If you break down, I'll drive out and find you
If you forget my love, I'll try to remind you
And stay by you when it don't come easy
He didn't get to Connecticut until it was already dark outside. Had he seen the sun today at all? Maybe for a minute or two? Between the six-hour flight and the three-hour time difference, it was nearly dinner time by the time he had landed in Hartford, paid for a rental car, and driven to the hospital.
He tried to sleep on the plane, but rest wouldn't come. He fidgeted for most of the flight, leafed through the magazine he found in the seat pocket in front of him, got up to use the bathroom twice even though he didn't have to go, and was probably the most annoying person the people who shared his row with him had come across in awhile. He couldn't help it; it just seemed like everything was taking forever, that everyone else was moving in slow motion while his brain was in overdrive. The people in front of him couldn't get off the plane fast enough. The girl behind the counter at the rental car place kept asking him stupid questions about what kind of car he wanted until he finally snapped and told her to give him the one closest to the exit. The speed limit seemed entirely too low, and the elevator in the hospital ridiculously backed up.
He found Nancy standing at the vending machine, punching the buttons for a cheap cup of coffee, before he found his mother's room. She had one hand in her hair, her head bowed down in exhaustion, and her back to him.
"Hey," he said, laying a hand gently on her shoulder.
She turned and he saw the utter fatigue, not just from the past 24 hours but from the past six months, etched on her face. Nancy was normally so well put together; she was clamoring to wear makeup when she was nine. But she stood before him now with the hints of dark circles under her eyes, in sweatpants and a t-shirt, and not a stitch of makeup to be seen. "Want some coffee?" she asked as the machine started to spit hers into a paper cup.
He shook his head. "How's Mom?"
She sighed. "They started her on some meds last night, so they're hoping," she paused and looked down at her wrist, but realized she wasn't wearing her watch. "What time is it now?"
"About 5:15."
"Yeah, they're going to check her counts again in a few hours to see where we are."
"No infections though?"
"No, nothing that has presented yet. So we're hoping Kathleen got her here in time."
He wondered how long her time in the ER was. A 71-year-old febrile cancer patient didn't need to be sitting in the emergency room for hours during the tail end of cold and flu season while the hospital processed paperwork and saw other patients. He glanced over and saw an open door, and his mom asleep in bed. Every time one of his sisters called over the past few months with an update, he always asked if they wanted him to come out there, and they always said no, they had everything under control. Last night, when Kathleen called to tell him this, he didn't ask this time; he told her he would be on the next flight out. And she didn't object.
"What do they have her on?" he asked.
"Cefzim."
At this moment, he was thankful that Nancy was here and not Annie or Maggie. He loved them, but they wouldn't be able to answer his questions the way he needed them to be answered.
"Not Vancomycin?" he pressed. Cefzim was good, but they didn't need to softball this.
"He doesn't want to risk her kidney function. She doesn't have an actual infection; her ANC is just really low," Nancy assured him, telling him the only good news he'd heard all day. "So they're just doing the Cefzim as a precaution."
"What about a G-CSF to get her ANC up?"
"Neupogen."
"Ok," he said finally, satisfied that they had handled the situation and the calls made were ones he would have made himself. They had to do something to get her white blood cells up; she couldn't fight infection without them. "She's sleeping now?"
"Yeah, she didn't get much rest last night. She's been napping for about an hour or so."
He nodded, and looked around the waiting room for anybody else, but no one he knew was there. "Where is everybody?"
"Kathleen went home to get some sleep. She told you she was the one staying with Mom after her treatment this week? She'd been up all night. And, uh," she paused, like she had to try to think of who else was in her family. "Anne was here this morning, but Audrey came home sick from school so she had to leave. And Maggie should be here soon; she's running out of leave at work so she is coming after. Oh, hold on," she stopped abruptly and pointed. "That's her doctor. Dr. Farrell. This is my brother Derek."
An older man, probably in his mid-fifties, stopped to shake Derek's hand. He was wearing a lab coat over dress pants and a shirt and tie, and though he was fit, his hair was gray. He shifted the charts he was holding to one arm, and took a firm grip on Derek's hand. "Pleasure to meet you," he said.
