A/N I'm back! And with a new story this time, too! So this will be extremely angsty, and yeah, that's about it. I will try to update as often as possible, but I have a killer schedule this year. Enjoy!
Almost everyone was gone from the stage door; just Meredith and Denise were left. When the last of the remaining fans disappeared, Meredith turned to Denise and said, "This is exhausting."
Denise nodded, understanding what she was talking about without her saying. "It's not your fault, you know," she said, hugging her friend tightly.
Tears welled in Meredith's eyes as she nodded, desperately trying not to cry, she had done enough of that lately. "I just don't understand," she stuttered, her voice breaking.
"I know," Denise mumbled comfortingly.
The door creaked open, and the girls jumped apart, Meredith wiping her eyes quickly, hoping they weren't too red. The open door revealed Brian Holden who looked bewildered when he saw the two girls standing there, staring at him wide-eyed. "So," he started a little awkwardly, "What goes on?"
Denise glanced at Meredith quickly, and said, "Nothing much, just partying after a show!"
"Sounds fun," he said, noting the slight redness in Meredith's eyes, but not commenting. "Well," he began again, "I gotta go. Packing and all."
Meredith nodded blindly, trying to force down tears, and turned away.
Denise said, "Well you have fun with that," and watched him walk away. When he was out of sight, she turned to Meredith, whose breathing had quickened considerably. "Mere," she said in a low voice, "Shh, shh, you have to calm down."
Meredith whipped around, "He's leaving, Deeds!" she said shrilly. "He's leaving and he's not taking me!" she finished, tears streaming down her face.
"Mere," Denise began again, not backing down, "You two broke up two years ago, he has no reason to." When she received no response, she said, exasperated, "You can't let this consume your life. He's moving to LA for a job, you can't take it personally." With these words, she went back inside, leaving Meredith to herself.
She sunk down to the ground and sobbed, not even bothering to worry about people seeing. When the tears finally slowed, she took a few deep breaths and sniffled a few more time before wiping her eyes and heading back inside. As soon as she crossed the threshold, she steadied herself, and put the façade of the bubbly, carefree Meredith they all knew. What they didn't know was that that Meredith had been a lie for a little more than two years. They had noticed that she hadn't had a serious relationship since Brian, and many were worried.
But she was an actress-and even though he cheeks were stained with tears, her eyes were swollen and red, and her nose was running slightly-she was able to cover it up with a bright smile and cheerful demeanor. This was the reason that unless someone took a careful look at her face, they wouldn't know what she was actually feeling. But tonight she wasn't up to her normal standard, and she was worried someone would notice. She cursed internally when Julia was the first one she saw, but the normally observant woman seemed distracted.
"Hey, have you seen Brian?" Julia asked, falling into stride with Meredith.
Meredith nodded, "He left a while ago."
"Perfect," Julia said brightly. "We're setting up for his going away party, so we needed him gone."
"A party?" Meredith asked, not having heard anything about it.
"Did no one tell you?" she asked, clearly surprised. But then a look of realization crossed her face, and she muttered, "Damn."
"What?"
Julia looked hesitant before continuing, "We weren't gonna tell you about it." A short, tense silence followed before Julia defended, "Just because you seemed to be having a hard time with the whole situation."
"I can't just not go to one of my best friend's going away party!" she exclaimed.
"That's what I said," Julia mumbled. "Anyways, we're setting up for it tonight if you want to help," she said, and then walked away quickly.
Meredith headed straight to the bathroom in the dressing room, grabbing her makeup remover and a hair tie on the way. She took off the stage makeup methodically, winning small victories each time she took a tear track off. When her face was back to normal, she turned on the water and leaned over the sink, splashing cold water onto her face, and then leaned on the adjacent wall. She focused on breathing steadily, and when she was satisfied, twisted her unruly hair into a messy bun and dried her face off.
After wandering around backstage for a bit, she found the party, which wasn't too difficult, because that was where the music was coming from. As she entered the room, her friends fell silent, "Spamalot" blaring from a speaker. After a few seconds of palpable silence, Meredith said a little weakly, "I heard there was a party."
The glances thrown at Denise and a huffing Julia appearing in the door, panting, "Guys, Meredith's coming," put all of the puzzle pieces together. Suddenly, she knew why her friends had been treating her differently; Denise had told them what was going on. Everything fit, her being delegated small tasks that gave her no chance to run into anybody but her partner, the necessity of having a partner, and being steered clear of Brian as often as possible. Everyone had been participating, except maybe Brian. But he was the one leaving, so he was treating everyone differently.
