Chapter Ten: And The Worst Part Is There's No-one Else To Blame.

You're surprised to find her eyeing you curiously when you open your eyes proper, the pale morning sunlight that precedes a vivid sunrise just peeking under the heavy hotel curtains. The colours seem to fade into the shadows and everything is dull except her vivid red curls.

"Hi," she says shyly, propping her face on her hand.

You reach out and brush her hair from her eyes, smiling at her, "Hi," you swallow and something tightens in your chest; it's a nervous, insecure sort of feeling, an ache, and you hate the feeling but it's because of that that you sound genuinely surprised as you observe her, "You're here."

She presses her lips together and nods slowly, twisting towards you until her head rests against you arm, "Yeah. You were dreaming."

"Did I wake you?" you absently pull your arm out from between you and wrap it around her sheet-clad shoulders, tugging the covers with her until she's half-sprawled on top of you in a cocoon of blankets.

She grins, "Once or twice, but it's ok."

"I'm sorry," you turn your face and raise a fist to your mouth, stifling the cough which interrupts your sentence.

She shakes her head, "Really Mark, it's fine but," she looks a little wistful, "Do you dream about me often?"

You smirk at her and she slaps the wad of blankets engulfing your shoulder with great difficulty, since she has a similar wad engulfing hers.

"That's not what I meant," she whispers softly, kissing you in much the same way and sighing as you pull her hair back from her face, running your fingers through it.

"Why'd you dye it?" you ask her, completely out of context with the current conversation but to you it seems logical.

She shrugs, looking ambivalent, "I don't know; I needed a change."

"I love you like this," you tell her, fingering her bangs fondly. The words aren't quite right but your voice is scratchy and sore so you can't really be bothered trying to think of a more subtle way to phrase it. It's true anyway; maybe not a wise thing to admit but you figure you haven't got a lot left to lose at this point.

She pulls backwards just the slightest bit and regards you curiously, "You never said you didn't like my hair blonde."

You make a fist around the curls and tug her mouth to yours, kissing her slowly and parting her lips with your tongue. She's breathing heavily over your mouth, both eyes still closed, so you murmur lightly in her ear, "I did like it. I just love you like this."

"Oh Mark," she says it like you're hurting her, pained and wary and this is why you hate mornings, "Please let's..."

"Don't," you interrupt, "Addison," you clutch at her wrist with the hand that isn't tangled in her hair, "Don't."

She swallows and nods against your shoulder, "Ok, ok I'm sorry I just..."

You stroke her hair absently and let your eyes slide closed again, "It's ok."

"I want to say I love you," she whispers sleepily, "But I don't want to be lying. And I'm so sorry, so sorry to have to say that but I can't... I don't want you to think that it means everything. It means something," she alludes to a conversation you would have thought she had forgotten; it was so long ago, "Just not everything."

You hug her against you a little tighter and sigh, "I don't think it means anything."

"It does," she breathes, sounding wounded, "How can you say that Mark? Do you really think that I would... it means something."

You open your eyes and push her upright until you can stare at her, the eye contact intense and piercing and you see her eyes narrow to echo your own expression.

"What does mean Addison?" you challenge her.

She snaps, eyes burning with anger, "It means that you hurt me. It means that sometimes I want to pretend that you make me feel like you used to, that I can trust you, that you're different because you're with me. It means that sometimes I want to pretend I was enough," her teeth sink down into her bottom lip and suddenly she looks more terrified than defiant. Immediately you regret your tone; you curl your fingers around her upper arms and squeeze gently as she says, "It means that I don't know what I'm doing any more."

"I'm so sorry Ad," you say with all the force behind the ache in your chest creeping into your tone; you hope she can hear how much you wish this was different, that it had all happened differently, "I'm just... sorry that I hurt you, sorry that I didn't call you, sorry that we're both so screwed up and miserable because you're amazing and you deserve better, but I," you sigh, lean back against the pillows, try to ignore the throbbing between your temples, "I don't think I'm making sense."

"Sometimes," she tells you gently, "Being sorry doesn't change the facts of the matter. And I want to forgive you and I want to forgive Derek; I want to move past, move on, stop letting it affect my life and my decisions but I'm... not ready yet. Some days I don't think I ever will be and most days," her fingers sink into her palms, fists resting against your chest, "Most days I don't think it will ever be the same again."

"That doesn't mean we can't be happy," you tell her, hands wandering along her shoulders as you tug down on the sheet, cupping her breasts in your palms.

She sighs in response, leaning forward to brush her lips against yours lightly, "I have to go Mark."

You pull back slightly but not enough because you're not really committed to the follow through, "I know."

"Hey," she pulls backward suddenly after briefly resting her forehead against yours, "You're hotter than usual today."