"Derek was hoping that you could give him a little more information about what's going on with our mom. He's a doctor too."
"Wow, lots of doctors in this family," Dr. Farrell chuckled. "No wonder you've all been so on top o your mother's care. Well, her chest x-ray, her bloodwork, urine sample—fortunately, everything came back clean, so we're hoping that we caught it early enough that we can reverse the neutropenia relatively quickly with the Neupogen."
"So the antibiotics are strictly precautionary right now?"
Nancy had just said it, but he couldn't help but ask the doctor for himself. Over the past few months, he really didn't have complaints about the care his mother had received, but a part of him still wished that she would have gone to New York to be treated by someone he knew, someone who had worked with him and whose credentials were what he thought they should be. He couldn't shake the thought that somehow it would have been different, better, if she had done that.
"Yes. Her fever hasn't broken yet, but I hope once she's had another dose, it will. We'll do another round of tests tomorrow, and if everything's still negative but she still has a fever, we'll dose her with the Vancomycin. Obviously, if an infection presents, we'll adjust accordingly," he assured Derek.
"What about her chemo?" Derek asked.
"We're going to stop."
There it was. Exactly the thing that he did not want to hear. A quiet 'oh' was all he could get to come out.
"We'll try to resume as soon as we can," the doctor promised, "But as I'm sure you know, an ANC that low—we need to take a break until she can handle the treatments again. I'm confident that we'll be able to finish her chemo."
Derek nodded, and looked over at the room where his mother slept. She was waking up, but the blankets were still pulled up high around her. She rubbed her face with both hands and looked around, then out into the hallway where the three of them stood talking. He made eye contact with her and she smiled weakly.
"You can go in and see her if you like," Dr. Farrell said, and waved to her before turning back to Derek and Nancy. "It was nice meeting you, Dr. Shepherd," he said, and extended his hand for another handshake. "If you have any questions, please page me."
They thanked him and went in to sit with their mother. He took a squirt of antibacterial gel from the bottle next to her bed, and rubbed his hands together before collapsing into an armchair that had been pulled out into a bed. He took one of her hands, and looked her over. She was thin, much thinner than she was when they had come for Christmas. Her head was bare now; he wasn't sure when she stopped bothering with the scarf all the time. He could see some peach fuzz, but for the most part, her hair was very much gone and her lips looked dry and cracked. He wondered if she had mouth sores, if they hurt, if anything hurt, and he tried to take a deep breath and not cry.
"Hey, Mom. How are you feeling?" Nancy asked.
"I'm feeling ok, hon."
"Mom?" Nancy said quietly. "I'm gonna go home for a little bit, make sure the kids eat and everything, but I'll be back in the morning, ok? Derek's here though, and Maggie is coming soon. Der?"
"Yeah?" he asked, turning around in his chair.
"Where are you staying tonight? Do you want to crash on my couch?"
He shrugged, and looked down at the chair he was sitting in, that could be extended enough for someone to sleep on. "I was just going to sleep here."
Mary balked. "No, everybody is getting a good night's rest tonight," she said, as forcefully as she could. "And I'm the only one with a bed here, so I'll be the only one staying here. Derek, you can sleep in your room at home."
"Ok," Nancy sighed. Even at 45 years old, she knew she wasn't going to win this fight. The five of them were trying to take care of her, but she couldn't stop being the caretaker herself. "I'll see you tomorrow, Mom," she said, and blew a kiss.
"Bye, dear." Mary smiled and blew a kiss back.
She turned her head to Derek, and squeezed his hand. Her hand felt fragile in his, and her skin felt hot. He wondered for a moment what her temperature was; then he made himself try not to think about it.
"You know, they're going to fire you if you miss much more work," she said.
"Nah. I'm way too good."
Her eyes looked tired, her hair was gone, she was probably twenty pounds thinner. But if he focused on her smile and tried to blot out the rest, she still looked like his mom.
"Still, you didn't need to rush out here."
"Mom."
Yes I did. You are so sick. You even look sick this time. Of course I came.
