When Cristina entered the resident's locker room she thought it was empty, to her surprise she found Meredith already changed, propped up against her locker reading. Meredith peeked out from behind her mother's journal, and eyed Cristina. "You never called," she said with an annoyed look on her face. Meredith was beginning to feel the title of you're my person was becoming just that, a title. She could definitely tell that something serious was happening between Cristina and Owen, and she wanted details. Cristina gave Meredith an apologetic look.
"Sorry, it was really late and I didn't want to hear your precious McDreamy nagging about how he didn't get his beauty sleep." Cristina began changing into her scrubs. "Anyway, Mer… I am seriously falling for Owen." Meredith seemed slightly surprised.
"So you're in love with him?" Cristina sat beside her. "I think so."
"Have you guys used the loaded L word yet?"
"No, but the other night he basically told me he wanted to be around 40 years from now."
"Whoa, that's a lifetime!"
Cristina smiled. "I know, and funny thing is, I'm not scared, I'm actually looking forward to it."
Meredith closed her mother's journal and put her arm around Cristina. "Wow, so we're really growing up." Cristina just rolled her eyes. "I'm happy for you Cristina that you're moving on, I'm glad you're over Burke." The last statement made Cristina laugh.
"Pshh! After last night the thought of Burke's existence has completely perished!"
"Ah so the dirty sex with Owen is that good?"
Cristina slipped on her shoes and stood up, "Mer, shut up."
Meredith put her mother's journal in her locker, and faced Cristina, "So where did he take you?"
"Downtown," Cristina paused remembering the buildings, "to Pioneer Square, we had dinner, enjoyed the scenery, and went to his place. It was just…" Cristina let out a deep breath.
Remember the last time Cristina was in another man's house she asked, "Did you go through his things?"
Cristina said with a smile on her face, a smile Meredith had never seen. "Mer, it's not like Burke. First, Owen is a real man, and second he makes me want to have that happy ending, with him I feel like I have something great to look forward to. This doesn't feel forced, just natural."
"That was pretty reflective, especially for us."
"Damn it, I know."
"See, that's what I have with Derek." Meredith said proudly.
Cristina laughed, "Did you hear the part where I said Owen was a real man?"
"I see being in love has not completely changed the Cristina we all know and love"
Cristina left the locker room and walked down the corridor. She was on her way to check the OR board to see whose service she would be on today, but stopped when she saw Owen. He handed the nurse a patient's chart and began to stretch, he was clearly exhausted.
"You look like you need a good massage." Cristina said as she approached.
He smiled, "Are you offering?" looking at her tiny, fragile hands he teased, "You sure those little things can do any damage with a massage?" Cristina raised her eye brows.
"You'd be surprised at what these hands can do." She said, as she ran her hand down his chest to the strings of his scrub pants. Owen would have continued to flirt but saw Bailey heading their way so he straightened up. Cristina took a step back and quickly put her hand into the pockets of her coat. As Bailey passed she yelled out to Cristina.
"Yang meet me in the conference room in five minutes." Cristina eyes widened, worried that Dr. Bailey saw her and Owen flirting, but they returned to normal size when she heard her say, "We need to go over some things about the V.I.P patient you're on today."
"Okay I'll be right there" Cristina yelled back, as Dr. Bailey disappeared around the corner.
She returned her attention to Owen. "How was this morning's 911 emergency?"
"It's a mess. 32 year old male, with multiple stab wounds, had to do deep damage control surgery. He's in the ICU now. Hopefully he'll be back in the OR for definitive repair." Owen stretched again, "Just thought I would try and get some sleep before having to go back in there."
"Yeah, you definitely should." Cristina began to tie up her hair, "besides I have to get to my V.I.P patient." She said with a smirk.
"Yeah, I saw that last night on the OR board. I'm not sure who the special patient is but you'll be happy to hear the famous heart surgeon Dr. Colin Marlow is taking point on the surgery." Cristina froze. "I bet he has loads to teach." Before he could say anymore a nurse came running down the hall and informed him his patient was coding. He took off in a hurry, leaving Cristina in her stunned state.