If you weren't feeling so crap you might consider making a joke about that. Her cool palm presses against your forehead and she wriggles sideways. You swallow and jerk back, away from her this time, suddenly remembering that your illness is probably making your breath even more terrible than it usually is this time of morning.

"Have you been taking the drugs?" she sounds suspicious.

You look at her incredulously, "I prescribed them for myself. Of course I'm taking them."

She sighs, "I should be letting you heal."

You try to raise an eyebrow at her, but you can't quite perfect the motion, "Instead of using me for your pleasure?"

She smiles and looks amused but a faint blush rises to her cheeks. "Something like that," she murmurs.

"Well," you sit up and say as you stretch, "I feel better."

She wrinkles her nose, "When was the last time you showered?"

Sniffing yourself you make a face, "I've been in bed for two days."

"Well," she teases, "I suggest you bathe. I'm going to go do the same."

You keep your voice light because you're not serious when you say, "We could save water."

She quirks an eyebrow at you, perfectly executing the incredulous expression you attempted earlier, "Mark Sloan, environmentalist extraordinaire."

You pull her closer suddenly and hug her to your sides, your arm resting around her shoulders as you bury your nose in her hair. It's easy for you both to slip into bantering daylight mode but you're not sure when you'll be allowed to take advantage of a situation like this again. "Bye Ad," you offer simply, and she leans into your side, head resting on your shoulder for a moment.

Then she swallows back something sentimental (you can see that much in her guarded expression when she slowly stands, pulling the sheet with her, and meets your eyes), "I'll... see you later Mark," she responds, trying to lighten the tenor of the conversation, remove the undertones.

"I," you hesitate, "But not tonight."

It's not really a question, but it hovers somewhere between a suggestion and a request.

"No," she agrees with a sigh, "That's probably for the best."

With a shrug you stand and wander towards the bathroom, keen on taking that shower now that you've realised you feel so unclean.

You can feel her eyes on you, watching you and probably waiting for some response so you turn once most of your body is shielded by the door frame and throw a reassuring smile in her direction, "It's ok," you state, more confidently that you feel, "We always did suck at just friends."

She rolls her eyes and gestures to her outfit, which makes her look like a sorority sister at a toga party, "Maybe it takes trial and error."

"Truce," you declare, "See you."

She nods and waves you towards the shower saying, "I'll let myself out."

So you leave her fishing for her clothes which are strewn about the bed in a scattered but defined pile and adjust the hot water until the temperature makes the back of your palm turn red. You step under the water, deaf and blind with your eyes closed and allow it to invigorate your skin. It's too hot; it scalds your shoulders, makes your fingers turn an angry red when you peek at them through the corners of your eyes.

You don't care.

When you exit the bathroom you smell better but her clothes are gone, the naked carpet glaring at you. There's still the slight smell of her though, when you sink down onto the bed to pull on the sweatpants still piled beside the nightstand.

Eyes wider than they have been in a while you consider your surroundings and realise, abruptly, that hushed whispers find your ears from behind your door. You recognise the cadence of her voice as it rises ever so slightly in frustration and his intonation as he replies in kind. Curiously, you allow yourself to cross the floor and lean against the cold wooden door; it soothes your burning skin, still pink from the combination of the heat and pressure of the water.

You can hear their voices now, muffled by the door but audible except at intervals.

"What more do you want?" she says, "I, I'm sorry Derek, I really am but I can't be any more sorry than I already am. So," she hisses her next, "Just stop. It takes two. And even if you were going to act like a saint, say you didn't do it first or you were in love as though that absolves you, you did it too. So-" she's lost midsentence and you wait for his rebuttal, because you know she rarely finds herself again in time to continue a tirade.

"What more do I want?" he raises his voice, "I want to come here and not find you sneaking off like a teenager doing the walk of shame. Jesus Addison."

"That has so little to do with you Derek Shepherd, and you have No Right," she snaps it with capitals, like that, "None, to tell me who I can and cannot sleep with or pass judgement."

"Oh you want judgement Addison?"

"NO," she interjects, so loudly you're tempted to remind them that unlike the rest of the medical professional, normal human beings may still be sleeping at this side of a full sunrise, "NO I don't because YOU HAVE NO RIGHT to say these things to me. You, you who said you wanted me out of your life, who left another woman's underwear in your pockets for me to find, who made me into this person, this Seattle version of myself who was willing to accept your shit for an entire year before I stood up for what I deserved."

You smirk at that. Addison Montgomery swearing sober, careful Derek.

"What you deserved? From me. After what you did to me you're talking about what you deserved?"

"Christ Derek, if that was how you felt why stay with me at all? If you... no, you know what, screw this. I don't have to explain myself to you. If you can't grow up and get over it then I'm..."

