I told him I didn't want him to date anyone but me, and what does he do? He keeps it a secret that he kissed a nurse that day. You know I might have overlooked him kissing a nurse if he'd told me this. How can I trust him he is always withholding the truth from me. First he doesn't tell me about his wife, then although I know he's given me fair warning that he is dating other women, he doesn't tell me he's kissed another woman. I find out from George. George of all people, he never tells me the hospital gossip unless it's true. How is it I'm always the last to know these important details? I knew I should have walked away every time he asked me to go out with him. Damn I can't believe I caved. I hate myself for falling in love with him. Well I'm done, its over, we're finished. Perhaps I'll go back to my former way of picking up inappropriate men and kicking them out in the morning. Life was so much easier that way.
"Pour me another, Joe." Meredith belted out with the slightest slur to her words.
"I think you've had enough, why don't I call you a cab instead?" Joe replied the concern etched across his features.
"No, I'm good, I'm not driving, I don't work in the morning, so pour me another one. If you're worried I won't pay here take this." Meredith reached into her pocket pulling out several rumpled bills, smoothing them out slightly before she handed the wad of bills over to Joe. "If that's not enough just let me know."
"Meredith, this is more than enough I'm just worried about you, I think you need to stop now while you can. I'd have lost count of how many shots you've had if it wasn't for the pyramid of glasses sitting there. Come on now I'll just call you a cab, or maybe I should call Cristina." Joe moved away towards the phone, just as he reached it he noticed the person who plunked themselves down beside the drunken resident.
"Don't worry about it Joe, I've got her, I'll give her a lift home. Come on my fellow dirty mistress it's time for you to say good bye to Joe." Mark grabbed Meredith's coat, sliding her arms through the armholes and pulled her to her feet. "Now just tell me how to get to your house and we're good to go."
Just as he finishes saying this Meredith passed out slumping into his arms. "Well I guess that's not going to work."
"Here, I'll write down her address for you, I've been to her place before." Joe scribbled the directions down on a napkin before handing it over to Mark. "I'll call ahead to her house hopefully someone will be there when you arrive."
"Thanks Joe, I'll see you another night I guess." Mark bent at the knees lifting Meredith's limp body into his arms and started towards the stairs for the parking lot. Quickly depositing Meredith in the passenger seat of his SUV, he moved to the driver's side of the vehicle and climbed into the seat. Starting the vehicle and putting it into gear Mark drove to the house following the directions Joe wrote down for him. Once he arrived he was pleased to see the porch light on. Climbing out of the vehicle he rushed to the passenger side, and pulled Meredith into his arms once again. As he reached the front door it swung open and Cristina stepped to the side allowing him to enter the house.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Cristina suddenly notices Meredith laying on the porch swing passed out cold. "Oh this is bad, this is really bad, what happened? Come on you might as well take her up to bed." Cristina led the way down the hall flicking the lights on as she maneuvered through the house. The two climbed the stairs in silence. Cristina left the light off in Meredith's room leaving the room in semi darkness as the hall light glowed in through the open door. Mark follows Cristina into the room laying her on the bed. Cristina pulled her shoes off her feet before she pulled the covers over her friend. The two stood there for a moment watching her sleep. Meredith suddenly let out a loud snore and Cristina sighed realizing that Meredith was out for the next few hours. Walking towards the door and motioning for Mark to follow her they left the room Mark pulling the door closed behind him. They retreated down the stairs in silence once again, Mark heading towards the door to leave.
"Mark, stay for a minute tell me what the hell happened. You better not have drugged her; I swear I'll hurt you." Cristina asked him this as she moved into the living room plunking herself into one corner of the couch and motioned for Mark to sit too.
Following her lead Mark sat in the opposite corner of the couch, and wiped a hand across his face. "I didn't touch her, well besides to help her to and from the car, but really that's just to help her. I'm not sure what happened. She had been drinking heavily before I even arrived on the scene. God what happened today that had her spiral out of control?" Mark looked at Cristina hoping that she would have the answers to the questions jumping around in his head.
