Meredith's house is quiet when Cristina walks in half past 10PM. The kids are sound asleep, with Derek's light snores floating from upstairs, and Meredith is in the living room with her eyes glued to an episode of America's Next Top Model on the large flat-screen.
Cristina plops down next to her and links her arm with her person, resting her head on her shoulder. "I'm sorry about Richard," she says.
"He was your mentor too," Meredith says, watching emotionlessly, as a blonde model tackles the brunette in the dressing room. "What took you so long to get back?"
"I spent two hours in the morgue," Cristina tells her, sighing. "They're going to perform an autopsy on Richard tomorrow, find out exactly how…" She drifts off, not entirely accidentally. She decides to go a different route. "Maggie offered to plan the funeral. They're going to have a simple ceremony, sometime next week."
Finally, Meredith looks up at Cristina, and even though she looks skeletal, there's still a flesh of redemption in her eyes. "It's not your fault," she says, putting a hand over Cristina's.
"I know," Cristina says, fresh new tears filling in old gaps. "I know that. But still. I'm the one who performed his surgery. My hands were the last ones inside his body."
"Your robot hands, actually."
Cristina looks at Meredith flatly, before they both end up sprawling over each other on the couch in a fit of hysterical laughter—the kind that's throaty and out of nowhere, the kind that catches you with its cruelty, the kind that aches.
"He's gone," Meredith whispers, her laughter slowly simmering to a sad smile. Cristina nods, knowing that this is the first of many moments that the loss sinks into you, fast and hard, furiously relentless. "Are you staying for the funeral?"
"Yes," Cristina says. "But I'm leaving right after. I called Dr. Crawford back a few hours ago. I'm not taking the job."
"Oh, Cristina—"
"Let's not talk about it."
"You're running away," Meredith tells her. "You're always craving what's next, Cristina. And this is it. You know it, and I know it, and I'm pretty sure Owen knows it too—"
"Meredith—"
"How is this any different from moving away from your pampered Beverley Hills life to become a doctor? Or doing your fellowship in frigid coldness? Or moving to Zurich?"
"It's painful," Cristina says, her voice rising. "It's painful that Richard died, and that every time I return here, there's an alarm that tells me to turn the hell away. It's painful that Owen and I are… I don't know. I don't know what we are, and that's painful to me."
"No," Meredith says. "It's confusing. But painful is when there isn't a road back home. Or when you lose someone you can't get back. Painful is when there is an ending without a solution. But this… you and him? It's confusing, and it's complicated, but it isn't the end. You said it yourself when you left for Zurich: you aren't finished. And you have a sign now, waiting for you. Plus you're a kick-ass surgeon who should take the job regardless."
"So you believe in signs now? Meredith Grey, you've changed. Must be the whole chief thing."
"You've changed too," Meredith responds, giving Cristina a small smile. "When did you become such a pansy?"
"Oh shut up," Cristina says, slapping Meredith's shoulder with one of the throw pillows on the couch.
"Ouch," Meredith squeals, holding her arm with her fingers and glaring at Cristina incredulously. "That one has beads on it, you bitch."
"Who's the pansy now?"
Another aching laughter sits between them on the couch. Another moment passes, this one harder than before, as Cristina and Meredith fall back against each other and let the shadows rip away the night.
It is raining outside, one of those foggy downpours with trembling casts of lightning that Cristina does not miss about Seattle. The kind she used to jolt awake from, sweat on her forehead, as she tries to remember the nightmare that broke away from her thoughts abruptly. The type of rainstorm that was comforting and daunting, all the same, and reminded her of wanting to stay in bed forever.
It is raining outside, so she couldn't tell if the light knock on the front door was an intruder or just the pounding of raindrops against sheer glass. As Cristina sits up on the couch, careful not to wake up a heavily asleep Meredith beside her, she spots a familiar shadow outside. Just with the slightest of movements, small tendencies, she knows it is him.
"This late-night showing has to stop happening. You have to at least throw rocks at my window," Cristina says, as she opens the front door. Owen is almost completely drenched, and even worse, he has his sleeping two-year-old son strapped into a stroller, and Cristina can see tiny drops finding their way onto Beau's blonde hair.
"I love you," Owen blurts, unfazed at how enormous Cristina's eyes turn. "I know that you don't want to hear it. I know that it scares you. But I'm saying it, out loud. I love you, and I have always loved you, and I can't imagine that I'll ever stop."
"Owen, come inside. It's freaking pouring, and you sound like a crazy person."
Painful is when there isn't a road back home.
"You said there's a missing piece," he continues, as if he doesn't hear Cristina at all. "That the only way we would both be happy, truly happy, is if you had a baby, or if I decided I didn't want one."
He pushes Beau's stroller inside, finally realizing that it's absurd for his son to be out in the cold. Cristina expects Owen to step inside as well, but as soon as Beau is indoors, he continues talking in the rain.
"But you're wrong, Cristina." He reaches out and takes her hand, presses it against his chest. "Beau is my missing piece. He was my missing piece, but he's here, in my world, in my life."
Painful is when there is an ending without a solution.
"Owen—"
You and me. Us.
"But you're not," he says, stepping closer to her. She can feel how soaked his coat is, and how his entire body is dripping rainwater onto Meredith's very expensive, white carpet. "You're not with me. It's been four years, Cristina, and I'm not whole yet."
Her fingers curl around the buttons of his coat, and she finds herself pulling him into the warmth, peeling the wet jacket over his shoulders. His arms snake around her waist, and the soppiness of the rain on his clothes remind her of their first date—the best and the worst of what has happened, of what could be.
This isn't the end.
Owen's breath is hot against her ear. "Where's the rest of the puzzle?"
In seconds, they are flying up the staircase, not before pulling Beau's stroller next to an unconscious Meredith, toward the guest room. Cristina tears off the rest of his wet clothes, as Owen plants a trail of kisses—against her mouth, her collarbone, the navel of her belly, and further down. She buries her face on the crook of his neck, as he pulls himself into her.
There are very few places where she could feel this much safety in a canvas of exhilaration. This moment fills her—hard and fast, furiously relentless.
She doesn't want to keep score—of the good moments, and the bad, and the ugly—but as she laces her fingers with his and finds sleep willing her eyes to close, she wants this to be the first of many, too.