Dark circles were bagged around Dr. Jo Wilson's eyes. Her hair was a mess. It was obvious she had slept only a few hours the night before, most likely sitting upright in a chair, with her chin leaning against her hand.

"What's going on, Dr. Gr-Meredith?" Jo asked Meredith, who stood above the patient. She'd taken the scalpel in her hand and was ready to cut.

"I need an extra hand, so you're scrubbing in," Meredith told Jo, whose brown eyes widened with surprise.

"Another surgery in less than twenty-four hours? I mean, yes, of course. I'll be ready right away." Jo beamed and she went into the scrub room to scrub. Meredith exhaled and smiled weakly, remembering what it was like to have your day made when an attending told her to scrub in during her residency. She knew that she was often resented by the other residents, because Derek always had her on his service and she scrubbed in all the time. It didn't ask nor expect special treatment. In fact, there were times she tried to avoid his service because she didn't want special treatments. Looking back, though, she'd enjoyed every minute of it, and sometimes, although she would never admit it, she credited Derek for helping her become the surgeon she was today. She wouldn't have gotten to scrub in on near as many procedures if it hadn't been for him. She'd watched Izzie and George struggle to get in on surgeries, and Cristina struggled after Burke left.

Jo bounced out of the scrub room. "Okay, what do you need me to do?" Jo asked. Meredith could sense the enthusiasm and eagerness to learn in the resident's eyes. Meredith began explaining the procedure to her.

"Do you want to open?" Meredith asked, and Jo's eyes widened.

"Are you sure? I mean, I don't know if I'm ready…I don't want to mess up."

"Confidence, Jo," Meredith told her. "It's the first and most crucial trait a surgeon must have. Without it, you won't succeed. You're never going to be ready to make that first cut. It's not something you can prepare for. You've just got to believe in yourself." Jo nodded hesitantly, and Meredith handed Jo the scalpel. "Ready to cut?"

Jo carefully cut the scalpel into the patient's skin, and Meredith didn't take her eye off Jo as she perfectly opened up the patient. Meredith proceeded to explain the procedure to Wilson.

"Wait, isn't this a peds case? Shouldn't Arizona or," Jo gulped, "Alex be here?"

Meredith exhaled. "Actually, that's why I paged you." Jo looked up, and Meredith began the procedure. "Alex walked out. He, uh, seems to think you're avoiding him. You ignored his call this morning."

"Huh?" Jo raised an eyebrow. She looked off. "Oh, shit. I think my phone was on silent then. I stayed in Jenni's room last night, and I didn't want it to go off and wake her."

"How's Jenni doing?" asked Meredith, having not forgotten about the little girl she'd stayed late to help the night before.

"She's doing as well as she can," replied Jo with a deep sigh. "I called social services this morning. As soon as she's released, she'll be going in their custody. Her mom didn't even come back tonight or this morning. I was with her when you paged. She's such a sweet kid. Actually...I see a lot of me in her. Oh, God, Alex thinks I'm ignoring him...I feel horrible now. I didn't expect him to call me at all."

"I wouldn't feel too bad. He didn't answer your calls last night, you said," Meredith said.

"Yeah, but maybe he was sleeping or his phone was off or I don't know. Like you said, he needed space, and then when he was ready to talk to me, I wasn't there. He must feel abandoned," said Jo. "I feel like such a bad girlfriend."

Meredith laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"Wilson, you're not a bad girlfriend," Meredith insisted. "I've known Alex for about eight years, and let me tell you, I think you're the best thing that's ever happened to him."

"Really?" Jo looked up with wide eyes and met eyes with Meredith for a split second.

Meredith shrugged. "I don't know if he knows it yet, but yes. Oh, there!" The tumor was in full visualization. She pointed it out to Jo, as they prepared for removal. "I need suction."

After the tumor was removed, Meredith allowed Jo to close up Lena, while monitoring her closely. "You, Alex, and Izzie were all friends, right?" Jo asked. Meredith looked up and didn't respond. "I mean, I know you were comforting Izzie in the bathroom yesterday…"

"Izzie and Alex were my roommates," Meredith declared, leaving out the detail that they'd all lived in Alex's house. It felt weird to refer to her old house, the house that had been her mother's, as Alex's house. "We lived and worked together, so yes, we were all very close."

