up and put his hands up in surrender, mouthing a 'sorry'.

"Laurel, you're with Dr. Karev," Lexie read out, chuckling, "Edward Taylor, with Dr. Avery. And Ela Garcia, you're with Dr. Chang."

Sage raised her hand so Ela would know which one was her. Ela, who had beautiful dark hair and eyes and was quite short even compared to Sage, walked over to her, smiling.

"You're Dr. Chang?" she asked and Sage nodded, a small smile on her face.

"Yeah, nice to meet you." Sage stuck out her hand and the girl shook it.

"Likewise." Ela turned away from Sage and looked around the room, her eyes eventually landing on Jackson, who looked like he wanted to shoot himself. She bit her lip, staring at him, a blush spreading across her cheeks.

"Where can I get his number?" she asked and Sage frowned, a pang of jealousy shooting through her chest.

"He's seeing someone," Sage shrugged, trying not to show how much it bothered her.

"And?"

Sage opened her mouth to say something she'd probably regret when Dr. Webber, who had been talking to Cristina, raised his voice so they could all hear him. "I will be picking my chief resident in a few months and you're still a prime candidate."

"The race for chief resident is on?" Meredith asked before Sage could.

"Since when?" Alex asked.

"Uh, how long have you been evaluating us?" April asked, a panicked expression on her face.

"Since your first day here," Dr. Webber replied.

Sage sighed, knowing between having to babysit the first year med student who seemingly had a crush on her boyfriend and the race for chief resident being on, she was in for a long day.

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   "HEY BABE." Sage yelped when Jackson appeared out of nowhere. He smiled and put his hands on her waist, pulling her close and kissing her cheek. She pushed him off, but a smile was forcing its way onto her face.

It was only lunch time and Sage was right about her having a long day. She had no clue how the hell Ela Garcia had managed to get into med school, since all she'd be doing all day was talking about the 'hot doctor and how she wanted to 'ride him into the sunset'. It was getting tiring, and Sage had half a mind to just tell the girl that she was dating him and to fuck off, but she knew it was best not to do that. Thankfully, she 'lost' her right before lunch and was trying to get to the cafeteria before Ela found her.

"Stop, stop," Sage chuckled, pushing his face away. "We're in the middle of the hospital."

"Fine," he muttered, his hands moving off of her waist. "Where's your little shadow?"

"Gone," Sage muttered, a small grin on her face. "And yours?"

"Bathroom, he'll be fine," he shrugged. "How's yours?"

"Well, she really wants to ride you into the sunset."

"What?" Jackson nearly choked on air. "What did you just say?"

"I said-"

"Dr. Chang!" Sage repressed the urge to roll her eyes when she saw Ela running towards them.

"Shoot me," she muttered to her boyfriend, who snickered.

"Dr. Chang, I found you." Ela slowed to a walk and approached the couple.

"Ela, yes," Sage greeted, faking a smile. "We're about to get lunch—"

"Great! Let's go," Ela cut her off, smiling at her. Jackson snorted, his gaze shifting to the girl beside him. He'd never seen Sage like this before. She was usually pretty laid back and relaxed, but now she seemed tense. He guessed he'd feel the same way if a random guy started talking about how he wanted to fuck her.

"So, Dr. Avery," Ela turned to him, a grin on her face, "Have you chosen a speciality yet?"

"No, I haven't," he replied, giving her a small smile. "I'm still figuring out what I want to do. Right now all I'm thinking about is my date with my smoking hot girlfriend."

Sage laughed, trying and failing to hide it. A blush spread across her cheeks when Jackson shot her a wink. Ela, who seemed to be a little uncomfortable now, nodded, biting her lip.

"Smoking hot, huh?" Sage teased, nudging him.

"Definitely," he confirmed, nudging her back.

Ela's eyes widened at the realization that Sage was the smoking hot girlfriend Jackson had mentioned, and her face turned a dark shade of red.

"Oh, you're—" Ela was cut off when her phone started ringing. She glanced down at it, frowning, and looked back up at the couple. "Uh, I have to take this. It was nice meeting you, Dr. Avery. Dr. Chang... I'll find you later." She waved awkwardly and walked away, her phone pressed to her ear.

Sage watched her go, an amused look on her face. Once the Garcia girl was out of sight, she turned to Jackson.

"So, when you say smoking hot, how hot are we talking?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. She bit her lip, and he knew exactly what she was trying to do.

"We can eat later," he decided, shoving her towards an on-call room. She chuckled, walking backwards and keeping her eyes on him.

"I'll take that as a very," she whispered, opening the door behind her. As soon as she was inside, Jackson's lips collided with hers. He closed the door with his foot and pressed her against the wall, his hand going to the waistband of her scrub pants. She hummed, her arms wrapping around his neck.

