Cristina intrigues me – there's so many facets of her personality that she's a writer's dream. As a side note, I hate writers who spell her name "Christina". It's like people who say Meredith "Gray" or misspell "Weasley" as "Weasly" in the HP forum. KNOW YOUR FANDOM, PEOPLE!!
Saying Uncle
Cristina Yang does not say "uncle". She never has – not when her mother remarried, not when Miranda Bailey threatened to keep her out of the O.R. for erasing her name, not when the Chief himself wanted to know which of the interns had cut the L-VAD wire, and she certainly won't do it for Preston Burke. Preston Burke is just a man, albeit an intelligent one who could make a better meal in an hour than she could in a day.
She is not the type of woman meant for mind games and tugs at heartstrings, because she will always win. She is clinically detached, a machine, and that almost always benefits her. Except now. Except this time, when her stubborn refusal to be less than the best has caused an eerie silence to permeate her home – a silence that even Cristina Yang, who could go days without a conversation, can't stand. It's the type of silence that gets under her skin, the type that follows her even to Seattle Grace, the one place she should be untouchable. Invincible.
This was almost as bad as being the pregnant girl who cared.
She wasn't cut out for intimacy. She had Meredith, her person, and that should have been enough. She didn't need her family, let alone a man. She's played Say "Uncle" before. She has cousins that she hasn't talked to since before she hit double digits.
She used to miss them, and she misses Burke now. Even so, she won't speak first. It goes against her nature, her upraising. To give in, to cave, to assume the submissive stance…it goes against every rule she's ever made for herself. Rule number one: vacations are for the lazy. She works through Thanksgivings, Christmases, birthdays, and Fourth of Julys. She hasn't gone anywhere for Spring Break since junior high; there's always a million better things to do, and she's never been a fan of the sun.
Rule number two: never accept lower wages than male coworkers, it's degrading. Rule number three: no serious relationships. She's not insane – she likes sex, loves sex, but she can't stand commitment. She's the girl who sleeps with the professor, but she'd never dream of marrying him. Marriage is for the weak-minded and feeble – the women who don't mind being second to a man. Cristina Yang is not that woman.
Or at least she wasn't, before him. He's like a virus, attacking her system and she doesn't think he'll ever leave. If he stays, she remains the pregnant girl who cares, with the estrogen and the hormones and the crying. If he goes, she's back to being the robotic sentient being she was in medical school, and she's not sure she wants to be that person.
What she's sure of is that she can't take the silence anymore. She can't stare him in the eye and not speak to him, not whine about Meredith's McCrap or Bambi, or discuss the surgeries she scrubbed in on. Without speaking to him, it's like she's watching her life, but not living her life. Like she's not in control.
Sometimes, saying "Uncle" is better than saying nothing at all.
