Twice the trouble

Summary: One moment, Alex and Meredith were in an accident and when they woke up, it's 2005. Back to Seattle Grace. (S15 → S1) Merder, Jolex, etc.


Chapter 3: Alex, what the hell!

Meredith was pulling out a cold pizza from the fridge for breakfast when she heard footsteps before Alex bursted into the kitchen screaming, "Jo!"

Meredith noticed the frantic look on his face. "What about her? You miss her already?"

"Jo could be with that bastard," Alex said in rage as he started pacing the room. It finally hit her, she was not the only one having a spouse who was married to another. And now, Jo, or Brooke might already have been married to Paul Stadler.

Meredith did not know how to help her best friend who was on the verge of a meltdown.

"She's 18 now right. That probably means she's at the trailer park. Maybe you can catch her before she meets Paul or even before she goes to Princeton?" Meredith suggested but did not expect Alex to brighten up at her idea. Kissing her cheek, Alex smiled brightly, "I knew there is a reason, I keep you around."

"Hey, have some pizza. We're going to be late!" Meredith called out as she saw Alex struggling to dress before rushing out.

"No time for that!," He hollered from the doorway.


"Dr. Bailey, l was hoping to assist you in the OR today. Maybe do a minor procedure. l think l'm ready," Cristina tried her luck before giving her the cup of mocha latte. Izzie was quick to cut her, "lf she gets to cut, l want to cut." Bailey tried to ward off her interns before stomping her feet, "Stop talking. Every intern wants to perform their first surgery. That's not your job. Do you know what your job is? To make your resident happy. Do l look happy? No. Why? Because my interns are whiny. You know what will make me look happy? Having code team staffed, having the trauma pages answered, having the weekend labs delivered and having someone down in the pit doing the sutures. No one holds a scalpel till l'm so happy l'm Mary-freakin'-Poppins. Mocha latte, my ass. Why are y'all standing there? Move!"

Meredith entered the elevator filled with excited and a little dread when she saw who it was inside. Not looking up from his cell phone, the man said, "Seattle has ferryboats. l didn't know that. l've been living here for weeks and l didn't know there were ferryboats."

Ferryboats used to fill her with grief, remembering her husband. But now it was serene, hope... Meredith turned to the man and pointed out, "Seattle is surrounded by water on three sides.".

"Hence the ferryboats… Now l have to like it here. l wasn't planning on liking it here. l'm from New York, genetically engineered to dislike everywhere, except Manhattan. l have a thing for ferryboats," he snapped his phone before looking up to Meredith, a grin creeping up his face.

Remembering how this conversation went, she decided to play along, "I'm not going out with you."

"Did l ask you to go out with me?" Derek mused, "Do you want to go out with me?"

"l'm not dating you, and l'm definitely not sleeping with you again... You're my boss," Meredith said in a mantra. The nostalgia set a warm smile to spread on her face.

"l'm your boss's boss," Derek corrected her teasingly.

"You're my teacher and my teacher's teacher. And you're my teacher,"

''l'm your sister. l'm your daughter," he stated sarcastically, leaning in closer to her from behind.

Meredith felt as if she couldn't breathe as she felt his breath tingling on her neck, she accused, ''You're sexually harassing me."

"l'm riding an elevator," Derek replied smugly.

"Look, l'm drawing a line. The line is drawn. There's a big line," Meredith felt her self-control waning as his presence. His familiar scent. That perfectly moussed hair, those dreamy blue eyes, that dazzling smile… She missed him

"So, this line, is it imaginary, or do l need to get you a marker?" Derek teased.

Meredith decided to throw caution to the wind, dropping her files and crashed his lips with hers. Maybe it was the thought of remembering her past life, maybe she didn't want things to change. Maybe the thought of telling Derek her knowledge of his marriage scares her. She wanted him, she needed him. And maybe changing things could affect her relationship with Derek. And maybe not in the good way as she would hope. Then no Zola, no Bailey, no Ellis, no family…

It scared her.

Hearing the ding sound of the elevator indicating they've reached their level, Meredith pulled away, grabbed her dropped files and exited, leaving Derek to stare at her leaving figure, smirking, before hollering, "I'll see you later."


Derek Shepherd and Preston Burke were the attendings treating the rape victim.

"See how shredded her hands are? She tried to fight. Rape kit came back negative. She kicked his ass!"

"l think l may have found the cause of our rupture. Large hemostat. More suction." Burke pulled out the foreign object, puzzled, "What is this? Does anyone know what this is?"

"Oh, Grey's right again." "There goes my fifty," whispers and groans could be heard throughout the OR and the observatory.

Burke having heard the commotion and noticed the horrified look among all the men in the OR with the exception of Derek. He asked in frustration as he could sense a smirking Meredith despite the mask covering half her face "What? Spit it out, Grey."

