"I'm scared, Derek."Addison admitted, pacing back and forth in his apartment.
Kathleen was suppose to pick Derek's daughter up from school and take her out to lunch. She was on a mission to get Ella to like her and she thought giving her ice cream for lunch would win her major points. After lunch she was suppose to drop her off at home where Derek and Addison were waiting.
"She's a kid, Addie, not an alien from some other galaxy. She's four and a half, she won't kill you. I promise. Besides, it's not like you haven't seen her before." Derek replied in a effort to calm her down before his daughter arrived.
"She was asleep." Addison reminded him. "She's not going to be asleep when she walks in through that door."
"Just remember that she thinks that you're her mother. Don't blow the story. If she asks you why you left her; tell her that you had to go to school in a different state or something like that. Okay?"
"Got it." she nodded, her head shooting up when she heard the door open.
A second later came a light tapping on the door before it opened and Kathleen walked in with Derek's daughter in her arms and her backpack over her shoulder. She passed the child to her father and dropped the backpack on the floor before she was able to catch her breath from going up the 4 flights of stairs to avoid waiting for the most accident prone elevator in the city.
"You okay, Kathleen?" Addison asked, seeing as his sister looks like she could pass out.
Kathleen nodded. "I'm just really out of shape. And FYI, Ella nauseous because I took her to Cold Stone and they accidently gave her expired vanilla ice cream " she warned.
Derek's brow rose as he looked into his sisters eyes. "You were suppose to take her out for lunch..."
"She wanted ice cream, I took her to an ice cream shop and they gave her old ice cream! How is that my fault?" Kathleen exclaimed as Derek pushed her out of the apartment and slammed the door shut.
"I can't decide which one of your sister's is more amusing. Amy might win thought...only because she everything she does gets her into trouble." She went closer to Derek and gently placed her hand on the child's back.
Ella's head was on her father's shoulder. She was staring down at the back of his shirt while trying to figure out why there was a strange woman with her father. Addison took a step closer to Derek and turned enough to see the child in his arms. "Hey, Ella." she said softly and offered a small, friendly smile.
Ella turned her head to the side and stared straight into Addison's eyes silently. When she felt her father trying to put her down on the couch she tightened her arms around him, begging him to hold her a little longer. Derek understood the wordless plea and kept his daughter perched on his hip while she kept her head on his shoulder. "Ella..." he began hesitantly. He could feel the tension Addison was radiating and at that second he understood how scared she was to be taking on such major responsibility. "This is Addison, she's your mommy."
Ella's eyes widened in shock as she stared at the woman standing a couple of feet away from her. She didn't know what to think or what to say but she knew that she wouldn't easily trust the woman whom she thought had left her. "I'm not going to called her 'Mommy'." Ella decided despite the fact that she'd been dreaming of being able to say it since she learned the word.
"Oh...uh.." She stopped, realizing she was too nervous to go on without taking a breath. "You don't have to call me 'Mommy' if you don't want to, Ella. I'm fine with Addison or Addie... or Ad. Whatever you want." she assured.
"My teacher says is dis-res-pect-ful to call your parents by their first name." she answered firmly, though the fact that she carefully sounded out the difficult word made it sound cuter than it was meant to be.
"It's okay. I really don't mind." Addison insisted. "We can start slow, kay? When you're ready to call me 'Mommy' than you can. Until then I'm fine with anything."
"Why did you leave me and Daddy? Why did you change your mind and come back?" she asked hesitantly, not sure if she even wanted to know what was going on in the mind of the woman who claimed to be her mother.
"She had to go to school, El. It was in a different country." Derek took over, seeing that Addison was too overwhelmed with the whole situation to go on. "But she transferred over to the same school that Daddy goes to so she can come back and be with us now." he explained.
Ella looked over at Addison and said, "Oh." with her lips curving into the perfect O shape.
"I'm gonna get those 400 teddy bears off your bed so you rest until your nausea passes. Addie can help you change into your pjs." he suggested as he passed the child into Addison's arms. He watched as his daughter nuzzled her head on her newly discovered mother's shoulder.
Ella held on tightly, afraid of being dropped. She didn't trust Addison enough to trust that she wouldn't drop her. She murmured something quietly into her ear but the only thing that come out clearly was "throw up." Before she could respond or act on the words, Ella eject what could only be assumed was semi-digested vanilla ice cream all over Addison.
Ella instantly regretted not being to contain herself and began crying. Addison's first instinct was to hold the child tighter and assure her that everything would be alright. "It's okay, El. Now that you got it out of you you'll start to feel better. Let's get you changed and in bed and by the time you wake up in a few hours you'll feel all better." she said softly .
