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Here We Go Again
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"You really think this is a good idea?" Alex asks as he pushes Addison into Mark's backseat. He groans and curses when Derek tries to go back into Joe's and after a five minute struggle he finally gets his other friend in the car.
Mark wipes the non-existent sweat from his forehead and leans against the door for a second to make sure that the message is clear for Derek. "I can handle them."
"Yeah but who would want to? They're divorced and they hate each other." Alex scowls at drunk Addison who is drawing pictures on the tinted glass with her pointer finger completely oblivious as to who is in the vehicle with her.
"They don't hate each other." Mark checks his watch, "And they aren't divorced yet. Three more hours and they'll make it count, trust me."
"I don't want to know." Alex turns around and heads back in the door for his abandoned beer and darts without asking how Mark got roped into this whole situation. If he has asked the answer he would have gotten would have been Joe calling the only guy he could think of when both McDreamy and McHot became McSulky and McPouty.
"Alright where to?" Mark questions strapping himself into the silver sedan. Technically the car is Addison's but having a spare key does tend to help when what you drive is a motorcycle. She doesn't seem to care so he revs the engine a bit for effect and to warn them that if they are going to vomit on the ride they had better do it now and get it over with. "Derek, man, you want to go to the trailer?"
"I hate the trailer." He broods and looks up at Mark with the face of a four year old who just dropped his ice cream cone on the sidewalk.
"I like it." Addison giggles and Derek finally and equally distastefully, takes notice of who he is sharing the backseat with.
"You would." Derek fires immediately and Mark watches in the review mirror as Addison tilts her head to the side in thought. He suddenly wishes that this was a taxi or a police car or a limo- anything with some sort of barrier in between the two compartments in case things get ugly. And things will probably get a little ugly, for a little while, just before things get a little out of hand and he'd rather not be around for either part. He's sick of watching these two. Nearly fourteen years and he finally wants to throw in the towel on the DerekandAddison parade.
"No you would." Addison demands seconds later and Mark prepares himself for the, "Did/Did not." battle of the night to begin.
"Addison?" Mark asks trying to pull them out of the forth round, "Addie!"
"Hmm?" She purses her lips and drops a warm hand on his shoulder.
Mark nearly swerves when he realizes that Karev wasn't man enough to get her into a seatbelt and that Addison is just this side of drunk enough to not care whether or not she gets destroyed in a rainy car crash. "Do you want to go back to the hotel?"
"I don't have any-where else ta'go." She slurs and slops back into her seat. "I'm all alone. Me. Jus' me."
"And Derek." Mark chimes in when she starts to sink too far down in self pity. "You have Derek."
"Derek hates me." She asserts, "I'm an adulterous bitch haven't you heard? You and me are the dirty sociopaths Mark...Marky Mark...Mark."
"Oh god, here we go." Mark mutters under his breath and checks the back seat to make sure that the head Derek has glued to the cool window isn't actually unconscious. "I don't hate you." He hears a few minutes later as Addison continues to ramble about how she's all alone in the world and in a car with two people whose lives she has ruined. Apparently, the redhead is the more drunk of the two. Derek's just drunk enough to be deeply remorseful. Mark takes a long drag of air readying himself for the tumultuous exploration this evening will result in.
"You don't? Why not? I hate me." Addison turns to Derek and frowns, "I wasn't a-good wife."
"I wasn't a good husband." He replies and finally peels his skin away from the glass to see her teary, bloodshot eyes. "Good thing we're almost divorced then."
"Yeah." She nods and looks out at the city lights as they speed by. "Pull over!"
"I'm on the freeway Addison, I can't just stop."
"I think you should stop Mark." Derek agrees looking at his companion's now greenish tint. "She's going to throw up."
"No really?" Mark quips sarcastically and takes the first offramp her can find only to hear a window rolling down in the rear of the car. "Can't you wait?" He doesn't get a response but does get a glimpse of Derek rubbing her back softly. In theory he should be making sure she doesn't fall out of the car but if she did he could only guess that everyone at work would say that Derek pushed her. Mark smirks at the thought because they don't know. They all think that these two hate each other. They don't. They just can't be married anymore. It's that simple. He eases the vehicle into an abandoned parking lot and cuts the engine. They could be here a while. Leaning back into the cushy headrest he stretches out his neck and counts the seconds down.
"Ok." Derek announces after Mark has lost count. He flips around to see his friend's hand on a knee that is not his own and knows that he accurately assessed the evening the first time when talking to the stupid intern. For the second time, however, he wishes for a divider because the only thing worse than a fighting, drunk Derek and Addison is a drunk, touchy-feely Derek and Addison. He swallows heavily and succeeds in getting back out onto the main road before he hears the light moans. Pushing up his line of vision to the rearview mirror he sees Addison provocatively stretched out on top of Derek and rolls his eyes. If they get pulled over for this little stunt he will mock them mercilessly as payback and make sure to get copies of their mugshots to scan and email to the family.