"Jackson..." she breathed out, closing her eyes when his lips trailed down to her neck. "Fuck."

"That's the plan," he muttered, pulling away to yank her top off.

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   SAGE CHANG HADN'T gone out on a real date in years. Sure, she'd hooked up with people and even gone to lunch or dinner with some of them, but never an actual, real, romantic date.

She didn't even really want to go now, because apparently the med students were evaluating them and Ela had some not so pleasant things to say about her. The chief read out little sections of their evaluations in the locker room, and the highlight from Sage's he'd shared had been 'she has a stick up her ass'. So basically, she was fucked in the race for chief resident.

So now, standing in the bathroom, she was feeling a little self-conscious, since she was pretty sure the dress she was wearing showed too much cleavage. It was actually Lexie's dress, since Sage hated everything she had. Her hair was straightened and left out and her makeup was simple. She looked great, but she was scared out of her mind.

"Sage! Come on!" Lexie shouted, knocking on the door.

"Just a second!" Sage grabbed a lip gloss from her makeup bag and applied a thin coat of it. She tossed it back in her makeup bag and ran her hands through her hair, taking a deep breath. "Ok, ok, ok, ok, ok."

She grabbed her clutch from the counter and walked over to the door, her heels clicking against the floor. She unlocked the door and pulled it open, revealing a grinning Lexie and Meredith.

"Wow," Lexie gasped, a smile on her face. "You look beautiful!"

"Really?" Sage asked, looking down at the dress she wore.

"Yes!" Meredith assured her, smiling. "Jackson's gonna be speechless when he sees you."

"Yeah, I doubt that," Sage laughed. She took a deep breath, smoothing down her dress.

"I'm sure he'll love it," Lexie assured her. "You should've seen how excited he was when he was getting ready. It was adorable."

"Really?"

"Yeah, he couldn't wait," Lexie confirmed, nodding.

"He's downstairs, just go," Meredith urged. "You look amazing. You're gonna be fine. He's gonna be stunned." She placed her hand on Sage's shoulder, giving it a squeeze.

"Yeah, yeah, ok," Sage sighed, a small smile appearing on her face. "I'll see you guys later."

When she got downstairs, Jackson was standing in front of the door, his phone in his hands. His back was facing her and she smirked, deciding to sneak up on him. She quietly crept up behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist.

"Guess who?" she teased, giggling when he jumped slightly. He turned around in her hold, his eyes wide.

"Damn," he breathed out, his gaze sweeping over her body. "You look... wow."

She shrugged, grinning, "You're not so bad yourself." She grabbed her jacket off the coat rack and put it on, before looking back at him.

"Ready to go?" he asked, holding his arm out for her.

"Yep." She took his arm and the two stepped out the door.

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   "RED OR WHITE?" Jackson asked, glancing up from the wine menu. Sage's gaze shifted from the menu she was holding to her boyfriend, who was sitting across the table from her.

"Whatever you want," she replied, shrugging. He rolled his eyes.

"Come on," he whined, "you have to have a preference. Red or white?"

"Uh..." She bit her lip, scanning the menu. "Red."

"Ok," he nodded, placing the wine menu back on the table.

The restaurant they were at was really nice, as Jackson promised it would be. The lights were dim and the tables were small, but there was plenty of room. There was a piano player sitting in the corner of the room, playing soft jazz music, and the room was fairly quiet, except for the sounds of silverware clanking, quiet conversations, and the music.

Their waitress, a young woman who couldn't have been older than twenty, came over, a big smile on her face. She took their orders and walked away, leaving the two alone again.

"So..." Sage pursed her lips, not knowing what to say. "Sorry, I haven't been on a real date in like... forever. I don't know what I'm doing."

Jackson laughed, shaking his head, "It's fine, you're doing great."

She chuckled, a blush creeping onto her cheeks. "Good."

The two stared at each other for a few moments, both with a smile on their faces. Neither of them had realized just how much they needed this. All the time at the hospital, all the surgeries, and all the stress had gotten to them. It was nice to just forget about the chaos of the hospital and relax for a while.

Their wine arrived a couple minutes later, and they thanked their waitress before turning back to each other. Jackson picked up his glass and held it out, and Sage did the same.

"To us," he toasted, smiling.

"To us," Sage repeated, clinking her glass against his.

notes from lottie,

...hiiiii

got real lazy w this one

i pinky promise i'll get back to writing the actual plots of actual episodes soon like i need to stop going off script 😭

and do i have any baseball fans here bc bro JUDGEY IS NOT HUMAN WTF IS HAPPENING

also 50k reads wtf ilygsm <3333

anywaysss, hope u enjoyed!

comment and vote!

love ya,

- lottie.

published: 8/22/24