Chapter 13: The Truth

AN: It took a little longer than expected to get this out, so I apologize! I hope people are still reading, even though the last chapter was kind of boring. Hopefully this one will be a lot better! Only one person reviewed last time, so I probably really sucked it up, huh? I really appreciate your opinions! They help drive the story. :)

Dinner was not ready until after eight, which successfully put everyone not already in a bad mood, into a bad mood. Mark and Lexie had had it out because from Lexie's point of view, Mark had an obligation to Meredith, as her brother-in-law, to tell her about Carson. So they were not speaking. Not even "pass the potatoes." Addison seemed to be angry with everyone: at Derek for probably a lot of reasons, at Mark for telling Derek, for Mrs. Shepherd for being so stereotypically controlling, and at Derek's brothers-in-law apparently just for being nearby. In fact, the only adults Addison seemed to be speaking to at all were Nancy, Amelia, Kathleen, and Lexie. Though, on the latter it did not seem to matter much because Lexie was not speaking to anyone as, from what Derek could understand, anyone who knew (i.e., everyone) had had a moral obligation to inform Meredith. He was surprised that she had stayed for dinner at all, with the attitude she had adopted. It seemed obvious to Derek that the secrets and lies had not been in the name of self-preservation, but in the name of protecting someone else. But he supposed that, to Lexie, the most important person to protect was her oldest sister, and that was understandable.

In fact, Derek thought as he poked at his beans in the eerie silence of the dining room, he was pretty sure that, of late, he had become quite a bit more understanding. He wondered when that had begun. Definitely becoming a father had changed him for the better, and sleeping with Addison had sobered him up pretty well, too. But what had been the turning point? James? Carson? Losing Meredith? Leaving Addison a second time? Maybe all of those had come together to force him into maturity—real maturity, which for all his years on Earth, he had often lacked.

Then his phone rang out from his pocket. Everyone glanced up momentarily, startled by the break in the silence, and then went back to their food as though choreographed. Nobody but Mark and his mother were speaking or really making eye contact with him, the "obvious" villain of the story.

He sighed, somewhat annoyed, and pushed his chair back from the table, wandering into the living room. From there he took the phone from the pocket of his slacks and glanced at caller ID.

It was his wife.

What perfect timing.

"Doctor Shepherd," he answered reflexively, his off-hand in his pocket as he began to pace the room.

"Derek? Am I interrupting? I thought dinner must be over by now." She seemed a little panicky for some reason.

"No, we got kind of a late start this year." Pause. "It's the first time you've called," he pointed out, as though Meredith might not have realized it before.

"I—I know. I'm sorry. There's just not much time or really the resources for things like that over here."

"You e-mailed once."

"Derek, I'm sorry, but I thought you knew what you were signing up for—"

"I didn't sign up for anything, Meredith." He knew he sounded harsh—probably too harsh, but the anger and frustration that he had been feeling for years now were threatening to burst free from his lips. "I don't actually recall you asking me about any of this, just you making decisions for us both—for all three of us."

There was silence on the other end for a moment. "Have I done something? I get a rare moment on the phone so I can tell my husband and son 'happy Thanksgiving' but if this is how you're going to speak to me…" She trailed off vaguely, and Derek knew she was right, that none of this was really her fault. But that did not ease his mind at all.

He sank into an armchair older than him—it had belonged to James Shepherd, senior and his mother had never worked up the courage to get rid of it. It was, perhaps literally, now or never.

"No, you've not done anything. But … we need to talk. Do you have some time now?"

"So I gathered." She hesitated. "Yeah, I have time. Please tell me what's been the matter with you."

His insides felt knotted, squirming as though to get away from him before he caused serious damage. But, there was no point stalling or beating around the bush; that had never quite been his style in matters such as these. Either his marriage would shortly be over, or it wouldn't. Might as well rip off the Band-aid.

"Please don't go crazy, Meredith, if I tell you the truth right now." Deep breath, in and out, slowly. "Six years ago, when I was called in for that consult at St. Ambrose, I…" He tried to find the words; the truth was a somewhat new concept to him, "I slept with Addison. We have a daughter. Her name is Carson, and she's five years old. I've only known for a year. I just never knew how to tell you."

There was a very long pause. After a while, Derek thought the line must have gone dead, so he said, "Meredith?"

"I'm here," she said quietly. Then, "Derek. There's something you need to know before this conversation progresses."

He felt a little relieved on one hand, but even more anxious on the other. It was an odd feeling. "By all means."

"I—" Her voice broke, and it was nearly a full minute before she continued, "I knew about Carson. While pregnant with James, I knew about her. Lexie… Lexie told me, just after she was born, that the dates added up and she looked just like you. And I wanted to tell you, but I knew—you named James 'Carson' and when I asked why, you said you had wanted to name your son or daughter that for a very long time. And it was so obvious that it was a name the two of you had picked out together when you were married, and I knew then that if I told you about her daughter that you would go back to her. Then what would happen to James? I was only looking out for him, Derek, our son…" She trailed off again, but this time into sobs.

