Title: Chinese food and memories.
Rating: PG
Pairing: Derek/Addison
Summary: Post episode "Thanks for the memories" Addison waits for Derek outside his trailer and ruminates on Chinese food and Thanksgiving's gone by.
Disclaimer: Shonda's not mine.
Reviews are love and much appreciated.
You understand the importance of Chinese food on Thanksgiving. Chinese food has always been an odd, but pivotal part of our relationship. You would always have lemon chicken and I would always have duck and every time we would order something that we had never had before. You would always take half of the mushrooms of my plate and I would take half of the water chestnuts off your plate without asking.
It started in med school when we studied together and you never had any food in. Our late night study sessions always peaked with the arrival of the food. I remember the first time we ordered, and how nervous I was over such silly things like getting food in my teeth and whether you'd laugh at me for not knowing how to use chopsticks. You didn't though, and taught me how to hold them, your fingers gently grazing mine as you moved my fingers into the correct position on the chopsticks.
Every time I pick chopsticks up now I think of you.
Now I'm waiting outside your trailer with Chinese take out beside me, twirling the chopsticks in my fingers like a baton and waiting for you to come home. You're at the hospital, probably with Meredith but all I want is you to come home before the food cools. I've chosen Chinese because I want you to laugh and remember when we had it on Thanksgiving.
It was the first time we had spent Thanksgiving in the brownstone. We'd only moved in a few days beforehand and I had yet to figure out which box I had packed our pots and pans in and also how to use the oven. We both got called into work as well so there was no chance of either of us having Thanksgiving dinner. It had to be take out. As we had no menu's we walked into the city and stopped at the first Chinese we saw. You had lemon chicken and I had the duck and we ordered a Wonderful Dragon as our new dish. We took it home and ate it on the floor, in amongst all the unpacked boxes. It was, in some ways a perfect Thanksgiving. All we wanted back then was to be with each other.
You would of never chosen the hospital over me on Thanksgiving back then. You are now though, and even though I know that you will return home soon, the surprise of the Chinese food has passed, as the food is cold now.
I think about taking into the hospital and surprising you but I don't think you would appreciate me for doing that. You did that to me once, and I loved you so much for it. It was our fifth wedding anniversary and we had planned an evening out but I got stuck at work with an emergency C Section and had to cancel our plans. I had only just finished the surgery when I saw you walk into my office laden with cartons. You even lit candles. It wasn't the fancy meal that we had planned and I was wearing scrubs, and not the new dress that I had bought for the occasion but it didn't matter. We were together and that's all that mattered to us. Now it doesn't seem to matter to you.
As I ruminate and start to think about taking the congealed food back into the trailer I see the lights of your Jeep, and finally you. As I speak to you my voice cracks and I'm really on the edge of having a full blown crying attack in front of you. You have other plans and move into kiss me before the tears start to fall. It's the first time you've kissed me since Mark.
We make love right then and there, with the cold Chinese cartons around us and its raining but it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because we are together, and after we've made love we go into the trailer and warm the food up. We finally have our Thanksgiving together, and I know that you get the in joke as you smile at me over the lemon chicken and your hand grazes mine as you take half of the mushrooms off my plate without asking.