May 2001 (A year and seven months earlier)

Covering her mouth as the exhaustion she'd been feeling all day-hit her once again, Gail blinked back the tears that had quickly followed her yawn-before politely excusing herself and drifting back towards the matter at hand.

"So, what seems to be the problem?"

The petite woman in front of her shrugged before hitting a few more keys on her keyboard, "I'm not certain, but it seems Dr. Morgan has added a couple of new employees to the staff list...most of them being in your department of course."

Smiling at the fact, Gail sighed with relief; having hoped for weeks that with so many surgeons and nurses leaving the small hospital, their resident advisor would try and hire more doctors. "So why the long face? This is a good thing."

"For you maybe," Karen said, turning her head to display the after effects of working a double shift to the older woman, "but not to someone who has to add three more hours to her already busy schedule. And to someone who has to take those three hours and put them into reviewing and entering all paperwork and random information into a too-slow-for-it's-own-good database. Not, and I repeat, NOT a good thing at all."

Playfully rolling her eyes at her friend's expression, Gail couldn't help but laugh at the tired woman in front of her. But all laughter was soon cut off as a high pitched scream was heard from down the hall.

"For the love of God, will you give him some drugs!"

Startled by the words, Gail and Karen, both peered down the hall in time to see two orderlies headed towards them with an occupied stretcher between the two. And if that wasn't enough to draw a response from them both, there were also four men chasing after the stretcher, with what Gail assumed to be looks of panic written across their faces.

Forgetting the exhaustion she had felt before, Gail quickly slipped into work mode, and darted around the nurse's station; cutting the two orderlies and group of men off. "I'm Dr. Rodriguz..what seems to be the problem?"

Even though she was talking to the two men in uniform, it was one of the other men who answered her question instead.

"Our friend..Joey. He cut his leg."

Glancing briefly at the man who had spoken, Gail frowned as she realized the dark haired man in front of her seemed to be having somewhat of a panic attack. Turning her head for a second to see if any of the other men were having the same kind of breathing problem as well, Gail made a slight hand signal to Karen before finally directing her attention towards the patient at hand.

Or better yet towards the patient's lower body; which seemed to be covered in blood at the moment.

"Oh my.." Was the first words that came out of her mouth as she quickly examined the roll of paper towels-that someone, she assumed had used as a makeshift gauze-in hopes of applying enough pressure to the wound to make the cut stop bleeding. "This is some sort of incision..."

Just as soon as those six words flew out of her mouth, Gail began to act on autopilot; commanding the two orderlies-that she didn't bother asking names of-to take the patient into room number 9, where she'd be with him shortly. And commanding Karen to show the other men, excluding the now full-on hyperventilating man, to the waiting area-where they could sit and wait until either Gail or Karen had updates on 'Joey's' condition for them.

"All right, now you.." Gail began, not bothering to wait until the others had completely left, before turning towards the hyperventilating man, "I want you to calm down and breathe with me, okay?"

"Bu...Jo.." He began, the shortness of his breathing evident in his voice. "He..needs me."

"No." Gail said, as she took a step closer to the man; putting an arm slightly around his shoulder to rub his back soothingly, "What your friend needs is for you to breath with me. Can you do that for him? Breath with me."

Taking a deep breath in, Gail began gently coaching the slightly shorter male on breathing; telling him to take slow deep breaths in and slow deep breaths out, until he was able to breath easily without her help. "There you go. That's a good boy."

She hadn't realized what she had said until the man, who she had her arm around, began to lightly chuckle; causing her to smile as well.

"Will you be able to head out into the waiting room now, or do you want me to stay with you for a couple more minutes?"

At remembering where he was, the amusement on the man's face quickly went away. But strangely enough, a slight smile was still on his face, "No, I'll be fine....you just need to go in there with Jo."

Nodding her head, Gail looked the man over once more before reluctantly turning away from him and making her way towards the direction in where she had pushed the two orderlies in.

Hoping the man behind her, and the man she was going to see, would both be okay.

"God, if you make this pain go away, I will never look....no, I swear I will never look or play another woman as long as I live...."

Trailing off as another shot of pain hit him, Joey closed his eyes and cursed himself as he realized even prayer wasn't helping him right now.

Maybe I should try something else.

"Shoot me..for the love of God will somebody please just shoot me right now. I'll give you anything you want, if you just shoot me."

"Well, violence really isn't part of the job, but if you insist...."

Momentarily forgetting the pain for a second, Joey's eyes popped open as he heard another voice, besides his own, in the room.

Slightly sitting up, before opening his mouth to ask her who she was, Joey cringed as the pain in his leg screamed at him to be noticed.

"Don't move." The woman began, before she was quickly by his side; laying him back down on the stretcher, "From the looks of things you've suffered a deep cut near the Extensor digitorum longus part of your leg."

Letting a deep breath out as he realized the throbbing pain in his leg had lessened a little, Joey moved his brown eyes to the woman's identical brown eyes; displaying confusion all over his face.

Noting this, the doctor-he guessed-smiled sheepishly, "Basically you've got a large piece of your lower knee cut into two, and from the looks of things either we're going to have to get you a pretty big Band-Aid or stitch this baby up. Your choice, of course."

Breathing a sigh of relief, as he realized the woman had mentioned nothing about surgery-since that was all the group needed at the moment-Joey closed his eyes and quickly said a "Thank God" before opening them once again; meeting the doctors gaze head on. "How long will I have to be in here?"

