Seasons of Us

by carnaby

525600 minutes. A year. 12 months. Addison and Derek face every parent's worst nightmare. (AU)

TITLE: Seasons of Us.

AUTHOR: carnaby.

RATING: PG13

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Grey's Anatomy or anything related to it, I'm just borrowing them for a short while, I promise to put them back when I'm finished.

SUMMARY: 525600 minutes. A year. 12 months. Addison and Derek face every parent's worst nightmare. (AU)

PAIRING: Derek/Addison.

A NOTE FROM ME: This is the first piece of fanfiction I ever wrote, when I wrote it I never thought I would post it, or that anyone would want to read it. Something Beautiful Remains is something I originally started as a further exploration of this but then it took on a life of its own (the next chapter should be up soon). This is angst-heavy. I promise I don't hate Addison and Derek, my muse must though, I have written happier stories for them which I will post someday.

March.

She was born on a Thursday, bright red hair atop porcelain skin, wide blue eyes that looked like they had already seen too much of the world.

At first she had perfect scores, everything was as it should have been, we were released from hospital the same day and then it was just us, alone in a great big house with nothing but the sound of rain for company.

She nursed 12 hours of the day, screamed the other 12. I don't know where she got her energy from because she never slept.

The screaming only got worse, when she was 8 days old she screamed for 8 hours straight, the pediatrician said it was reflux and gave her a clean bill of health.

I told him it was something else, he said I needed to stop being a doctor and just concentrate on being a mother, that my baby was perfect.

I wanted to believe him but every time I looked into her blue eyes all I could see was pain and frustration, she was trying to tell me something, I was listening but the pieces weren't fitting.

3 more pediatricians said the same, to persevere with the anti-reflux medicine and just enjoy being a new mother.

At 3 weeks old she weighed less that she did at birth, it didn't make sense as all she did was scream and feed, feed and scream, she didn't sleep, she didn't learn new skills, something was wrong with my baby but no one was listening.

The fifth pediatrician said I was the problem, that I was exhibiting all the signs of post-partum depression, he said it was to be expected, I was a single mother who had been through a difficult pregnancy.

I wasn't depressed.

I was terrified.

Something was wrong with my little girl and no one was listening to me.

I called him twice in that first month.

I sent a picture. The only one I had where she wasn't crying.

I heard nothing back.

I pleaded with the doctors to listen but they looked in her ears, shone lights in her eyes, tested her tone and all came back with the same answer; my daughter was perfectly healthy, just a little slow to gain weight.

A few days before she turned 4 weeks old I looked into her pain filled eyes and I promised her that I would keep fighting for her, that I would find an answer to her pain, that she would learn life could be different than this vicious cycle we were stuck in.

That was the same night I gave her formula for the first time.

And it was the first time in my life that I really felt a failure.

April.

The day she turned 4 weeks old I officially registered her birth.

My daughter had a name that she would carry for the rest of her life; Beatrice Mae.

It means she who brings happiness, because that's what her life was meant to bring, not this endless cycle of pain and frustration.

When she was 5 weeks old she started vomiting, and not just the way babies do but exorcist style vomiting that would make her eyes water and her face turn blue, afterwards she would finally sleep, her tiny little body finding peace for the first time in her short life.

At 6 weeks old the vomiting became so bad her whole body would practically convulse my heart breaking as I watched her struggle, helpless and terrified as everyone around me refused to listen to my concerns.

I called his mother, she hung up on me.

I drove to her house, the lights were on but nobody answered as the tiny body nestled against me whimpered her voice silenced by hours of crying.

I stood there for an hour before giving up.

We really were alone in the world.

As she turned 7 weeks old I found myself googling her symptoms, I was a double board certified surgeon, the best in my field, I saved babies no one else could and here I was resorting to the internet to help my own child.

The words on the screen eventually blurred together until nothing made sense anymore and I began to think that maybe everyone else was right, perhaps my daughter was perfect and I was the problem.

But then I looked into her eyes, the same blue as her father and I knew I was right, something was wrong with my baby, eyes that young should not hold a pain that strong.

Over and over I promised her we would find an answer that it didn't matter if we were alone in our battle because I was all she needed.

Just before she turned 8 weeks old she stopped breathing for 28 seconds, the most terrifying 28 seconds of my life.

My faith in New York shattered I got in my car and I left the city, desperate to find someone that would listen.