"What Addison?" he retorts, nastily but jealousy has always been especially ugly on him, especially when underscored by self-righteous anger, "You're going to screw him again to get back at me?"

You silently resolve not to tell him later that that's not why she sleeps with you. You can take it like a man and resist the urge.

"Oh yes Derek really, EVERYTHING IS actually about you, I'm SORRY, I should have remembered that a divorced newly single woman couldn't have sex with a similarly unattached man unless you had something to do with."

"Considering the players in question are my ex-wife and best friend," he shouts in his own defence.

You hear her angry groan, count to ten, and wait for her to resume her diatribe, so curious as to how this is all going to end because you have a morbid fascination with car crashes.

"I am not going to let you punish me anymore," she says, bitingly calm, "I'm selling the brownstone. The contract settles next week. I've talked to the accountant about transferring half the profit to your account. I'm making a trip to New York to retrieve what's left of my things, but I wanted to know," she pauses, businesslike, "If you wanted any of the furniture. Otherwise it's going with the house. We'll ask for more."

You can hear the slump of his shoulders in his tone, "No. I don't want any of it."

"The house in the Hamptons goes to auction next week then," she manages to clip out through her teeth, like a typewriter talking, "I'm also giving you half."

He must open his mouth then, you hear a hesitant sound before she cuts him off with some finality, "We jointly owned the properties. Regardless of what happened, in the settlement you gave them to me. You can be responsible for subdividing the blame and assigning us and Mark our own share of guilt but I'm responsible for the property. You're getting half."

"Addison," he says, misdirected pain showing it's true self in his voice which probably isn't a tactic knowing Derek but you know this will hurt her more than all the anger he could have thrown at her, "I... I know I have no right."

Her voice softens immediately; you can imagine her faint smile as she jokes, "Damn right you have no right."

"But, what are you..."

The pause is longer than you might have liked.

"Some mistakes," she stammers, you bristle, "It's."

"Complicated," Derek supplies, no question mark follows.

"Yes," she agrees, "Mark always... oh Derek, I've loved you so much more, so much better, for so much longer than anyone. You have to know that, you were there and you must know that no one could fake that kind of happiness," her voice has the edge of tears that you always seem to bring out in her intonation, "But."

"Always a but Addison," he interjects sadly.

"I was in love with him Derek, like you," she swallows the words, then reconsiders, "You love Meredith. It's not the same," she continues, awkwardly, "But I know you do love her. And that's a new thing, for you. Please try to understand that it was never a new thing with Mark. I'm not melodramatic enough to try and tell you now that I loved him all along, I didn't, but him and I," she sighs, "It was the first year of medical school Derek, and he changed me in lots of ways."

"I don't know what you're saying," he offers, at a loss, "I."

"He didn't forget to call," she says evenly.

"How long?" he returns.

She sighs, "Just once, we didn't speak for a long time."

"How long now?"

Her tone changes slightly, has more of an edge, "Derek, you have no business asking me this, but I'm going to tell you anyway and this is my final peace offering. Like I said, I will not let you hold this over my head anymore. No one is going to hold this over my head anymore because I," she sighs, slows down, and finishes matter-of-factly, "I can't change the past. It's done, and so am I."

He mumbles agreement quietly, which you have to deduce because you don't really hear anything. She continues though, so you assume.

"Mark is easy to be with. He is... he knows me, and I trust him and we are or were or are still despite it all," she pauses, you can see her hand gestures in your head, "Friends. Just like you are Derek. You'd like to deny it but he still gets you and he, he gets me and he gets me better than even you did most days. We shared a lot of things, you and I, but Mark," she sounds exasperated now, "For better or worse, and I'm leaning towards worse because he always did use his talents for evil, Mark always knew things about me before I knew them myself. He told me I was going to marry you," she offers this as proof though you really don't think this proves you're anything special in terms of perception. They were a done deal. "And it's easy to forget what happened between all of us with him, because we were never finished. Derek, you and I had years, had time to grow apart. We made a go of it. We realised what we could be. With Mark there was always this sense of potential. And in my youthful wisdom I had the sense to stay clear of that, but now. For all 20 years has taught me, I've regressed terribly when it comes to saying no to Mark Sloan."

"Addison," is Derek's thoughtful response, "I. What am I supposed to say?"

She responds firmly, "Nothing. Because it's not your right to ask me to explain myself anymore; I'm not your wife, you make it clear again and again that you don't even want to try to be friends, if that's even possible after sleeping beside someone for 14 years. It's not your place. I gave you up. Why can't you give me up Derek?"

"Does it have to be to him?"