"I know you said Izzie hurt Alex, and I can't even begin to wrap my mind around why she would hide his son from him for so many years, but you knew her. Is she really crazy? And do you think there's a chance Alex still loves her? I guess deep down, I keep telling myself she's a complete lunatic, so Alex wouldn't want anything to do with her. But honestly, I-I'm terrified that Alex will decide to leave me for her. She is the mother of his kid. I really don't want to lose him. Everyone else around here-all the other residents-have had their hearts broken by attendings. I-I've seen what they've gone through, and I don't know if I'm strong enough to go through that. And Alex...he's amazing. He can be a dick at times, but he's kind and sweet too. There aren't a lot of guys out there who have hearts like him, you know?" Meredith couldn't help but chuckle. "Oh Gosh, now I'm rambling and you think I'm the crazy lunatic."

"I don't think you're a crazy lunatic, Jo," Meredith insisted, gently laughing. "I was just thinking about how it wasn't too long ago I was in your position. Did you know Derek was actually married when I met him?"

"He was?" Jo's eyes widened. "I guess I've heard rumors, but who knows what you can and can't believe around here. I knew you'd met when you were an intern."

"Right. Well, I was known as the dirty mistress back when I was an intern," Meredith started, "I didn't even know he was married until his wife showed up one evening as Derek and I were preparing to go out on a date, and she announced that I was the woman who'd been screwing her husband."

Jo's jaw dropped. "Oh, wow. That must have been really hard for you."

"Oh, you have no idea," Meredith said. "Let's just say that tequila became my very best friend for a while, but it all worked out in the end. Addison moved to L.A. and has her own private practice, Derek and I got married, and life is just peachy." Peachy was an overstatement, but Jo didn't know that. Everyone in the hospital seemed to think that she and Derek lived a perfect life with perfect house in the perfect Dream House. From an outsider's perspective, her life did look perfect. And her life was pretty great. But that's because she and Derek had learned to keep their drama out of the hospital. They'd learned how to make it work without involving all of their co-workers. Their problems were their problems. They didn't need to involve the rest of the hospital in them.

Of course, now Amelia was back in town, and who knew what drama she would stir up. Meredith didn't dislike Amelia, but she wasn't sure if she could be trusted.

"Sounds a little scandalous," Jo pointed out, referring the Meredith-Derek-Addison triangle.

"I didn't intend for any of it to happen, nor did I plan on being a husband stealer. But I wouldn't change what happened. What's supposed to happen will happen, Jo. It's all going to work out in the end," Meredith gave Jo a piece of her wisdom. She didn't know when she'd become so optimistic, and she of all people knew how it was hard to be optimistic in the situation Jo was going through. Meredith knew that if she were going through, she wasn't so confident she'd be the optimistic either.

Jo shrugged, "At least Alex isn't still married to her." Then her eyes shot open wide. "Wait, he isn't, right? You're not telling me this all because Alex is still secretly married to Izzie, right? Oh, my God…"

Meredith chuckled. "Jo, relax. I saw the papers. They're divorced."

Jo breathed a sigh of relief, and Meredith's phone beeped. She reached for her phone, surprised to see she had a page from Derek.

9-1-1, my office

Meredith clenched her fists together as she remembered the photos she had discovered just before she'd entered surgery. Perhaps Derek had discovered that she'd grabbed his iPad, and he was worried that she would discover the pictures.

She wondered what else could be possibly so important that he was paging her 9-1-1. She smiled to herself, briefly calling the days when Derek would page her to his old office for super-secret sex. The last time Derek had paged her 9-1-1 to his office, it had been five minutes before the daycare was about to close for the day, and it'd been his day to pick up the kids, but he was tied up and couldn't get out of the office. Needless to say, Meredith was pretty livid afterward, and they didn't have sex for two weeks after that.

Meredith turned to Jo. Lena was closed up and ready to go back to recovery. "You can bring Lena to recovery, right?" Meredith asked Jo.

Jo nodded her head. "Yeah, sure."

"Okay, page me when she wakes up," Meredith told Jo as she dashed out of the operating room.

