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By the third funeral, the laughter stopped. Derek's had been too crowded, Owen's too formal, and Reed's too surreal. The chorus was too small now, anyway, and only Cristina stood beside her, as Meredith stared impassively across the grassy field. It was harder to laugh, anyway, since she'd seen Reed just moments before, before, well… because she'd walked right passed her with a polite nod, back when time still ran clockwise.
It was all past tense, now.
Now, there was just before, just before, and now-s tumbling around randomly in fits and starts, and Meredith glared across the field at her sort of sister, who was sobbing into her shaking hands, and she just wanted to shake her, or to slap her, because every twitch and every gasping, hiccupping breath she uttered grated, almost like how she twirled her hair nervously as she related epic paragraphs of trivia, after everyone had stopped listening.
The crowd dispersed, and Meredith went home to change out of her black dress, and they returned to the hospital, where Cristina grabbed Alex's chart, pacing as she read, while Meredith perched by his bedside. They'd finally gotten all the blood out of his hair, she noticed, delicately brushing her fingertips across the short wisps, which spiked like bristling, angry crab grass.
He'd need that defiance, she thought, since he was still too pale and his fingers were still too cool to be his, really, since Alex always simmered at a slow burn, even when he was sleeping, and he needed to be Alex again, she needed him to be Alex again – all ornery, hard scrabble, infuriatingly tenacious as crab grass Alex – and he needed to wake up.
"These look good," Cristina insisted briskly, nodding as she scanned his latest lab results.
Her voice was deadly calm, and all business as she related the vitals, and Meredith didn't interrupt her as Cristina pulled out another binder and began pouring over the pages.
Derek had been her first cardiac solo, and Cristina reviewed her work obsessively. It didn't matter to her that a second bullet had shredded his heart, that she had operated at gun point, that she hadn't had time to sterilize the surgical field. None of that mattered to her, Meredith knew, because she was Cristina Yang, and she didn't fail at cardio, not even when her patients were shot on her table, inches below her hands.
Meredith replayed those events obsessively, too, as her heart rate sped and she gripped Alex's hand tighter and watched as Cristina sat quietly, rocking in the hard plastic chair as she made small motions with her fingers, reviewing every cut and every stitch, as if she could still save him, if she just mastered one more technique.
Stopping her would have been pointless, though, because then she'd have to replay the rest of the story, too, would have to see Owen catch a bullet between the eyes. There were worse things for Cristina to obsess over, Meredith knew, and she was soon back to Alex's chart anyway.
Meredith leaned back in her own seat, exhaled heavily, and watched as Cristina sprang up again, leaving the room as she muttered something about a lab report that needed to be updated. Nodding blankly, Meredith leaned in closer and brushed her fingers over Alex's hair again, more insistently this time, trying to annoy him.
"Hey," she whispered, squeezing his hand more firmly, as her voice strangled in her throat, her eyes burning and bleary in the harsh fluorescent light of the ICU. "Did I tell you you're going to be an uncle?"
"Don't be stupid," Cristina barked three days later, shoving his hands away as she peeled back his thick bandages and examined the scar lines.
"T's fine," Alex muttered groggily, shifting uncomfortably as she traced her finger along the fresh sutures.
"No thanks to you," she snorted, completing her exam and taping him back up. "What'd you expect to happen, thrashing around like that? You're lucky Teddy re-did these," she snapped. "I'd have used staples."
"Carpentry," he grumbled, his voice trailing off into a muffled haze.
"At least I didn't go to state school," she smirked, busily writing several comments on his chart. "Now I get to go be an actual surgeon," she noted smugly, turning to leave.
"Lunch here at one," Meredith called after her, as she leaned back in her seat. He'd been moved from the ICU that morning, and his new room had a window, and she watched tiredly as narrow clouds streaked the sky, until her eyes fluttered shut.
It was her only option, because she couldn't go home alone, and she couldn't face the on call rooms, and she couldn't stand all the sympathetic glances, or the curious whispers and stares, and she still wondered if Cristina was ready to blow at any moment, since Dr. Wyatt hadn't actually cleared her to do surgery, yet, and Alex's hand was still too cool, and she almost missed the funerals, which at least had guide lines.