"She bit it off."

"Bit off what?"

"That's his penis. She bit off his his penis," Burke dropped the repulsive specimen into a cooler box and handed the cooler box to Meredith. Yeah penis minder again. Knowing she had to hold the cooler box till the police took custody.


"I'm having a bad day…" Meredith declared as she sat beside Cristina the cooler box between them. "l kissed Derek," Meredith confessed.

"You kissed Derek?" Cristina tried to pry for more information.

"ln the elevator. l was having a bad day."

"This is what do you do on your bad days, make out with Dr. McDreamy," Cristina teased.

Alex slumped and leaned on Meredith as George and Izzie joined them in the tunnels.

"I hate being an intern," Meredith declared.

"Hey, at least you made quite the earnings from today's bet," Izzie grumbled as she tear of the bag of chips and started munching.

"How are you always winning? I never win," George joined in as Alex smirked at her knowingly. She shrugged and attributed it to luck.

"Come on, there's something we can do to cheer us up," Izzie dragged the interns up to the Peds floor.

Chuckles, cooing and laugher while George was talking gibberish, "You are such a woman," Alex teased the other man.

"Says the *cough* peds *cough*" Meredith teased.

Several beeping of pagers brought them out of their baby wonderland and had them running down the halls to answer the pagers, leaving Alex and Meredith behind.

"Hey Alex did you see that?" Meredith pointed to a baby turning blue.

"You're not authorized to be in here. Do you know how much trouble you can get into?" A peds intern approach the two of them.

"Are you going to do any tests? lt's a benign systolic ejection murmur," Alex pressed.

"lt goes away with age," The intern dismissed the both of them as she walked away, "You should get out of here."

As Alex and Meredith walked away, Alex muttered, "Sucks being an intern. I'm the head of peds for god sake. Scratch that, I was the bloody chief of surgery!"

"Interim," Meredith corrected him. "Come on, we should get Burke to handle this."


Meredith held wanted to check on rape victim before noticing Derek munching in chips at the nurses station, "Have you been here all night?"

"Mm-hmm. You know, l have four sisters. Very girly. Tons of kids. lf l was in a coma, they'd all be here. l'd want them here. Having no one? Can't imagine that."

Meredith was hit by a pang of guilt. She suddenly recall him saying this the first time too and had not fulfill his wishes. Memories of the night flashed through her mind as she tried to hold back the grief and sadness associated to that night. Meredith barely recognised Derek washing his hands before leaning on a doorway beside her, "So we're kissing, but we're not dating?"

Noticing her dazed look, he misunderstood her intentions, "Don't get me wrong. l like the kissing. l'm all for the kissing. More kissing, l say. Is it gonna happen again? Because if it is, l need to bring breath mints," he gazed at her, before leaning close to her, whispering, "Put a condom in my wallet.".

Absorbed in her thoughts, she did not reply him which prompted Derek to take a closer look at her. "There was this baby up in the nursery. He's brand new. No one's neglected him or damaged him yet. How do we get from there to here? Someone's beat the crap out of her, and she's got nobody. I just don't get it." Suddenly there was a beeping, Derek rushed into the room while Meredith hit the alarm before wheeling her into the OR.

Meredith sighed, the rapist lost a penis but here was Allison who may never wake up, Meredith leaned against the wall, waiting for Derek's return hopefully with hood news. "I had to leave her skull flap off, till the pressure in her brain goes down."

Meredith shook her head. The world was such a cruel place. Derek looked at her helplessly, "She's going to be fine."

"If she ever wakes up," Meredith pointed out.

Derek nodded and sighed, "If she ever wakes up."

Meredith walked over to the elevator to head to the OR, she was about to head home but ran into Derek who was waiting for the elevator. "So. It's intense… this thing I have for, ah, ferry boats I mean."

Meredith turned to smile at Derek, who had a playful glint in his dreamy blue eye, "I'm so taking the stairs this time."

"No self-control," Derek called out before entering the elevator. "It's sad... Really."


"Mer, I found her," Meredith groaned as she was pulled out from her slumber to see Alex standing at the foot of her bed. She had just finished her shift and only had a few hours of sleep and clearly did not appreciate the interrupted sleep. Meredith got up but tripped and fell flat on her face before limping out to follow her best friend.

Meredith found it extremely strange to see Alex chipper and preparing breakfast for the both of them. As he was about to leave the house, Meredith just knew what his plan was and knew she couldn't do anything. "Alex, don't do anything stupid."

"Stupid? Are you kidding me Mer? I won't," he declared before bolting out the door. Meredith had a really bad feeling about this.


"Fools on bikes killing themselves. Natural selection is what it is. Chief! Dead baby bike race started twenty minutes ago," Bailey approached Chief Webber who was admiring the OR Board.

