A/N:Deep gratitude to everyone who's read and commented on this story. This was a difficult chapter to write, and feedback means a lot. I'm giving a content warning for this chapter, since it contains discussion of abuse raised in previous chapters.

under everything, just another human being

The infamous Lyman Stockton has a shock of white hair, a bow tie, and the kind of tan-weathered skin that indicates an elderly man who's spent long period of his life outside. In his case, sailing, which is the current topic of conversation as the four of them face each other in the hospital's lobby. Mark is half listening and half keeping an eye on Addison, who's toying with her necklace in the way she does when she's anxious.

The Captain is smiling in his blandly cheerful manner. "You used to sail with us, Addie, when you were little. You remember the old crew, don't you? Biff here, and also Skip Rutherford, and Scooter Latham…."

Mark takes a moment to appreciate that the Captain isn't the strangest-named member of his apparent sailing club, then notices Addison tensing next to him. He glances at her curiously.

Her face is tight as she nods.

"It's good to see you, Addison," Stockton says. "I haven't seen you since ... " He stops talking and Mark realizes that the last time must have been Archer's funeral. "…since the old days," he finishes with a smile.

"And now you're here, in Seattle, and so is the Captain. How wonderful." Addison's voice is cool and formal, not the warm, flexible voice Mark knows so well.

"Yes, well, I'm here for business, as you know. I can't discuss the case, of course."

"Of course," Addison smiles pleasantly.

Amy walks by then, a cup of coffee in her hand, and she shoots Mark a confused look when Addison gestures for her to join them.

"Dr. Stockton, this is Dr. Amelia Shepherd, one of the other surgeons on the team that operated on Annabel."

"After all these years, I think you can call me Biff, Addison." He turns to the others. "Addison here could mix a perfect gin and tonic when she was just yea high." Stockton lowers a flat palm near the ground, his large signet ring catching the light. "You know the secret is in the pour."

Amy elbows Mark.

"I understand the little girl will make a full recovery." Stockton gestures to his briefcase, where Mark assumes he's been updated on Annabel's case. "So young."

"Almost seven. And she's never mixed a drink in her life," Addison can't seem to help adding. Mark sees a nervous look cross her face, but then she masks it with a smile as the others chuckle.

"Seven," Stockton says thoughtfully. "Addison was quite the little sailor at that age, I remember."

She's silent.

"We sailed a lot in those days, didn't we, Captain." Stockton chuckles. "Some of the children were very competent. Yours were. My Catherine never sailed, though." He hesitates. "Seasick, you know."

Addison is toying with the chain around her neck again. "How, uh, how is she? I haven't seen Sissy in years."

"Oh, she's doing well. She's on her second marriage, though. But you know how these young people are."

Addison grimaces.

"How do you get Sissy from Catherine?" Mark whispers to Amy when the other three are distracted.

"How do you get Biff from anything?" she replies.

..

Mark tries to get Addison alone after the awkward meeting with Stockton.

"How are you doing? You seem-"

"Do you think Meredith looks okay?" she asks, interrupting him.

He glances over at her, confused. "Is this one of those trick questions, like when you ask me if a woman in the park is prettier than you?"

She smiles at this, as he intended. "No, I mean, like … run down. Exhausted. From everything."

He's not sure how to answer that. The last time he saw Meredith, she looked … like a surgeon, on the move doing a variety of things. Was she particularly tired? He's not sure he knows her well enough to gauge.

But more importantly, it reminds him of early periods in their marriage. She would worry about everyone first. If he asked her how she was, she would respond with something about the children, about a patient, about him – anything but herself. It's this jump to talking about Meredith that cements his concerns.

"I don't know," he says finally. "But I think it makes sense to be tired after the last two weeks. Addie, I know there's a lot going on, but can we find some time to talk-"

"Are you upset with me?" she asks hurriedly, interrupting him.

"No, not at all." He reaches out to stroke her hair and sees her body tense before he can touch her.

