AN: This show makes it very hard to like Derek right now or want Meredith anywhere near him again. This is my therapy for last night.
What are you doing?"
Meredith had heard the voice come from behind her and knew who it was. She was expecting this since she stormed out of her session last night. She had been expecting this since she skipped the scheduled appointment she had with Dr. Wyatt this morning. She meant to miss it, she also had been swamped trying to go over the test results from the latest casualty of the clinical trial. Trying to find something out of his test results that she missed. She had locked herself away in front of a computer monitoring all the results all morning.
She knew it would be called avoiding. Avoiding Dr. Wyatt. Avoiding Derek. Avoiding Derek and Rose. She knew differently though, and she was tired of being told she was avoiding.
"I'm doing work." Meredith told the doctor without even a glance back. "Trying to save lives and all that. It's my job, it's what I'm here to do."
"I can see that Meredith, but we had a session."
"Not anymore we do. Nor will we again."
"Meredith.."
"No! Don't tell me that I have to go, don't tell me that I have no choice and don't you dare stand there and have the audacity to call me a coward because of accepting life as it is. You want to know why Derek's with Rose? How about the face it's what he wanted. It's what he chose. I wasn't good enough. I wasn't enough to wait for. He can spew all the sentiments of love, marriage, love of my life and all that but when it came down to it. He ran to go live happily ever after because it was easier, just like my father. So don't you dare stand there and blame me. I am tired, so tired of being blamed for everything. From him, from my parents and now from you. I'm done being the whipping post."
And with that Meredith stood up and left the computer area she had been hiding out at for the past few hours. Grabbing her files and heading for another area of seclusion.
"Meredith.." I heard Derek call to me as I raced down the hall to find a new place of seclusion. Which seemed to not happening at the moment especially with him on my heels. She was going to have to have no choice but to buck up and face him, he is her superior this could be work related, trial related, stopping and listening to him would not be avoiding.
"Yes, Dr. Shepherd?" I ask him stopping my movements to wait for what he basically chased me down the hall to say. Once I call him by his formal title, he looks taken back. He looks hurt, not sure what in the world he's hurt over. It's his name.
"Meredith, I just want to make sure you're ok after last night..." he said hesitantly to me. Now I was confused because this doesn't sound work related. This sounds friendly and we are not friends, I learned my lesson after the last time.
"Dr. Shepherd I have rounds and I have to finish my research on our last patient."
"I just.. Mere."
"Dr. Shepherd." I try to interrupt him from this personal place he wants to go. I glance around the nurses area to look for his nurse, why is she never around when I need her. Taking her boyfriend off my hands right about now so I can escape from what ever weird place he wants to go right now would really be handy.
"Stop calling me that." he barks angrily. I am taken back by his tone and bitterness. I quickly glance again around and still no Rose but her nurses crew are looking on with wonder. That's not good she thought and before she knew it, Derek had placed his hand on the small of her back and was pushing her into an exam room and locking the door.
Angry Derek who's with another woman, angry me, and a locked exam room, now this is bringing back memories. If he thinks he's getting deja vu he's sadly mistaken.
"What do you think you're doing?" I ask shocked and angry.
"I want to talk to you and I can't when you keep saying my name like that." he yelled back.
"Like what? Like professional, Dr. Shepherd? Hate to break it to you, but it's your name and I've been calling you it for a long time, so whats the difference now?"
"The difference now is it hurts, ok? Are you happy now, it hurts." I really don't know what to reply to that with, he left me, he chose the nurse, he's sleeping with the nurse and he has the nerve to tell me that me calling him by his name hurts him? What about how he's hurt me.
"What changed between yesterday and today?" I ask coolly, he looks taken back and surprised.
"What?"
"What changed between yesterday and today?" I ask back again in the same cool manner. I look him up and down and he isn't the Derek that she was in the OR with yesterday. He wasn't happy or excited. He looks tired, he looks miserable, he looks like he's in physically in pain.
"It just makes me feel like that's all I'll be . That for now on I'll just be Dr. Shepherd to you forever. That I've screwed up so much, that this pain I'll live with forever and I deserve it I know I do for what I've done to you and to us. But I just every time you say my name like that, it just like a knife to my heart." Ok now I really don't know what to say, he's standing here in tears in front of me. Admitting he screwed up to, admitting it's not all my fault and I'm speechless because all I've been hearing is that screwed up coward Meredith ruined things with McDreamy and here he is in pain blaming himself and not me.
"You think it's not all my fault?" I whisper so quietly I think he didn't hear me.
"Oh god Mer, I'm sorry. So sorry. I know it wasn't all your fault. I've been a fool, an impatient willing to settle fool. It's you, only you I've ever wanted."
"Ok." I tell him, because I can't come up with anything else.
"Ok?" he repeats back confused.
"You don't blame it all on me. I don't blame it all on you. We equal blame, so OK. Let's go to work." I say and move to get out of this exam room before I can reach the door he turns to me. "Meredith what does this mean?" I hear him say and it's so funny that I can't help but laugh at the irony of that question being asked in this room.
"Meredith?" he says my name confused as to what I found so funny.
"Do you remember the last time you asked me that in an exam room?" I saw him smirk, remembering prom night. Remembering how months of longing, aggression and just turmoil accumulated into an explosion of love.
"That won't happen again Derek." I tell him and his face immediately goes blank.
"You want to know what it means? It means you're still a man who's involved with another woman. It means I'm still a screwed up girl with commitment and trust issues. That doesn't change because you admit you screwed up too. It doesn't go away. Just like Rose won't go away. You want me to trust you, to believe in a house and future with you. Give me something to trust and believe in."
I tell him reminding us both of when I asked for a reason to believe. Before I once again turned to walk out the door looking back at him, he's got a little smile on his face.
"I'll see you after rounds, Derek" I tell him walking out into the hall. Knowing that using his name, that little step was making him smile and good enough for now.
I glance back at the nurses desk to see the same crew still there with now a scared looking Rose and smirking Mark. All focused on the empty exam room Derek had angrily pushed me into. I smile and nod a hello to Mark, who equally returns the gesture with approval and I think today was going to be a good day.
Much better than yesterday and tomorrow may be even better. Steps, I was taking steps.