f Andrew is honest with himself, he knows he's in love with Meredith Grey, and he has been for some time. He feels an overwhelming need to be with her, to talk to her, to know her, all the time. It's not interfering with work – he thinks.

That said, it is excruciating to be in love with someone you barely know.

That's a lie. He knows Meredith. He knows her likes and dislikes, her family story, her background. He knows exactly how she wakes up in the morning and how she takes her coffee. He knows that when she's on the brink, her lower back convulses and her eyes open wide and look directly at him and it unnerves him – it's such a gesture of openness that he's not accustomed to from Meredith.

That's the nexus of his major problem: she is just not as… open? Yeah, open. She's not as open with him as he is with her. He understands there are reasons for that, good reasons, important reasons, devastating reasons, but it makes it so hard to feel like he's in a real, grown-up relationship. He doesn't know why she does certain things – why she never calls or texts, why she never really takes initiative. The dark, moody part of him – the part he blames on his father – feels like it's because he's not worth caring about. The rational side knows the reasons and tries to accept them, but as he falls harder and harder for her, it's harder to ignore the darkness.

So he's at work, still getting past this mess with his father. He lost a patient this morning – a woman in a car accident who was talking when she came in and dead two hours later – and had the parents of a kid yell at him because he forgot the dad's name. James, not John. If he had been in a better mood, he would have laughed it off because that was stupid as hell, but in the mood he's in, it just serves to make him feel like a shitty doctor and a shitty person.

And Meredith still hasn't texted.

He's sitting in the lab, screwing up this experiment he's doing for Dr. Shepherd for the fifth day running (though Dr. Shepherd told him he needed to screw up a bunch of times to know how to do it right), when he's finally had it. He needs to go do something low-stakes and low-risk.

That's how he ends up by the third-floor nurses' station, signing charts and reviewing orders. He sees Meredith out of the corner of his eye. It's been a few days since they last really saw each other – since then it's been hands touching in hallways and one brief on-call room kiss. And, of course, she hasn't really texted or called. He sends her messages in the morning, the afternoon, and at night; she responds, but doesn't really engage.

He sees Alex walk over to Meredith and figures that's his entrance. Alex can't be rude to him; there's too much tortured history and they both care too much about Meredith's happiness.

He meanders over, starts asking Alex about a patient from earlier; he's helpful and gives him the chance to scrub in, a chance he appreciates since he got kicked off that pancreatectomy case a few weeks ago.

But before he even gets a chance to talk to Meredith – before he can make eye contact – she gets up, smiles in his direction, and walks away.

He knows it's petty. He knows it's stupid. But in his mind, he feels a little atomic bomb go off. She doesn't want to get to know him. She doesn't want to make small talk. Maybe she really is using him. Maybe he's not worth being in a relationship with. She'll never carve out a space in her life for him; he is extraneous, he is supplemental, he is not needed.

He finishes his chat with Alex and retreats back to the lab. If she's not going to talk to him, and if his mood gets any blacker, he really shouldn't be dealing with patients.

He's cursing at a computer program a few hours later when Amelia walks in.

"Dr. Shepherd, hi." He's trying to be cool. This is Meredith's sister. This is her husband's sister. This is Meredith's family.

"Hey, DeLuca. How's it going?"

He lets out a long exhale. "I've been screwing up, like you asked." Amelia laughs at that.

"It's okay, DeLuca. Not one resident in a million would get this on the first… million tries. I have faith in you. Keep at it."

He lets out an exasperated noise.

"DeLuca, everything all right?" Amelia's brow knits and when he looks at her, he sees concern in her eyes.

"Crappy day." He doesn't want to say any more – he doesn't want her to know how fucking lame and insecure he's feeling.

Amelia pulls up a chair and sits next to him. "Is it your dad?"

Andrew shakes his head. It is and it isn't. "Seriously, Dr. Shepherd, just having a crappy day."

Amelia raises one brow – Andrew fears she's got some kind of spidey sense for drama.

"Is this about Meredith?"

Andrew feels trapped. "No, no, no, no – of course not. Just – you know – I lost a patient, and had an argument, and this experiment…"

Amelia interrupts him. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. You have a look on your face like my sister is giving you acid reflux. Fess up, Andrew."

She only ever calls him Andrew when she's being really nice to him. After her surgery. When he was sleeping on her sister's couch. When he got beat. At Jo's wedding.

He decides he won't hit the nail on the head. "Just – you know – sometimes I feel like I want too much."

Amelia gives him a tiny smile. "And Meredith isn't really in the business of giving… well, much."