"All right, people! Dead baby bike race day!" Chief Webber hollered.

"What's that?" George asked.

"Dead baby bike race day, only in Seattle. Every year, the Dead Baby Bar holds this underground bike race. The race is completely illegal, and crazy, a bunch of bike messengers racing against traffic trying to beat each other for free shots of tequila. All-out, no holds barred competition, the race doesn't even have any rules. Except eye gouging - no eye gouging," Meredith explained.

"Great, we're going to be trapped in the Pit bandaging up idiots when we could be up in the OR?" Cristina approached the duo from behind moaning.

What kind of people engage in a race that has, as its only rule, that you can't rip out the eyeballs of another human being?" George grumbled.

"Okay people, the rules of trauma. Don't mingle with the ER interns, they don't know their ass from their oesophagus. Sew fast, discharge fast, take bodies up to the OR yesterday. Don't let me catch you fighting over patients. Got it? Come on, let's go," Bailey instructed.

"Where is Karev?" Bailey shouted finally noticing Alex's lack of presence. The other three shook their heads and denied their knowledge. Meredith and Alex had discussed beforehand that they did not want to reveal their living condition because they did not want Izzie and George to live with them. Especially Izzie since Alex had divorced her before. And it was already hard to see George everyday and not be reminded of how he looked like at his last moments. But at this moment in time, Alex's ass needed saving. She could only hope he didn't get into any trouble.

"He's… um… sick?" Meredith tried.

All the interns turned to her questioningly and Meredith saw Bailey raise a lone eyebrow in her direction. Nobody can say no to that eyebrow, "How'd you know that Grey?"

"I saw him this morning…" Seeing Bailey's unconvinced look, she finally revealed hesitantly, "we're roommates." Bailey nodded before leaving.

"What are you and Alex a thing?" Izzie questioned nosily and she noticed George's crestfallen face and Cristina's knowing look.

"No, we're just roommates," Meredith declared before attempting to walk away before getting to George and Izzie started to cling on both her arms asking if she had any spare rooms for them too.

Meredith tried to get Cristina to help her but she looked to amused by the situation.

"OH look patients!" Meredith pointed out. In their momentary lapse where the loosened their grip on her arms, she took off to the ambulance bay.

The rest of the interns ran and jostled for positions to tend to the injured bike riders everywhere. Cristina was giddy with excitement, "Oh, it's like candy, but with blood, which is so much better." Cristina, Izzie and George were fighting over patients which brought memories of their first time as intern struggling and fighting for OR time and patients. It's been a while that she was stuck with the interns job, suturing while all of the other patients needing surgery passed by her. It sucked being an intern.

"Ah, you got a nice touch. And by the way, you are a rocking babe," Viper flirted.

"Seriously, do you actually think you have a shot here?" Meredith rolled her eyes, losing her patience since she was stuck on scut.

"I like to think I've got a shot anywhere."

"Look, you really have to let me take you for some tests, and a CT. You could have internal bleeding," Meredith chastised.

"No thank you, I've got a race to get back 's a party at the finish line. Do you want to meet me there?" Viper scrambled to get up.

As Meredith persuaded the man to take the test but to no avail, so she shoved him the AMA forms to sign, she was also trying to recall how she remembered the man. Viper got the papers signed, took a few steps towards the door, turned back, grabbed Meredith and kissed her, "That was for good luck... Don't worry, darling, you'll see me again." before dashing out of the ER.

Meredith shook her head. Right now she remembered, Viper, the first patient who had ever kissed her. She looked up and noticed Derek entering, knowing exactly his intention.

"You make out with patients now? How many guys are there?" Looking at him, she could see straight pass his amused facade. She could see it now as clear as the sun on a bright day, something she could not see the last time. Jealousy… When did Derek start loving her? "What are you, jealous?"

"I don't get jealous. We had sex, and we kissed, in an elevator. No, seriously, I mean come on, go out with me," Derek attempted to fish a date out from Meredith again. Meredith shook her head in refusal.

Derek pulled himself closer to Meredith and gazed intently into her eyes, "You know, I almost died today... Yeah, I came like this close. How would you feel if I died? And you didn't get a chance to go out with me?"

It took every ounce of Meredith self-restraint from jumping the man with the charming smile and sparkling eyes, "Get over yourself already" Meredith said before walking away. "I'm still not going out with you."

Derek smirked, "You say that now," before leaving Meredith to ponder.


As Meredith parked on the front porch, she noticed the living room was lighted up.

"Alex, you owe me big time for covering you," Meredith walked into the living room after receiving no response.

Alex was sitting on the floor as he was staring intently at a figure on the sofa.

Meredith froze as she noticed the shape the figure it was in, "Alex, what the hell did you do?"