Author's Note: Yeah, so I wanted to try something different and I haven't written any real angsty fics, so I decided to give it a try. Not my best, but I don't think it's my worst either. I was inspired to do a crossover by mystripedskirt's Where I Stood (go! read! it!), which has some nice Gilmore Girls stuff going on. This is dedicated to Hannah, because Dernier Cri's "Finding the End" is pure angst-ridden goodness.
Disclaimer: I don't claim to own The Clique or Grey's Anatomy (the lovely-ful Shonda Rhimes does.) Looking forward to some more MerDer next season. I was nervous when they were talking about putting "kids' rooms" in the new house. Good lord. Meredith, I love ya a lot, but you'd make one screwy mother.
I'LL WAIT
-A Clique/Grey's Anatomy crossover by: Honour Society-
Wisps of dark tresses pushed behind her ears, the girl seemed devoid of hope, of life, and utterly alone in the world. Her mother and father were en route to Switzerland for some charity event or another, explained the girl, and she didn't want to bother them. They were doing something good for the world, she said, and what was she doing? "Just wasting taxpayers' money."
--
Meredith suspected that this girl didn't want to be a burden upon her family, friends, anyone. In another life, this girl had been strong. Stronger than most girls her age. Meredith recalled the way the girl sighed and rolled her eyes when asked to confirm her age. "Thirteen," she'd answered, before frowning and adding, "unfortunately."
--
The look of appreciation that passed by the patient's eyes as the head neurosurgeon at Seattle Grace Hospital, dubbed "McDreamy" by last year's interns, did not go unnoticed by Meredith Grey. She smiled at the display of affection. Usually by this stage in the disease her emotions would be lessening. It was good for the girl to feel.
"Hello, I'm Dr. Derek Shepherd and this is Dr. Callie Torres," the dashing dark-haired doctor gestured to the petite, curvy Hispanic woman standing beside him. She cracked a toothy smile and half-waved at the young girl lying wordlessly in the hospital bed. The girl said nothing.
"Apparently you're not big on talking. Okay. Well," Shepherd hesitated, taking in a sharp inhalation of breath. "As you know by now, you've been diagnosed with Kearns-Sayre Syndrome. If you have any questions, feel free to ask me, or Dr. Grey or Dr. Torres and we'll answer them to the best of our abili—"
--
"How long do I have to live?" asked the girl bluntly one day, while Meredith's group of hung-over interns were all mysteriously out with "sushi poisoning." It was quite clear to the entire hospital staff, they were hung over from a night of drinking and debauchery, but the Chief of Surgery had no comment on the matter.
Squinting through amber eyes, it was obvious to Meredith, Derek, and Callie, alike that her tunnel vision had kicked in.
After exchanging worried glances, Meredith stepped up, "KSS is a progressive disorder. Cases have been documented of patients living for years after their initial diagnoses." Derek looked appeased with this response, but the girl betrayed no such sentiments.
"Then this thing inside me will only get worse." She didn't ask for confirmation this time. Meredith was glad, too. Meredith would've had to agree. The disease would only get worse, but that was no reason for such a young girl to lose faith.
--
No one had visited her in the three weeks she'd been at Seattle Grace. It made Meredith's heart cry.
--
"Please." Amber eyes locked onto blue. "I want to go home. Why won't anyone let me go? I hate it here!"
Even though the girl was completely stationary, her muscles wound up so tightly that she couldn't move much, her eyes were alit with fire.
"I. Want. To. Go. Home."
"I'm sorry, you just… You can't, okay?" Meredith wanted, with all her power, not to have to say no to this girl. She wanted to send her home, wanted the girl to live her life, but knew it was impossible. She could hardly move.
"I'm a freak," she insisted from the dismal comfort of her private room. "It's no wonder no one's visiting me." And with that statement, the girl eye's shut slowly. Meredith wondered if they would ever open again. Meredith wondered if it was because the girl was sick of talking to her or the rare disease that was slowly killing her, which made her close her eyes.
Meredith wondered if she was usually such a hassle.
--
For days after her outburst, patient 02034 was utterly silent. If Meredith didn't know any better, she would've suspected the girl of being mute. If Meredith didn't know any better, she might've considered the girl thoughtless, opinion-less. She knew both those statements to be false, however.
Occasionally, Meredith thought she saw a flicker of — of something in the girl's startlingly yellow-toned eyes. Of course, her feelings were practically unreadable, through her silent and squinting eyes.
--
In the past days, Meredith's patient had attempted to "escape" from the confines of her "sterile little prison," as the girl insisted upon calling Seattle Grace. Seven. Separate. Times.
They'd had many patients desperate for attention, but somehow, someway, Meredith thought maybe this girl wasn't just "attention-seeking" like Meredith had scrawled in her imperfect penmanship on the patient's report. Maybe she was looking for something different; something more.
Maybe she wanted a friend.
--
As these things usually happen, Meredith Grey was correction in her assumption that her patient needed someone by her side, through the pain, which Meredith knew would be excruciating — despite the series of pain medication she took daily.
Meredith decided to be that someone.
"Hey," the doctor said one rainy Seattle morning — that wasn't saying much, she knew, as everyday is pretty much a rainy one in Seattle — , "How are things?"