She swallowed, and looked at him hard, and something unspoken passed between the two of them. They didn't say anything for a moment, and neither one of them wanted to break their smile first. He wondered if they were going to talk about this, or acknowledge in the slightest way that they were in fact sitting in a hospital room. He hadn't held her hand since he was a small child learning to cross the street, but he was holding it now. He squeezed it, and she wilted a little. They knew.
She sighed, and offered him what smile she could. "How's the baby?"
Ok, so they weren't going to talk about it. She tried to find something happy, something hopeful, and she found Emily. Derek hadn't heard Emily's voice in hours, but when he called Meredith earlier to tell her he landed safely, he got an update. Still croupy, and pissed off that she wasn't invited to visit Nana.
"She's good. A little under the weather right now."
As soon as the words were out, he felt kind of dumb for saying them. Emily would be fine in a few days. She essentially had nothing more than a bad cough. But Mary looked genuinely concerned anyway.
"Oh, what's wrong?"
"She's got croup. She'll be fine. She's a little mad at me right now though because I went to see Nana and didn't bring her."
Mary chuckled heartily. "She told you that?"
"That's what Meredith said earlier."
"How is Meredith?"
He kept talking; it seemed like that's what she wanted him to do. But he didn't let go of her hand. He wanted to say things. Just in case. But he couldn't come up with the words. So he talked about the things that came easier, the things that didn't matter as much.
"She's good too. She's just working a lot. Actually, they just offered her a fellowship at Seattle Grace, so she was excited about that."
"Oh, so you're staying in Seattle then?" Mary asked.
"We don't know yet. She hasn't heard from the other programs she applied to, so we're waiting until then to make a decision."
Was she hoping that they'd move back East? It might be a little too much Shepherd overload for Meredith, but knowing his family, they probably were hoping for exactly that. They'd have to wait, though, and see how the other programs would respond to Meredith. She'd probably have her pick, and they'd make the decision together, weighing the options at the kitchen table in a few months.
He shook his head a little. Why the fuck was he thinking about the fellowship when he wasn't sure how he would get through this week? Why was he wasting time thinking about things that were not pressing, were barely important at all right now? "How are you feeling, Mom?" he asked.
"I'm fine, hon," she assured him, adjusting her position on the bed a little. "Just a little tired."
"I can let you sleep," he offered hurriedly. Were they too loud before, when they were talking in the hallway? They probably woke her up, and now he was keeping her awake when all she really needed was to rest.
"No, no. I am happy to see you, even though you really didn't need to come out."
He gave her a look. "Yeah, I did."
They waited a moment, and he let go of her hand. The guilt he'd been fighting for months swelled up inside him: those first few years in Seattle where he intentionally stayed away, not wanting his family to call him on how out of control his life was; staying so far away, even though they had to for work and couldn't visit often for the same reason; not giving Emily as much time with her relatives as his nieces and nephews got; not being there to help his family through this every step of the way; only being able to come now, when it was critical. It bubbled up inside him, and the words started to come out.
"Mom? I'm sorry I didn't call and visit more. After Addison, especially. I was wrong to do that."
"You were figuring things out. Trying to find your way," she said quietly, knowingly, and patted his hand. "It's all right, Derek."
"No, I should have been better," he said. Maybe she could let him off the hook, but he couldn't let himself off the hook. "We could have visited more. I could have been around more. I'm sorry about that."
Her grin was weak, but it was there. She knew him so well. "Derek?" she soothed. "Stop talking to me like I'm dying, ok?"
She said the word 'dying.' Everybody was thinking it; it was the unspoken thing between him and Nancy before, and the two of them now. But she'd actually said it. And he felt like he'd been sucker-punched. He took a deep breath, but before he could figure out what to say and summon the strength to make the right words come out, she stopped him.
"I don't want you to feel like there's more you could have done, or more you should have done," she said. I know my boy and I know you're thinking it. "You are a wonderful son. It's been a privilege to be your mom." She grabbed for his hand, and continued. ""I love you, Derek. Think about how much you love Emily. I love you that much."
Why was she telling him this? He knew it, but why was she saying it out loud? He'd never doubted it his entire life, that he and his sisters were first with her. They always said the cursory 'love you's' before bed and things like that, but they'd never been the type of family for big heartfelt displays. He still knew, though. And he didn't realize how lucky he was to just know something like that until he met a girl who, even years after her mother passed, thought her mom probably loved her but was never certain.
