¸.·´¸.·*´¨) ¸.·*¨)(¨*·.¸)¨´*·.¸´·.¸ Runaway World ¸.·´¸.·*´¨) ¸.·*¨)(¨*·.¸)¨´*·.¸´·.¸
11. Staplegunned

Wow, guys, your reviews last time were absolutely amazing! And believe me, I'm happy too that Addison knows that Sage is her son. Here's the next chapter for you, hope you like it! Staplegunned is a song by The Spill Canvas.

Eight Years Ago:

A neatly frosted path lay in front of her, being slowly littered with new fallen snow. Addison hurried up it, cursing, for the one hundredth time that day, her choice to wear heels in the New York wonderland.

"Addie!" came calls from the kitchen as soon as she managed to unlock the door and fall inside of it. She leaned against the doorframe, the baby inside of her having positively exhausted her, and began unraveling her many layers of clothing.

"How'd it go?" Naomi asked excitedly as she appeared around the corner, mocha skin lit up by the bright fire and Sam's arm tight around her shoulders.

"Good, good. He," she said, putting emphasis on the word, "is doing great."

"It's a boy?" Sam asked joyfully, eyeing her humongous stomach.

"I thought you were going to wait and have it be a surprise?" Derek said as he and Archer emerged from the kitchen. He kissed her cheek softly, his lips lingering there, and she could smell hints of scotch and cider on his breath.

"I was, but my OB forgot to tell me to look away and I saw … definitely a boy," she said with a proud grin.

"Addie, mother called," Archer said, twirling a small bottle between his fingers. "She wants to meet for dinner in Seattle in a couple of weeks."

"Hello, Archer, nice to see you too. No flavor of the week tonight?" Addison teased her brother, ignoring the comment about their mother. The last time she had seen Bizzy was over three months ago, when the Montgomery house had been on the brink of explosion as a result of Bizzy's discovery of Addison's pregnancy. Case in point, it had not been pretty, and she was surprised her mother would willingly speak to her.

"Amber found out about Taylor, who found out about Lisa," he explained indifferently. "But I met this girl Mercedes …"

"Okay, okay, we don't need to hear any more," Derek interrupted. "I've already got enough of that over the years from Mark."

"Ah, the mysterious Mark. Are we ever going to get to meet him?" Addison asked Derek. "I'm starting to think he's like your imaginary friend or something, and you're going to have to hire someone to pretend to be him in order to save face."

"Haha, funny. No, Mark is still traveling the world, errant as ever. He'll drop in eventually, up to the nines in alcohol. Anyway," he said, resting a hand on her expanded belly gently, "got any idea for names for this little one?"

"Samuel. Now there's a nice name," Sam suggested with a wide smile.

"I kind of like Nathan," Naomi mused.

"Derington," Archer proposed.

"That has got to be one of the most pretentious names I've ever heard," Addison snapped at her brother. "You sound like Bizzy."

"Fine, fine," Archer said, backing up with his hands raised. "I'll just shut up."

"Daniel?" Derek wanted to know.

"No, Skippy Gold's older brother was named Daniel. He would always stare at me during band," said Addison with a shudder. "I think Daniel Gold scarred me more than Skippy did when he kissed me and got our braces stuck at prom."

"You could name him December," Naomi suggested. "Since he's going to be born, without a doubt, this month."

"Hmm," she said. "I want him to have a unique name, but maybe not quite that unique.

Archer, apparently, couldn't help himself. "I got it, Lionel."

"God, I already feel sorry for your kids," Naomi joked. "They're going to have the strangest names."

"If I ever do have kids, I probably won't know," Archer pointed out.

"That's true," Addison said, rolling her eyes at her brother. "I don't know, I was kinda thinking of naming him Alexander. I haven't decided for sure yet, but it sounds like a good name."

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"Addison?" Derek called when he was nearly knocked over by a storm of fiery red.

She paused unwillingly, answering, "What, Derek?" in an exasperated tone. He thought it best not to mention that her hair was sticking up slightly from running and that one of the buttons of her lilac silk blouse was undone.

"Nothing, I just … I heard that you get to take Sage home today, and I just wanted to say I'm really happy for you both. And if you two need anything …" He trailed off, unsure how to continue. They were talking about the boy that, if things had gone differently, would have been his son. Of course he felt a bit of responsibility, although he didn't regret how things had turned out.

Her face softened, her usual mask melting, and she sighed. "Thanks, Der. That means a lot."

"So you still don't … know anything about the father?" He felt intrusive, like he was peeking in at a life that wasn't his to look at anymore. He wasn't entitled to Addison's secrets. And yet, if she was being left to raise a child alone by someone who simply didn't want anything to do with her, well, he was going to have something to say about that.