"From the looks of things," She began, placing a hand on Joey's leg-far enough away from the wound to not send him into hysterics, but close enough for the throbbing pain to take over Joey once again. "I'd have to say you'll be out of here in less than 48 hours, but I wont know until we wheel you down to the X-ray room."

Nodding as the woman took her hand off his leg, Joey sighed as the pain slightly subsided. "I'm ready whenever you are."

Not more than a half-n-hour later, Gail opened the door to the private waiting room-where Karen had informed her Joey's friends were seated in-and was slightly startled as she noticed that with the other four men came several other men; ones whom Gail couldn't help but widen her eyes at.

And ones whom she quickly wondered if she'd seen on America's most wanted the week before.

"Are all of you here for Mr. Fatone?"

As her confused voice echoed throughout the room, all brief commotion in the room seemed to stop and all eyes seemed to be on her; causing Gail to slightly gulp.

"How's Jo?"

Turning her head away from the rather large men in front of her, Gail smiled slightly as she locked eyes with the hyperventilating man from before; glad to see he was doing just as good as his friend was. Even better, it seemed. "Mr. Fatone is doing fine. As we speak, I have Karen, the nurse you met before, prepping him for surgery."

"Surgery!"

The exclaim was heard throughout the room, and as she noticed what was going on, Gail almost blushed as she realized that her words were taken a completely different way than she had meant for them to be taken. "Not..not that kind of surgery."

It took a few more tries at trying to talk over the group of people in front of her, but after a few more seconds a man-that she hadn't noticed before-stepped forward; huskily commanding everyone to hush up.

Which they did as soon as the words were uttered.

Seeing as this was her chance, Gail began again using a less medical approach, "Excuse my medical language from before. What your friend went through, to my recollection, was a trap door slamming down on his leg. And whereas he wont need full surgery as he would have if he would've tore the whole muscle of his Ex-...leg. He still will have to go through slight 'surgery'-meaning he'll have to have stitches."

It took a few seconds, but one-by-one the somewhat large group of people in front of Gail began to fully comprehend what she had just said. And one by one, they begin to smile.

Realizing their friend would be okay.

"So, how are you doing over there, Mr. Fatone?"

Sighing as he realized the medicine the doctor had given him a few short minutes ago was finally starting to take effect, Joey slightly smiled. "I'm fine..but call me Jo..or Joey. Mr. Fatone is my dad."

Gail nodded and smiled at this, before asking the nurse-who she was working with-for a surgical blade.

"Do you mind if I ask you how long you've been doing this?"

Handing the blade back to the other woman, Gail continued with what she was doing before answering the question. "Not as long as you let me ask you how long you've been singing."

The slight tense in his leg gave away Joey's surprise without either of them having to mention it.

Or at least without Gail having to mention it.

"How'd you-"

"I've been working here for almost four years." Gail started, cutting Joey off, "My sister and I moved here when I was eighteen, she was sixteen. And I quickly got my doctorate degree at Alcoln State University."

Silently nodding at her words, Joey took in what she told him; growing confused by the second.

"If you don't mind me asking, how old are you? I mean, you don't look a day over twenty-five, but if my math is accurate-which it probably isn't-you should be...thirty?"

Their was a brief pause; one which even the nurse-who Joey hadn't really paid much attention to-noticed as well.

"Actually, I'm thirty-two...I took a couple years off between here and college."

With that being said, Gail continued silently working on Joey's leg as a strange silence crept into the room; one which wasn't broken for another ten minutes.

A full ten minutes where Joey wondered if he had said the wrong thing.

"Well, Mr. Fatone, it looks like my job here is done."

Looking from the doctor to his leg, which was still covered in dry blood, Joey couldn't help but grin as he saw the stitches were in-and his recovery was starting to take place. "Thank God....and thank you."

Gail smiled down at Joey as she took her gloves off, and threw them in the biohazard waste basket-next to his bed. "Don't mention it, you were a pleasure to work on."

Looking up from his leg, Joey returned the smile before opening his mouth; his words from earlier coming back to him. "Well, you didn't exactly shoot me..but you made the pain go away, so what is it that I can get you?"

Lifting the rails up on each side of his bed; preparing to take Joey into another room, Gail furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "Excuse me?"

Moving a hand from his side, Joey placed it on Gail's arm; causing her to stop and look at him confused. "I said before I'll give you anything you want if you just shoot me. And even though you didn't shoot me, a promise is still a promise. So...what do you want?"

Their was a brief pause between the two of them as Gail studied Joey's facial expression; wondering if he was serious or not.

He was.

"Well," She began, not really knowing what to say to his offer. "I've always wanted my own flower shop, but I guess I'll skip that request for now and ask for something else. Something that only you can give me."

Raising an eyebrow at this, Joey had to stop his mind from quickly going to the gutter-and his eyes from traveling over the doctors' body, "What can I..what is it you want?"

Smiling mischievously, Gail made her way towards the top part of the stretcher; pushing it slightly so the bed would move. "What I want...." She paused, waiting until she had pushed Joey all the way out of the room, and almost halfway down the hall, before continuing, "is for your friends, JC and Justin, to take a hike for a while, and let you and Chris take over a few solos. Can you do that for me?"

Shifting his head so he could see if she was serious or not, Joey couldn't help but chuckle as Gail shot him a mock looking innocent smile.

"I'll have to see what I can do."

****