"Addison…"

"Good." She smiles at him. "In that case, I need to get back to Annabel; the OT is on her way."

..

Over the next few hours, every place he looks for her, she's nowhere to be found. A nurse assures him she's in Annabel's room, but when he gets there, he learns she's just left. By the time he trails her to the PT center, and then the cafeteria, and the playroom, she's gone each time.

"You okay?" he asks when he finally finds her seated in the far corner of Annabel's room, where their daughter is sleeping. "Addison."

She doesn't respond, but she's awake, staring at Annabel.

"Addie?" he touches her shoulder and she jumps.

"What?"

"Sorry." He's not sure why that startled her so much. "I was just asking if you're okay."

"I'm fine, Mark."

"You've been running around. Let's take a break, get some fresh air."

"I have a meeting with her OT in fifteen minutes." She stands up, stretching slightly as if she's stiff.

"So we can take fifteen minutes," he suggests, following her into the hall just outside Annabel's room.

"I'm fine, Mark."

He rests a hand on her shoulder. "I know it's stressful having the Captain here, but it seems like-"

Spinning around, his hand falling off her shoulder as she moves, she snaps at him in a tone he can't remember ever hearing from her. "Annabel's the one in the hospital, Mark, not me. I don't need twenty-four hour care, so would you please stop with the hovering and just back off!"

She presses her fingers to her mouth a second later, looking horrified. "I'm sorry," she whispers, shaking her head and turning away.

He rests a hand lightly on her back, waiting until she looks up at him again.

"What's going on, Addie?" he asks softly.

"I'm just tired. I didn't mean it."

"You're not yourself. You're snapping at Max, snapping at me…"

"I said I was sorry!"

"I know you're sorry. It's okay. I just want to understand what's going on with you. Tell me what I can do to help. You want me to run interference with the Captain? Keep him away? I can look for a golf course with a lot of traffic…"

"No. Thank you." She rests a hand on his chest, and there are tears in her eyes when she looks at him. "I just want to get through the hearing. When Derek gets his license back, everything will be fine. Stay with Annabel, please."

Watching her walk away is hard when every fiber of his being is screaming that something is very wrong. He knows her parents have a history of screwing with her head. Derek told him early on that they made her miserable, that they made her crazy and, worse, that they would occasionally swoop in and leave her all but catatonic afterwards. He saw bits and pieces of it before the divorce, when they were all friends, but he only dealt with it himself once.

He pulls open the door, surprised to see Addison standing outside his apartment looking rather worse for the wear in a battered college sweatshirt and jeans, face bare and pale, her hair scraped messily back. It's almost eleven; he wasn't expecting her.

"Hey," he says, confused, when she doesn't greet him.

She doesn't respond, staring at the carpet under her feet.

"Um…what's up?" he tries again.

She raises her eyes slowly to meet his. "Derek's away," she says.

He's not sure why she's telling him this. He's well aware Derek flew overseas yesterday, he's been talking about this conference for weeks.

"Addison, are you … okay?"

She's silent, still standing in the hallway just across the threshold to his apartment.

"Did something happen? Was it a bug in the brownstone?" Even though the goriest of human conditions and injuries don't make her blink, she's notoriously petrified of urban wildlife. "I'll go over there and deal with it if it's silverfish but I don't do cockroaches." He lifts his eyebrows, making it a joke, but she doesn't smile.

"Addison? You're … kind of freaking me out a little."

"I'm sorry." She looks at him again in that same way, like it's taking major effort to make eye contact.

"No, it's fine, just do you … want to come in?"

She nods slowly, but when she finally inches over the threshold and enters his apartment, she just stands in the middle of the open plan living room looking dazed. He's nervous, watching her. Should he try to reach Derek? It's six hours later in Geneva, not even five a.m. But Mark hasn't seen her this shaken very many times.

Every time, though, it's had something to do with her family. And he's heard her fight with Derek about it.

"Is, um, did something happen with your parents?"

She looks at him quickly, then back over his shoulder, not meeting his eyes. "Something like that … yeah."

