I hope that people are reading and enjoying this. I still love Addison/Alex -there was so much potential there.

Chapter 3

Alex stood outside the door to the resident's locker room. He closed his eyes and let out a deep sigh before pushing the door open. Addison had stayed on an extra few days, and had been letting him scrub in on her surgeries. The surgery they'd just come out of had been long and difficult but ultimately successful. While he'd been in surgery working doggedly to make sure mom and baby survived he'd been able to forget that today was the day Robbie was supposed to take his daughter back to Shahala.

He was halfway across the room to his locker when he caught sight of Meredith and stopped short. Meredith was sitting in a chair his daughter laying comfortably in her arms. "What's going on?" He dropped tiredly onto a nearby bench. The last thing he'd expected to find when he'd walked in here was his daughter snuggled up close to Meredith.

Meredith shifted Alyssa in her arms. "Robbie stopped by looking for you, but you were already in surgery. She decided Alyssa deserved a chance to be with her father." She stood up and put her in Alex's arm. "She said to call her if you have problems or you change your mind." She ran her hand over the baby's soft hair. "She did a huge thing. You should let her have a relationship with Alyssa too."

Alex just nodded as Meredith left the room. He looked down at his daughter and panic threatened to overtake him. He had no idea how to do this. He couldn't help but thinking that maybe it would have been best for everyone if he hadn't fought Robbie on taking her back to Shahala. He didn't know the first thing about being a good parent.

"Karev?" Addison opened the door to the locker room far enough to poke her head in to see if her former intern was still in here. "Karev." She said his name again and pushed the door open further. "I just wanted to let you know that I'm heading back in the morning." He'd been great on the surgeries she'd had while she was in town. He could have had a great future in neonatology, and she believed he'd be a wonderful pediatrics surgeon.

"I don't know what to do." He didn't look up at her. He just kept looking at Alyssa who was starting to squirm in his arms.

Addison came to sit down next to him on the bench. She reached into her bag and dug around for her keys before handing them to the baby to entertain herself. "I thought Izzie's mom was taking her home."

"She decided she needed her father." He'd gotten what he'd fought for.

Addison reached for the baby and gathered her close. "Hello, pretty girl." She cooed. Alyssa handed her back her keys and instead reached out for the necklace that Addison was wearing. "And now you're thinking you can't do this, right?" She met Alex's gaze.

"I live in a room in Meredith's house. I don't have any baby stuff. And I have a fulltime job with irregular hours. What am I going to do with her when I'm here?" That was just the beginning. He was sure he could come up with a hundred other things that he didn't have covered.

Addison gently unwrapped the baby's fingers from her necklace. "Meredith and Derek aren't going to kick you out. That you gives a place to stay while you look for something that is right for you and Alyssa. And you can buy baby stuff. Robbie probably left some of the essentials here."

"What about daycare?" Alex challenged her. He knew it couldn't be as easy as she was making it sound.

She shrugged. "Do what Bailey does. Bailey uses the daycare in the hospital. It lets her go downstairs and check on her son whenever she has free time. She goes down there and has lunch with him. You have people who will help you, Alex." She used his first name for emphasis. "What this little angel needs more than anything is for you to love her."

"She's a quiet baby." He commented not addressing Addison's comments. Izzie was rarely quiet.

"She's had a lot of upheaval." She dropped her keys back into her bag. She looked back down at Alyssa who once again had her necklace; this time in her mouth. "That taste good?" She asked the baby as she again took the necklace from her. She kissed the baby's chubby cheeks and handed her back to Alex. "Take your daughter home." She stood up, gathered her things, and left the locker room.

!1

"Addison?" Derek asked quizzically as he answered the door later that evening. "His ex-wife was the last person he expected to see on his doorstep. "Don't you have an early flight?"

"I do yes." It was a detail Derek wouldn't have known when they'd actually been married. "I'm not staying long. I just have some things for the baby." She held up the shopping bags she was carrying.

"Upstairs." Derek stood back to let her enter.

"Thanks." She climbed the stairs quickly. The door to his room was closed and she knocked quietly in case Alyssa was sleeping.

"Addison?" He hadn't thought he'd see her again before she left for Los Angeles.

"Can I come in for a minute?" She could see that Alyssa was in dead sleeping in the playpen that Alex had set up in his room. It made the already small room almost impossibly cramped.

"What is all that?" He eyed the bags she was carrying.

"Baby stuff." She saw him staring at the label of the expensive department store on the bag. "It's a gift. I wanted to do this." She told him before he could start an argument with her about how it was too much. She set the bags down and reached into one and pulled out a newspaper already opened to the classifieds. "That's for you."

"Thanks." He didn't tell her he'd stopped on his way home and bought a copy of the paper as well. "What'd you get the baby?"

"The essentials. Diapers, wipes, that kind of stuff. Some clothes. Things she can wear now and some that she'll grow into." She'd maybe gotten a little carried away as she'd gone through the aisles of pink and purple outfits. But she couldn't picture Alex Karev picking out dresses and sweater sets for the little girl.

"Thanks." Alex looked down at the bags and then at the woman standing in front of him. He surprised them both by stepping forward to hug her. "I mean it. Thank you."

She hugged him back briefly and then stood back. "If you ever need anything you can call. I mean I know I'm far away, but if you ever just want to talk." She walked to the door and turned back to face him. "You're going to be a good father, Alex."

He didn't know how to respond to the complete faith in him that she had. So he just nodded. "I'm going to try." He was going to take it one day at a time, do the best that he could, and hope it was enough.