"I see so much of Dad in you," Mary said. Her voice wavered for a moment, and her eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them back and corrected the tremor immediately before she kept talking. "I know you probably don't remember, but he talked to you the same way you talk to Emily. He used to make you guys pancakes on Saturdays. Do you remember that?"
"On schooldays sometimes too," Derek murmured.
After over thirty years, it upset him to think about it, but his father had become almost an abstraction. He knew his picture, but it was harder to conjure his face on his own. It was blurry, a familiar voice that he'd never forget coming from a face whose details had slipped away. He remembered his dad's 1962 Yankees World Series ring, the one he wore on his right ring finger every day until he died and was now sitting in a small box in Derek's top drawer. He remembered the red and black flannel shirt that his father wore a lot; the five of them had quietly stolen it from each other's beds for three years after he died, until the fabric had all but disintegrated. He remembered the pancakes he used to make that he had never been able to recreate for his own child. But the man himself was so hard to bring to mind. No matter how hard he tried, he could only get bits and pieces, little details of a life, and very rarely the whole man.
"You're right, he did," Mary agreed. "Used to drive me crazy because I could never get you out the door on time on those mornings. And he never let you guys go to bed without saying goodnight first. You know, he loved your sisters so much, but he had such big dreams for you. I wish he could have seen you grow up. He'd be beside himself proud of you."
As a child, a part of Derek always thought that any sane parent would have preferred Mark to him. He couldn't understand why Mark's own parents were so disinterested. Mark wasn't skinny or scrawny. He was good at sports. He had more friends. Derek was ok, but Mark was really the cooler one and the better one. As a ten-year-old, it seemed so dumb to Derek, the way his dad thought the sun rose and set on him.
"I wish Emily could have known him. And Meredith."
"Oh, God, he would have loved her," Mary sighed. She had a dreamy look in her eye for a minute, like she too was picturing Jack as an old man, with her, surrounded by their family with the littlest ones, Emily and Annie's Ian, in his arms.
"Which?" Derek asked.
"Well, both. He would have loved Meredith. But Emily, she would have had him wrapped around her finger from the day she was born. All of them would have. I would have had sixteen spoiled rotten grandchildren."
Derek laughed a little at that, but then grew quiet. What was going to happen if she died? He'd thought about it a million times, over and over again, since he learned her diagnosis. But what would it be like? How much and how long would it hurt? Could he be here when it happened? If it happened, he corrected himself. He could still hold out for if. Could he say the things he wanted to say, and stop himself from feeling for the rest of his life that their relationship was cut off and unfinished? He wouldn't have to leave it at a 'see ya' on his way out the door, or come home from a normal day at work to find out that she was already gone. His eyes filled with tears, and he stared at her, but said nothing.
"Derek," she soothed. "It's not like Dad." His tears spilled over: ugly, splotchy, droplets running down his face—how did she know?—and she kept talking. "If this is happening, it's not going to be like Dad, I promise you. I will not leave you without saying goodbye. I can't promise you much, but I will promise you that."
"But I don't want you to die." He sounded almost like Emily in that moment—like a scared, clinging child with a helplessly wavering voice. He hated that they were having this conversation at all.
"I don't want to die either. And I'm going to try really hard not to," she replied. Her voice wavered again, but it didn't break. "But I don't want you to be scared for me. My life has been so good. I've got five intelligent, compassionate, wonderful kids. And you've all given me sixteen beautiful grandchildren. I've got a lot more than most. Can I tell you something though?" she asked, and patted his hand. "Just a little advice from somebody who's been around the block a few times?"
How did she have it together? Well, mostly together? Especially when he felt like he was going to break down or vomit or explode from feeling so out of control.
"Yeah, Mom." He tried to steady his voice before he asked, "What is it?"
Mary didn't talk for what felt like a long time, at least a minute or two, and he just waited while she tried to find the words. She looked around the room, out the window for a moment, then at the wall for a moment more until she finally got back to his face. She studied him for a while, and when she started talking, the words poured out.
"I don't want you to be afraid. Not of failing, not of pain, not of anything. You or the girls. If you hurt, it's because you loved first. And I'd rather have you have that, than close yourself off to anything because you're afraid."