After setting Ella down in bed, Addison walked into Derek's bedroom and pulled off her 300 dollar white cashmere sweater and grabbed a random t-shirt from one of his drawers. Usually she'd consider taking a hit out on who ever ruin her clothes, but this time she couldn't possibly care less. In the 45 minutes she'd spend with Ella she's somehow managed to develop the maternal compassion her own mother lacked.
Just as she was pulling the t-shirt over her head Derek walked into the room with a bright smile on his face. "Welcome to motherhood." he exclaimed proudly.
Addison arrived at Derek's hotel room as soon as her last patient left the practice. She impatiently banged on the door until he opened it. She stood still looking into the blue ocean which were his sleep compromised eyes. "I uh...I'm sorry for interrupting your night." she said awkwardly
"You're not interrupting anything." he assured, stepping aside from the door to let her in. "I'm just a little surprised that you're here."
"Wyatt got Ella's test results back. I thought you would wanna know so I came here ASAP." she answered unsurely, still debating whether or not it was a good idea.
"Oh..." Derek sighed, pacing back and forth for a few short seconds. The news she came to deliver had the potential to change his life. "Should I be sitting?"
Addison looked at him uncomfortably. It was obvious that she felt awkward and out of place in his temporary domain. "You should be in any position you're comfortable in."
Ella turned onto her other side to face her parents. She had been pretending to sleep but she couldn't. Not while her parents were in the same room discussing the matter of her life.
"Just tell me." Derek said nervously, looking from his daughter's emotionless eyes to Addison's.
"Ella has got stage one ovarian cancer." she stated clearly, her voice deprived of all the personal emotion that went with it.
"How long does that mean I have?" Ella asked after watching the tension between the two for a few silent seconds. "A week? A month? A year?"
"Stage one, Ella." Addison emphasized. "We caught it very early, before it spread, before it did too much damage. Survival statistics are excellent. You're not dying, honey." she explained.
"That's...great." Derek said with a pause. He needed a second to process the words he was hearing and change his negative perspectives in regards to the future of his family. "So we've got options..."
"Yeah, we do. We can do a few rounds of chemo, follow that with radiation. We can do a partial oopherectomy and follow that with a round of chemo just in case the surgeon doesn't get all the potentially cancerous cells. Wyatt suggested joining a clinical trial but that would be taking a risk...And I'm not sure I'm willing to take a risk with this." Addison answered without realizing that she was on the border of crossing the line of overly informed parent and personally involved physician.
"No...no clinical trials." Derek agreed. "You're the gynecologist here... and I know you probably went through the training for gynecological oncology even though it wasn't required. You're Addison, you needed to know all or nothing. So, come on! Tell me what we should do!" he exclaimed with unmistakable confusion and worry in her tone.
"I did train for it." she confirmed his statement. "But that's not the point! I'm not suppose to stand here at 11 pm and discuss the medical aspect of this with you! I'm in your shoes, Derek. She's my kid, too... I'm just as freaked out and lost as you are."
"Yeah but the difference is...you know what can help her, you know what can go wrong. You're just choosing to ignore it and be a normal mother. Well guess what, Addison...you're not a normal mother! You're not even really..." He stopped himself before he could go on any further and immediately regretted the words. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way. This whole thing's got me so worked up that I don't know my limits. "
Addison looked up from the stop she'd been staring at on the ground. "It's fine." she mumbled with a broken voice, wiping away a single tear with the tip of her finger. "I should go." she whispered, backing away toward the door.
"Wait...what just happened? What did we decide? Because you lost me after the word 'radiation' and I'm still trying to catch up." Ella admitted in confusion, pushing herself up onto her elbows to feel more awake and less isolated.
She never got her the answer she was looking for, instead she watched her mother walk out of the hotel suite and turned her eyes back onto her father. "You're an idiot." she decided surely and stated it to be an undeniable fact.
"Yes, I am." he agreed. "I suck with words and emotions and...love."
"Things were finally getting better with her and you just ruined it and sent her to rock bottom again." Ella yelled in disappointment and anger. "FYI, I may not be dying right now...but I plan on killing you."
Thanks for flashback suggestions. I credit McHobbit with the idea for this one. :) I know the flashback was longer than the present but it was too fun to write to keep short. Hope you guys don't mind.
Oh, and I know it's a lot of angst and it's getting too depressing to continue reading but I promise, the end will be so worth it. Just gotta stick with me through the next three chapters (most of which is already written out)
Thanks for Reading. Don't forget to leave a review.