It gives him a tiny bit of relief to know that Amelia feels that way. "Is there, like, a shortcut to figure that out?"

Amelia laughs at that. "Of course not, DeLuca. You're dating my sister. I'm giving you clues, not a roadmap."

Andrew knows, realistically, that a woman who spends as much time with him as Meredith does is not doing it out of the goodness of her heart. She's doing it because she wants to. But he still can't shake the feeling like it's him – he's doing something wrong, or he's committed the cardinal sin of not being her husband.

"Dr. Shepherd?" Amelia has been staring into space for a minute or so, but she looks at him as though her train of thought was never elsewhere. "I just…. How do I know this isn't a fling? How do I know she actually, you know, feels invested?"

Amelia's eyes narrow for a second, and he's hoping it's that she's thinking – not that she's considering ratting him out.

"Meredith has been through a lot. It's hard for her to get close to people. You know that, Andrew." She could be scolding him, but she isn't. "Meredith has had more misplaced trust than most people, and also more loss than most. You'll have to give her the benefit of the doubt."

Andrew knows this, but it's helpful to hear it from someone else. "And how will I know when she's actually decided to trust me?"

Amelia laughs, again, a kind of bittersweet laugh. "You'll have to let me know." With that, she stands up, pushing her chair back in. She puts a hand on Andrew's shoulder. "You're good for her, Andrew. Don't be afraid to push a little. Not a lot, a little." She squeezes the hand on his shoulder, then heads for the door. Before twisting the nob, she turns around and gives him an inscrutable look. "We never talked about this, you know." And before Andrew can respond, the door is closing behind her.

He stays staring at the door for awhile. Amelia knows Meredith, maybe not as well as her other friends, but she knows her. He feels like he can take her at her word. A little bit of the black cloud hanging over his day has lifted. He's still not ready to make the effort; he's still not ready to bring it up; but he can sit and think about it, and maybe screw up this experiment more while he's at it.

A few hours pass, and he looks toward the window – the sun has almost fully set, and his brain clicks on – he's hungry. He gets up and heads for the cafeteria, knowing that food will likely solve most of his current problems.

He's munching on his dinner in the resident's lounge when his phone vibrates in his pocket. He assumes it's Carina – she's the only one that ever texts him – and he's shocked to see a text from Meredith, asking if he's still planning on coming over.

His brain kicks into overdrive. If she's texting him, she must want him there, right? She's not texting him to break up with him?

His next thought comes with a side of anger. Why is he having this conversation with himself? Why is he parsing her text like a high schooler? Why can't he take her words at face value? He's at angry at himself for being childish as he is at her for not communicating.

Rather than stew, he knows he has to talk to her. He texts her back, lets her know that he'll be on his way soon. He quickly changes and grabs his bag. He knows he should probably take a cab – he's definitely not focused enough to get on his bike right now.

The familiar road to Meredith's house stretches for what seems like eternity. He's still not one hundred percent sure what he's going to say. Does he tell her he's pissed? Does he tell her he doesn't think she cares? Does he tell her that he's insecure as fuck and she's better off pining for her dead husband?

He chastises himself – that's not fair to her. He does need to be honest, though. He's good with feelings, but it's never been this hard for him to tell the truth.

When the car pulls up to Meredith's house, he's still unsure. He can't school his face into passivity; he knows he's going to look upset regardless. He gently knocks on the door and is greeted, almost immediately, by a robe-clad Meredith. His anger seems to evaporate and when he sees her he can't think of anything but how happy he is to be in her presence.

Luckily, his face and his voice don't catch up to his brain. He's gruff, and can't make eye contact, mostly because it's going to murder his willpower if he does anything else. When she asks what's wrong, it spills out. How he feels her avoiding him. How she never asks him how he's doing. How she never communicates. He's trying to avoid it sounding like a laundry list of grievances, but he knows that if he wants this to work – and more importantly, if she does – he just has to tell her how he's feeling.

She's clearly thrown off by what he says, and he instantly feels guilty. Who is he to push in like this? Who is he to be worthy of her thoughts, her affection?

When she says she's sorry, he can't take it. His eyes meet hers and he feels, suddenly, so much better. Even the word vomit he's spewing about his feelings and emotions and needs – it all seems so insignificant.

"So what do you need, Andrew?"