He nodded, wondering if she had this conversation with the girls. Maybe she did, and said different things. Or maybe it was the same talk for all five of them. Maybe he was the only one. He felt nauseous to think that they were having a potential farewell conversation, absolutely sick with it, but he tried his best to listen to her.
"Derek, I guess what I'm trying to say is that even if I knew before we got married that I was only going to get fifteen years with Dad, I would have married him anyway. Because trying is better than not, and if you can't have it all, some is still good. So I want you to promise me that you'll try not to be afraid."
"Ok," he said, though he wasn't quite sure how he would keep that promise. "I'll try, Mom."
Why was she talking about Dad so much? She made sure that he would never disappear from their lives, and talked about him often. All of his nieces and nephews called him 'Pop,' even though they were all years from being born when he died. On special occasions, like a graduation or a wedding or a new baby, someone would usually say that they wished he were there. He was still a presence in their home. But it was an unspoken thing for the most part. The way she was talking about him now was more than he could remember in years—less funny anecdotes, more yearning.
He wasn't sure how to go back to a normal visit after that. She looked tired, like she said all she wanted to say, but it wasn't like he could just turn on the television after something like that and go back to normal small talk. The silence felt heavy, and he felt like he should tell her about everything in his life, anything that came to mind that could possibly be important.
"Dad and I. We fought a lot when you were about four or five. I bet you don't remember that." She looked straight ahead when she said that, not at him at all the way she had before.
He searched his brain, but he couldn't remember anything of the sort. Granted it was almost forty years ago, but any yelling, fighting, even heated conversations—nothing specific came to mind. Nothing even remotely like the knock-down, drag-out screaming matches that Meredith remembered happening in her house crossed his mind whatsoever.
"No, I don't," he finally replied.
"Money was so tight," she sighed. "Dad's business was down. And Annie was only a baby. I was so tired and stressed out. I was just waiting for everything to collapse from under us. And everything Dad did set me off. And I guess I was the same way for him."
"I didn't know," he said simply.
"We didn't want you to. We saved most of our fighting until we had you guys in bed. Maggie heard us once—I think she had a nightmare one night and she came into our room—but I don't think she remembers it. Kathleen and Nancy—I know they were a little older, but I hope they don't know."
"Then why are you telling me this, Mom?" he asked.
As much as he hated how she was talking to him before, he didn't like this at all. He remembered his home as not perfect, but pretty close. It was secure, and so was he because he knew his parents loved him, and loved each other. And if he was being honest, it kind of freaked him out that his life could have been very different.
"Because I see me in you," she replied. "You are your dad. You really are. You two look just alike; your personalities; everything. It's actually a little unnerving at times." She smiled a bit at that. "But I see a little part of me in you, and I just wanted to tell you that. I know you want to feel safe and in control. But it doesn't always work like that. You can't always know. And sometimes there's nothing you can do. I wish I could have figured that out then. Maybe it would have saved your dad and me a lot of pain."
"Did you guys almost break up?" he asked. He couldn't help but wonder, even though it felt almost perverse to ask, like it was none of his business.
"I think we probably would have. If situations had been different, and we didn't need each other so much, we probably would have. But we had the five of you, and your dad's business and everything else. So we stayed together, and eventually it got better. We got through it, and we remembered how much we loved each other."
He didn't know what to say. It was so strange to think that his parents had problems, that they weren't the perfect couple and the perfect family that everyone, including he, had always thought they were. He felt kind of childish thinking so, but it was weird to think of his parents as people with such complicated feelings and problems and heartaches, and it rocked him to think that what he always believed, that his mom never felt any pain until his father died, was wrong.
He was still quiet when she kept going for him. "I wish you wouldn't stand so still so you can try not to break. It's no way to live. You don't know when things will change, if bad things will happen, and trying to make them not happen is not necessarily going to help. I don't want that kind of life for you, Derek. I just want you to be ok."
She shrugged a bit, like she couldn't believe it had taken so much explanation to get to those last few words, and she finally let a few tears roll down her cheeks.
"Mom?" he murmured. He squared his shoulders and smiled weakly at her. "Stop talking to me like you're dying, ok?"