She clenched tightly to Derek's iPad as she made an anxious dash to Derek's office. Meredith hadn't figured out how she was deal with Derek in regards to the photos she'd found on his iPad. She really wasn't mad, because she knew he wouldn't share the pictures with anyone else intentionally. She was just shocked, and the initial shock had already blew over. Her biggest concern was the fact his iPad wasn't password protected. If he was going to take pictures of her like that, he should at least have his iPad password protected.

She cracked the door open to find Derek sitting behind his desk, buried in his computer. He looked up the instant Meredith entered the room.

"You paged?" she asked, raising an eyebrow, running her hand over the iPad. He stood up and pushed his chair in.

"Close the door," Derek smirked, walking toward her. She pushed the door shut. Her heart raced as Derek moved in on her and pushed her against the door, then locked it. He gently pressed his lips against hers, and her breathing quickened as his lips moved down her neck and a moan escaped her lips.

"Oh, Dr. Shepherd, what are you doing?" Meredith asked inquisitively, still holding onto the iPad. Her teeth hovered over her lip, debating on whether to say something. He wrapped his strong arms around her waist and pulled her in close; she set his iPad down on the table by the door, then Derek ran his fingers through her hair and softly kissed her cheek. Meredith sensed that he hadn't noticed the iPads had been swapped, so she decided to keep her mouth shut and let him find out himself.

"Well," Derek laughed, "you were saying last night how you missed sneaking away for sex."

"Mmm," Meredith murmured as Derek wrapped his arms around her and lifted her off the ground. She giggled softly, feeling rejuvenated in youthfulness, as she reminisced her intern and resident years. Derek set her on his desk and began kissing her neck, working his lips down to her collarbone. She noticed his computer in the corner of her eye, careful not to lean back far enough to budge it. She noticed the webcam. "That's off, right?" she asked sternly, not having forgotten the picture on the iPad. She bit her lip, secretly enjoying Derek's ignorance.

"The webcam?" Derek asked, his dazzling blue eyes twinkled as he seductively gazed into her eyes. "Yeah, of course. Well, it doesn't work anyway. The NIH staffers haven't been able to see me through it yet. Not sure what's wrong with it. Do you think I'd be doing this if it was on?" He laughed and nuzzled his nose against hers.

"Well, gee, I don't know. Maybe you have some deal with the president to produce his live porn," Meredith said and watched as Derek raised an eyebrow, chuckling.

"Hm, live porn?" He kissed her nose. "You and I would make pretty good porn stars, huh?" He slowly removed her lab jacket and then took off his shirt. She pressed her hand against his warm, hairy chest and giggled softly.

"I suppose we would, but I'd prefer the President of the United States not to see me naked. My naked body is for your eyes only," Meredith replied adamantly, raising her eyebrows, not thrilled that Cristina had seen her almost-naked earlier. Though, she was glad it was Cristina and not someone else. Cristina and Meredith had seen each other in little clothing plenty of times. Cristina would just tease her about the circumstance, which she could handle, because Meredith knew about Cristina and Owen's sexts.

Derek's eyes rounded, and she sensed a hint of guilt in his sparkly blue eyes. His eyes always said everything. She looked around the room carefully, halfway expecting to find a hidden camera.

"There's, uh, not a bug in this room, is there?" It wouldn't surprise her if the president had a chip in Derek's room that allowed him to hear everything that was said. Big Brother was always watching, right?

"God, I hope not." Derek's eyes widened as he slid her scrub top off and sat down in his chair and she kicked off her tennis shoes. He pulled off her pants and then pulled his off, pulling her on top of him. She wrapped her legs tightly around him and felt his erection through his underwear as he lightly kissed the top of her breast as he unfastened her bra. She kissed his ear and ran her fingers through his soft dark hair. Their lips collided again as he worked off her panties, and she helped him slide his off. "One sec," Derek said as he reached for his desk drawer and Meredith saw him pull out a Trojan condom.

"You bought condoms?" Meredith laughed, her stomach fluttered. "So, this was definitely premeditated."