Addison smiled ruefully, staring down at her three inch heels. "Nope. Never even found out his name. Things were … different back then, I guess. I was blonde, did I ever tell you that? Anyway, in a very Mark-esque moment, I slept with him and left in the morning without even talking to him."

She had never, ever spoken a single word about her child's father before, not even during the closest days of their relationship, so he was surprised to hear the details she was spouting. They took root in his brain and he struggled with them, sure that there was something he was missing, something that should have been obvious.

"How did you know Sage was your son?" he asked her, trying to make sense of the strange feeling. It was like the universe was manipulating all of them: Sage, Addison, now him. Why else had Addison and her son shown up here on the same day? What other explanation was there for their connection, invisible but so, so vivid?

For a second he was sure she wouldn't answer, because this was going to far, unlocking things she kept hidden deep. But then she sighed. "He gave me a crystal key necklace the night we met, which Bizzy gave to Sage when she put him up for adoption. Listen, Derek, this has been lovely," her mouth twisted, the irony pungent, "but I've gotta go get Sage, so I'll see you later. Oh, and Derek?" she called as she walked away, "You might want to avoid Izzie if at all possible. She practically assaulted Meredith this morning because she hasn't written her vows yet."

"Right, thanks," he said vaguely. Crystal key … why was that familiar? What was he missing?

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Sage woke up practically bursting with excitement, like an overripe fruit. Today, it was finally official, he was finally claimed. It had taken the boring administrators several eternities to sort out the paperwork and confirm that he was indeed Addie's son. And today he got to go home with her, after she signed yet more slips of paper saying that she did not want to press charges against the hospital who had given him up nor start an investigation about the person who had forged her signature. He had a feeling that she knew exactly who it was, but if she did, she wasn't telling him. But, he supposed it didn't matter. He'd done what he had set out to do, and all other details faded into insignificance.

"Hey, bud," Addie said brightly as she entered. It still felt slightly odd to call her mom, like a shoe that wasn't broken in yet. She kissed his forehead lightly, smiling as she did so, and looked around the room. "You ready to go?"

"Yup," he said, hopping out of bed, almost tripping over the sheets in his eagerness. He'd gone to bed last night in his clothes in preparation for the day to come. This was the accumulation of his life thus far; this was his ultimate dream, his prevailing goal. This was everything he'd even wished upon a star for and more.

He squirmed as his mother squinted at him, her expression disapproving as he gathered his few possessions and headed toward the door. All his life he'd felt unwanted, extra, invisible, like the world had turned its back on him and abandoned him to capricious Chance and its erratic whims. His path, always tortuous and winding, was straightening out, affording him a long-awaited glimpse of what lay ahead.

"You need some new clothes," Addie said as she scrutinized him. "And new shoes." He inspected his shabby attire, abashed, until she slung an arm around his shoulders. "We'll go shopping after we stop at the hotel."

"Hotel?" he asked.

"Yeah, that's where I'm staying while I'm here. Sorry, I know it's not the most fun place to be, but it has a nice pool and everything." She seemed worried about his reaction, looking anxiously for the first sign of discord in his face.

"You mean you don't live here?"

"No, honey, I live in LA." Los Angeles … it was worlds away, especially seeing as he'd never set foot out of the state of Washington in his life. But the feeling, the one that had led him here, flared up again. He needed to stay in Seattle, of that he was sure.

"I don't want to live in LA," he said, urged on by the feeling, like little pushes against his brain. "I want to stay here."

"Sorry, baby," she said, grimacing slightly. Did she like LA? It didn't seem like it. She'd already been in Seattle for a month. "But that's where I live. I used to live here in Seattle, but … things didn't go so well."

He was tempted to ask what she meant by that, but her face was so sad, there was a multitude of hidden tragedies inscribed all over it, so he restrained himself and sighed. There had to be something he could do to convince her to stay, like she so obviously wanted to but could not justify. Little did the boy know that it would not be he who convinced her.

They ran into Dr. Mark by the exit, and Addison paused, the tension in the air instantly escalating. It wasn't bad tension, necessarily, merely the feeling that invisible words were walking between them, a secret language he did not speak.

Finally Mark spoke, breaking the taunt silence. "You finally taking the kid home?"

Addison nodded, but Sage couldn't resist interrupting, "Yeah, but we have to go to a lame hotel because Mom lives in LA."

The words left his lips unbidden, and the second they did, he wished there was a way to snatch them back up again, because he'd unleashed a monster embodying infinite unspoken emotions. Dr. Mark winced visibly while his mom blushed and looked away.

"But …" Mark finally stuttered. "I kinda thought you were staying here."

"I live in LA, Mark," Addison said, her voice devoid of feeling.

Sage doubted Mark could have looked more hurt if someone had taken a scalpel to his heart. They stared at each other, ice blue eyes battling with sapphire, and he wished he'd never got in the middle of this, whatever it was.