Shrugging her shoulders and frowning at his response. "I don't know, I know that Tucker shook her up, hell seeing him in there shook all of us up, but I don't see how that would send her to the bar drinking." Cristina sat in silence once again pondering what could have sent Meredith into this self destructive mode. "What happened today, god she was so happy yesterday, she told me she was telling Derek that she didn't want him to date other women, she was happy, she was working on her issues. What took her from bright and shiny to dark and twisty times four. She wasn't even this bad when Addison showed up." Cristina nervously plucked at the loose thread on the cushion she was squeezing the life out of.
Mark once again swiped his hand across his beard before groaning. Cristina looked up at his groan seeing Mark's enraged expression she realized that he was privy to something. "Spit it out, I know you know something, and let me guess it has to do with your so called best friend, the idiotic neurosurgeon people like to call McDreamy." Cristina sneered.
"I'm guessing that Meredith found out about Derek kissing the scrub nurse Rose, and that has something to do with the drinking." Mark pulled out his phone, scrolling through the numbers looking for the right one.
"Okay, but it has to be something more than that, but I swear this is the last time, I'm going to castrate him for hurting her again. What is it about him and his love of pulling Mer through the wringer?" Looking up she notices that Mark has his phone pulled out and had just hit send and was pulling the phone to his ear. "What are you doing?" Cristina looked at Mark in frustration when he didn't answer her instead holding up his finger to silence her instead.
Speaking into the phone, "hey man, what's going on?" After a minute of silence as he listened to the person on the other end of the line, "what happened today? You don't sound so good." Mark once again listened to the person on the other end of the line frowning at the other person's response. "Man how much have you had tonight? You need to drain the bottle….no not down your throat, go drain it down the sink; you need to sober up man. Come on why are you drinking?" Sitting in stunned silence Mark finally looked up at Cristina and spoke into the phone. "Sorry man, I'll try and come by later, I'm being paged to the pit." Mark snapped his phone shut and dropped it onto the coffee table. Looking up at Cristina he finally muttered. "This is not good, actually it's really bad. Apparently they broke up, no more broken up sex broken up."
"Oh this is not good, where is he, he's at his trailer right," Cristina jumped up from the couch pulling on her shoes and jacket before she grabbed her helmet and keys. "You stay here and watch Mer, I've got something I've got to take care of."
"Whoa, what are you going to do?" Mark jumped up from the couch chasing after Cristina just as she stormed out of the house.
"What am I going to do? What am I going to do? I'm going over there and I'm going to kick some McDreamy ass. He's hurt my person too many times to get away without some kind of payback." Cristina jumped onto her bike shoving her helmet on throwing her weight onto the throttle, waiting until she was turning into the street before opening it up and tearing out of there.
Minutes later she returned in a full rage she stormed into the house with her helmet still on muttering under her breath about stupid neurosurgeons living out in the middle of no where and having no clue how to get there. Grabbing her bag she pulled out her phone and pressed speed dial tearing off her helmet and dropping it onto the table before she spoke into her phone. "Izzie I need you at Meredith's house now, someone needs to stay with her…I don't care if you were going to be crowned the queen of England get your beauty pageant ass here now before I go all apeshit all over you too." Slamming her phone shut she looked up at Mark glaring at him before she grumbled, "the minute Izzie walks in the door we are out of here, you're taking me to McAsshole's place so I can beat the crap out of him."
"That's fine with me, I'd like to hear what happened too, and you can kick his ass after we get the details." Mark stood up and started pacing back and forth behind the couch. "Those two are confounding. I don't get them. They love each other we get that. It's so obvious to us, yet every time we turn around they've fucked up once again and one or both of them are hurting again. Fuck I thought I had problems and Derek was always good with relationships, but he's just blown this one out of the water."
"You know she was trying, she had me going through psych books with her, trying to figure out her issues, and man did she have a lot of issues, but the fact that she was trying was something. The daddy issues, the abandonment issues, the almost dying thing the dead mommy, dead fake mommy she was working through all of them and she'd come to the conclusion that the only time she felt safe and truly happy was when she was with him. You know she told him she didn't want them to date other people, and what does he do he goes and kisses the nurse." Cristina walked over to the front window whipping the curtain back out of the way watching for Izzie's car.
