All The Things You Said
Chapter Fourteen
-The Plan I Had-
Addison had to force herself to get out of bed the following morning. She really wanted to go to the hospital, look for Derek and find the words to explain, but she knew him well enough to be sure he wouldn't listen. Every thing she made was mechanical. She turned off her alarm clock, went to the bathroom, ate, showered, got dressed, and before she knew it an hour and a half had passed and she hadn't noticed. She felt empty. Derek and Archer were right, most of her words were lies. She tricked Derek, making him fall for her without meaning to, and even when she realized she wanted to back out she kept lying and lying and she let Derek find out in the most awful way. But what neither Derek nor Archer could see, not yet at least, because she hoped they'd understand some day, was that she truly loved Derek. Her feelings for him were the strongest she had ever felt for someone in her whole life, with the only exception of Mackenzie, who in any case reminded her of Derek every single time she caught a glimpse of her in the hospital hallways.
Addison knew she looked horrible. She didn't have a good sleep the previous night, and she only wanted to hide somewhere and cry it all out, pushing all the sadness and guilt and anxiety away from her aching heart.
Archer insisted on booking a room at a hotel for a night; Addison knew it was only his remorse talking because he claimed he would be staying in Seattle for the rest of the week, and maybe more, immediately after. At that very moment Addison was actually torn between her need of the familiar presence of her big brother to comfort her and the anger she still felt towards him for messing up her life once more. She felt lonely, but at the same time she wanted to be alone, for the vanity that was in her shuddered at the thought of someone else seeing her so in ruin.
But it was close to ten minutes past nine, and she was already running late, she couldn't linger no more. Driving carefully and slowly, conscious of the very low attention she was paying to any thing that wasn't Derek or her own feelings, she arrived at work with almost fifty minutes of delay. Immediately another doctor approached her with the intention of presenting a new emergency case, but stopped, as if frightened by her paleness, and asked if she needed to sit. Now that it was pointed out to her that bluntly, Addison couldn't help but nod weakly.
Chief Webber had apparently been informed of her delay and that she wasn't feeling well, because he walked up to her about five minutes later while she was sitting on a chair drinking some fresh water.
"Dr. Montgomery, are you feeling sick?" he asked.
Addison shook her head. "Not really... just a little weak. I'll be fine in a few minutes, Chief."
Webber eyes her suspiciously. "You have the day off."
"What!" Addison couldn't help but jump up. Sure, she wasn't at her best at the moment, but work was her only distraction. She needed it. "Chief, I said I'm fine!"
"You barely took a whole day off since you started working here, Addison. I'm glad to have you in my staff but you need to rest and relax. I can't have sleep-deprived doctors performing long surgeries and treating patients. It would be really irresponsible of me. Go home, Montgomery. Have a good sleep, read a book, watch a movie, I don't know, but I don't want to see you before tomorrow at noon. It's an order."
And with those firm words he left, leaving Addison bitter on the chair. She stood up, assuring the nurse that she was feeling better, and breathed deeply. She was going to go home soon, but she wanted to talk to Derek first, or at least attempt to.
She wandered through the hospital for a bit, absently biting her lower lip due to nervousness. She suddenly noticed Derek in front of her, talking to another neurosurgeon, John Feldman, she remembered. Addison made a step forward, her heart in her throat, beating fast, cutting away her breath. Derek noticed her, and his smile died down. Addison watched as he talked to their colleague, occasionally glancing at her with rage. She waited, thinking that it was a good sign that he didn't leave as soon as he saw her. When Feldman walked away, probably on his way to the operating room, Addison hesitantly approached Derek.
He clenched his fists, looking away from her.
"You didn't let me explain. I need to tell you, Derek. I need you to hear it from me, even if you already know. Please."
Derek eventually looked up, and Addison did everything she could not to interpret his look as disgusted, but she miserably failed.
"Two minutes, not a second more."
"Thank you." she told him, tears in her already red eyes. "Derek, I'm really sorry. I was forced to give her up. My parents made me give her up, it was my only choice. I wasn't even twenty. They blackmailed me. They would have thrown me out, wouldn't have given me any money, if I had kept her. I wanted her to have a good life. I didn't even hold her once, you know? I couldn't, I wouldn't have let her go if I had hold her. I buried her memory in the back of my mind until a few months ago, when my mother apologized to me for the very first time. I had a plan, Derek. I planned to come here, see my daughter, make sure she was living a happy life and then leave without anyone knowing who I actually was. But you know what they say, people plan, and God laughs. I didn't mean to fall in love with you, I only meant to see Mackenzie once or twice, without even being noticed by her, to make sure she was adopted by good people. But by the time I got my answer, I was in love with you so deeply that it made me forget everything else."
Addison stopped talking, sucking in a big breath of air, staring at Derek.
He returned her look, calmer, but still distant. Everything had changed so quickly that he was lost in a limbo between the past and the present.