"We both know you don't belong there, Addie," Mark said.

"Where do I belong then, Mark? As a regret, like you said?" she snapped. He'd always thought anger was hot, like fire, but he learned from her that frigid anger was much more potent, like frostbite.

"I never said you were a regret, Addison!" Mark yelled, causing faces to turn towards them from all angles around them.

"I can't do this now," his mother said, tugging his hand toward the door. Agony was present in her voice, and he longed, searched, prayed for a phrase that would make this all better, but none came to him.

"Are you okay?" he whispered as they exited into the humid Seattle air. The sun was shining for once, bathing the striking city in light. He thought he saw Addie's hand flutter to her eyes, like she was wiping them, but when she answered, her voice was steady.

"I'm fine," she said. Then, "Do you really want to live here that badly?"

"Yeah, but I don't want to mess up your life in LA," he said contritely.

"LA wasn't working the best anyway," she admitted, glancing back at the doors behind which Mark existed. "I – I'll think about staying, okay? But we will have to go back, at least for a few days. I promised a coworker of mine, Violet, that I would deliver her baby. Anyway … I was thinking we could stop and get some ice cream and then go to the mall. Does that sound good?"

"It sounds excellent," he said.

They exchanged smiles, both hopeful for the future that would come, the new life they were weaving out of strands of their old. But he couldn't help wondering: What had gone on between his mother and Mark?

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"Mom! Mom! Mom! Look at this!" Sage practically yelled, his small, warm hand yanking over to a video game display. Mom. She was still getting used to it, hearing it from her own child's lips instead of somebody else's, having that word mean her and not some other lucky woman.

"Mom, can I have one of those?" When Sage turned pleading emerald eyes on her, she instantly decided he'd been spending too much time with Mark, because he had mastered the expression that she could never resist. Sighing, she took a look at the box he was holding up so eagerly. She figured out it was some sort of game system, but beyond that, she was lost. "It's a Wii," Sage said in response to her confused expression. "Can I have it?"

"Um …" She didn't want to spoil her son, but it wasn't like he'd ever had anything good before in his life. Just seeing him in his tattered orphanage clothes made her shudder. Besides, it wasn't like her mountains of money, which meant next to nothing to her, weren't rotting away in some foreign bank anyway. "Sure, but we won't really have anywhere to put it," she told him, and was gratified when his face lit up like a lantern. "And we're supposed to be shopping for clothes," she reminded him.

"Yuck," he said, making a face. He skipped ahead, eager eyes lingering on the flashing displays of toys and games.

"Sage, honey, please slow down!" she called. "You were hit by a car not too long ago, and you had a severe concussion, and a broken collar bone and rib. Your arm is still in a cast!" He rolled his eyes, giving her an exasperated look, but slowed until he fell in beside her. "I have an idea. Why don't we go look at shoes first?" she offered. "That's better than clothes, right?"

Sage thought for a moment, then nodded. "Much better. I've never had new shoes before." Mom," he asked after a minute, his eyes full of insatiable curiosity, "what's my middle name?"

"I don't think they gave you one, honey," she admitted. "Sorry. But," she added, thinking quickly as his face fell, "when I was pregnant with you, I wanted to name you Alexander. That could be your middle name, if you want."

"Sage Alexander Green Montgomery," he said, trying out the words, measuring their cadence against the air. "I like it. That means I have four names now. How many names do you have, Mom?"

"Three," she said. "I had four once, but now I just have three."

"Why? Did you lose one?" he asked.

"No, I got divorced," she admitted.

"Who were you married to? My dad?" Although she kept walking forward beside Sage, Addison felt like she had missed a step, or plummeted down several floors in an elevator. It was inevitable that Sage would ask about his dad, that he would wonder who fathered him and where he was. But it was a question she was unprepared to answer. How to tell an eight year old that his father was little more than an incandescent dream in a fantasy that would never come again?

"No, not your dad. I was married to … Derek." Her ex-husband's name fell uncertainly from her lips, because she was sure that Sage's acquaintance with Derek would only lead to harder and harder questions.

But to her surprise, her son's face turned contemplative, as if he sensed that she didn't want to discuss it. "That's kinda weird," he finally said, wrinkling his nose, and she laughed. "But maybe it just seems that way to me because you've both moved on. Anyway, if you weren't married to my dad … then who was he?"

In that moment, she finally understood the convoluted dilemma of motherhood. She'd never wanted to be the kind of mother who lied to her kids blatantly, but her instinct was to protect Sage and hope that he never found out the things it hurt to know. It was an irrational, impossible dream, to shield him from all the bad clouding the world, because eventually he would have to know about it to survive, but she wished she could save him from such harm forever.

In the end, though, she couldn't lie to eyes that bespoke of apples and peacocks and exotic spices all at once. "I met him a really long time ago, and I don't know him anymore," she said. It wasn't the clear-cut, pure truth, but it was close. Or, at least, she thought in that particular moment in time that it was close.