"Mere," Cristina interrupted abruptly, shaking her awake a few hours later. "Food," she noted, shoving a salad and a yogurt cup into her hands.
Meredith nodded, blinking as she peered up at the monitors again.
"He's fine," Cristina insisted, digging into her own lunch. "Teddy came by about an hour ago to check on him."
"Okay," Meredith agreed, watching her closely. They hadn't mentioned Owen's name, not since the funeral; they hadn't mentioned Derek's either. They hadn't mentioned a lot of things, and Cristina had even volunteered to supervise the Pit, anything to keep busy, and Bailey had been stopping by to talk about anything except funerals, and the Chief had been by to discuss anything except the new head of Neurosurgery, and no one said a word about how they all traveled in packs now – though apparently cardio was fine.
Cristina finished her lunch and was off answering a page before Meredith could look up again, and she ate her salad as she looked over the detailed notes that her and Altman had added to his chart.
"Dr. Grey," a startled voice blurted from just inside the door frame. "M-M-Meredith, I… I wasn't sure you'd still be here," April Keppner muttered, staring awkwardly at her.
"Excuse me?" Meredith asked, baffled by her presence.
"I just thought," she stammered, "with…with the Chief, with Der… with Dr. Shepherd… I thought you'd be…," her voice trailed off uncomfortably.
"What did you want?" Meredith asked, exhaling reluctantly.
"Dr. Karev," she stammered, glancing wide eyed at Alex, who still slept peacefully. "He, he was… with Reed… when she… she was my friend, my best friend, and I…I… wanted to ask him…I just…I wanted to know.. if he… if she-" the young doctor stammered.
"I don't think this is the time," Meredith interrupted her sternly. He was stable, Altman insisted. He'd be fine, Cristina assured her. But Alex wasn't a talker to begin with, and certainly not about things like this, and certainly not with a twitchy, frantic intern.
"I… I passed by twice yesterday," April said quietly, her voice still shaking slightly as she pointed toward the open doorway. "I heard that he was awake, talking with you and Dr. Yang. I just thought, if he remembered-"
"We don't know what he saw," Meredith interrupted her curtly. She had no idea how much her remembered, really, since he'd mentioned something about Reed, but nothing about the bloody path to the elevator where they found him, or whether he saw a shooter, or how he'd managed to survive, like an ornery patch of crab grass.
"Of course, of course," April nodded vigorously, still wide eyed and visibly trembling. "And I'm… I'm sorry… about the… about-"
"Thank you," Meredith said firmly, cutting her off again, as April nodded and fled. The young woman meant well, she was sure. But she just couldn't take one more person awkwardly telling her how sorry she was.
She probably should have added something about Reed, though, since apparently April had needed a black dress, too. But then she'd have to speak in past tense again, about another person she'd seen alive just minutes before, and every word about them now just seemed to push them further away, and she couldn't talk about the past just then, not when the only future and the only family that she had left still needed her protection.
Two weeks later, Meredith woke abruptly, startled as she frantically swiped her hand across the empty sheets, as strange wall paper and sloppy piles of clothes and a messy path of papers and shoes and bags strewn clear across the floor drew into muddled focus, until she remembered that she was in the spare bedroom. Silence surrounded her until she scrambled into the hall, where muffled noises echoed down the dimly lit corridor.
"Stop squirming," she heard Cristina hiss, as she hesitantly pushed the door open and peeked into the steamy bathroom. "You'll pull them out again," Cristina snapped, glaring at Alex as she roughly taped him back up. He was bundled in towels and wet from the shower and foggy from the drugs, but apparently clear enough to mutter something that made Cristina snicker.
"Help me get him back to his room," she said to Meredith, hauling him up from one side as they walked him down the hall and settled him back into his bed, Meredith unwinding the damp towels and dropping them carelessly on the floor as Cristina hastily spread two blankets over him, rolling her eyes as she glanced at the clock on his nightstand.
He was mostly asleep by the time they finished and Meredith just watched quietly as Cristina checked his meds again, and the bandages, before lightly brushing her fingers over his hair. It almost made Meredith gasp, or hurl, and her ears were still ringing when Cristina announced abruptly that she was going to the hospital, and the pharmacy, and maybe the store – she didn't say which – though it was already nine in the evening.