It's the least he could do really.
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Mark managed to ignore the breathy groans, the light sucking sounds and the swishing of fabric for the entire duration. He was even able to turn up the volume on the radio just enough so that he didn't get the full song but more of a muted, edited edition that still allowed him to make sure they were both alive back there and not seductively/passive aggressively finding ways to kill each other with words. He forwent the trailer knowing, no matter how much he hated it (and honestly its consequences), they were going to find a way to be together tonight. It's ironically fitting like that. Anniversaries they both forget but divorces are special occasions for some reason.
Sometimes, like now, as they slowly work their way through the lobby and Derek slips a hand into Addison's jeans pocket, Mark really wishes that he could find new friends because these two are so fucked up it's not even fun anymore. It stopped being fun for him when he had to lose a friend to save a friend and now all he's getting is a free viewing of what the Shepherd marriage was like the first seven and a half years. He doesn't need the reminder.
The elevator dings as Derek pushes Addison against the elevator wall to get better leverage and Mark somehow wrangles them both into the hallway (without them having to break apart or come up for air) before leading them to the correct room, opening the door and shoving them inside as they assault each other's lips. Then he bids them goodnight and cuts his losses. He'll be picking up the pieces soon enough anyway when they realize what they've done. What they've started.
A can of worms is about to be opened and he's not going to stick around to watch them wiggle free.
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Addison pulls her head from the pillow slowly, feeling the pressure build with each rising inch. Today will not be a good day. She ascertains her whereabouts and then surveys the room closely. Finally she finds the body of the arm slung low around her sheeted hips and shakes her head. Squiggling back down under the covers she rolls over and faces the opposite direction hoping to be struck by some genius plan that doesn't involve having to remember most of last night because right now she can't and the fact that Derek is presumably naked next to her doesn't bode well for the happy ending.
She squeezes her eyes tight when she feels him begin to stir. Maybe if she pretends she's asleep he'll just walk out.
"Happy divorce day." Derek grins, softly nipping at her bare shoulder. "You want breakfast cause I think we are going to need some eggs with Tabasco and some seriously greasy bacon to cure what I have going on in my stomach over here." He waits a second and the pokes at her ribs making her jump. "Hey you. Up time."
She tightens her grip on the sheets and hopes to wake up from the nightmare. She's become that woman. The one who gets inappropriately drunk and somehow lures her husband, strike that, ex-husband into bed for the night. She's begun a new never ending cycle of self loathing, managing to one up herself when she thought she was already in the innermost circle of hell. "I..." Suddenly ending that sentence with anything seems stupid so she shuts her mouth and tries again. "I can't remember what happened."
"Well we got drunk separately and then Mark showed up in your car somehow and then you threw up all over the side of your car and then in a parking lot and then you propositioned me in the car and here we are. That's the long and short of it. And I think there was sex in there somewhere. You weren't very good from what I can remember. You get sloppy when you're drunk." He dodges the flying pillow and grins as she continues to try and disappear.
Addison finally turns over when his cheery tone continues on about what kind of toast she wants. He can't possibly be as hungover as she is because if he was he wouldn't be wanting to hear his own voice right now. "You aren't mad."
"No. I'm hungry. You want anything?" He reaches for the receiver on the phone and waits until she nods to dial room service.
When he hangs up (after having ordered half of the kitchen) she finally finds the strength to ask, "Do we need to talk about it?"
"Nope. That's the beauty of divorce Addison." He lightly kisses the top her head knowing that this isn't the end of them per se but merely a new beginning. A different road that started in a bar drunk instead of at a college stressed out. It's the grown up edition. Version 2.0. "We don't have to talk about anything ever again."
"Right." She feels her heart wrench and scoots down a little further to think things over.
"Unless you want to."
"No." She mumbles, pulling the sheet up over her head and willing the bed will just swallow her whole. It's not like she isn't going to die in this thing someday anyway. Today's as good as day as any.
Derek answers the door ten minutes later and before he can object Mark strides into the room with a renewed carefree attitude. "Let's get our stories straight."
"What story?" Derek asks.
"About what happened last night. You guys clearly left the bar together so let's get this all lined up and in sync before I go to work and someone asks and then things get out of hand and then next thing we all know- you have fathered a purple mutant baby and Addison is doing a own c-section on herself."
"What?" Addison pops her head out.
"Oh good you're alive. No need to thank me of course. I love ruining my Friday nights by picking up you two drunk idiots."
"You don't care." Derek replies and Mark knows it's true. "And there's no story. If they ask tell them you don't know. You dropped us off and left. We can deal with it on our own."
"There's a 'we' again? You guys move too fast." Mark warns heading for the door. "Good luck with that." He winks at a mortified and flushed Addison and slaps Derek's shoulder on the way out, secured with the knowledge that they all know now what he knew from the beginning of last evening's DD adventures. Derek and Addison never end. They just find new, inventive ways to begin over and over.
Bring on the worms.
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