"Yang!" Bailey yelled with force. Cristina slightly staggered. "Umm… yes?"
"V.I.P. patient, conference room, now!" Cristina hop skipped and jumped at Bailey's orders.
Bailey and Cristina entered the conference room to find Chief Webber, Marlowe, and the chairman of the hospital board; Larry. He was the V.I.P. patient for the valve replacement. They took seats beside each other and listened to what the Chief was saying. It was the typical speech from the last time penis fish guy was here, so Cristina tuned out the Chief's voice and drifted away in her thoughts about Owen. She knew once her friends found out Marlow was here, word would spread like wildfire of his last visit; him having his hands all over her ass. It would only be a matter of time before this news reached Owen. He would not only learn of her former romance with Marlow, but it would eventually lead to her ex-fiancé Burke. These thoughts frustrated Cristina, she was not sure she was ready to give Owen these details of her past. However, remembering the moments Owen shared with her, she knew he deserved to know, and to know now. Cristina decided after this meeting was wrapped up, she would track Owen down, and spill everything out before he heard it through the grapevine. When Cristina emerged from her thoughts, the meeting was over. The Chief, Bailey, and chairman of the hospital board left the room. As Cristina got up to leave and find Owen, Marlow began to speak.
"I'm sorry to hear that the wedding did not follow through." He made his way across the table and leaned against the doorway.
"Oh don't pretend to sorry," Cristina said as she placed her hands on her hips, "deep down you're jumping with joy." Marlow laughed and nonchalantly made his way in front of Cristina.
"You're right." He said, placing his index finger on her collar bone, "I always knew the Cristina Yang I fell in love with was still in there," and made his way down towards her heart. She swatted his hand away in disgust. "Don't even think about trying to feel me up again, and I am not that gooey eyed student infatuated with her professor. That Cristina is long gone." Just as Cristina finished her sentence, she saw a familiar figure from the corner of her eye. It was Owen; he had seen Marlow's passionate gaze he gave Cristina, but was too far down the hall to hear the exact words of their conversation. Owen witnessed Marlowe's finger touch Cristina, which sent waves of jealousy through his body. He was strongly tempted to go punch him his face in, but refrained when he saw the chief returning to the conference room.
"Dr. Marlow, Larry would like a word with you." The chief then directed his attention to Cristina. "Yang, please go book OR 1." Cristina nodded, but walked in Owen's direction. When he noticed she was coming his way, he turned and walked away. Cristina sped up, and caught his arm.
"Hey…" she tried to explain, but Owen cut her off. "I've got to get back in the OR, my guy cannot wait, sorry," and he walked toward the scrub room. Owen was visibly taken back by what he saw, and Cristina knew it. "Wait Owen. What you saw…" He stopped and faced her.
"I'm working, I'm busy, and clearly you are too." He said in an annoyed tone. "Great, just fucking great," she thought. On her way to book the OR she ran into Meredith, and Izzie. She was not up for any conversation, and Meredith instantly saw that, she said nothing, but gave an understanding look. Izzie however could not hold back.
"Sooo, the pig murderer try to kill Marlow yet for touching your ass?" Cristina glared at her.
"Shouldn't you be in the clinic sticking band aids on people?" Izzie simply laughed.
"Breathe Cristina, you can get through this." Meredith said before joining Izzie in the clinic.
Cristina booked the OR, and met Marlow in the scrub room. All she could think of was getting in and out of the surgery as quickly as possible. She needed to find Owen and explain everything to him. Before she entered the OR, she breathed deep, and tried to focus on the task ahead. "I can do this" she told herself, "focus on the medicine, I can get through this." She got her gown and gloves on, and joined Marlow on the opposite side of the operating table.