She left before Meredith could stop her, or call her on whatever lie she was telling this time, and Meredith just sat quietly beside him on the bed, leaning back against the wall and exhaling heavily, as vague shadows still danced in the hall. They'd been staying in the spare bedroom, her and Cristina, and she still refused to call it Izzie's old room, or her sort of sister's, and she still refused to look at the framed post-it above her bed, whenever she went in to her own room to change, and she still wouldn't open the sympathy cards that poured in from the polite and the well meaning and the sort of informally related.
Sliding her hand lightly across Alex's chest, she double checked, because there were no monitors here, though his breathing was steady, and less constrained then it had been even the day before, by the bruising that ringed his ribs. He'd be fine, they all said, Teddy, Cristina, Bailey, but they both knew that fine was the ultimate F word, and she snaked a finger between his just in case, too, though his hands were warm now, and his hair still stood in bristling spikes, like an army of sentinels, and they were strangely comforting, when the wind rustled through the branches outside his window, casting their own eerie, strangely hypnotic patterns across his dimly lit room.
She drifted off nearly an hour later, and woke early the next morning, gathering the towels from the floor and heading down to the kitchen, where laundry and foraging began, paced awkwardly around the large vases and over stuffed bouquets, and Lexi's keys, tossed haphazardly on the counter the week before. She hadn't said much, just something about Boston, but her room was empty, and Meredith knew she was gone.
It was one of the few Grey traits Meredith had ever seen in Lexi, the impulse to run, and it wasn't one she admired, the drive to scurry away, like Thatcher, and they had all been hers first, anyway – Derek, Cristina, Alex, all of Seattle - had been hers first, and she'd seen enough blood spilled to know that it didn't make you sisters, not for real.
Continuing her foraging, she retrieved a box and two cartons, and traced back up the stairs, handing him his meds from the nightstand and two stale pop tarts. She grabbed one herself, blueberry, and watched as he smugly forced his own down, and polished it off with a half carton of chocolate milk which she wasn't entirely sure hadn't expired.
She finished off the other one herself, anyway, and it didn't matter about crumbs or drinking glasses, because they didn't need to be domestic anymore, since Derek was gone, and Izzie wasn't coming back, and Cristina's idea of putting away the groceries was to cover every horizontal surface not already buried under stacks of mail or piles of take out menus or masses of rolled up newspapers still in their little wrappers.
She called them both slobs, though, even if Alex could barely move, and Meredith ran the washing machine now and then, and the dish washer – well, back when they used plates and utensils, before, before, before Derek was gone, and Owen, before Cristina had started lying to her, and Alex had a gaping hole blown into him, and Meredith perched on his bed, gnawing on semi stale pop tarts, with tears rolling down her face.
She probably wasn't supposed to be there, she thought abruptly, not in a blubbering mess, but he wouldn't tell her that she was lucky because at least she still had the baby, and he wouldn't tell her that things happened for a reason, or that some god provides, or that he was sorry, as if he'd had anything to with the funerals, or that she'd be a perfect mother, anyway, or that she was still young, and could start over – as if that hadn't been what she'd freaking been doing, until the latest round of funerals, as if there was any point.
Brushing her fingers over her shirt, she wondered if it was starting already, if another generation of dark and twisty was stirring inside her, because she was sure the baby would be a girl, and just like her, because that was just the story of her life, and she was sure her daughter would hate her, because dark and twisty would haunt her, too, and because her daughter had already begun losing people herself, before she was even born.
"Heard I'm going to be an uncle," Alex muttered, watching her vaguely through half open eye lids, and she nodded as she tried to catch her breath and she closed three of her fingers around two of his and she leaned back against the wall again and she shouldn't be trembling or sobbing because the baby would need her and the baby would think it was about her and the baby would be terrified, too, if she didn't get a grip on herself.
"I can't do this," she whispered, and she wondered if she was angry at Derek for leaving, or if he was angry at her for being a blubbering mess when their daughter needed her, or if she was angry at herself for being the mother she swore she'd never be or if she was angry at Derek for being the father she already had, or didn't, even if he had no choice.
