Meredith stares at her pager as she ponders how to answer Derek's question. Derek realises she is stressed to answer him on this when he realises she is worrying her bottom lip with her teeth,
"Mer" he soothes as he rubs her back "just tell me, it can't be that bad, it's your past right, before me, I'm not going to judge you on that".
She glances up at him and flicks him a short smile in response.
After a few more minutes of silence Derek sulkily says "so does this add another 25 steps back on, the fact that you still wont ever open up to me"
Meredith rolls her eyes at his tendency to move to a sulk as soon as he doesn't get her way. "Derek" she growls warningly "It's just, complicated and well, awkward"
Derek realises he is heading towards a mood and that it won't help either of them. "Ok", he offers "I'll ask questions and you answer"
"Ok then" she agrees, she does want to open up to him, but doesn't know how to start
"When was this?" he asks
Meredith sighed and twisted her watch once more then looked up at Derek, "Just before med school.."
"When you took the year off"
"Yes"
"So Europe.."
"Yeah last semester at Harvard, then Europe.."
"Wow, that's long for a non-boyfriend, non-relationship"
"That's not a question" Meredith states
Derek frowns and her and Meredith shrugs "Maybe I was the only one who thought we weren't in a relationship" she sighed.
"Oh, different points of view" Derek repeats from earlier
"Yeah I guess"
"Ok, so they thought you were in a relationship, you didn't"
"Yeah pretty much"
"So you ended it when you realised that?"
"I tried, but we were in Europe, and I was having fun, so I was I guess, vague about it.."
"Vague"
Meredith cringes "Yeah, vague, I just kind of pulled away"
"Oh" you avoided he states
"Yeah I guess" she says offering him a wry smile
"And it ended like that?" he asks
"No, they didn't get the hint, I was working up the courage to be mean and just end it, when Ellis saved the day."
"Ellis?"
"She'd never approved of us being together and I guess that is part of why I didn't end it earlier. You know pink hair had grown old, I needed some new rebellion."
"So if you stayed in it partly because of Ellis, how did she help you end it?" he said getting more confused by the moment. Underlying anger was starting to bubble away at him as well, despite her adamant denial, how could she not see something that spanned at least six months, and that her mother was clearly aware of, that involved overseas travel together could not be constituted as a boyfriend. He bit his tongue for once though cause at least she was talking.
"She got sick" Meredith looked up at him at raised her eyebrows "I guess it was one consolation in that. It helped me end the mess I was in. I left Europe came home to look after her, and went to med school, the rebellion was over"
Derek nodded he knew there had been a shift around that time, and this helped him put some of the pieces of things she had told him.
"So why is he back after all this time?"
Meredith cringed at his question "Seems word of Ellis's death has spread"
"Oh" Derek frowned "Oh so he feels now that Mommy Dearest has gone you'll fall back into his arms?" he asked
"You could kind of say that" Meredith laughed nervously
Mad as Derek was that there was some guy roaming the halls of Seattle Grace who thought he had some claim on Meredith, and that she was clearly skirting the truth about the definition of their relationship. He was glad she was opening up to him. Unfortunately their heart to heart was interrupted by a loud knocking on the door.
"Meredith, I know you're in there" Meredith flopped back against the wall with a loud sigh as Derek's face registered shock as the firm, loud, but definitely female voice continued "You can't hide forever you know".
"Oh" he spluttered "not a boyfriend"
"No" Meredith sighed loudly.