He takes a minute to process and think. What he needs is her – all of her. He needs her to try for him and to talk to him and to keep him close and to never, ever leave him. But all of that sounds intense and ridiculous, and he doesn't want to freak her out, so all he says is, "Just… be there more? For me? I feel weird always being the one texting or calling." Even that sounds pathetic to his ears, but she smiles and nods and squeezes his hand – somehow, she ended up holding his hands, though he doesn't remember how.

"Happy to."

"And no more Cheshire-cat smiles at the nurse's station without actually talking to me."

Meredith laughs and suddenly the spell is broken. His anger melts away.

"I was thinking about that time in my car in that loading zone on Mercer Street, and I knew if I stared at you any longer, or started talking to you, I wouldn't get any work done."

Andrew is amazed at his male brain – he's gone from angry to incredibly turned on in probably under a minute. His highlight reel of that particular moment starts to play and all he can think about is pulling off that robe.

But he can't be that much of a cad. "Dr. Grey, are you telling me you weren't being entirely professional in the workplace?"

Meredith smiles back at him. "Dr. DeLuca, I was not being at all professional. And in the interest of full disclosure, you should know that I was also thinking about that time by the kitchen sink."

He short-circuits, and next thing he knows he's pushed her up against the foyer wall, his hands scrabbling at her waist and all he can think is Sex. Now. Right now.

"I was worried about you, so I drew us a bath." Andrew knows he has to control himself. She was thinking about him. She did something to show she cared and wanted to be with him; the least he could do is respect that without acting, again, like an immature teenager with zero self-control.

She leads him upstairs and undresses him, and he's more turned on than he thought possible. She sheds her robe and he's this close to taking all of his well-earned, well-built control and throwing it out the window to ravage her. She evades his grasp and pulls him into the tub with her.

Andrew's deep, dark secret is that he loves the bath. Alone or with someone else. There's something about the rocking of the water and the heat that just puts him at ease. He remembers being in the tub at home in Rome when he was just a little kid, the one time he could be alone in the quiet without screaming parents or fights with his sister. It's always been his happy, soothing place.

Meredith is lying in his arms, and he'd be lying if he said he weren't keeping an eye on whether or not he could see certain… salient details in the water. But Meredith, as always, throws him for a loop.

"How was your day?"

Andrew is touched, and pleased, and vindicated, and he tells her so – not in so many words. He talks about his patient in the pit, the family he argued with – he's finally able to laugh about it – and the experiment he's screwing up for her sister. He can tell she's listening, but she just lets him talk; he wonders again, for the hundredth time, how he got this lucky.

When he asks about her, she throws him for a loop – again.

"Mostly, all I could think about was you."

He laughs, but the turned-on part of his brain lights back up, and he knows his self-control is flagging – they're naked, in water, and the heat has made him a little light-headed and dreamy. "Tell me more."

"Remember when you pushed up against me while I was doing the dishes? You stripped my pants and underwear down in two seconds flat and were inside me after five. I almost blacked out, you made me come so hard." Andrew swears he can't breathe. "I just kept thinking about that, and how good you felt, and how loudly I screamed when I came."

And just like that, his self-control completely evaporates.

"Well, you wanted me to communicate."

He's done, cooked, fried, ready to go. "Meredith Grey, your communication skills are unparalleled." And with that, he picks her up and delicately places her on the bed before covering her with his body and binding himself to her for as long as possible.

He knows he's in love with her, and it takes all of his willpower to not say it to her right now. So he does everything he can to show the depth of how he feels – with his lips, with his tongue, with his eyes, with his hands. She falls, repeatedly, staring into his eyes each time. He feels her hands squeeze his own and he knows he can't keep it to himself much longer. He loves her.

And if she can tell by the way he's looking at her, then all the better.

At one point, she's moving over him, her blond hair static-y and flying everywhere, her cheeks pink, her eyes wild, and she leans down and crushes her lips to his, eyes open, left hand grasping his face and right anchoring to his hip. He knows she's feeling something; maybe it's not love, but it could be, one day.

When the evening is winding down and he's lying with his head on her hip while her free hand plays with his hair, he looks up to see her staring at him. Her eyes are soft and the corners of her lips are turned up; he could swear she wants to say something.

But all she says is, "Let's get ready for bed. I've got a meeting in the morning and you should probably leave early."

He feels his heart sink, just a tiny bit, but he relishes the thought of sleeping next to her. After she gets ready for bed and crawls in, he envelops her in his arms, their still-damp skin sticking his chest and her back together.

It is not time yet, he knows. He can't go from one emotional extreme to another in a day; that's his father's department. But for now, he will settle for a night with Meredith in his arms, waiting for the light of day to break the spell.