Alex didn't say anything, just swallowed awkwardly as he squeezed her fingers harder, like he had the first day he really woke up, and his hands were still warm, so it hadn't just been the heat from his shower, and at least the possibly expired milk wouldn't kill them, even if her daughter would probably never like pop tarts, now, and she couldn't do this, but she had no choice, either, and she couldn't' do a baby when she couldn't even do fresh milk, and she couldn't tell Dr. Wyatt all that, when there were no words for any of it, and she just squeezed back harder, because really, what else was there to say.
It was nearly nine thirty by the time Cristina sped into the narrow parking space, the hazy street lights casting their own fog around her as she walked briskly down the sidewalk. The hotel lobby was too brightly lit, almost making her wince as she doze into the nearest elevator car, and it reeked of decadence, of over stuffed pillows and elaborate brocade bedding and huge five course meals and fussy maids and pristine floors and the gaudy chandeliers that her mother loved and everything that she hated about Beverly Hills.
He was waiting for her, as he'd promised, and her arms were around him before the door locked and she was dragging him to the bed and he was always one for formalities but her hands were already pouring over his sculpted chest and her lips were already brushing his neck and she was already undressed before he could breathe out a hello.
His clothes followed hers to the floor and he didn't bother to fold them precisely this time and she the room was dimly lit but she remembered every inch of him, every line and every plane, and his first word to her in person came out over and over, "Cristina," first as a tentative question, and then as a deep sigh and then as a sharp gasp and then as a rumbling murmur and then as a heated growl and then as a thunderous, shuddering groan that shook the room around them and she wouldn't stop until he said it, again and again, in that rich baritone that washed over her like a gentle rain.
She remembered every inch of him and her body coiled around his frantically, her nails digging into his heavily muscled back and she was trembling and panicked and it was all in front of her again, steely eyes and gun metal and the acrid scent and screaming and she just pulled him closer, deeper, shaking violently as she willed him to drive out the images and the sounds with his lips and his hands and own feral howl.
It had been too long, or maybe just yesterday, she couldn't quite remember, as the heat from his body boiled her veins, and his electricity coursed furiously through her, and she just gasped and threw her head back like a shrieking banshee as a riot of long, wild curls spilled over his shoulders, shrouding his own scars, as crushing wave after crushing wave crashed over her, slamming her body against his again and again and again.
It would have been too long if it'd even been another minute more by then, and she dug her claws deeper into his flesh, clinging desperately amid another on-rushing tsunami as
his limbs locked iron clad around her and his body shook fiercely on a scale that could only be measured in Richters and fire burned through her lungs because she still wouldn't say it yet, couldn't say it, wouldn't scream his name, until she summoned hers from him again, and again and again, until she was sure she'd win this time.
It came in ragged, shuddering gasps this time, echoed around her again as she dug her hands into his hard ass, pulling him deeper and deeper, insistent, demanding, clutching and tugging until a last groan ripped through him, and he collapsed beside her. She traced her hands more delicately over his body then as she curled tightly around him, as if trying to scramble under his skin, and she willed herself to stop quivering, his name dancing on her tongue as his lips found their way teasingly around her body.
"I missed you," she whispered into his ear, smirking as her tongue followed entirely too lightly, and another moan rippled through him, while her fingers traced leisurely over his skin, outlining every beat of his heart. She missed him, first frantically, then desperately, then with a deep ache that flared every time Owen shoved his tongue down her throat, with a new excuse, a new apology, another reminder of why he would never be her forty years, could never be her forty years, since those years were already claimed.
"I missed you, too," Burke murmured, his voice rich and precise and deep, as it always had been, even after she'd left him breathless, reminding her that she'd missed every thing, the feel of his skilled hands, the curve of his shoulders, the steady pulse of his heart beneath her ear, the curves and angles of his body, as he folded seamlessly around her, as if his body had been designed and sculpted for just that purpose.
"Don't go back," she whispered harshly, clutching him again suddenly, because an inch of space had opened between them, an icy crack wide enough for it all to seep around her again, the steely eyes, and the feel of a cold metal barrel pressed against her head, and the acrid smell of smoke, and the furious beeping of the monitors, and the screams, as Gary Clark turned the gun on himself, feet in front of them.
