Disclaimer: Grey's Anatomy is the property of ABC television, Shondra Rhimes and Co. No copyright infringement is intended.

A/N: This story was conceived and begun before episode 5x14 "Beat Your Heart Out" aired. It is an AU take on Owen's relationships with Beth and Michael Whitman and his personal family history.

Ghosts: Chapter One

Owen studied the smattering of coffee grounds in the bottom of his cup. Ten minutes. Ten long minutes and Beth had not said a word. She had been crying intermittently since he discovered her outside of her father's hospital room. Not a big display, just a steady gathering of tears which occasionally spilled over to trace silvery trails down her cheeks. He did not know what possessed him to take her out for coffee. Their personal interactions should have ended with a dutiful embrace, an expression of sympathy from one old friend to another. He winced. Not friends. Ex-lovers with no common threads left save the man in the bed beyond the door. He should have heeded the instinctive urge to flee, but self-disciplinewon out over self-preservation. Without making a conscious choice he became the soldier, the savior, the gentleman his mother would have wanted. Now they were sitting in a coffee shop two streets over from the hospital. Beth's gaze was level and unrelenting on his cheek. The chaotic emotions forced to the surface by her return cast a pall of intimacy he no longer felt for her. Shoving the cup aside, Owen forced himself to look up and meet her eyes.

"How could you break things off like that and never call? Not one word in five years?"

Her abrupt question was typical. Beth had always been a contradiction: a bright, shiny penny of a woman with an infectious smile and the pure look of peaches and honey gold hair. Beneath lay a will Owen still admired in part because it was so unexpected. That layer of iron kept her eyes from dropping to the table between them. Owen shook his head, knowing she would never be satisfied with his words but compelled to try one more time to explain. "I told you why."

"You wrote an email. Who does that?"

"And if I had gone to your apartment?" Owen bit back a curse as familiar frustration welled up. "You knew I was going to enlist. I never made a secret of my intentions after Residency."

"And to hell with what I wanted?"

Owen's thoughts strayed to her father lying in an ICU bed at Seattle Grace. Now was not the time and yet here she sat demanding words he did not want to say. "I'm a doctor, Beth. It's the one thing I've always been good at. My choice was…my choice. It wasn't about you."

"You've always been a selfish bastard," she retorted, swiping a hand across her damp cheeks. "Heartless."

It would be easier if she truly lost her temper, Owen reflected as he signaled the waitress for a refill. Pounded her fists against his chest, screamed and made a scene. That was not Beth's way. In her own fashion she was just as closed off as he had become since the ambush. Not unlike Cristina Yang… He swallowed hard and took a hasty sip of coffee, welcoming the scald of the liquid down his throat.

"He asked about you all the time."

"Excuse me?"

"He asked about you. Where you were and why you never called him." Beth's blue eyes turned flint gray as indignation flattened her voice. "He loved you like a son and you couldn't even be bothered to write him a letter."

Owen sat back and looked out the window to the street. Collateral damage was the term the Armed Forces used when discussing civilian casualties. Concise, technical, and completely inadequate to describe the sense of abandonment Beth's father must have felt. "I'm sorry," he said.

"Ten years. You were there when Mom died. You knew and yet you could just run off and join the Army like his friendship—his love—didn't mean anything."

"It wasn't like that," he snapped. "I don't run away. I never have."

"Oh please." Beth took a drink from her water glass and set it down hard, leaving a puddle around the base. "We supported you when there was no one else. Dad was there after your own father walked out the door and left you and your sister without a damn dime. You don't repay that kind of friendship with a few lines of text written half a world away!"

Her voice was rising for the first time. Owen felt mildly pleased with himself. Maybe he was the heartless bastard Beth claimed. If not then, certainly now. He opened his mouth not sure what might come out. Beth saved him the trouble.

"When dad got sick he told me he wanted to see you. It didn't matter that you were not an oncologist. He insisted. So I tracked you down. You sure as hell didn't make it easy."