The conversation got a little easier after that, like they both decided together that that was enough for now, and they could talk about something else instead. Not long after, a nurse brought her dinner. She picked at the tray for awhile, and when Maggie arrived, bringing get well soon cards from her kids, she ate a little more once Derek had someone to back him up on the benefits of eating. The three of them made small talk for a few hours, discussing the colleges that their oldest nephew, Kathleen's son Jeremy, had gotten accepted to and which would be best for him to attend. They talked about Maggie's three sons, especially her middle boy Kyle, who had broken his arm sledding a few weeks before. They talked about Emily, and moving her to preschool in a few months. And they made it a point not to talk anymore about how afraid they were, even when the nurse came in to take more blood for some follow-up tests.
By nine o'clock, Maggie apologized, but she had to leave. Her husband Paul, she said, if left to his own devices, would probably let the boys stay up until she got home rather than fight them on going to bed without seeing Mommy first. Mary brushed her off, and told her to go, she would see her in the morning.
He waited alone in his mother's room for awhile, while an intern came to take her to x-ray to get another look at her chest and make sure there was still no infection. He looked around the room, and it felt bare. No flowers in vases; nobody had thought to do that yet. Only the three cards from Ben, Kyle, and Will. He wished Emily were close by. She would have given Mary the butterfly she made at daycare the other day. Was it too late to call her? He could probably catch her before she went to bed. He took out his cell phone and tried calling the house, but no one answered, and he felt a little silly leaving a message so he just hung up. When he called Meredith's phone next, it went straight to voicemail.
They brought his mother back after about forty-five minutes, accompanied by the on-call resident, who let them both know that the chest x-ray was clear again, but they'd do another in the morning. A nurse helped her get comfortable in bed again, pulled the blankets up over her, and took her temperature and other vitals.
"101.4," she murmured aloud, and wrote it down on her chart. "That's better," she said, looking up at them.
Derek nodded, and the nurse left, promising to come back in an hour with some medicine, and to page if they needed anything.
"Mom, why don't you try to get some sleep?" Derek suggested.
"I'm ok," she replied. "Really, it's just nice to sit with you."
"Ok. Do you need anything?"
She shook her head. "I'm fine. Really, Derek."
"Some TV, then?" he asked, and when she nodded, he reached for the remote on the table next to her bed.
He turned on the television and flipped through the limited channel selection for a minute until he settled on some schmaltzy hospital drama that his mother liked. Mary dozed a little in the middle of the show, but was awake again, though a little more tired-looking, by the end. He was about to suggest that they turn off the television and go to sleep when he heard a familiar voice in the hallway.
She looked a little flustered, a lot tired, but she was there, talking to the charge nurse at the nurses' station. Her hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail, and she had a duffel bag slung over her shoulder. Her jeans were wrinkled, and she was still wearing her winter coat. But she was there.
"I'm looking for Mary Shepherd," she said. He couldn't hear what the nurse was saying in return, but she quickly replied, "Dr. Meredith Grey," and then clarified, "No, no, I'm not her doctor; she's my mother-in-law."
Mary smiled weakly and waved Derek out of the room. He got up and poked his head out, and called for her before stepping all the way out.
"Hey," she said, relieved when she saw him. Her shoulders sunk and her bag slid down her arm. They met in the middle. He pulled her into his arms, not realizing how much he missed her until he was there holding her.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"I didn't want you to be alone," she replied quietly, simply.
He looked around but saw no one else with her. "Where's Emily?"
"She's with Mark."
Derek said nothing, while thoughts of his child staying the night at Mark's apartment ran through his mind. Mark knew absolutely nothing about taking care of a child. He pictured Emily hanging out with him, eating junk, staying up way too late, going to daycare the next day in what she wore the day before. Truth be told, if that's what was happening, she was probably having a great time. It wasn't that he didn't trust Mark, but nobody ever saw Mark Sloan and thought 'he's probably great with kids.'
It was like Meredith could read his mind, because she barely let a few seconds pass before she said, "He wanted to help. And he wasn't sure if he should come out here or not. But he offered to watch Emily for a few days." She shrugged. "And his girlfriend is there, she seems good with kids."