She pulled him tighter, until she feared he might snap under the force, until she feared he might never be close enough, until his arms closed completely around her, and his chest pressed into her face, until she feared she might leave a permanent imprint, until his body closed entirely around her, and her wild trembling steadied somewhat, and the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding for well over a year suddenly rushed out in agonizing, shaking spasms, until the scream she'd been holding in for weeks pierced the darkness, echoing around them until she almost thought another heavy booted swat team would burst into the room at any moment, with another fully loaded arsenal trained upon her.
He didn't flinch, just pulled her closer, as her torrent of tears washed over him, and she clung harder, her eyes fixed vacantly on the shadows playing outside the window, until the trembling slowed further, and the last violent spasm rippled through her, and the gun shots stopped echoing through her ears, until all she heard was the steady rhythm of his breathing, and the faint beat of his heart against her, and the same whispered incantation washed over her again and again, "Cristina," in the only cadence that could matter, until the room grew warm and dark and gauzy, as she dissolved into him again.
Meredith cleared off the coffee table the following week, tossing another bouquet of dead flowers and several unopened cards into the garbage bin as she absently piled laundry on the couch. It was blanketing her house like a steady blizzard, Cristina's stuff, trailing vaguely up the stairs, until it coated even the spare bedroom like a fresh fallen snow.
It was just as well, she'd already concluded, the day they brought Alex home, because Cristina wasn't ready to return to surgery yet, and she couldn't go back to her apartment, not with reminders of Owen everywhere, and at least she kept busy lining Alex's night stand with water bottles and bandages, and littering every inch of Meredith's house, and griping about Evil Spawn as she checked off his prescriptions.
It was just as well a week later, too, Meredith imagined as she listened to Cristina grumble about Wyatt's refusal to clear her. She could have told her that she agreed with the shrink, since Cristina still wouldn't say a word about Owen, or Derek, or the slight shaking of her hands that Meredith was pretty sure Cristina thought no one else noticed, whenever she checked Alex's incision, or taped him back up.
But Meredith couldn't really mention that, either, because then she would have to answer her own questions from Wyatt, about why she wasn't badgering her to return to work herself, and how she'd manage, now that house plans had been replaced by catalogues of baby furniture. She was still fingering one of those brochures a day later, when Alex eased onto the couch beside her, almost wincing and slightly winded from the stairs.
"Long trip?" she teased, watching him roll his eyes as he glanced at the flickering television, tuned into a very late night infomercial.
"Yang snores worse then you," he grumbled, settling back into the couch and closing his eyes. "Why is she here again?"
"Owen," Meredith said softly, flipping through the glossy pages. He couldn't sleep any better then she could, she knew, Cristina's snoring not withstanding, not after the meds wore off. But it was just as well to have something else to blame.
"Um-huh," Alex nodded, his eyes fluttering open again, and settling quizzically on the open catalogue.
"I have to pick a color," Meredith muttered, as she surveyed coordinated displays of cribs and changing tables. "I'm thinking of white," she added.
"White's cool," Alex agreed, nodded sleepily, and forcing his eyes open again.
"Maple is nice, too," she replied, flipping two pages back with a studied frown.
"Makes good syrup," Alex agreed, nodding seriously, his eyes widening in a way that made her think the meds hadn't worn off completely after all.
"Are you hungry?" she prodded. "I can heat something up."
"No," he said, focusing on the television again, as she returned to her catalogue.
"What if I can't do this?" she asked quietly, several minutes later.
"Pick furniture?" he asked, scowling.
"This," she retorted, pointing to a smiling set of parents in the ad, happily settling their child into an over-sized crib.
"He was supposed to be here," she insisted. "We were supposed to do this together," she noted, her eyes blurring again. "We were supposed to pick names, and put the freaking ultrasound up on the fridge," she continued. "We were supposed to do this together," she repeated softly, tracing her finger over the picture as her eyes watered.
Alex nodded, his fingers awkwardly toying with his faded tee shirt. He didn't argue, and he didn't apologize, and he didn't tell her she'd be a perfect mother, and he didn't tell her she was worrying over nothing, and he didn't tell her everything was fine.