"Oh he knew that she didn't want to date them other people, that's why he showed her the house plans, he thought that it was the next step in their relationship. Obviously not that wasn't the right next step, even I could have told him that wasn't the way to go." Mark continued to pace back and forth, finally going over to stand beside Cristina to look out the window with her. Minutes later they saw Izzie's car pull up in the driveway and the two stormed out of the room meeting up with Izzie in the hallway.
"Okay I'm here, you know I was actually enjoying my evening off for once, but you had to ruin it." Turning to Mark Izzie questioned, "What the hell are you doing here?" Izzie sulked as she pulled off her coat and hung it up on the rack.
"Save it Stevens, you need to make sure Meredith is okay, she's passed out in her bed right now, but you never know if she's going to wake up and start puking. Just because my best friend is an ass and doesn't deserve her, doesn't mean I want anything to happen to her." Mark pulls on his leather jacket as he says this before he and Cristina leave and get into his vehicle. Backing out the driveway he quickly threw it into drive and sped down the street. Izzie stood in the doorway watching the taillights in stunned silence before she turned around and picked up her phone calling first Alex then George calling in for reinforcements.
"Seriously, I know why I'm pissed at him but why are you" Cristina asked.
"He keeps yanking her around, actually they yank each other around, but she's let herself be more open than he has. He's always kept things locked up tight ever since his dad died, he doesn't realize that he has issues like Meredith. I'd like to go and knock some sense into him myself so if you don't finish him off I'll take a go at him." Mark turned and gave Cristina a smirk.
"Oh save it and your McSteamy smile, don't worry about your pretty little head, there won't be anything left of him when I'm through. First we'll go in find out his side of the story then I'm going to beat him in to a pulp. When we're through you'll take me back to Meredith's and hopefully I'll be able to get some answers out of her." Cristina sighed, thinking of the pain her person was going through once again.
"Yang just hold on a minute. Don't get your shirt in a knot. I don't know what's gone on, why they broke up but I can guarantee that Derek will know I'm not impressed with what has happened once again." Mark's grip on the wheel tightened as his anger at Derek began to show. Flipping the turn signal Mark stepped on the brake and turned down the gravel driveway.
"Okay so what's the game plan? How we going to get it out of him what happened? Cristina turned to watch Mark's face as she flung out these questions, figuring he would have a better idea of how to handle Derek.
"Well, he had already started drinking when I called, I don't think he's as bad off as Meredith as long as he didn't continue to drink, but I'm sure it's not going to be pleasant. Just stand clear of him until I can assess the situation. He's got a temper and he's upset he might lash out." Mark looked over at Cristina as he parked the car and turned the key in the ignition.
Mark and Cristina climbed out of the vehicle and moved towards the trailer. Climbing the stairs to the small deck Mark jiggled his keys in his hand in nervousness before finally sliding them into the front pocket of his jeans. Knocking on the door he waited a minute before swinging the door open and walking into the semidarkness shrouding the small trailer. Finding Derek sitting at the table with the nearly empty scotch bottle sitting in front of him Mark places his hand on Derek's shoulder before reaching in front of Derek and grabbing the scotch bottle. Mark handed the scotch bottle to Cristina, who placed it on the counter behind her, as he sat down beside Derek. Mark waits until Cristina sits down across from them before Mark starts the "what happened?" Cristina who had been fully intent on kicking Derek's ass before their arrival looks at the two men in a different light, seeing Derek for once as the broken man he actually is, recognizing the inner pain that he has been fighting since her almost wedding.
Derek groaned as he stuttered out, "I thought, I thought it would be better if we broke up, if she would put me out of my misery of not knowing what I meant to her, but this, oh god, this is worse. I can't, I can't live without her." Sputtering to a stop Derek begins to weep at the mess his life has become. "Oh god it's over, my life is over!"
A/N: Okay so this is just a one-shot right now, but possibly a prequel to a fic I'm thinking of writing in the future. I have a lot on my plate right now, and am also writing another fic. Once it's finished I'll start the other fic, but this one needed out of my head. I wanted the angst to come out the pain we know both Meredith and Derek are in, but I didn't want to fix them. The title comes from the song Broken by Lifehouse, it was the song that played in 4.11 as Meredith and Derek broke up and the faith healer came to Tuck's bedside to heal him.