One eye opened. Well, it opened as much as an advanced case of Kearns-Sayre would allow for.
"Crappy."
"Tell me about it." Meredith leaned in conspiratorially, "my boyfriend has these… plans for us."
"Who's your boyfriend?" Smiling just slightly, and twitching her fingers — the only movements she still had control over — to the beat of a song playing only inside her own mind, she added, "Is he hot?"
"Oh, yes. Way hot."
And that was how, at 11:43 AM on a typical rainy Seattle Sunday, Meredith Grey befriended a patient, daring to cross lines she'd put up when she started interning. Crossing lines, Meredith learned, was worth it sometimes.
--
Brought on by the ridiculous amount of time Massie Block spent on her limited-edition purple, Swarovski crystal-studded cell phone, conversing with her loose-lipped compatriots, a certain shaggy-haired boy arrived on the doorstep of Seattle Grace. He was completely stationary, much like the frail brunette he was coming to see.
Rain poured down upon him; pelting him; sticking his baggy t-shirt and soccer shorts to his frame. He couldn't move. He wished he could; wished he could get up the nerve to pull open that glass door, stomp over to the front desk and demand to see her. He wished he could, but he couldn't.
He brushed away his too-long bangs from his golden brown eyes and shivered, though he'd become almost immune to the cold in all his days, weeks, years spent jumping up and down inside a net, waiting to make the "great save" that would make her notice him.
"Waiting for something?"
Turning at the sound of a sly, slightly raspy voice, he found himself face-to-face with a statuesque redhead. She turned her sympathetic gaze on him. "Aren't you cold?" She tried another question, hoping to get a response — Is this kid sick?
"N— No." He answered confidently, pointedly avoiding her harsh stare. She grinned at the effect she had on teenage boys; it could come in handy sometimes.
"Ah. I see. I'll let you in two little secrets." The redhead, whose hospital I.D. card identified her as Dr. Addison Forbes Montgomery — Visiting, held up her index finger, while using her other hand to balance a simple black umbrella. "We're all waiting for someone." She added another finger. "She'll want to know how you feel."
"Okay." He said, not confirming nor denying that he was waiting for a girl.
Addison suddenly smiled. "Or he will."
"I'm not gay!"
--
"Massie. You have a visitor." Meredith Grey wasn't one to get too emotional with patients, but even she had to smile at the soaking-wet boy — "cute" by the standards of any young girl — who'd arrived at the reception desk, just as Meredith was descending the grand staircase.
The boy had introduced himself as "Derrick; Massie and I go to school together." Meredith didn't bother pointing out that it was highly unlikely Massie would be returning to Westchester in September.
Massie nodded, only semi-consciously and Meredith almost caught herself in a disappointed frown. Where had the emotion she'd seen in the girl gone? Why was she suddenly so devoid of life and passion?
"Come in…" croaked the girl hoarsely. Her voice was going out too, Meredith sourly noted.
"I'll leave you two alone." Meredith winked not-so-subtly at Massie, who not-so-subtly rolled her eyes in response.
--
With Derrick Harrington sitting on the foot of her hospital bed, legs swinging, Massie wished that he would magically transform into her dog, Bean, or her mother, Kendra, or even Claire who she didn't really like in the first place! Anyone but Derrington, who was practically a stranger to her.
Of course she'd seen him at soccer games; seen him block shot after shot after shot, and yet she had never heard a drop of gossip about him dating anyone. It was a preposterous idea that in the elitist community of Westchester's young, bright, and gorgeous that a first-string soccer play would want to spend so much time alone, or just hanging out with his buddies, when he could've had any girl.
Any girl, with the notable exception of Massie Block.
--
"Why,"
"I was worried about you, Block." Endearingly, the tips of his freckled ears blushed pink. "Everyone is."
"Clearly you're mistaken." The brunette who'd been the object of his affection for so long replied haughtily. "Or you wouldn't be the first visitor I've had since I came to this damn place."
"They are worried." With a newfound courage from a deep place inside him, he continued: "I'm just worried a little bit more."
--
Even with the tiny machine, a pacemaker, inside of her chest, nothing could stop the sudden heart blockage. He knew something was wrong, even without glancing at the various scanners and screens surrounding her, watching her. He scrambled to press the button above her bed, like he'd seen on General Hospital.
A flood of nurses came in, with Meredith clutching a sparkly pager, Callie wide-eyed, and Derek frowning, close behind them.
"Oh, god." Callie grabbed her own — noticeably less sparkly — pager from the waistband of her ice blue scrubs. "Paging Dr. Hahn."
"What's happening?" Derrick asked at the exact same time Massie mumbled, "What's wrong with me? Why am I dying so soon?"
--
Being rushed through the hospital on her way to OR 1, Derrick's eyes never left Massie's. He never left her side. And when her bony, pale fingers grabbed his own, he held on for dear life.
"Wait for me," she said as the stretcher crossed beyond the yellow HOSPITAL PERSONNEL ONLY: DO NOT CROSS tape on the marble floor.
"I will," he said, loud enough for only her ears to hear. "I'll wait."
Author's Note: For anyone who's wondering about it, Kearns-Sayre Syndrome is an actual disease. I had a hard time finding a rare one that wasn't featured on Grey's already!