The next day I found myself in Boston, my screaming baby cradled tightly in my arms as she stopped breathing for the second time, her face turning a horrible shade of blue.

Until that moment blue had always been my favorite color, after that moment I hated everything about it.

May.

The day she turned 8-weeks-old I sat alone in a city I didn't know watching as a machine breathed for her.

That same day a graying man with wire-rimmed glasses took my hand in his as he told me in gentle, even tones that I had been right, that something was very wrong with my baby and how sorry he was that no one else had listened, but that he was listening now and together we would find the answer.

For the first time in my life I wished I was wrong.

A week later they finally had the answer; my perfect, beautiful little girl had an inoperable brain tumor.

The ventilator was removed as she was placed back in my arms, her eyes heavy, the remains of sedation lingering in her system as her tiny kidneys struggled to break it down.

Her left hand resting on my breast as I pleaded with her to latch on, as a mother I was supposed to take her pain away, protect her, but cancer didn't care that I was a double board certified surgeon or a Forbes-Montgomery so I did the only thing I could do I held her close and prayed.

I insisted they send the scans to Seattle. Dr. Evan Miller, the same doctor that had held my hand and promised me I wasn't alone agreed. He even agreed to my request that he remove all identifying features from her medical file.

6 days later he said the same as everyone else; that I should take my daughter home and enjoy what time she had left, that symptom control was all I could do for her.

I rang every pediatric oncology centre in America and some further afield but everyone said the same, they all said that it was an exercise in futility.

13 days after her diagnosis Beatrice nursed for the first time in weeks, wide blue eyes looking up at me with a peace I hadn't seen in her before, the doctor in me knew it was the cocktail of pain relief and steroids they had started but the mother in me saw it as hope.

My daughter was not an exercise in futility.

As soon as they gave me the green-light to take her home I chartered my family's private jet across the country, landing in the Emerald City just as the sun was rising on a new day.

June.

Beatrice. Or Betsy as she had become affectionately known in Boston Children's Hospital turned 3 months old today.

As I stood holding her in my arms outside of Seattle Grace Hospital she smiled for the first time, her blue eyes sparkling as her tiny lips curled upwards.

He had a girlfriend I didn't know about.

He had a daughter he didn't know about.

He had a wife the girlfriend didn't know about.

Everything is one big mess of secrets and lies, but as the tiny bundle in my arms made her presence known with a tiny, gurgling noise I realized that nothing else mattered, in that moment all that mattered was Betsy.

So in the lobby of the hospital he had sought refuge in he met his daughter for the first time.

Blue eyes meeting blue as tiny fists reached out to pull at dark curls.

He didn't question her paternity.

He asked me why. I told him I tried.

For the first time since our arrival he had the sense to look guilty.

He said he was sorry. I told him she was dying.

He took me to his office. I showed him the scans. A look of recognition flashed across his features.

After studying them for over an hour he looked up at me with tear-filled eyes, he said he was sorry, that her being his daughter didn't change his answer; there was nothing he could do to save her.

I heard the cries and saw fists pounding against his chest before I realized they were my own.

I begged him, he performed miracles all the time all I needed was one more.

His words were barely audible as he told me that even a miracle couldn't save our little girl.

He asked me if he could hold her.

A part of me wanted to take her and run; if I only had her for a little while longer I didn't want to spend it fighting with him.

But I knew that he deserved to know her to have his own memories to hold onto.

He asked me to tell him everything.

So as our daughter slept in his arms I recalled the first 8 weeks of her life and how my desperation had led me to Boston and to a diagnosis no parent ever wanted to hear.

He apologized. Again.

He was sorry for not being there, for making me go through it alone, that if he'd known he would have been there.

He promised to be there from that moment on, every step of the way.

He held me close; our daughter still nestled in his arms.

I booked Beatrice and I into a hotel, I didn't sleep that night, I just watched her sleep, grateful that her body seemed to finally have found some peace.

She woke up smiling the next morning.

I dressed her in a pale pink cashmere onesie, smiling to myself as I struggled to do it up, she was finally putting on weight, and realistically I knew it was down to the high dose steroids, but I couldn't help but hope it was because her body was healing.

Later that day I found him in his office, her scans lighting up the board behind his desk.

He requested a repeat MRI.

I agreed.

As our daughter's tiny body disappeared into the huge doughnut shaped machine he held my hand and we hoped.

The scans were even more devastating than the previous one.

The large tumor on our baby girl's brain stem had grown, the medication she was on masking any effects it might be having on her tiny body.