"10 blade." Marlow instructed to the scrub nurse. Cristina watched as he made a six to eight inch incision at the center of Larry's chest. He cracked his chest open and proceeded to put him on bypass by placing a special tube in the right atrium of his heart. Once that was finished, he made another incision, this time in the aorta. Watching this started to soothe Cristina's distraught mood, heart surgery invigorated her. It was when Marlow began to remove the damaged valve that broke the moment. With superiority in his eyes, he broke the silence, "I find it hard to believe that Preston Burke is deserving of the Haper Avery award, if he was, then the chairman of the medical board would have requested him to perform his surgery." Cristina refused to comment, but it did hit a nerve, bringing back the painful memory of her and Burke's tremor gate incident. He was not giving up on cracking Cristina's silence. Marlow continued to make malicious remarks all through surgery. He touched on everything from her poor decision in men, aside form him of course, to Burke, and how she allowed him to turn her into one of the weak and undirected she once talked down on. At one point Cristina wanted to shove the suction instrument down his throat. For the first time, Cristina dreaded being in the OR. Nearing the end of the surgery, Marlow asked Cristina if she would like to do the honors of sewing the new valve in place. She declined. Cristina did not want to share another moment with this man. She left the OR before he closed up Larry's chest. While scrubbing out, her mind could only contain one thought, and it was Owen. She felt he deserved to know her before in order for them to completely start their lifetime together. She was annoyed that it took Colin Marlow to show up.
"You can do this." Cristina said aloud. She had paged Owen and was pacing back and forth in the same on call room where he fell asleep on her. With each minute that passed Cristina became more nervous about what exactly she was going to say, and how he would take it. Once again she tuned her surroundings out, and was lost in her head.
Oh god, Oh god. What is he going to say when he hears that my last two significant relationships were with my superiors? I know exactly what he's going to think, I was sleeping to get ahead. He's going to see me as a social climber. The one guy who seems to fit into my life so well is going to be driven away once I spill all this on him. Oh not to mention the pregnancy, ectopic one at that, the loss of my fallopian tube. Ugh, once he finds out I was once engaged too, he's going to thing I'm a total hypocrite for being upset by the fact he did not tell me about Beth.
Owen walked into the on call room to find Cristina with her first clenched, eyes shut tight and mumbling to herself. "Cristina" he said soft. She did not respond. "Cristina!" he yelled loudly. The sound of his booming voice made her jolt. She turned to face him, and thought it's now or never. "Umm… I don't really know how to start, so bare with me. I want to tell you all of this before you hear it from someone else; I think you deserve that, especially after you've shared so much with me."
Cristina breathed deep.
"I know you saw Colin Marlow place his hand on me, and clearly it upset you but you should know that there is history between us. You see he was my professor at Stanford, and we became romantically involved for 3 years." She paused to take a look at Owen. He just stood there with his arms crossed, an expression on his face she had never seen nor could describe. It worried her, but she continued anyway. "When school was ending, I broke things off with him, and came here to Seattle and began my internship. Upon arriving here I got involved with an attending, Preston Burke; he was the head of cardiology. Our relationship progressed very fast, we started sleeping together, and then I got pregnant." Cristina paused again, this time when she looked at Owen, she recognized this expression; it was a state of shock. She looked away and continued. "Before I got a chance to tell him I was pregnant he broke up with me. A few days later I suffered an ectopic pregnancy, lost a fallopian tube, and those events brought us back together. We moved in together, got engaged, and made it to the wedding chapel." Cristina needed another breather before continuing, her voice now became shaky. "On the day of our wedding, he broke up with me, and left. He waited until the day of our wedding to tell me it was all over. He pushed me into moving in together, getting engaged, all the stupid wedding planning, and calls everything off." This time Cristina paused to look Owen straight in his eyes. She went on to tell him about the tremor gate fiasco, how she became his hand in surgery, and in the end was given no credit for it. "My name should be in that article." Tears filled Cristina's eyes. "That's it, that's my before."
Owen was still trying to process everything Cristina had said when she looked for him to respond. He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out. Cristina felt a knot form in her stomach and throat from Owen's silence. She was expecting him to flip out or judge her, anything but silence. Cristina sat on the bed, and watched as Owen simply turned around and left the room. Finally she allowed her tears fall.
I am not very pleased with this chapter. After revising it many times, I finally gave up and I'm publishing as is. Apologies if this chapter is all over the place. =/