He was going to do it. He'd never been a man to hesitate and now wasn't the time to start. Guys were notoriously bad at reading signs, but the ones she had been giving him were obvious, the equivalent to bright, vivid green lights along the dreaded, dark highway of… love. He'd admit it. He was strong and self-assured and, for once in his life, head over heels for a woman. Alex Karev was in love with Addison Montgomery. Looking back, he had never had a choice.
The one question that remained despite his resolute certainty was what to do about it. He knew it was going to be up to him. She wasn't the kind of woman to disregard rules and regulations. But lucky for them, he was that kind of guy. She might not want to be the one to initiate their relationship, lest she be deemed an inadequate superior, but he'd never shied away from debauchery. He invited it. Especially when something so potential satisfying could result.
He was going to ask her out.
And he did. Only the response he received wasn't the one he wanted to hear.
"Alex." He should have realized that the frown that accompanied his name was a good indication as to where the conversation was going.
She sighed and gazed into his eyes, silently begging him to understand. He wasn't going to.
"That day when Meredith drowned, I was feeling vulnerable. Mark... He… I… I promised him then that if he could last sixty days with no sex we'd try having a real relationship."
He inhaled sharply, feeling betrayed.
She reached out and touched his shoulder gently. He backed away from her touch as if he was repulsed by it. He'd never know how much her spirit plummeted at that moment; how much he'd caused the hole in her heart to expand, effectively tearing out the stitches that his devotion alone had once placed.
Her eyes were downcast when she spoke again. "I don't think I can cast away so much history without giving him another chance. A real chance, this time."
Tears stung at his eyes and he looked upwards to halt their spillage. "He's hurt you," he ground out.
She nodded, crying quietly herself. "He has. And I've hurt him. But we've been through so much and I need to see this through. For my own piece of mind."
He dropped his head in submission and left. There was nothing more to say.
Walking around the streets of Seattle, he found himself lost, physically, emotionally, wholly. He could find his way back to the hospital easily enough by way of street signs, but there were no road maps that could tell him how to regain the part of himself that he'd lost to her.
Mark Sloan was the kind of guy that he thought he had wanted to be. But he'd been wrong; he'd discovered that, ironically, with her help. He wasn't Mark Sloan and, in everyway but one, he didn't desire to be. But maybe if he had turned out more like him, she would have been his. In this symbolic battle, Mark Sloan was the winner and he was simply on a losing crusade.
There was always the possibility that Sloan could waste his chance with her, but did that really matter? She'd made her decision. He was second best. If that. He didn't really know. All he did know was that she sent him looks that made him think she wanted him and definitely made him want her. She had a powerful presence that commanded respect and a gorgeous figure that held a damaged soul. She was intelligent and witty and pursed her lips when she was thinking in a way that made him want to pull her close by her lab coat and show her his affection. She was flawed, but she was just flawless.
So what if he wasn't Mark Sloan? She was better off with him-- and he knew that with some convincing, she'd agree.
When she saw him approach her, her eyes grew wide. He grinned to himself.
'That's right,' he thought, 'you'd better be surprised.'
He strode directly up to her and they stood about a foot apart. She gazed up at him, curious to say the least. He felt his skin grow warm at her proximity and shook off his unchaste thoughts.
Clearing his throat before he spoke, he glanced down at his pager. "Do you know what today's date is?"
She raised an eyebrow at his inquiry. "The seventh, I believe. Why? Is it important?"
He grinned playfully. "Not yet, but it will be."
She shook her head in confusion. "I don't…"
He silenced her thought by running one of his hands through her hair. His determined eyes bore down into her hesitant ones and he felt himself slipping further into her spell.
"The way I see it, this means I still have forty-seven days to win you over."
Her eyes enlarged at his declaration. She opened her mouth as if she were going to protest, but gradually closed it again. He could have sworn he saw a glimmer of anticipation- or possibly something more profound- in her eyes and it spurred him on.
"If you can give him two months to prove himself to you, then it's only fair that I should get the same. But since I'm the better candidate, I'll just take those forty-seven days."
He flashed a self-assured smile her way.
"Starting now."
Any meaningless protests she might have had were lost in his kiss.