He held me as we cried.

Over the next 7 days he spoke to hundreds of specialists, none of them offered any hope.

He was giving up hope, until finally a doctor in Sweden suggested proton beam therapy, he'd considered this option over and over again but Beatrice would be the youngest patient to ever undergo it.

For a week Derek held onto that hope sending her scans to various centers, never sleeping, barely eating, he had every detail of her MRI memorized.

The day our daughter turned 15 weeks old he told his mother everything.

12 hours later she had turned up in Seattle.

She apologized for ignoring me when I turned up at the house, she promised that if she'd seen the baby she would have answered the door.

I told her it was ok.

But it wasn't.

I was a part of her life for 15 years, I knew she was angry but she could have at least had the courage to open the door and face me.

After much persuasion I finally let her meet her granddaughter.

She cried for hours about how unfair the world was.

July.

The day my daughter turned 4 months old her grandmother held a party.

I knew what she was doing.

Celebrating milestones that usually wouldn't matter because we didn't know how many more there would be.

I hated her for it.

I didn't want to constantly be reminded that my daughter's life was going to be cut short, that she would die before she really had a chance to live.

He said I was being unreasonable, that she was just trying to deal with things in her own way.

I apologized.

Derek's sister, one of my closest friends told me about a study she had read and how a hospital in Philadelphia had recently had success in treating brain stem tumors.

She agreed to fly out there with Derek, 2 days later they were back with the answer I had been expecting; my daughter was too young.

The idea that there was no point in trying to save her life because she was too young made no sense to me, surely because she was so young we should be trying harder.

I had saved babies that medicine says shouldn't be alive, babies that were now children, children who were now at school.

Surely my daughter deserved the same chance.

I begged everyone to leave, to let us be alone as a family.

The next day I found him with his arms around the blonde intern, his tongue down her throat. And I realized that we weren't a family.

I thought I was ok with that.

I thought Beatrice was all I needed.

A week later when she suffered her first seizure I screamed his name over and over again as our daughter's body jerked wildly, her eyes rolling backwards as her heart rate reached dangerous levels.

It took 27 minutes for them to get the seizure to stop.

And it was another 4 hours before he finally picked up the phone.

He didn't have to say the words this time, I knew just by looking in his eyes how sorry he was.

I heard the whispers the next day.

He'd ended things with the intern.

Apparently he'd told her that he needed to put his family first, that Beatrice was all that mattered.

He still watched her though; when he thought no one was looking.

Sometimes when we were alone together, just the 3 of us I could let myself believe he still loved me.

Then I would see the way his eyes would meet hers across a crowded room and I knew I was fooling myself.

4 days after her first seizure Beatrice had another one.

This time she stopped breathing.

The PICU consultant took us to a room; he asked us how far we wanted them to go to save her.

I begged them to do everything they could.

He remained quiet.

Later that night as we sat in the PICU watching as the machine breathed for her he whispered that perhaps it was time to let her go.

I told him to leave.

He told me that I needed to face the truth.

I accused him of giving up too easily, just like he had on our marriage.

He told me that if there was any hope we would have found it by now.

August.

Summer came.

After 17 days in PICU our daughter started breathing on her own.

They started her on new medication and increased her dose of steroids.

I tried to feed her but she was too weak to latch on.

The nurses put a feeding tube down her nose.

Feeding my daughter had been the one thing I could do, even that was taken away from me.

Her eyes always seemed so distant, like she was somewhere else.

I prayed that she wasn't aware of what was happening to her.

I prayed that she was aware of how much I loved her.

He suggested a holiday, Disneyworld.

I suggested my parent's lake house.

He agreed.

He took a leave of absence from work and we drove across the country.

I was terrified that a plane ride would take her from us that her already unstable equilibrium wouldn't be able to deal with the pressure changes.

The drive to Lake Tahoe was uneventful.

We barely spoke a word to each other, instead I opted to sit in the back so that I could monitor her every move.

We took her out on the lake.

Every morning he made breakfast on the porch.

We took her swimming.

I listened as he told her how loved she was.

And how no matter what happened he would always love her.

He promised to never forget a moment he spent with her.

And when he thought I was sleeping he promised her he would always look after me.

September.

She turned 6 months old while we were at Lake Tahoe.

We bought her a birthday cake.

Even though she wasn't eating very well we let her lick some of the chocolate frosting off of our fingers.

She laughed her first real laugh as we threw cake at each other.