This realization took about two seconds, but when she came back to the real world, the room appeared to be in chaos. Julia muttered, "Shit," and everyone else was whispering to each other. The room had a slight spin to it, and was only steadied when she took a step backwards. All eyes win the room were on her, and she stammered, glaring at Dense, "You all knew?" A few people nodded apologetically, and Denise began an apology.
She was cut off by Joe Walker, "of course we knew, Mere!" Denise jumped, and Julia shot him a warning glance, which he ignored, and continued, "You might be an actress, but we're your friends, and we can see right through that. Oh, don't give me that," he added when Meredith looked at him skeptically. "You're not over Brian, you never have been and probably never will be, especially if you carry on the way you have been." Meredith stared at him, shocked; she really thought she had been hiding.
"Maybe she doesn't want to be over him," Jaime realized out loud.
"Why not? It's been two years," Joe asked obsoletely. After a second of uncomfortable silence, realization dawned on his face, "You loved him, didn't you?"
Meredith looked at him like he was an idiot; "Of course I did!" she said angrily, "How could I not? We were together for three years! I'd known him for even longer! But I guess none of that really attire in the end because his family hated me, and you can't get around that in the Holden family!" The group was watching nervously as they realized that two years of pent up emotion was coming out of Meredith.
"But yes Walker, yes. I loved him even through all that. And so what if I still love him? We talked about getting married and having kids, but his family was more important than one of his own was more important that a new one, apparently!" she spat, showing no signs of stopping soon. "And even if we didn't talk about that, why should it matter? Juls still loves Darren, and they haven't been together since college, he lives across the country and is engaged! But no, only worry about Meredith. 'Poor Meredith,'" she said mockingly, "'had her heart broken, don't let her drive!' 'Meredith it's been two years you need to get over this stilly thing!' 'The love of Meredith's life is moving across the country, don't let her do anything important or tell her about his gong away party!'" Angry tears were streaming down her face, rendering her unable to see the guilty and shocked faces surrounding her.
They also prevented her from seeing Brian, who was standing in the door. A silence filled the room, only broken by sniffles from Meredith. Brian stood there, processing what he had just seen. He had honestly not known how badly this was affecting her, probably because he was focused on packing and holding himself together. It wasn't just heard on her, he didn't want to leave her, but his sister and Darren had told him that this might make it easier to move on. It was how Darren claimed to move on from Julia, and his sister just knew him better than almost anyone.
After all of that went through his head, he said softly, "Mere. He cursed himself internally; he didn't know what to say now. What was he supposed to say? He didn't know how much he'd missed, but no one had noticed when he walked in around when she was yelling about Julia not being over Darren. But now everyone knew he was there.
Meredith stiffened and paled, that was not something she had wanted him to hear any of. She didn't turn around at first, only complying when he repeated, "Mere," a little more desperately. "What?" she said, trying to sound cold, but still sounding sniffly.
Brian searched his mind desperately for something to say. "I-I didn't know," he said quietly.
"Of course you didn't," she sighed, then tried to skirt around Brian to get out of the room.
He turned and grabbed both of her wrists to stop her, and said, "I'm sorry," so quietly no one else could hear, looking her directly in the eye, something he hadn't done for two years.
Their conversation was silent, Meredith's pleading eyes asking if he was still leaving, a hesitant nod confirming it. Why? her eyes that were quickly filling with tears again asked.
I have to, a small twitch of his mouth. Meredith tried to pull away, and Brian tightened his grip, not done yet. You could come with me, he asked with widened eyes.
Would you be able to? she asked, scrunching her eyebrows together and grimacing.
A long second of nothing passed, and even the watching Starkids could feel the tension and importance of the net reply to an unknown question. Hesitantly, Brian shook his head. All resistance left Meredith's body, and she slumped against the door frame, looking anywhere but Brian. He squeezed her hands gently in apology, and Meredith looked at him, eyes devoid of any emotion. Brian blinked, startled, he had never seen anyone have such dead eyes. Meredith shook her head, and Brian's heart dropped, understanding her rejection perfectly. But the small spark of hope that was always there pushed through, and he laced his fingers through hers and cocked his head, asking, Are you sure?
Tears escaped from her eyes, and she shook her head, I can't. She pulled her hands away gently, and walked out of the room. Brian watched her retreating back, fighting the urge to run after her, knowing it would only hurt them both more.
"What the hell just happened?" Lauren finally burst out after nearly a minute of heavy silence.
"Well I'm going to LA," Brian said carefully.
Seeing Lauren about to ask another question, Julia silenced her with a glare. Instead, she asked a question, "Is she laving?"
"She's going home," Brian said, leaving the rest to wonder why he was so specific.