"Oh God."
He had to give Mark a little credit; he'd been with the same girl for almost a year, the longest relationship of his life. Besides possibly Addison, but he certainly wasn't going to go there right now. But a new series of worries scrolled through his head. He pictured Emily finding one of this woman's bras or something lying around the apartment, or Mark forgetting Emily was there and leaving the door open while they….
"She'll be fine," Meredith interrupted his thought process. "He said he could bring her out here if you wanted her. He said just let him know," she soothed.
"Ok," he conceded reluctantly.
"I talked to her in the cab on the way here. Seriously, she's ok."
"Ok," he said again, a little more genuinely this time.
"How's your mom?" she asked.
"She's ok," he sighed quietly, and glanced back towards her room. "They're stopping chemo for now though. There's no infection, but she's still febrile. They're supposed to dose her with Cefzim again in probably about twenty minutes."
"What's she getting for her ANC?" she asked.
"Neupogen."
Meredith nodded. "That's good."
"Yeah. Her temp is down from what it was when she came in. And her chest x-rays have been clear."
Meredith smiled in a relieved sort of way, like the news was better than she thought it was going to be, and rubbed his arm. "Can I pop in and say hi?"
"Yeah," he replied, a little taken aback with Meredith voluntarily offering to sit with his mother and not appearing at all nervous about it. "I'm going to go check on her meds. I'll be right back."
After a brief conversation with one of the nurses on the floor, and a quick bathroom break where he took an extra minute to splash some cold water on his face, he returned to his mother's room to find Meredith sitting in his seat next to the bed, engrossed in conversation with his mother, even laughing a little. What could there possibly be to laugh about?
"Hey." He laid a hand on Meredith's shoulder. She turned to face him, and he was stunned to see that her eyes were watering, brimming with tears that hadn't spilled over. What did they talk about?
"The nurse said she'd be in in a few minutes with your medicine, Mom," he said, feeling a bit like he had just missed out on something.
Meredith stood up and stretched a little. "I've been told I'm supposed to take you home," she said.
Immediately, he stopped looking at Meredith and shifted to look at his mother. "Mom," he protested. "I can stay."
"Derek," she said in the no-nonsense tone he knew very well. "As soon as I get this medicine, I'm going to sleep, so I probably will not be that interesting." She stopped, and smiled at him. "I would love it for you to come back in the morning, but you should get some rest. Both of you."
"Ok," he murmured hesitantly. Truth be told, he was pretty exhausted. "You're sure?"
"Absolutely," she said, practically shooing them out the door. "I'll see you in the morning."
The ride back to his childhood home in his rental car was a quiet one. He couldn't think of what to say, and wasn't up for making small talk. So he just drove and drove, and kept his thoughts to himself.
His mother's usually ordered home was uncharacteristically cluttered, with rumpled blankets on the couch and half-empty glasses of water and orange juice on the coffee table. He dropped their bags on the living room floor and just stood there and looked around for a minute. He felt a little selfish for thinking so, but he was glad he hadn't been in Kathleen's position, the one to discover this complication.
Meredith disappeared into the kitchen, and he heard her rummaging through the cabinets and opening the refrigerator. Had he eaten today? Maybe the bag of pretzels on the plane at least? He couldn't remember for sure. He sat down on the couch and put his head in his hands, and suddenly, he was so tired.
Meredith sat down next to him. "There's no alcohol," she said simply. "I checked."
He nodded, and felt her hand on his back, rubbing gentle slow circles. He knew she was trying to make him feel better, but he didn't think anything was going to work. He wanted to do something; he wasn't sure what, but there had to be something that he was capable of doing. The enormity of his inability to act raked over him, pinned him to the couch. The phone rang, but he made no move to answer it, and after three rings, Meredith finally reached over and did.
"Hello?" It's Nancy, she mouthed. "Yeah, I got here a few hours ago.—No, he's, uh, showering.—Yeah, he had a long day." Derek stared straight ahead and she kept talking, doing what he was supposed to be doing and talking to his sister for him, filling his family in on what they needed to know about their mother.
When she hung up, she looked at him and smiled. "Let's go to bed," she suggested.
