one hundred and two - "dude, she's callie o'malley" - one hundred and two

The house was a mess. No matter how much laundry Amelia and Link did, the basket always seemed to be full. No matter how many dishes they loaded into the dishwasher, it seemed that everytime they passed by the sink it was full of dirty dishes again. The kids toys were all over the floor, their school supplies, laptops, and tablets spread out all over the place. Virtual learning was not the most effective thing, but it was the best for their family. Their class schedules were printed out and hanging on the fridge, daily alarms were set, and baby monitors were littered around the house. Anna's growing boxes of unopened insulin in the fridge now occupied two drawers. Everytime Amelia opened the fridge, she was reminded of her eldest niece's absence in the home.

Maggie and Amelia sat with Zola in the living room. Zola had been asking questions about Meredith and Anna more frequently, and so, they decided it was best to just be honest with her, "So, this morning they put your mom on a ventilator."

"That's the machine that breathes for her." Zola said.

"Yes."

"When will they take her off of it?"

"Different people come off of it at different times."

"My dad never did." The girl frowned, "Do you think my mom will?"

"We hope so. But we don't know. We just... We don't know."

"We shouldn't tell Bailey and Ellis." Zola's eyes filled with tears, "Not unless we need to. They're just too young to understand."

"Okay. We'll wait."

"What about sissy?"

"Sissy's doing better," Maggie hugged her, "We just have to wait and see."

"I miss her and mommy."

With COVID cases continuing to rise, the hospital was still at capacity and understaffed. And the staff that they did have- well, they were overworked and exhausted. Between running back and forth from Meredith's room to Anna's room, Richard was going insane. He stared at the eldest Shepherd child, looking over her stats on the monitors, before sighing and taking a seat at her bedside, "I miss hearing your voice, talking to you."

Richard eyed her pale face. She looked like she was sleeping peacefully. For her sake, he hoped she was. He never wanted her to hurt.

"You always were the best listener." He trailed off in thought, "Catherine and I... we're reconciling. And I know, after everything- I'm just spread thin here, Anna. I'm holding on... hardly. Your vitals are good, your glucose is in range... right now, you're better off than Meredith. Please, wake up for us. We need some good news. Lord knows we need it."

He left her room, the floor, and headed to a conference room where is wife was waiting for him. They both had a spare moment and wanted to unload the day's stress.

"You know, I built my life, my sanity, my sobriety… around the surrender to a higher power. I mean, for me, it’s the belief that there's some purpose. That there's a… a bigger plan. Something that if I got all the way above it and could look down on it like, um… Like a jigsaw puzzle, okay? That somehow it would… It would make sense. My faith is rooted in the trust that there's a… a meaning and a wisdom that I'm just not elevated enough to see or understand. A faith that whoever made this puzzle, it makes sense to Him. And it’s beautiful. Today, I'm… I'm struggling. I'm struggling with my faith. I'm struggling to trust anything. And I just cannot see any wisdom in this."