Disclaimer: Grey's Anatomy and these characters are the property of Shonda Rhimes and ABC. I do not own anything. This story is for entertainment purposes only. No copyright infringement is intended.

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"Take care, now." Cristina handed the note back to Owen and walked off into the night, leaving him feeling more bewildered than he'd been since that first day when he'd put his train wreck of a life under the magnifying glass of psychotherapy. He stood there indecisively for a few long moments and pondered what had just occurred. Cristina had looked absolutely crushed, and Owen had the distinct impression that despite his good intentions, he'd done even more damage and fucked things up yet again. Not that there was much to fuck up anymore, not where Cristina was concerned anyway. He had seen to that. Yet he had to keep reminding himself all the same, because their relationship seemed to be a living, breathing entity despite the fact they had both stopped feeding it weeks ago. While it was true that he had felt silly using those ridiculous three word sentences on Cristina, it was also true that he had trusted in the certainty that keeping her out of his life was the right thing to do. It had to be better for her if he stayed away. He was toxic. He was a one-man wrecking ball. I didn't occur to him until he saw the tears rolling down her cheeks and heard the devastation in her voice that there might be more pain for her in his distance than in all the incidents that caused it.

"Take care, now." If only he could be sure what she meant. Was it her way of saying she loved him back, or a sarcastic response to being pushed away after what they had been through together? It was all he could do to keep himself from running after her and asking the question, but the part of him that wanted to keep her safe at all costs glued his shoes to the pavement. He had no right to clarity on this. He had no right to ask for anything at all. He stood there in silence for another moment, then began his leaden journey to his truck, back to the place where he always parked it, the place where Cristina had, earlier today, found it and saved a man's life with what he kept in his glove compartment for emergencies. He had never yet had to stop at the scene of an accident and use the stuff, but he would be sure to replenish it just in case.

If only stopping this bleeder was as simple.

He moved on autopilot, his feet tracing the well-traveled steps through the deserted employee lot, his eyes downcast, and that was why he was almost at his truck before he noticed Cristina's small frame leaning up against his driver's side door. He hesitated for half a step before continuing toward her. Part of him desperately wanted this confrontation - anything to re-engage with her, even in anger. Another part of him dreaded what it would take to distance from her yet again when it was over.

She pushed away from the door as he neared, and walked up to him, her eyes now free of tears and blazing with indignation.

"You suck, you know that? You SUCK." She punctuated that last statement with a shove to his chest. Owen put his hands up in a placating gesture and took a step back.

"Cristina, I..."

"No, shut UP. You don't get to say anything. Now it's my turn to talk. You don't get to call all the shots here. I have a say. You don't get to tell me you have those three words for me and then give up on us in the same breath. You don't. You think you did this terrible thing to me that night, but this... this thing you're doing now... it's way worse."

"Cristina, you broke up with me, remember? You said you couldn't do this."

"I don't care what I said. I didn't mean THIS. I didn't mean that I would just be another resident to you, someone to treat like everyone else, someone you say stupid things like "Hey there, now" to. I didn't mean THAT. Seriously! That doesn't even sound like you! And don't tell me you weren't trying to push me away, too. You would have ended it if I hadn't."

"Yeah, I would," he pleaded. "You deserve so much better than me. I'm a complete mess. I'm not fit to be with anyone right now."

That statement seemed to incense her, and he could practically see the sparks. Her voice took on a new and almost frightening intensity. "You ASSHOLE. How do you know what I deserve? Huh? Who died and made you Chief?" Her hands were balled up at her sides, and the thought crossed his mind that she was resisting the urge to punch him. "You wanna know what I fucking deserve? I deserve a guy who won't bail on me and wrap it up all pretty like he's giving me a present. You think you're the first one to do this to me? Well get in line, Hotshot. This is the fucking story of my life." She looked away for a moment, and her tears began to well up again. "...Only this time I actually care enough to fight back."

His heart, already broken, was shattering into small pieces at her words. "Cristina...."

"Shut UP! You know, you're just arrogant enough to think you broke me when you got involved with me, but you didn't. I swear you didn't. I was already broken when you came along, Owen... really badly broken. You helped me. You helped me believe I could do better than some self-important tool who would have the gall to ask me to marry him and then leave me at the altar. He let me off the hook too, didn't he? How gracious of him. What a nice gift. And you know what? I suffered over that for a long time, but when I met you, I was glad. I was glad I didn't marry him because that meant I was single when you came along, and when I got a load of you I really wanted to be available..."

Owen could barely keep up with what he was hearing; her past, her feelings for him when they met, her resentment of his attempt to protect her - it was too much to process all at once. He searched her eyes and saw her raw vulnerability as the tears began their slow trail down her face.

"Owen, you are so much better than he ever was, WE are so much better, even if you're too blinded by this martyr thing you're doing to see it." Cristina took a breath and stood up straighter, her spine stiffening with determination. She moved in closer and poked her finger at his chest, and her words became very deliberate. "So listen up, you jerk. I would rather wait an eternity for you to get better than try and find someone to equal the man you are to me. I'm in this with you whether you like it or not. So if all I can get from you is a bunch of meaningless three word sentences in the meantime, if all you can do is treat me like everyone else, I'm telling you now I won't be able to stand it." Her voice broke momentarily and she paused before continuing with a soft plea. "If you really feel like you say you feel, you'll have to do better than that."