"I didn't even get to tell him I was pregnant," she stammered in a strangled whisper, tears welling in her eyes.
Alex nodded again, his fingers strumming the couch tentatively, inches from where she sat. He wouldn't just grab her hand, but he wouldn't pull away if she took his, and he wouldn't tell her everything was great, or that McDreamy would be so excited, or that she should be happy, or that she could tell the baby all about him someday.
"I don't know how to do this," she muttered a few minutes later, wiping at her eyes as she struggled to catch her breath.
"That set's cool," Alex noted awkwardly, pointing to the page she held open. "Kid looks happy with it," he noted, surveying the picture more closely.
"The kid's like three weeks old," Meredith smirked, wiping at her bleary eyes again. "And I wasn't talking about the furniture."
"I can build it," he said, studying the photos more closely, which were labeled assembly required in ominously bold print. "It looks like it comes partly together, anyway."
"I wanted him to be here," she whispered sadly, fingering the glossy picture again. "I wanted him to know, I wanted to tell him…"
Alex nodded again, swallowing almost audibly.
"I don't even know where to start," she muttered, shaking her head.
Taking the catalogue abruptly from her hands, Alex turned to the center page, searching out the company's phone number. "Start here," he said gruffly, pulling out the order form. "Tell them you want the stuff on page fifty seven."
"That's not exactly what I meant," she protested, rolling her eyes at him.
"Do you want him to sleep in a laundry basket or something?" Alex prodded.
"Of course not," Meredith protested.
"Then that's where you start," Alex insisted, shrugging uncomfortably.
"My baby's going to be a girl, anyway," she grumbled, filling in the order form as she prepared to call her selections in. "I can feel it."
"It's a boy," Alex insisted, leaning back into the couch again. "No way I'm living with three chicks who snore," he growled, shaking his head as his eyes fluttered shut.
"How do you know she'll snore?" Meredith demanded, eying him closely.
"Have you heard yourself?" he mumbled incredulously, almost asleep before she'd even picked up the phone.
"What do you want?" Cristina demanded a week later, rolling her eyes as Alex dropped onto the couch, sometime around three a.m.
"Shut up," he grumbled, grabbing one of the bottles and taking a swig. He didn't ask why the coffee table was lined with Tequila bottles. That would have been stupid, even if her hands weren't shaky, and she wasn't up at this hour, with the television muted in the background.
"I hate this one," she insisted, scowling at the familiar infomercial scrawling across the screen as he replaced the bottle on the table.
"We could find the remote if you weren't such a slob," he retorted, leaning back in the couch as he surveyed the heaps and piles around them. "I though you already had one of those, anyway" he growled, motioning to the infomercial she was watching, again, "up-stairs with all that other crap on Mount Yang."
She grabbed the bottle again, taking another sip before reminding him that she had two afternoon surgeries the following day, while he was still waiting for his first meeting with Wyatt. Smirking at his annoyed expression, she drew back into the couch, watching as another infomercial sprawled across the screen, as he stared blankly, struggling to stay awake as the announcer praised the merits of a combination radio and salad strainer.
"What's she want?" he muttered finally. "Wyatt."
"She wants to know how you freaking feel," Cristina snorted, drawing the words out sarcastically. She was sure it pained him to ask her, though being out of surgery was probably worse, even for a hack like him.
"Um-huh," Alex nodded, still staring at the screen with a groggy frown. They both knew that the longer he waited, the harder it'd be to get back. He needed to be cleared as soon as possible, just like she had. Surgeons understood that; shrinks didn't. Then again, all shrinks did was talk, as if talking ever fixed anything.
"Owen used to do push-ups," she volunteered a few minutes later, eying him closely. The name rolled off her tongue so casually that it almost surprised her, and would have shocked Meredith, who wouldn't mention it at all. Then again, Mere wouldn't mention Derek either, or Lexi, and Mere couldn't drink, and she couldn't do the one night stand thing, and Mere was hanging by a thread, so it was just as well she hadn't heard.
"When he couldn't sleep," she added carefully. And that said it all, why they'd broken up in the first place, why there'd never be a fucking forty years, why she was lucky she got out when she did, why she was almost grateful, when he went sniffing after Teddy.