"I could … call Derek, if you want, or …?"

"No. I didn't tell him."

Mark nods, knowing how Derek seems to disapprove of her spending time with her family.

"Can I sleep here?" she asks abruptly. Her lips are trembling and he's not sure what he's going to do if she cries.

"Sure, you can sleep here if you want."

Their place is a lot bigger than his, and Addison has it decorated all fancy and homey, but he does have a guest room, at least. Well, it's also his office. And his gym. But there's a bed. He upgraded his apartment when he transitioned from underpaid resident to enjoyably paid attending, but he's never seen a reason to make the guest room anything special. His guests stay in his bedroom – or, if he gets his preference, they visit his bedroom and then don't stay the night.

But his housekeeper washes the guest room sheets, he knows this. She's rather religious and he's pretty sure she thinks he only entertains in there. Whatever the reason, the bed is fairly freshly made. He ushers her toward the guest room – she says no to a drink, no to water, and just follows him mutely after that.

"Don't tell Derek," she speaks suddenly, reaching out to grasp his sleeve.

"Okay," he says unsteadily. "Um, sorry about the mess," he indicates the free weights taking up half of the guest room, and the rowing machine. "Have to stay in shape somehow, all the … hospital doughnuts."

Still no response. It's eerie.

"Um … is there anything I can get for you, or…?"

She's sitting stiffly on the edge of the bed; her eyes are naked with pain even in the low light and he swallows hard. He's not good at this kind of thing. Derek's the sensitive one.

"Okay, well," but when he turns to leave the room so she can sleep he sees her tense up. So she doesn't want to be alone. That's a feeling he understands sometimes, even if he wouldn't admit it.

"Do you, um, want to talk about it?"

She spends a long time studying a rip in the thigh of her ancient-looking jeans. "No, but … thanks."

Okay, then. But something about the set of her shoulders makes her think he still shouldn't leave.

"I was, um, going to do some work," he lies, indicating the desk in the corner of the room. "If it won't bother you."

He can see the relief in her face. "It won't bother me," she says quickly.

He turns on the flexible desk lamp and pulls a random medical journal off the stack. It's not like it will kill him to catch up reading. He shoots glances over his shoulder at the bed. Addison doesn't look comfortable, exactly, but she's curled on her side – still fully dressed, shoes and all, on top of the covers.

"What are you working on?" she asks quietly.

Crap. Good thing Dougherty has been after him to write this month, so he spins the most convincing tale he can as if he's already started. She murmurs the occasional encouraging word, so he keeps going. Her verbal prompts slow down, and then stop altogether.

He glances over his shoulder. She's asleep.

She woke up the next morning like nothing had happened, he remembers, drank coffee in his kitchen before heading back uptown, and when he saw her at work she looked perfect in an elegant ensemble with carefully applied makeup, her hair neatly curled. He never said anything to Derek. This was … two years or so before their relationship changed.

But this, whatever's going on now, feels different. She's not catatonic. She's tense, short-fused, distracted. Max told him cheerfully that she had been up and down during the previous night. So she's not sleeping well, either. There are dark shadows under her eyes that only someone who knows her face as well as he does would be able to see under the makeup, but they're there.

He needs to talk to her. And he doubts it's going to be easy.

..

"Why aren't you with Annabel?" That's her greeting when he finally catches her stepping out of the pediatric therapy unit on the second floor.

"Nurse Betsy's with her." She's their daughter's favorite so far, though it's hard to choose among the wonderful staff in pediatric neuro.

"Why?"

"Because I want to talk to you."

"I don't think that's necessary."

"Humor me," he suggests, steering her by the elbow to the on-call room down the hall. In his experience it's the closest thing to privacy in the chaos of a hospital.

He pushes open the door and freezes.

Not only is this particular on-call room not private - and not empty – it's taken by the tall, dark haired surgeon Addison befriended, who is standing in the middle of the room wrapped around Dr. Robbins – who, it seems, has already been divested of her teddy bear-printed scrubs.