"I didn't want to be found." Owen sipped his coffee and continued to stare out the window. She had played the guilt card, knowing it would hurt. He would not give her the satisfaction of triumph or the ease of pity by meeting her eyes.

"He's going to die, isn't he?"

"I haven't consulted with the doctor assigned to his case…"

"Dammit Owen, tell me the truth!"

He looked at her, one eyebrow cocked in surprise."The truth? I don't lie when it comes to medicine. I don't know anything for certain Beth. I would tell you if I did."

"So it's okay to lie when we're not talking about medicine?"

"That's not what I meant and you know it."

"Do I?" She laughed shortly and took another drink from the water glass. "Do I really?"

Owen watched with growing unease as she reached into her purse and pulled out a folded piece of paper. She crumpled it into a ball and tossed it onto the table. "Do you even remember what you said to me?"

He did not touch the paper as it slowly unfolded like a smashed flower.

"Ten years was not a lie? Your last words were not a lie?"

A surge of anger sang across Owen's raw nerves. He sat up and met her demanding stare with equal intensity, a small part of him reveling in the way Beth's body pressed back into the seat cushions. "What do you want me to say? That I lied to protect you? That I told you what you wanted to hear, especially during my last year of Residency?"

"You told me you loved me, that you wanted a future."

Owen clutched the coffee cup. The hot liquid quivered and sloshed over the sides and onto his hands. He did not flinch. "I told you that we would have time. That I had to serve my country because I couldn't just stand by and watch good men die without acting. You wanted more and you wanted it immediately."

"I…"

Owen shook his head, hating the harsh words that tumbled out and the way her face collapsed. "You were ambitious. You wanted to be a doctor's wife, period. Two kids and a white picket fence with twin SUVs in the driveway. I could have…" He fell abruptly silent, unwilling to speak of the dark line that so sharply divided his world into the Before and After.

Fresh tears stood in Beth's eyes but did not fall. She breathed deeply as her hands rose to rest on the table. Pink tinted nails dug at the glass, fingers pulling into small, loose fists. The walls fell back into place and her next words were spoken in a monotone. "We followed you across the country because you made me believe that there was a future. Then you decided otherwise. You had no right to make him a part of what happened to us."

"And you wouldn't have?" he challenged icily.

"No."

The single word deflated Owen's anger. He was too tired to debate the truth of her reply and contented himself with mopping the spilled coffee from the table and his hands with a napkin.

"You said you were sorry," Beth whispered. "You should tell him that before…it's too late."

A gout of warm air bathed Owen's calves from the vent in the wall. He shivered, overwhelmed at the prospect of facing Mike. He had not lied. There was no way to say for certain if her father was going to die today or tomorrow or six months down the line. He had his suspicions however, and she knew it. It would not take more than a phone call or a five minute consult with a fellow physician to confirm what Beth sensed instinctively. How soon before it was too late to make amends?

"You don't know how to apologize to him, do you?"

In the Before there were words and the ability to be gentle no matter how hard the situation might be. Owen had always regretted not speaking to Mike given their history. He stayed away knowing that Beth would be a part of any relationship he might cultivate. They were as close as any parent and child could be. It was not fair to cut out the older man simply to avoid her, however. And Owen had never imagined a time when he would not be able to explain his absence. Now there was so much he needed to say and more he needed to hear. Beth's father was a Vietnam veteran. He would understand the darkness clouding Owen's soul. Each day it was getting harder to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Cristina seemed willing but she could never truly understand. Owen suppressed a sigh, unnerved by the cold knot twisting in his guts. "Sometimes words fail." He shook his head and glanced up, not surprised at the ironic smile that rested on Beth's lips.

"I'll give you a piece of advice. Don't send an email. Dad doesn't use a laptop." Beth threw two dollars on the table and slipped out of the booth and into the milling lunch crowd without looking back.

