Derek Shepherd is an idiot.
Said I, his wife of 11 years, who fell for this idiot.
And then, smart enough went and joined his league in idiocy by screwing with his best friend when our marriage suffered multi-system organ failure.
So he, being the original carrier of this idiocy virus, took this chance and adapted to the numbness of society and drove across the country to live in a trailer.
Of course, I being the wife who screwed the vows, decided to follow in idiocy anyways, and ended up living in the trailer with him.
Yes.
It's the estrogen.
I, Addison Shepherd, am not actually this bitter.
It's all the estrogen.
And maybe even the trout and the spiders.
And the dog, definitely the dog. Her dog, his dog, their dog, and now my dog.
My dead Dog.
I hate the trailer.
Hate. Hate.
Did I mention, hate?
But none of that matters now. I'm no longer living in that trailer surrounded by wilderness and Derek but not.
Derek used to like fishing, I knew that.
Back in the days of our residency, when we actually had time for life, he went fishing a lot.
Ironic isn't it?
Residents, interns and the like are supposed to be busier than attendings.
They still have to prove themselves.
Whilst I, the successful neonatal surgeon, just have to take time, refuse a few patients, delay a few surgeries, to have time for my family.
Yet here I am, standing in the shambles of my family life and marriage.
On our recently signed divorce papers, it clearly said, in big bold words with numbers listing them as an item, a condition of sorts to our marriage: No children in said marriage.
You wonder exactly what we've done to end up in this predicament. Was it me screwing his best friend and him in love with his lusty little intern, and of course, screwing her too, or was it something else. Maybe our marriage took a downward spiral on hell express long before the recent events.
Ha! Speak of the devil.
How dare he, the no-longer gorgeous NY hotshot surgeon turned fisher boy extraordinaire, look at me with those eyes.
He lost the right to look at me when he said that he never wanted to see me again.
He glared at me…and then he passed.
All that leaves me is a whiff of what used to be yesterday.
Derek doesn't know that he smelled like home, everyday, regardless of how strong the hospital sanitizer or how long a surgery he just stood in or how many hours he spent outside fishing, he always smelled like home.
But not anymore.
He smells of betrayal, of anguish, of love lost yesterday and like Mark.
Yes, now he smells like Mark.
That was the one thing I didn't like about Mark.
Mark and Derek drank the same overpriced scotch, used the same classic cologne and liked just about the exact same everything. Making additions to Mark's wardrobe during the holidays came easily; it was just like shopping for Derek, but in a different size.
But Derek had always managed to smell like home, when Mark didn't.
No matter how much I tried to get used to the same cologne on a different man, he wasn't Derek.
No matter how much he tried to fill in the same side of bed that Derek once slept on, he would never fit.
But instead of leaving him and looking for my husband, I stayed.
I stayed to smell Derek's cologne on a different man. I stayed to sleep in the arms of his best friend, because I felt guilt and shame. To Derek for sleeping with his best friend and the downfall of our marriage and to Mark for him not being Derek.
So instead of packing my shoes and chasing him down the street the second the door shut, I stayed and smiled everyday at Mark.
It was the smile I had when I knew I couldn't save a patient. It was a smile for a perfect goodbye. It was a smile to settle for second best…the worst.
But eventually, I couldn't stand Derek's cologne on another man and another man's body on Derek's pillow space, even if that man is his best friend.
Especially because that man is his best friend, our best friend.
Am I rambling? I think I'm rambling. I'm drunk but I didn't drink. I'm drunk in all the evil bitter misery in my perfect life as a surgeon. Ha.
Anyways.
Derek had the smell of the women he wasn't supposed to smell like. He smelled foreign.
So, why on earth am I standing here, on the ferry by the water, and pondering over the complexities of our existence.
I looked down at the ring that once united us as one. I looked up at the stars that shone brighter than the city lights of New York.
And Derek walks back. He's not looking at me…but he's back.
He does this pacing thing, when he's trying to get perspective, or just plain passive aggressive: he wants to talk to you, but he doesn't want to-he wants you to talk to him first.
Now it was my turn to glare at him.
This is the last ferry today so there aren't a lot of people on the ferry.
I could afford to glare at him. No one was close enough to care that we looked like little hormonal teenage boys prepared to charge each other.
And he says my name in this voice of his. It's the… "Addie, where are my socks?" voice he used to use during residency when we were both bordering being late for morning rounds because of a last minute shower escapade.
Why am I even thinking about that?
He says my name again. Probably because my eyes don't look exactly, entirely focused even I am sort of looking at him.
Addison, he says a little louder this time, with more frustration than anything.
"Why –" He began to ask, but never finished.
"– Did I come after you even when I apparently chose Mark? Or is this still about me wasting a year of your happy hour with Meredith?"
"Don't drag Meredith into this!"
"Ha! Because I'm so important and I'm still the root of all our problems! Actually, scratch that, we don't have any more problems, we're divorced."
"Addison!" He says it again.
"Stop calling me that!"
"What? I don't get to call you Addison anymore? What is this?"
"We're divorced. You didn't want to see me ever again. And we're divorced."
"You think I want to look at you? I'm not looking at you!"
"Then why are you even here?"
"Addi –", I glared at him before he could even say it out loud. "Fine, Dr. Shepherd."
"Divorced, remember? Women typically drop their marital name when they DIVORCE."
I glared at him some more, he finally gives in and glares back. Had it been 10 years ago, I would've called this angry eye sex. But of course, it's not, not anymore.
Then Derek Shepherd did something that nobody should do on a ferry – or in any public place at all with their EX-wife – he kissed me.
I willed myself to separate us, proceeded to glare at him one last time, and then walked away.
I'm not being the chasing idiot anymore. Not this time.