Upstairs, they changed into sweatpants, brushed their teeth, and crawled into bed silently. He wrapped his arms around Meredith. Even though he told her it wasn't necessary that she come, he was glad she did. He wouldn't have wanted to sleep here alone, and she felt so good next to him. Some time passed, and even though he wasn't sure if she was still awake, he asked her quietly, "What did you and my mom talk about?"
"You," she whispered.
She didn't ask what he and his mother had talked about. She just stayed there with him, squeezed his hand under the covers, and let him hold on to her like she was the buoy to hold on to when he was drowning.
She turned until they were both on their sides, facing each other, and he kissed her like she was the only thing in the world that mattered, the only thing he could hold on to. And she kissed back: a comforting, earnest sort of wanting that let him know that even though he was the one needing her right now, this was all just part of it. This thing, between them—nobody was leaving.
He pulled her shirt off; she did the same for him. Their pants followed, and he held her there for a minute, pressing his skin to hers. He kissed her shoulders and down to her chest, feeling her hot breath on his neck. She was there with him, clutching his right hamstring, stroking him over his boxers and then in, grabbing his ass and pulling him closer, moaning when his hands pushed up under her breasts and then dipped down into her panties. He shucked off his boxers, and then her panties, in the frenzied, needing way he always did when they did this at work and had to worry about getting caught.
"Derek," she gasped, when he stroked her just the way she liked and then pushed two fingers inside of her. He kissed her, rubbed her just a little, and when he finally rolled on top of her and pushed into her, they both sighed.
He thrust slowly at first, knowing that in his haste he hadn't made much time for foreplay. She kissed him hard, and grabbed at his hair, traced her fingers down the small of his back. She moaned quietly the way she always did, the pleasure caught in her throat, but he didn't make a sound.
He pulled her into a sitting position, and she closed her eyes for a moment, sighing loudly as she sunk down a little deeper. He held her like that for he didn't know how long, and let his hands roam everywhere. He ran them through her hair, down her shoulders until he cupped her breasts. He didn't move much, only thrust a few easy times, but it wasn't about trying to hold out or trying to get her to come first. It just felt good to have her close.
Meredith kissed him and kissed him, cupping his face with her hands, and though her lips didn't say a word, her eyes said I'm here, I'm here, I'm here. She never said it was ok, she never said not to worry, but she was there. And that had to count for something.
She let out her breath in little sighs, the warmth of it drifting by his ear, and moaned eagerly, clutched him that much harder, when he rubbed her in the space between them.
"Derek," she said again, this time in a more yearning way, in a way that let him know that she absolutely craved him. Finish me.
He laid her back down on the bed, and thrust hard and fast into her. She groaned at the unexpected hurriedness of his motions, grew louder when his thumb found her clit and pressed down, and he couldn't help but grunt a little when he buried his face into the crook of her neck and came. Another few seconds of rubbing just the right way, and she finished too, with her hands on his back, pushing him further into her.
They didn't bother to put their clothes back on afterward, and when they curled up into their normal sleeping positions, with his body spooning hers, she fell asleep within minutes. He stayed up a little longer, looking around his childhood bedroom. This room hadn't seen much sex when he was in high school and still lived here. Ok, it hadn't seen any sex when he was in high school. Don't forget to wash these sheets in the morning, he repeated three times in his head.
He breathed in the scent of her hair, which smelled like a different sort of flower since they had discontinued the conditioner he liked so much a few years ago, and shifted a little in her arms. He thought about calling the hospital, just to make sure that everything was ok and that it was all right to wait until morning to go back. While he waited for sleep, he went over the complications that arose from, the treatment protocols for, and whatever else he could remember about FNP. When he shifted again, Meredith grabbed at his hand, and pulled his arm around her waist.
"Derek," she whispered groggily, "Sleep." It took a few more minutes, but he finally did.
When the phone rang in the middle of the night, he couldn't decide whether he should rush to answer it, or if he should just let it ring, but when he finally got up and answered his phone, he heard Kathleen's voice on the line.
"Derek," she said. Why was she whispering? "I just thought you would want to know." She paused, and he waited, and in the silence, a glimmer of hope slipped in. "Her fever just broke."