"Oh, my god," Addison squeaks next to him. "Sorry!" Mark says hastily.

Callie – that's her name – looks over at them. "No sweat. Just close the door, will you?" She gives him a saucy grin and he decides he likes her.

"Well." He glances at Addison. "I guess on-call rooms in Seattle aren't so different from the ones in New York."

She doesn't crack a smile.

The next one is empty, thank goodness.

Once inside, she rests a hand on her neck, staring past him. Somewhat unconsciously, he's standing against the door he just closed. He's not really trying to keep her from leaving – he doesn't have a plan, if she leaves - so he just walks toward the bed and hopes that whatever is going on with her, she still trusts him enough to stay.

He sits down and pats the mattress next to him. Addison looks like she's about to protest, then seems to change her mind and sits down next to him instead.

"I'm worried about you."

She drops her head into her hands. "Not this again."

"Yes, this again. You're distracted. You're angry. You jumped a mile when I touched you before. You look like you haven't been sleeping."

"It's been a long week."

"Hypervigilance, sleep disturbance, irritability…"

"I don't have sleep disturbance, any more than you do, and don't list symptoms at me!"

"Max told me you woke up multiple times during the night when you were sleeping with him in the hotel."

Her eyes widen. "You're grilling our child about me?"

"No." He studies her face. "He volunteered it. He's four, Addison, he doesn't have a filter. Something interesting happens, he shares it. He's like Amy that way," he says in an attempt to lighten the air between them. It doesn't work.

"Can you talk to me about what's going on?"

"Just stop … interrogating me."

"Addie," he says gently. "I'm not trying to interrogate you."

"Whatever." She looks at the floor.

He reaches for her hand and she jumps slightly when he touches it.

"I just want to know what's going on with you."

"You know what's going on, Mark. It hasn't exactly been a relaxing time."

"No," he agrees. "But Annabel is doing so well now. And we have a plan in place to help Derek, even. So it should be more relaxed. Did the Captain say anything else, other than about your mother?"

"No."

"It's your mother? Finding out that she's…"

"No."

"Addie," he says gently. "You're fine for the worst week of our lives and then your father flies in and your fuse is chopped in half and then this Stockton guy gets here and you're jumpy as hell."

She's looking away from him.

"I don't want to talk about it now."

"I know you don't." He sighs. "I'm asking you to try anyway. Addison, this isn't what we do," he says when she shakes her head. "We don't ignore things."

"You ignored telling me about your daughter." It's a fairly low blow, not to mention syntactically confusing, but he can't hold it against her; he knows she feels cornered.

"I should have handled that better," he says simply.

She rubs her temple with the fingers of her free hand.

"Headache?"

"No."

"Addie," he tries again. "Something is different, the last two days. You're different. I know having the Captain here is stressful. I know what you found out about your mother is stressful. I know having all this come up is probably bringing up a lot of memories and you said this Stockton guy was around when you were a kid too…" his voice trails off.

Addison is looking straight ahead, not meeting his eyes, but there's something in the set of her shoulders that makes her look very young.

Memories.

"It's something to do with him," Mark says slowly. "Stockton. You said he threw your brother off a sailboat when you were kids. Did he do something to you?"

His suspicions are confirmed when she doesn't answer him. Her eyes are very blue in this light, sheened over with tears. She flinches when he touches her shoulder, and he draws his hand back. Her reaction hurts him – they've always been able to say so much to each other with touch, always drawn so much comfort from each other's closeness – but he knows it's not about him.

"Addison," he says quietly, his heart speeding up. "You know you can … tell me anything."

"I know that."

"Then what? It's the hearing? You're worried that Stockton won't-"

"It wasn't him!" the words seem to surprise her, too, as they burst out, and his stomach drops at the implication. "Dr. Stockton never touched me."

"Who was it?" he asks quietly.

She doesn't say anything for a long time and he starts to think she's not going to; he waits, hoping against the odds that his assumption was wrong.