And through her whole spiel, the man in his dead father's armchair had remained silent, though only one thing really even mattered: "You knew." It hadn't even needed time to sink in. It seemed to Derek that he had been waiting his whole life to hear her confess to the treacherous, heinous crime she had committed. "You've known for five years that I had a daughter, but you didn't think it would be important enough to tell me? No," he was out of the seat and pacing again, clenching and unclenching his fist, "it's worse than that. You knew how important it was, you just wanted to keep me from her. This is the worst possible thing you could have ever done. You don't keep a little girl from her father just because you're afraid he might leave you for her mother. That's not up to you, Meredith."

He paused, looking for the right words to say, and Meredith seemed to take it as her turn to speak, "Derek," she sobbed into the phone, "If I could take it back, I would. If I could change things—"

"—if you could change things, you would do nothing differently. Drop the act, Mrs. Shepherd, it does not become you." A deep, calming breath, then, "We're over, Meredith. We have been for a while, and you knew it. This has all been borrowed time. I will never be able to thank you enough for the son you've given me, but I never want to see you again. Ever. Goodbye, Meredith."

All he heard was a resigned sigh before he ended the call.

It's better this way, he told himself as he pocked the phone once more and left the living room to finish dinner. It's been drawn out long enough. Short, succinct—that's how this ends.

o0o0o

There was no way that he could sleep that night. All of his sisters, brothers-in-law, nieces, and nephews had left, and the house now belong solely to Mrs. Shepherd, Derek, Addison, Mark, Lexie, and their three children, respectively. Derek was lying in his old room, still decorated with posters of The Clash, The Sex Pistols, and The Stranglers; but no signs of sleepiness were coming. As he lay atop the full-size bed of his childhood, he wondered who else in the house was lying awake, staring out of their own window at the same moon he was. The last time he had slept in this bed, Meredith had lain beside him, and though the bed was small, the had managed not to touch. The last time—and virtually every time since—he and Addison had shared this bed, the close quarters had led to long nights of lovemaking. It felt odd, and pained him a little, to remember all the two of them had put the little old bed through, and to think that now they slept in separate rooms.

At that thought, he just couldn't lie there anymore, so he got up and pulled on his robe; the old Victorian was notorious in his family for lacking the ability to retain its heat, especially in the middle of a New York winter night. He knew where he wanted to go subconsciously, but didn't really think about where his feet took him until he wound up outside of Amelia's old room, which had been converted to a room for the kids, with bunk beds and twins now crammed inside.

He slowly turned the knob on the door and pushed it open gently, not wanting to wake the sleeping children within. And the sight on the other side of that door caused his heart to swell.

It was clear that James had started out sleeping in a twin bed with blue covers, but he had taken the matching plaid pillow over to the bed with floral print bedclothes that Carson slept under. The two children now lay close, probably huddled for warmth.

Derek sat in a spare dining chair across the room and resolved to watch his two children sleep for a while. Though he would never have been able to explain it, it seemed the right place to be, though it was after midnight. And so, there he was, observing with a small smile the two innocent, beautiful little people he had helped create. All of the drama, the secrets and the lies of the Shepherd clan were lost on them. All that mattered to them was playing with the other children, sharing secrets about matters Derek couldn't even dream of with his adult mind, and remaining glued to their respective parents' hips. And Derek wondered what cruelty in the universe had placed these children in the middle of such a mess. They were four and five years old; how was it fair that they should even be involved in such triflings as love, marriage, and infidelity?

And as Derek thought this from his place of brooding, a small, curly-haired girl stirred in her sleep, and he heard a faint sniveling. After a moment, the sniveling was accompanied by muffled whimpering.

"Mommy?" said Carson pleadingly.

And Derek could not help himself. He was across the room in an instant, gently scooping the pajama-clad figure from the bed. His arms around her, she laid her head against his shoulder and he patted her back soothingly. Her tears soaked through his T-shirt as his own fell from his cheeks. She was five years old, yet this was the first time that he had held his daughter. He knew, in that instant, that he would do anything to keep her in his life, do anything to protect her from the world he had unknowingly brought her into.

"It's okay," he whispered in the dark, smoothing Carson's hair, "it's okay, sweetheart, Daddy has you." He knew he should not have said it, that if she at all registered what he said in her barely-awake state it would confuse her, but it seemed the natural thing to say, and he was very much through with pretending.

o0o0o

Addison stopped short at the door as she heard footsteps cross the floor. Years of practice as a single mother had honed her skill of awakening instantly at the sound of her child crying. And from two doors down, Carson's delicate call had sent her running; the poor girl's night terrors did not seem to be letting up as Violet had assured her they eventually would. But when she got to the room, she saw through the crack in the door that her ex-husband had beaten her to the draw. Her heart could not help but soften towards him as she saw the tears streaming down his face, witnessed the way he comforted her like the girl had been in his life all these years, heard the words he shamelessly whispered. And Addison knew that she had to turn away from the door, because to go any farther would be to intrude on something very private and personal for Carson and her father.

AN: Not very long, but I like this chapter! What did you think? Next chapter will be rated a strong M rating, so if you feel uncomfortable reading that, please let me know, and I will be more than happy to privately set you up with a softer version.