~*~*~

Cristina had seen Owen embrace the daughter of the patient in room 512. It was an awkward moment, his eyes darting restlessly around the nearly empty hallway before alighting on her at the far end. There was something dark and deeply troubled in his gaze. This was not passion on display, rather something much more complex. She nodded once, acknowledging the promised explanation before continuing on her rounds. Two hours passed before she saw the woman again. This time entering the hospital lobby where Cristina had stopped to speak to Lexie. Her steps were purposeful, her pale face set in hard lines. The dark blue eyes swept over the room blazing a stinging trail across Cristina's cheeks as they scanned. After a moment's pause, she crossed to the elevator and entered an empty car. Cristina sighed with relief as the doors slid closed.

Moments later, she spotted Owen entering the big glass doors over Lexie's shoulder. Dismissing the Intern with a hasty nod and growl, Cristina watched him cross the lobby. Owen usually walked with confidence and the erect posture of a career soldier. He was professional and unfailingly polite to the people he encountered. This man walked with hunched shoulders, his eyes carefully focused on the floor. He nearly collided with an orderly and barely spoke a word of apology when he walked away. The skin on the back of Cristina's neck prickled with concern.

They were not dating, at least not officially. She had promised to give him another chance even though the incident in the shower had left her overwhelmed by the enormity of his personal problems. Clearly the blond woman was another ghost from the past that she would have to contend with. Cristina dare not ask how many more there might be even in the privacy of thought. She had her share of skeletons and was not looking forward to showing them off any time soon.

Owen stopped in the mouth of the hallway that led to the trauma center. He looked up for the first time and Cristina began walking. Several seconds passed before he spotted her. The tiniest of lights flickered in his eyes and was gone in a heartbeat. If anything, he seemed more tense the closer she got. Cristina drew a steadying breath and stopped close enough to smell the rain in his hair. She dare not touch him. Held still not only by the people passing by but by the glassy stare he pinned her with. That same distant look that accompanied his revelations in the shower. She sighed and indicated a different direction with her chin. "Come on."

He hesitated but Cristina stood her ground. Whatever had passed between Owen and this mysterious blond had awakened the demons. There was only one place she could think of that might silence them. She waited until he nodded fractionally and followed her.

They could have walked there with their eyes closed. Owen had been going to the vent for months. She had visited at least a half dozen times since the night of Alex Karev's solo surgery. It was their space, undeclared but mutually agreed upon. He held the door as she stepped through into the warm, damp room. The machinery throbbed around them as it cycled. Seattle Grace breathed in great smooth gasps, its bones vibrating with the steady beat of her heart. Safe within the cocoon of concrete and steel mesh, Cristina reached for Owen's hand and waited patiently for him to step onto the vent with her.

Owen would not meet her eyes as the air rushed up their pant legs. Cristina shivered and took his other hand. Gently she urged him closer until she could slip her hands around his waist and rest them on the small of his back. The first time on the vent had been a shared release of the passions they had both clearly considered but never given into. This was something entirely different. Nearly lost within the roar of the air was the sound of Owen's quickening breath. His chest heaved and his fingers clenched, grazing Cristina's back and shoulders. Then his arms enfolded her, holding fiercely tight and still as her hair danced all around them. Cristina felt the tremor travel up his body. It grew as the seconds passed until her bones ached with the force of it. She held on, lightly stroking his back, saying nothing as he shook and gasped harshly into her hair. They swayed back and forth in the funnel of air until the cycle completed and their clothes hung limp once more.

Owen stepped back and cradled her cheeks in his hands. His eyes were unreadable mirrors as he bent and trailed feather kisses over Cristina's eyelids and temples. His fingers threaded her hair and she stretched up to kiss his mouth, tasting coffee and salt. He deepened and lengthened the kiss, his hands cupping the back of her head and straying down to her shoulders and eventually her waist. The next blast of air lifted her hair into a dark swirling cloud. Cristina heard his chuckle low and deep and felt the gentle nip of his teeth on her earlobe. His lips were warm, the brush of his beard lightly abrasive at the juncture between neck and shoulder. She smiled and rested her head against his broad chest. Finding comfort in the steady beat of his heart and willing him to speak when the memories grew quiet.

To be continued….