She expected an interrogation, after all, what child would understand that their mother didn't know their father? But Sage merely shrugged, and she wondered at his advanced maturity until he said, "That's what happened to Eddie, at the boy's home. He was twelve, and he said that he never met his dad and that his mom couldn't take care of him anymore. That's why she gave him up."

Sage looked away as he spoke, refusing to even look at her until she put a hand on his skinny shoulder. "I always wanted you, Sage, do you hear me?"

"Yeah," he muttered, falling into her arms when she held them out. People flowed around them, an endless river of destinations and purposes, but all she could see was the redheaded boy in her arms. He sniffed and she squeezed his body tightly, holding him to him like it could keep him there forever, and she wished it could. They'd already lost eight years, and she wasn't going to waste even a second longer.

"Love you," she reminded him, standing up. "Now let's pick out some shoes."

"Any shoes I want?" he asked with a mischievous grin.

"Any shoes you want," she promised.

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"Hmm," Derek sighed, rolling over so his head was cushioned against her bare belly. "This is nice."

"Yes," she agreed, stroking his damp ebony curls absently. Their engagement, so far, had been nothing short of blissful, but the weather was unfortunately not in tune with their ecstasy. Summer was circling Seattle, biding its time until its final swoop, but they already felt the effects of the sun's early celebration. She was sweaty even while wearing nothing more than Derek's boxers.

Still, she couldn't figure out while she was so uncomfortable. Guilty, even, like her body was covered in itches she couldn't scratch. The feeling was similar to what she had felt during the serial killer's death, pity even though it wasn't her fault …

"Der," she finally said, sitting up so quickly her head spun. She probably should have paused, thought this plan through just a bit more, but jumping in headfirst was just ingrained too deeply in her personality. "I have an idea. It's kind of a crazy idea, and I don't know what you're going to say, but …"

"Just tell me," he said, moving his lips to her knee, nipping the skin softly and arousing her from head to toe.

"I can't think when you do that," she complained, swatting his head away. "Anyway, Der … I think we should have Addison and Sage come stay with us."

"What?" Derek asked, looking at her like she belonged in a mental institution. "In what world would having my ex-wife stay here, while we're planning our wedding, be a good idea?"

"It's just that she has a kid now, and she's all alone, and poor Sage has to live in a hotel …" she whined persuasively. "It won't be that bad. Addison's good at planning weddings."

"You really want to do this?" Derek asked.

"Really really," she said.

"Okay," he sighed, rising and combing the floor for his discarded clothes. "It's just that when Addison first came in and introduced herself as my wife, well, I certainly never thought that you'd have her willingly stay at our house."

"Meredith!" Sage cried in delight when the door burst open half a second after she knocked. "And Derek, hi! Look, Mom got me new shoes!" He stuck out each of his feet in turn, which were decked out in checkered Vans. "And new clothes! And a soccer ball! And a Wii!"

Sage and Addison's hotel room was expensive, elegant, and well-furnished, but it was nobody's home. Addison's many designer clothes were piled all over the floor, along with Sage's new things. "How would you like to come stay with us?" she asked Sage, ruffling his floppy, gold-tinted crimson locks.

"Anywhere is better than dumb hotel. My mom said I had to stop playing soccer inside after I hit a lamp. It was supposed to be the goalie, but she said that it wasn't a toy."

"Where is Addison?" Derek asked, speaking up for the first time.

"Oh, she's right there," Sage said, pointing at the bed where Addison lay curled up. "She wasn't feeling that great." Addison started slightly when she heard her name and sat up, squinting at Derek and Meredith like she'd imagined them. "Mom, can we stay with Derek and Meredith? Please?" Sage pleaded, already on his knees in front of his small suitcase.

"Seriously?" Addison asked, looking between them. The redheaded woman looked lost, for all her strength and independence, and Meredith knew it couldn't be easy to suddenly find yourself a full-time parent, not to mention being so utterly betrayed by the person who was supposed to have raised you. But she did know that she would need some major help.

"Seriously," she said.

"Okay," Addison said hesitantly, standing unsteadily. She began throwing her clothes in her own suitcase, occasionally glancing up as if suspecting she and Derek would change their minds. "Meredith, Derek, are you absolutely sure -"

"Positive," Derek said firmly, hefting one of Addison's many bags and Sage's suitcase, which still had the tags on it.

"Come on, Mom," Sage said softly, grabbing her hand and tugging her toward them. And mother and son followed her and Derek out, the first steps to a new existence.

So Addison and Sage are living with Meredith and Derek ... this should be interesting. It's funny, that wasn't exactly planned, but sometimes characters just get minds of their own. At least they do when I write. Anyway let me know if you liked it :D