He kissed me that night.

I kissed him back.

We fell asleep holding each other.

Her cries woke us up.

We took her outside onto the porch, laid down on a picnic blanket with her between us.

She fell asleep as the sun rose over the lake.

We did the same every morning for 2 weeks.

We fell asleep every night holding each other.

She liked the water, her tiny hands happily splashing against the crystal clear surface.

I remembered why I fell in love with him.

We told her stories of our life together.

How we met.

The moment we realized we were in love.

He told her how he proposed.

I told her about our wedding.

He told her about our honeymoon.

She seemed to listen, her eyes darting between us.

He told her that he wanted to stay here forever.

I told him there was nothing stopping us.

He agreed and extended his leave of absence.

October.

As she turned 7 months old the days started to get shorter.

The sun appeared later and disappeared earlier.

She didn't smile anymore.

She slept for hours at a time.

We knew the end was getting closer.

Her right eye struggled to open now.

But still we created new memories.

He took her fishing.

I sang her lullabies.

Together we read her our favorite stories.

We took her on a bike ride, with her bundled up in a snow suit against the cool air we cycled around the lake.

She slept between us that night.

We watched her sleep, grateful for every breath she took.

He wanted to take her horse riding.

I worried that it was too dangerous.

He won. Once again we bundled her against the chilly October weather and took her to the tiny stables just 15 minutes from the lake.

It was where I had learnt to ride.

We sat her on a tiny pony, her neck barely strong enough to hold her head anymore.

That night he thanked me for letting him have that moment.

We never talked about what would happen when the moment came, even though we knew it was getting closer, it was like we both knew that we needed to just live in the moment.

He found my favorite wine.

We toasted our family. We toasted us. We toasted our daughter.

November.

She slept for nearly 20 hours a day now.

Sometimes her breathing would become so shallow that we could barely notice it.

She couldn't lift her arms anymore.

But she could still wrap her tiny little hand around our fingers.

One morning we woke up to pain filed whimpers, her hands gripped tightly in little fists by her side.

We contacted the local hospital.

The doctor there prescribed pain relief.

Her body relaxed after a few doses.

We took her out on the boat.

We knew it would probably be the last time even though we didn't say it.

He gently hummed the words to his wedding song for me as he cradled our daughter, rocking back and forth on the porch swing as the moon sparkled above us.

I turned away so he wouldn't see me cry.

She spent the whole of the next day cradled against his naked chest, her tiny body exhausted, the pain medication dulling her senses.

I stood at the edge of the lake and screamed until I could scream no more, pleading with anyone that would listen to let us have more time.

That night he held me as I cried.

The next morning we were woken up by the sweetest sound ever; she was babbling again.

He knew this didn't meant things were getting better, that there would be good days, bad days and days that destroyed us, he knew that after it all it would still end the same way.

I held onto the hope that this was the first sign of a miracle.

He let me hope because he knew it was all I had.

We had 5 good days.

Then on day 6 she whimpered until her face turned blue, her little chest moving so erratically that we feared this was it.

I held my daughter against my naked chest, needing to feel her heart beating one last time.

We sat like that for hours but then her breaths evened out and the color returned to her cheeks.

He hated this rollercoaster, he hated the not knowing.

I was grateful for every extra minute.

December.

The outside world found us.

Carolyn Shepherd turned up begging for the chance to spend some time with us.

He told his mother that they were reaching the end.

That every day could be our daughter's last.

I made plans for a family Christmas.

He feared she wouldn't last that long.

I ordered a 'my first Christmas' onesie online in the hope that my daughter would get to wear it.

He locked himself in the bathroom and cried into a towel.

I baked a cake.

Carolyn knitted a stocking.

He cried.

Christmas Eve came and she was still with us.

I agreed to let the family visit, we spent the day opening presents, presents that she would never get to use as our daughter slept soundly in my arms, waking only for a few minutes at a time.

He lit a fire and we laid her on the rug between us.

We watched her sleep.

He proclaimed her the most beautiful baby he had ever met.

I agreed.

We made wishes for her future, wishes that would never come true but for just one night we wanted to believe, that this wasn't our life that we were going to get our miracle.

Christmas had always been our holiday.

He bought me a beautiful charm bracelet with our daughter's name, her birthstone and a tiny impression of her thumb.

I cried.

I bought him a world's best dad fishing tackle box and told him she would always love him.

He held me close.

We bought her a locket.