"Did it help?" he asked hesitantly. She almost snickered, because insomnia was the least of Owen's problems.
"Sometimes," she shrugged, still staring at the flickering screen; sometimes; not nearly often enough.
"I don't miss him," she admitted quietly, in a raspy whisper. He was Evil Spawn, and they didn't talk, and she didn't talk, not even when Wyatt held her job hostage. But it pissed her off to no end, that they all tip toed around her, as if even mentioning his name would send her scurrying under the nearest gurney.
Alex raised his eyebrows quizzically, frowning slightly in her direction.
"Wyatt wants me to say that I miss him," she snapped bitterly. "But I wasn't even thinking of him when… when… I had the gun to my head."
Alex nodded again.
"Burke called," she added, almost too casually. "He wants to… he's applying for the Cardio position. He wants another shot at Chief." He wanted a lot more then that, maybe, possibly; maybe she did, too, possibly.
"Mere know?" Alex asked, suddenly puzzled.
"No," Cristina said, shaking her head. Mere couldn't know, because Burke might want more, he might want everything, and Mere couldn't take it if he left again, not after the way he left last time, not after she'd just buried McDreamy in a still fresh grave.
"Derek," she answered his next baffled glance, as if that explained everything.
"She thinks you're all screwed up over Hunt," he pointed out.
"Yeah," she agreed, nodding deliberately. "And that keeps her from being even more screwed up over McDreamy," Cristina added flatly.
"Not really," Alex noted, shaking his head with a frown.
"Yeah," Cristina agreed. "I know," she added, exhaling heavily. Meredith went willingly to Wyatt these days, and she wasn't even badgering her to get back to work, and she was obsessing over bibs and baby blankets and stupid little out fits, almost like…
"Would you try again?" she asked suddenly, "if Izzie cam back?" It was insane, really, because she'd dumped him with a tattered sheet of notebook paper, and he'd watched her die ten times over, and even he wasn't that stupid, - almost, but not that stupid.
"She's not coming back," he snorted bitterly.
"Yeah," Cristina agreed, "but if she did?" She watched his face darken, watched a frown twist his mouth, and watched his fingers twitch uncomfortably, as his hazy eyes stared blankly in front of him, until he finally nodded mutely, as if words just wouldn't come.
"Stupid feelings," Cristina agreed, handing him her bottle before taking it back and taking another long swig herself.
"And I do not have a pink Snuggie," she insisted, settling back into the couch beside him as the familiar infomercial began again.
"Dr. Altman says you're healing nicely," Wyatt announced, reading through his file as Alex sat impatiently across from her, his fingers tapping on the arm of his chair as he deliberately worked to slow his breathing and hold his tongue.
"Yeah, I'm good," Alex agreed, nodding seriously. "Ready to get back to work."
"Did you know Reed Adamson?" Wyatt asked, eying him closely, her pen poised over her own yellow notepad, waiting, he was sure, for him to make a mistake.
"We met," he shrugged casually.
"Did you know anything about her?" Wyatt pursued.
"She liked yoga," he frowned, his eyes narrowing as he met her gaze. "I told her to move in the locker room, once," he added sourly. "She was in the way."
"Did you hear anything, see anything?" she prodded. "In the supply room."
"Not really," he shrugged. They didn't count, he told himself again. The vacant eyes he saw in his sleep sometimes. They didn't count, since they were already dead, and it wasn't like anything he said could change that, and it wasn't like the hole in her head would be any less bloody, if he described it in another hundred words.
"You were found in an elevator?" she continued, glancing back over his file again. "After quite some time," she added, as if there was a question buried in there somewhere.
"Wasn't really conscious," he said flatly, shrugging again. What was he supposed to say? That it hurt like hell, as if it wouldn't? That it sucks to fight for every breath, as if you're underwater, as if you're burning and freezing at the same fucking time. That its creepy when can't see the shooter, and you're bleeding in a metal box?
"Do you remember waking up?" she continued, still surveying his initial remarks, from when she's talked with him the first time, days after his surgery.
He hesitated briefly, trying to remember what he'd told her the first time. It was all a haze, that first week, of drugs and lights and voices and monitors.
