Christmas Eve, when you were both six years old, you told Derek Santa Claus didn't exist. When he resisted the cynicism, you hit him with the evidence: pastrami on sourdough with wholegrain mustard and ketchup, a kosher dill cut in quarters widthwise and a glass of whisky (that you both later learned was a finger of single malt scotch) couldn't reasonably be his dad's and Santa's favorite snack. For two people to both like such weird food, one of them had to be made up.
He took it pretty well: he was naïve but logical. And if he had any urge to cry, he got over it quickly and you went back to playing whatever it was you were playing. Probably catch.
But the expression on his face was subtly different, changed in a way that got to you even though you didn't understand why. Ever since then, somewhere deep down, you've always felt a little bad about it.
He needed to find out sometime; but you could've let him work it out for himself.
"Anytime you're ready, Mark," Derek says. "Presumably we're not freezing our asses off out here for the fun of it." He rubs his hands together, blows on them, then stuffs them inside his coat pockets.
You don't really mind the cold, not today anyway. The little flurries of flakes that mark the tail end of snowfall are kind of pretty; watching them takes your attention away from the surreal payback that's overtaken your life, and anything that does that is good as far as you're concerned.
It's easier here, sitting outside the hospital with Derek. No long-lost daughter; no grandkid in utero (you close your eyes for a second, because the thought that you're close to being a grandfather makes your stomach sink so hard it feels like you might throw up); no freaked-out girlfriend shooting you wild-eyed glances in between frantic attempts at understanding that are rapidly wearing thin.
You feel bad for Lexie. You offered her a drawer to keep her panties in and a space in the bathroom for her toothbrush and too few months later she wound up with a stepfamily. (And, so far, she only knows about one generation.)
"Mark," he interrupts your thoughts, stamping his feet now. "Say whatever it is you need to say and let's go and get a drink."
When you were eleven or twelve, it snowed on Christmas Day, thick and feathery and white. Your parents had let you accept the Shepherds' invitation to spend the holidays with them, and you and Derek pushed each other around in the snow, hurled snowballs at each other (and at his sisters, until Mrs. Shepherd yelled at you to quit), then threw yourselves down on the ground and made the best snow angels you'd ever seen.
You can remember lying there, next to him, laughing up at the sky and thinking - not in words, exactly, because you wouldn't have known what words to use and, anyway, the whole adolescent male shame thing would've kicked in with the first definable feeling - this might be close to something like love. And even if it wasn't, there, in the snow, in Derek Shepherd's backyard on Christmas Day seemed about the coolest place you could ever be. The coolest and the safest.
You clear your throat. "Sloan's pregnant," you mutter.
His eyes widen. "Come again?" There's a trace of concern, but a smirk is trying to turn up the left-hand corner of his mouth.
"Sloan's pregnant," you repeat, loud and bitter this time, then sigh and scrunch down into the collar of your leather jacket, jamming your hands in your pockets, partly from the cold, but mostly from grudging, stubborn embarrassment. "Okay, let's get it over with," you say wearily and wait for the onslaught of jokes.
It doesn't come. There's an edge of humor when he asks, "You're going to be a grandfather?" And, really, who could blame him? But it's tempered, kind, even a little reassuring.
You pull your hands out of your pockets again, indecisive, and drag them through your hair. "Shit."
He lets out a short laugh, but then his hand is on your arm and there's a brief but definite squeeze. "You'll be fine," he says.
You can't help the Yeah, right that emerges inside your head: he's delusional (or lying) and you're scared shitless. The support is heartening, though, and you hope he takes your silence as thanks because, underneath it all, it kind of is.
Christmas Day, when you were fourteen, you split a secreted six-pack and a quarter hip flask of Mr. Shepherd's second best scotch, and drank behind the garbage cans in the backyard. You both giggled dumbly through lunch and, later, Mr. Shepherd smelled your breath, warned you with a wagged finger, but didn't give you away to Derek's mom.
You think it was the same year you got to second base with Nancy.
At the time, and for years later, it seemed like a pretty good Christmas. Now it just seems like an archetype of all the ways you habitually screw up whenever you're on to a good thing.
"A fucking grandfather!" You're getting close to losing it. "How the hell am I supposed to do that? How the hell did I get here?"
"Basic reproductive biology?" Derek offers, falsely innocent and smirking again.
You shoot him a dry, unappreciative smile, and growl deep in the back of your throat. "You don't think an STD would've been bad enough karma?"
He shrugs. "You've had those before, no doubt," he says, then his voice turns soft and serious, "Sloan is -"
"Vapid?" Because she is; and crass, and inappropriate and self-centered; and, oh yeah, apparently she can't keep her legs closed. She's inherited all your worst traits.
"Your family," he says. "And evidently she needs you."
You're my family, you think. The only one you ever gave a damn about. But you know how it feels to need someone who doesn't care; a part of you (one you're slowly learning to recognize and accept) doesn't want your daughter to feel that way.
You spent Christmas 2006 alone, and the New Year drinking and screwing your sorrows away. You'd been playing house with Addie - well, you call it that now, but at the time it felt real and you, at least, were trying to make a go of it - until she left to chase after Derek.
He was always between you, anyway. And however much you tried to blame it on Addison refusing to let go, that wasn't the only or, necessarily, the real problem.
Sometimes when you closed your eyes to go to sleep; when your hand brushed her thigh; when you held her in bed while she cried, or after sex, or both; you would see Derek's face and his expression when he caught his best friend screwing his wife.
You kept telling yourself you didn't miss him, because she was worth it. But you did, like crazy, and it killed you every time.
"I wanted to make a go of things with Lexie," you say. "She's not gonna stick around for this."
"You haven't told her?" Derek asks.
You shake your head. You wanted to tell him first.
"Lexie's tolerant," he says, only slightly doubtfully.
"She's twenty-four, Derek. She's twenty-four and, even if she was older, she'd need the tolerance of a fucking saint."
"But she understands about family," he says. "She understands you didn't choose this. And," he smiles, mischievously, but with a slight softening around the eyes, "if Lexie leaves you, you always have me."
He chuckles, but he seems to mean it and, for a moment, it's like the old, cool, childhood place where everything seemed safe.
"Yeah, but . . ." because that place is still better wordless, "Lexie gives me sex," you grin, repeating what he once said to you about Meredith.
"Well," he winks, "obviously I'd have to talk to Meredith first, but . . ." You both laugh. And you briefly wonder if there really is such a thing as karma and if, maybe, stepping up for Sloan and her kid is redressing some of yours.
"Drink?" he says, standing up. "I'm buying."
You nod, but stay seated. There's something else you need to say. "I'm sorry."
"For?" He raises an eyebrow.
You inhale, because you realize how ridiculous it's going to sound thirty-three years and eight days too late. "Ruining your Christmas in 1976."
He narrows his eyes as his mind works backwards, calculating, then smiles. "Oh!" he says, the smile turning into a laugh. "Santa Claus." His eyebrow quirks again. "You're forgiven. On balance, it's not exactly your worst offense. Can we get out of the cold now, please?"
"I'm forgiven?" you push it. It's not what you intended or even hoped for, but it's out there, spoken out loud, and you're willing to take the risk.
For a moment, he hesitates, his eyes registering the significance of the question. "You're a different guy," he stalls. Then, like an afterthought, he adds a quiet but clear-cut, "Yes."