She laughs at his growl, "You know sometimes I'm convinced this is more a pissing contest between the two of you than anything else. Mark and I are not together Derek and I am not a possession to be surrendered to the next owner. I reiterate: I am sorry for the part I played in this, but any issue you have with him is your issue, any issue you have with me is your issue. And the issues I have with Mark," she pauses for air, "Those are mine. Not yours. You have plenty of your own to deal with without our... for so many reasons what happened between Mark and I is a lot more complicated and a lot less resolved than what happened to our marriage. The feelings are less clear cut, the intentions on the whole a lot less honourable and the outcomes a lot more messy."

"So I've heard," is his response, laden with implications.

"So you can imagine Derek," she doesn't sound angry, just sad, so sad, like she's aged more than she though she ever would and doesn't quite know how it happened, "What that did to me."

"Do you know what it did to him?" he counters, which you're surprised at but maybe modern reproduction being the minefield it is, men have to stick with men, solidarity and all that.

"It wasn't easy. I know that. I know I was right, but that doesn't mean it was easy. And I know he thinks," you listen intently for this next, feeling not-at-all guilty for your methods of collecting information, "We could have done it. He thinks it would've worked out in the end. Maybe he's right. Maybe I made a mistake. I don't think so."

"Do you think it would have been different if we'd had kids?" he asks.

"Maybe," she answers, "But I've seen staying together for the children first-hand Derek. It's not the prettiest."

"No, I know."

"And I can't keep living a life of what ifs and resentment Derek," she lowers her voice; her words are so gentle. You wonder why she's so convinced he's breakable and you're made of steel. "It just has to be over now."

"I know," he swallows; you hear it. "I'm trying to let it go Addison. I'm building bridges but it takes time. It... so many things have changed for me. I'm in this place, this place that I never thought I'd be, without the two people who I'd always thought would be there so I'm doing the best I can. When you keep dropping these revelations in my lap about you and my best friend it's, it's difficult. It's hard not to wonder if it was really the first time, it's hard not to ask myself how I didn't realise you could be so cruel. It's damn well impossible not to ask if I spent twelve years playing second best because you..." he trails off, sounding guilty, "I know it wasn't. I know it in my mind. But how I feel... that's different."

The sucking sound of hair sliding between her lips as she pulls them together precedes her words, "Derek. I know it's hard. I know, more than anyone else I think, how hard it is."

"We'll keep trying," he vows quietly, "It's got to get easier sometime. And I don't think I'll ever be ready to lose you completely."

"Me either."

"Maybe we need to find ourselves first," he continues philosophically, typically Derek with his bad metaphors and soap opera lines.

Credit to her she keeps a straight face, or she must. You find yourself with the heel of your palm pressed against your mouth to stop the superior smirk turning into a full-force dismissive laugh.

They're quiet for far too long then, which kills your laughter where it sits in your stomach. One last kiss for old times sake then, maybe. It annoys you that you'll never be able to confirm or deny.

"Addison," he says, breaking the silence which makes you uneasy. At least there are no face-sucking noises.

"Derek," she says back.

At the sound of his key slipping into the door you bolt off the floor, surprised and not too keen to be caught eavesdropping. You don't quite make it to the bed though, caught in transit halfway and probably looking guilty as sin.

He eyes you with an expression transiently amused and persistently annoyed.

You just shrug by way of explanation and flop down onto the bed, "In my defence, there was yelling."

"Coffee's cold," he responds, but his shoulders drop and you know you're forgiven.

"So," you state, giving him an opening if he wants one, making noise for the sake of it if he doesn't.

"Yeah," he runs his hands through his hair and sinks down into the chair opposite you. "How much did you hear?"

"How much should I have heard?" you counter, ever the diplomat.

"It doesn't matter," he admits, sounding defeated, "I think that was the end of it."

"Yeah," you echo, "Same to you."

He doesn't voice the question, just looks inquisitive until you elaborate: "Addison. I think she's done with both of us."

He nods.

"Serves us right I suppose," you muse.

"Speak for yourself."

You take a sip of the cold coffee and meet his eyes, meaningfully. No need to waste words on that thought though because you see it mirrored in his expression. He looks slightly pained and rubs at his cheek thoughtfully, like he expects to find something on his face.

"Before you ask," he holds up a hand for emphasis, "Whatever the question is, I don't have an answer at this point in time."

"Good," you respond, "Because I have no idea what to say."

After a silence in which you both take long sips of frigid caffeine he ponders something out loud which you've been wondering about yourself, "I know that sometimes we have no choice in the matter. I know that sometimes things happen that change us whether we like it or not. But right now, I feel so strange. My old self is dead to me, I know that but this new one, it feels wrong. I feel like I'm stuck in this place between who I am and who I will be but it seems like such a leap of faith to make the transition, embrace who I've become. I'm not sure I like myself anymore."

You shrug.

You've never liked yourself much.