"There," he said, "You explained. Don't think it means I forgive you, Addison. I loved you, and as much as I am thankful to you for bringing Mackenzie to life, when I see you I only think you're her biological mother, now. The enemy."
Addison took in his words, that hurt incredibly, but to her surprise she didn't feel like falling. After all, Derek was right. "I understand. Derek, I still want to talk to you. I know I hurt you and that I lied to you, but I truly love you with all my heart and I want you to see that I never was the enemy. I will stand aside in this. It was a mistake, we should have never even talked. I refuse to tear your family apart even more than I already did. You don't have to tell Mackenzie who I am, just go on with your life. All three of you. I'll talk to Webber and ask if I can resign immediately."
She waited for a moment, hoping to hear Derek's answer. But it didn't come, and she nodded in bitter acceptance, turning around to leave.
Derek stood there, isolated from any form of life around him, his words only half-way out.
Meredith and Derek were sitting on the couch of their living room, waiting for Mackenzie to come home from school so they could talk to her. The room was silent, neither one of them felt like talking to their spouse. Derek felt bad for how he cheated on his wife, and he didn't want to bring up a fight. Meredith was still too shocked about Addison being her daughter's mother to have any coherent thought, but she was trying to plan how to explain things to Mackenzie nevertheless.
"Do you still love her?" Meredith asked some time later, when the thought suddenly and painfully crossed her mind.
Derek looked at her sheepishly. "I don't know." Meredith didn't add anything, and he felt the need to explain himself better. "I really fell for her, to the point that I needed her in my life at every moment. I never thought about leaving you for her, but I admit I didn't want to end things with her, either. I don't think that love is gone, it's probably somewhere hidden in my heart, but I can't find it. I can't feel it anymore right now."
Meredith swallowed slowly, sitting straighter. "I wouldn't get mad if you wanted to stay with her. Had it only been sex, I'd be furious, but I'm the first to know you can't help falling in love. It's just... she was probably meant to be in our life. You said Addison told you we don't need to tell Mackenzie who she is, but we do."
"I know, Mer."
"She'd want to know. And it's right for her to know. We just need to leave out the part where you slept with Addison... other than that, she needs to know. I'm not scared of losing Mackenzie, I know I'll always be her mom no matter what. And I'm not scared of losing you, because from what you said I gathered that I pretty much already lost you, and I'm still alive and breathing, so I can handle it. You can be with her, Derek. Everything will change, but if she is who you want we can find a way to get through it. Mackenzie, me and you. But – but if there's even the slightest change of you loving me again and choosing me, I'll fight."
"Right now I don't know anything anymore, Meredith. I barely know who I am, let alone what I want."
Mackenzie choose that moment to walk in, with her usual warm smile and a lot of things to tell about her day. Meredith and Derek loved those moments, when they all sat down to eat together, the three if them, and their daughter chattered happily talking about everything she could think of.
"Hey, honey." Meredith stood up and hugged the girl tight, closing her eyes to savor the moment better.
"Hey, Mom. Hi, Dad! I got an A- on my English test!"
"You're so brilliant, sweetheart." Derek told Mackenzie proudly.
Mackenzie smiled even more. "Thank you, Daddy."
Meredith seemed to shake herself out of the nice moment, looking at Mackenzie in a mixture of sadness and comfort. "Sweetie, Dad and I need to talk to you about something important. Can you sit down for a moment?"
She led the eleven-year-old to the couch, between herself and Derek, her arms still holding the girl tight.
"What's wrong?"
"Don't worry, kid. It's not really a bad thing. You might be a little shocked, we were too when we found out, but part of you might actually be a little excited."
Mackenzie didn't seem to feel any better or less worried about the situation; her brown eyebrows were still up in a frown.
"Do you remember when we told you you were adopted?"
Mackenzie remembered it well, like it happened the day before. She was a little over six, and everything was exciting and fascinating to her. For the first two weeks she couldn't stop asking question after question – to which her parents didn't know how to answer – but little by little the subject died down, and while she was growing up, when she talked about it with Derek and Meredith, she claimed she would have liked to meet her biological parents someday, maybe when she turned thirteen or fourteen if she still wanted to. Of course those words were followed by reassurances that she wouldn't love them any less and that they would always be her parents no matter what.
"Why?"
Derek cleared his throat. "We met your birth-mother. She's in town."
"Really? And she wants to see me?"
"She does." Meredith answered her. "But it's up to you, of course. Now, sweetie... about this woman. You've actually met before we were informed of who she was."
"Really? Who is she? Where did I see her?"
Meredith and Derek could see how their daughter's worry was quickly turning into excitement, maybe a little too fast.
Meredith felt her heart sting; she couldn't answer, not that bluntly, but she didn't know how to sugarcoat it. She turned pale when Derek built up the strength to say the words.
"It's Addison."