We didn't eat Christmas dinner that day, or turn on the TV, instead we spent all day lying on the rug, promising our daughter the world.

The rest of December passed the same, the tiny life between us battling on.

January.

On New Year's Day she had a seizure.

We didn't take her to the hospital.

We gave her medicine to make it stop and he laid her on his chest.

The next day she opened both her eyes and looked up at us, we knew that she was ready.

Through tear-filled eyes we told her that it was ok, that we would love her no matter what, that she had fought so hard, we thanked her for giving us a perfect Christmas together as a family, we thanked her for choosing us as parents, and we told her we were proud of her.

She died in my arms.

I knew it was coming before it happened.

Her heart beat became so slow I could barely feel it as I ran my hands over my daughter's perfect face her tiny chest rising slowly until finally it stopped and she was gone.

I told her I loved her.

He told her he loved her.

We promised to never forget her.

We dressed her, wrapped her in a blanket and took one last drive around the lake as a family.

I don't remember much of what happened after that.

I remember refusing to let her go.

I remember his voice gently reminding me that she was already gone.

He made the necessary calls.

I lay on the rug holding the Christmas onesie to my face.

We flew back to New York. Seattle had never been my home, it had never been her home.

I refused to plan the funeral.

He begged me to help him, reminding me that as her parents we needed to make sure everything was right.

I told him that nothing about this was right.

He agreed.

I screamed, threw things and cursed the world for letting it happen.

He held me, soothed me and let me cry.

Her funeral was on a Monday.

I didn't say a word the whole day.

When it was over I returned to the brownstone alone, falling asleep in the nursery, a room my little girl had barely had the chance to sleep in.

He found me there the next day.

Richard told him to take as long as he needed, that his job would be there waiting whenever he was ready to return.

He doubted he would ever be ready.

He didn't want to leave me.

I didn't want him around.

His sister sent us the number of a bereavement counselor.

We put it away in a drawer.

I unpacked our bags from the cabin, refusing to wash anything, needing to hold onto her scent for as long as possible.

He smashed up our bed with an axe, unable to see it without seeing me naked underneath his best friend.

Mark sent flowers.

He threw them away.

Cards arrived, I refused to open them.

I sent the flowers away, paying the delivery teams to take them somewhere else.

He watched as my frame became dangerously thin, struggling to recall the last time he'd seen me eat a proper meal.

His nightly glass of whisky turned into a nightly bottle.

His sisters tried to stage an intervention, pleading with us to get help.

I walked away and locked myself in the nursery.

February.

He came to on the floor of his office an empty whiskey bottle discarded next to him and the smell of cooking.

He watched me cook, placing a kiss atop my head before inhaling the scent of my freshly washed hair.

We ventured outside for the first time since her funeral.

Bundled up against the harsh New York weather our booted feet crunched through the snow.

Central Park had always held a special place in our relationship.

I had dreams of him teaching our daughter to ride a bike there.

Of picnicking together as a family.

Of a little girl with his eyes and my hair chasing fireflies.

Dreams that would never come true.

Her ashes arrived on Valentine's Day.

We argued over what to do with them.

Finally after many sleepless nights we agreed.

His family begged to be a part of it.

He knew it was something we needed to do alone.

I packed a bag, the Christmas onesie nestled safely inside my carry on.

He informed the airport of our unusual cargo.

I refused to let the small porcelain urn out of my sight, it sat on my bedside table as we waited away the days until our departure.

He told me he loved me.

I told him it was too late for us that the only thing keeping us together was gone.

The lake house was exactly as we left it.

Her medical supplied still littered the kitchen side.

A lone, tiny white sock was tangled in amongst the still unmade bed.

The lake was almost frozen over.

We didn't sleep that night.

Instead we sat wordlessly nestled under a blanket on the porch swing.

We spread her ashes at sunrise.

I cried.

He held me.

He made me hot chocolate and brought it out to the lake.

We remembered her.

We promised to always remember her.

I left while he was still sleeping.

He never tried to find me.

I moved to LA, needing to be somewhere I didn't have a past.

He went back to Seattle.

Every year on her birthday he would visit the lake house.

Every year on the day she died I would visit the lake house.

He knew I'd been there.

I knew he'd been there.

And every year for Christmas I would receive a single charm, the packages held no name but I knew who they were from and what they meant.

It was his way of telling me that he remembered.

That what we had still meant something to him.

That he would always love me.

That even though our daughter was gone we would always be a family.