"I remember Mere," he said finally, nodding slightly. He remembered Mere's warm hands, and Yang's snark, remembered hearing that he'd be an uncle, which almost made him smile again. "Remember Dr. Altman," he added quickly.
"Did you know why you were in the hospital," she continued, "or did someone tell you about that?" He remembered the whispers and stares, the gossip among the nurses and the aides, the nervous exchanges, the bewildering backdrop to the searing pain in his chest, as if he could ever forgot.
"Altman told me," he said finally. "Told me I was fine," he added pointedly. "That the surgery had gone well," he continued, "said I'd be back in no time."
"I'm sure," Wyatt nodded, frowning herself as she scratched some comments onto his file. "And I see here that you were divorced recently, from… Dr. Stevens," she added, "the young woman who had cancer," she noted, more to herself then to him.
She looked up after a brief silence, apparently waiting for another reply, as if he was supposed to have heard a question in there somewhere. He shrugged casually, which was plainly not what she wanted, since she leveled a more curious stare at him.
"It was amicable?" she asked finally.
"We signed the forms, and I moved on," he shrugged. That had to be what Lexi was, before she'd split, moving on.
"Oh," she said. "So you'd say things are going better for you now?"
Better was relative, he assumed. Shot and divorced in the same month was crap, but it wasn't like it was much worse then all the crap that had come before, and all the crap that would follow. It was all the same basic crap, no special high-lights; it wasn't like Sports Centers' Top Ten Plays or anything.
"They will," he agreed, "when I get back to work."
"And you're specialty?" she prodded suddenly, searching back through his file again.
"Don't really have one," he said finally. Everyone had him slated toward Peads, like he was some freaking baby sitter, as if he wouldn't still be in Plastics, if Sloan weren't such a jack ass, as if he wouldn't be in Cardio, if they could keep a freaking department head, as if he might not try Neuro, if Mere hadn't monopolized all the best surgeries, or even Ortho, if Arizona Robbins weren't so freaked out about her switch hitting girl friend.
"Oh," Wyatt said, pulling another note from his file. "Dr. Bailey says you're going into Peads. I wasn't expecting that," she added, almost under her breath.
"What difference does that make, anyway?" Alex demanded impatiently.
"I'm trying to determine how likely you'll be to run into gun shot wounds during your first few weeks back," she corrected, not looking up as she continued to write. "Peads is surprisingly violent," she added casually, flipping over to the next page.
He almost laughed.
"I can speak with Dr. Bailey and Dr. Robbins," she said, "about assigning you to their service. Half time for the first six weeks," she added, eyeing him sternly, "and only if you complete every other week follow up with me."
"Follow up for what?" Alex replied, scowling. "I got shot. You're not a surgeon."
"And you're not telling me everything," she retorted. "I can keep you out entirely," she reminded him pointedly, "if I think you're not ready."
"You think I'm not ready?" he asked, almost rolling his eyes.
"I'm not sure," she said flatly. "And I have quite the case load these days, even if I'm not a surgeon," she retorted sharply.
"What else do you want?" he asked, puzzled. "I told you-"
"You told me what you thought I wanted to hear," she interrupted bluntly, her eyes meeting his forcefully. "Next time, you might try for the truth," she added.
"I'm no liar," he grumbled, glaring at her before looking away, his eyes wandering toward the fish tank that sat placidly behind her.
"No," she agreed, her tone more measured as she pulled out her appointment book. "Not to most people, you're probably not. But how about to yourself?"
Alex exhaled heavily, almost rolling his eyes again. "Take it or leave it," she said finally, "half-time for six weeks, with all the follow up appointments. Or," she added, as she wrote out her next card, "no surgeries, and you're still back here next week, anyway."
"Blackmail," he growled, taking the card from her.
"We prefer to call it positive re-enforcement," she corrected, holding out the time of their next meeting to him.
"I might not-" he started.
"That super-cedes whatever else you're doing," she interrupted, pointed to the card in his hand. "I've already spoken with Drs. Bailey and Robbins."
"Putting a gun to peoples' heads?" he smirked, still grumbling as he stalked out of her office.
"Don't tempt me," she muttered under her breath, exhaling heavily as she continued to scribble in his chart.