Expectations (a rewritten scene from the second most recent ep.)
"What am I to you? The woman you screwed to get over being screwed?"
It's a valid question, and he knows it. He knew she'd ask it, after all, it's what he led her to believe. But he didn't expect to feel. . . hurt by it.
He didn't expect her to no longer trust his intentions. He didn't expect a lot of things. He should have.
He looks down. Then up at Meredith. "You were like a breath of fresh air. It's like I was drowning, and you saved me. That's all I know."
There is a long silence. A long, uncomfortable, silence.
She's unsure of how to respond. It's a valid answer, definitely. She could tell he meant it. But it still doesn't change the fact of what he did. She wants to forgive him, she really does. But what's to say there's not something else he's keeping from her? Kids, maybe?
She thinks about it.
He doesn't seem like the kids type to her.
"Derek?"
He expects her to dump him, get in her car and move on. And he accepts it. He screwed up, after all. Didn't tell her he had a wife. Biggest faux-pas of his life. Second biggest. First was getting married in the first place. When he answers, he sounds defeated. "Yeah?"
She does the one thing that he never expects.
She walks over and sits down beside him again, lays her head on his shoulder and wraps her arms around him.
Her way of telling him that things would be okay.
And they will be, he thinks, as he returns her embrace on the porch of his trailer. They will be.
THE END.