Meredith was wiping her mouth with toilet paper when Christina found her. Light fell through the window, making Christina wince before her eyes adjusted to the deserted bathroom. One of the sinks was still dripping beads of water out of the faucet but Meredith didn't seem to notice.

"She seems….mature for her age," Christina began hesitantly, lightly stepping over some toilet paper stuck to the floor. The blonde nodded in agreement, slumping over the sink. "She's smart. They raised her…."

"We should get back to work."

"You don't want to… talk or anything?"

"No."

"But you always want to-"

"Not today."

"Okay…."

Meredith sighed, "Look, Christina, this is a lot to take in. My kid is here, in this hospital, right now, looking for her adoptive dad who happens to be my ex boyfriend. My life is beginning to sound dangerously close to a soap opera and I hate soap operas so…"

"Yeah, but-"

"I'll be in the pit if you need me."

"Meredith-"

"What!"She burst, dangerously close to shouting, "What could we possibly talk about that would make this okay? "

"You could at least admit that this is a big deal!"

Meredith pushed past her friend angrily and wrenched open the door. The next few seconds were slow, and Meredith felt like she had just lost her balance and was falling towards something that she really didn't want to fall towards. Behind the door, hand raised up like he was about to knock, was Derek Shepherd.

She had only gotten a glimpse of his open mouth and searching eyes before she pressed her palms to the wood to shut the door again. Whirling around and forcing her weight into keeping it shut against his pounding protests, she let out a long breath of air and tried to ignore the self-satisfied smirk playing across Christina's lips.

She couldn't.

"What's so funny?" Meredith demanded.

"Oh, nothing. Just the fact that for once you can't run away from your problems and pretend they don't exist."

"I don't-"

"Yes you do."

More pounding.

"Don't even try to open this door, Christina," she warned, "I swear to God if you-"

"Derek! Hi. Meredith was just getting ready to talk to you. Won't you come in?"

He did.

"We need to talk," he began, making room for Christina to pass him. Meredith's eyes went wide, and she frantically tried to grab at her friend's lab coat.

"Christina, please...I-I-I've already done one heart-to-heart I don't think I can take another-"

Anxious blue eyes met brown and Christina, for a second, realized just how much Meredith was dreading her talk with Derek. Her legs barely looked like they could hold her up and her face had lost any color that'd been there two minutes before.

"Mer, are you okay?"

No, she wanted to yell, I'm most definitely not okay. But Derek was here, and Derek thought her only problem was that he hadn't picked her. Derek thought he was the reason she was in a bathroom, again, in the middle of her shift.

Derek, who was here to apologize for something that didn't even really seem that important to her at this point.

She latched onto the sink, her knuckles turning white with pressure.

"Fine," she gritted out, "Just don't-don't leave, okay?"

Derek's forehead creased with familiar worry.

"Mer, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," she snapped, not turning away from her best friend, "Please, Christina."

"You have to talk to him sometime."

"Christina…"

"Okay," she broke their gaze and turned to Derek, "McDreamy? I'm going to be the mediator. So if someone says something….bad, or if Meredith doesn't want to answer a question-"

"Question? I'm here to explain-"

"If she doesn't want to answer a question," Christina repeated firmly, "Then I'll break up the session and you guys will have to do it on your own time. Alone."

Meredith's eyes went wide.

"Now's good," she choked out.

"Good."

"Let me get this straight," Derek cut in, "You're going to be giving us a self-help session in the middle of the women's bathroom at Seattle Grace?"

Christina pretended to think.

"Yes."

"You?"

"Yes."

"Mer, are you sure we need this?"

"Yes."

"Okay," he consented, before sweeping his gaze over his surroundings, "Can you believe I've never been in here before now?"

--

Hannah had looked everywhere- the nurses station, the OR, the cafeteria, on-call rooms, janitors closets, the basement. She'd asked interns, residents, and now she was moving on to Chief Webber to recruit for her 'find dad before mom finds out I haven't been with him all day' mission.

She didn't knock, she knew he wouldn't mind.

"Chief!" she greeted happily, and he slipped off his glasses to make sure he wasn't hallucinating.

"Hannah? You're huge!"

She rolled her eyes, "Mark says that all the time."

"Well, he's right," he said, before squinting at the empty space behind her, "Where's your mom?"

"Home. I'm actually looking for my dad…"

"Mmm…actually I haven't seen him yet today. But I do have some medical cases that are pretty crazy…."

She smiled, quickly trying to figure out approximately how mad her mother would be if she hung out with the Chief instead of her dad. She doubted it would be monumentally earth shattering.

"Like what?"

"Come here, I'll show you."

AN: Another short-ish chapter. sorry. And it's a little choppy. But this is kind of a filler for the 'big talk' between Derek and Meredith and some other stuff so yeah. I should probably be writing my thank-you cards for graduation gifts but this is so much better!!

Reviews are so amazing!!!!