He smiled warmly and breathed his warm breath into her ear. "There's nothing wrong with premeditated sex." He took the condom out of the wrapper and carefully put it on, and he lifted her off the chair and carried her over to his new cushioned couch in the corner of the room. She was on top of him, kissing his chest as she inserted him into her. She moved her hips gently up and down and her heart rate spiked as she moved her hips faster and faster. Meredith loved the power she felt when she was in control. She indulged in this power she possessed, as she prepared to drive them both over the edge. The sensation wasn't as strong as it was without the glove, but tiny waves of pleasure radiated within her body. Soft moans escaped her lips, as the last thing she wanted their sex date to remain unheard by others in the hospital. Or worse, the president, if he did have a bug in the room. In that case, she was screwed-literally. It was too late for her to care, though.

She panted fiercely as she breathlessly approached her climax. She could see Derek's eyes shimmer as he reached his climax with her. Meredith fell off Derek and rested her head against his shoulder. She kissed his neck, "That was great, but condoms suck. No more condoms, okay?"

Derek laughed. "You'd rather get pregnant than use condoms?" Meredith didn't answer his question, because she honestly didn't know the answer. Derek exhaled, "You're the one who forgot to take your pill. You know, there are other methods, so you don't have to have to remember to take the capsule every day."

Meredith groaned; she was well aware. Sometimes Derek's knowledge of the female reproduction system could be irritating, though. He'd been married to a gynecologist for eleven years, so of course he knew a lot more than most men.

"I know," Meredith said. "Trust me, I know."

"You could get on the shot, and then you only have to get it every three months," Derek suggested.

"There are so many side effects of the shot, though," Meredith rejected. "Depression, weight gain, hair loss, nausea, oh and lowered sex drive. I don't think you'd appreciate that. So you'd have a depressed bald puking fat wife who never wanted to have sex with you."

Derek's eyes widened and then he laughed. He kissed her neck lightly. "I don't think it's possible for you to get fat, Meredith, and if you did, you'd still be beautiful."

Meredith sighed. "Don't flatter me. Besides, I've heard of women who were on the shot and couldn't get pregnant again after going off it. I don't want another baby now, but in another two years...once Bailey's potty trained and in preschool, and Zola's in kindergarten, I might. Did you talk to your president's people about cutting back on your travel."

"I did," he said, "and they said they'd try to cut back on my needed travel hours." He leaned in and gave her a peck on the lips. "And that does sound like a good time to try again," he said.

"We had such a hard time getting pregnant the first time. I don't want to do anything to decrease my fertility, since the chances of us ever having another baby are so slim as it is." She exhaled. "And good. They must really want you, since they've been so quick to negotiate with you."

"Yeah, I guess," Derek shrugged like it was no big deal, "And you're just saying that you want to keep the option open...for more babies," Derek said carefully. "It's understandable, and if we don't have another baby, that's fine too. We can always adopt, too. There are lots of babies in the world who don't have parents."

Meredith nodded just as she heard her phone buzzing from her pants pocket, which was all the way over by Derek's desk. She groaned and leaned into kiss him again. "We definitely have too much going on now to even be having this conversation."

"There's nothing wrong with having this conversation," laughed Derek. "It's good to have a plan."

"You and I both know that plans never turn out the way we plan them," Meredith said as she covered herself as she walked in front of Derek's computer, just in case the webcam actually was on, and she bent over to grab her phone out of her pocket. She had a text from Owen.

9-1-1 - incoming trauma - school bus hit cab - ALL HANDS ON DECK

"Crap," Meredith said out loud.

"What's wrong, Meredith?" Derek said as he walked behind her and placed his soft, warm hand on her shoulder.

"Hunt just paged me. We have an incoming trauma. I guess a bus hit a cab. Hunt says all hands on deck," Meredith said as she quickly dressed herself in her navy blue scrubs.

"Hm, he didn't page me," Derek observed, looking at his phone.

"Probably thinks you're busy doing important presidently duties," Meredith noted jokingly. Derek shrugged. Meredith added, "Though, I'm sure he can use you. You should come with me."

"Well, I guess it couldn't hurt to get out of this office for a little bit," Derek said as he put on his scrubs. The couple made a dash for the Emergency Room together.

A/N: I just thought I'd warn you that updates will probably be slower after this chapter. I have the next two chapters written, but work has been pretty hectic lately, and considering a vast majority of this story has been written while I was at work, that's slowing me down tremendously. I now only have nights and weekends to write, and my peak creativity hours are in the morning! I'll just hint this: A Shondaland character was affected by the accident mentioned in this chapter. The question is…who?