They were standing so close he could smell her shampoo, and without conscious thought he suddenly found himself pulling her in close and crushing his mouth against hers. Cristina melted in his arms and kissed him back with everything she had, all her anger transforming into a a desperate need to be near him. Owen pulled her hips in to his, felt her rub herself up against the front of his jeans, and let out a low growl of longing. He ran his hands up her back, burying his fingers in her hair, and caressed her neck as their tongues found each other again. The taste of her was intoxicating after such a long drought, and he tried to infuse every kiss, every touch with all the feelings he'd been bottling up for weeks.

In the small part of Owen's brain that was still capable of thinking rationally, he realized there would be time later to berate himself for giving in to this, plenty of empty moments to contemplate how it might be possible that he had not been the one to break her, to wonder what the hell she'd meant about being left at the altar by whoever had come before him. Right now, all of that was meaningless data, and the only thing that mattered was to connect with her physically, to stay present in this moment, to hold her tightly and show her how he really felt without worrying about those three words he wasn't supposed to say. If he didn't actually say them, maybe he could get away with a few minutes of pleasure before he had to shut the door again. So he kissed her and nibbled on her ear, making his way down her neck to the place that made her shiver. And she gave in to the sensations and sought out his mouth with hers over and over again, thinking all the while that this had to be real, this couldn't be a fleeting thing, there was no way she'd been wrong about him - not him, not Owen. This deep connection, the passion they shared, the way they understood each other without words, was the solid foundation to everything that mattered in her life since he came along. Losing Burke had damaged her, but losing Owen - that would truly destroy her.

Neither one of them wanted to end the embrace, and they stood there for a long time after the initial flame banked itself, kissing and touching each other gently. He wanted more. He wanted to pull her into his truck and take her home, carry her upstairs, and nail her to the bed with his erection. He wanted to channel all of the sadness and frustration and anger he had been feeling lately into an intense release in her arms. He wanted to give her so much pleasure she would cry his name out over and over and forget everything he had ever done to hurt her. And he knew with certainty that none of this was going to happen tonight; that if they attempted it, somewhere between getting in the truck and arriving at his place, they would realize it was a terrible idea. He could save them both a lot of grief by bringing this to a close here and now.

"Cristina..."

"Shhh. Quiet. Don't say anything."

She had nestled her face in the crook of his neck, and he rested his chin on top of her head as his mind began to clear. In the reality he had constructed for himself since starting therapy, this was supposed to be wrong, but it didn't feel wrong. Wyatt had told him early on that he had been disconnected from his feelings for a long time, and he knew he was only now getting back in touch with them. Perhaps this was part of that process. Until this moment, the only place where his gut had spoken to him lately had been at work, his intuition taking over when the desperate cases came in and there was no time to ponder all the alternatives. He had spent hours on Wyatt's couch analyzing his relationship with Cristina, had talked himself into a shitload of guilt, but until now he hadn't just let himself go with his feelings or even considered what it might be like to allow her to support him through his ordeal. He had been afraid to - afraid he would hurt her again, afraid he wouldn't be able to stop himself this time, afraid of his potential to wreak havoc with her life. It occurred to him, standing there in the parking lot with Cristina, that perhaps he was overthinking this. He had gone with his gut in the most elemental way tonight, and while he was shaken from the flood of emotion that had engulfed them, they were both still standing nonetheless. Was it possible he needed to depend less on his analytical skills and more on his heart to figure this out?

When a life was at stake, didn't you just have to use what worked, and fuck the FDA?

She finally broke the silence. "Walk me home."

"Cristina..."

"Just shut up and walk me home," she insisted, and slid herself around to his side, her arm around his waist and his around her shoulders. The way they fit together so naturally was sweet torture for him. They walked in silence the short distance to her front stoop and she turned to him, stretching upward to reach his lips with a soft kiss.

"Don't say anything. Just listen." Owen was pensive and silent. She could see the wheels were turning in his head, and she continued. "I get that we can't be together right now. I get that you have more work to do. But as long as I know we still have this, I can get through it, even if it doesn't happen again for a long time. Just don't lie to me anymore, ok? Cut out the moronic three word sentences that you don't mean. If you can't say something honest to me, then don't say anything at all. I'd rather you didn't speak to me than hear that phony crap you dished out today."

He smiled a little in spite of himself. "That bad, huh?"

"Worse," she retorted. "Now go home before I drag you upstairs and rip your clothes off."

He pulled her to him one more time and gave her a fierce kiss, one for the road that would hopefully last them both a while. The path ahead was a long one, but for the first time in weeks, Owen could look at the journey with something other than utter despair. Wyatt had said something about navigating to somewhere better, and he felt like they had just drawn the first tentative line on that map.

He watched as Cristina took out her key and let herself into the building, the door closing behind her.

But not forever. Maybe not forever.

----THE END----

A/N: Please review. Whatever you have to say, I want to hear it!