"One of their other sailing pals."

His heart sinks. She's still not looking at him.

"Addison … I'm so sorry." He doesn't want to crowd her, but every instinct he has is ordering him to offer comfort when he sees the expression on her face. He puts a tentative arm around her shoulder and she doesn't push him away, but she doesn't lean into his embrace either.

"It's fine," she says stiffly. She's staring straight across the room at nothing. "It was a long time ago."

"How long?" he asks carefully.

"I was seven ."

Annabel's age.

Neither of them has to say it.

His stomach is twisting into knots; he has to force down the adrenaline flooding his system. It's pure cave response: he needs to find this man, and he needs to hurt him.

"Mark." Addison turns to him, touching his face, her skin cool. "It wasn't that big a deal. I haven't thought about it in a long time, and seeing Dr. Stockton just reminded me of that time, and … but it's fine."

"How can …" he stops himself at his raw tone. She doesn't need to deal with his anger. Forcing calm into his system even though he wants to scream, he takes her hand in his. "Can you tell me what happened?" he asks gently.

"It wasn't that big a deal. Like I said. He was one of my parents' friends. He was around their place, or the club. But it was never that bad … most of the time I could avoid him. Eventually I got smarter and faster and then he moved away. He's been dead for years. And that's it."

His first peds trauma case flashes through his mind. She was only nine years old and he was stunned all over again at what people are capable to doing to each other. To innocents. He'd thrown up in the locker room when he peeled off his scrubs.

His mouth dries now as he tries, and fails, to form the words to ask a question. Twenty years practicing medicine and he can't bring himself to ask.

"Addie…"

"No," she interrupts, recognizing his question before he can ask it, as she has so many times over the years. "It never went that far. His two best friends were doctors," she says bitterly. "He was smart enough not to do anything that would… no."

He rubs her back gently, grateful when she doesn't flinch. Seven. The idea of her so small, so young, without anyone to help her leaves him cold all over. He's trying to figure out how to ask if she ever told anyone without sounding like he's blaming her if she didn't; again, she anticipates his question.

"I never told anyone."

"When … it was happening, you mean?" he asks gently, confirming.

She looks at him. "Ever," she says.

He's stunned.

"Derek…"

She shakes her head again. "No. I just …" She takes a deep breath. "I didn't think about it by then, I didn't want to think about it. We were so young when we met and I just didn't – I guess I was afraid he would look at me differently."

Gently, he brushes her hair away from her face.

"I know he wouldn't have really … but I couldn't. And it was ancient history by the time you and I..." her voice trails off. "I thought about telling my brother, or my nanny, at the time, you know, but I didn't want to get either of them in trouble."

"What about your parents?" He's pretty sure he knows the answer.

"Honestly?" She fiddles with her necklace. "It don't think it even occurred to me that they'd listen."

She leans into him and he wraps his arms around her, grateful to be able to touch her, to telegraph his love and concern.

"I'm sorry," she whispers into his shirt.

"You don't have anything to be sorry about, Addie."

He cradles the back of her head, holding her against him.

She's not crying, but she's breathing rapidly, painfully, into his chest and he rubs her back, just holding her for a while and waiting for her to calm down.

"So, Stockton," he prompts quietly when she's calmer.

"He never did anything," she says immediately. "He was just … part of that group. And I guess hearing his name made me think about it."

"I'm sorry," he says, even though it feels inadequate. "I'm so sorry."

For a long time after that, she's quiet, leaning against him. He rubs her arm gently when she starts to talk again.

"At the beginning, he didn't do anything. He just … paid attention to me. He was nice, you know? He told me I was smart, when we all sailed he used to let me do the better jobs, you know, the ones the boys usually got…." Her voice trails off. "I was such an idiot."

"Addie, you were a baby. You weren't an idiot. None of it was your fault. He groomed you." He's heard the word enough times but he's not sure he really understood it until now.

"When he started … touching me," and he holds her closer as her voice cracks slightly, "I don't think I had the words to … talk about it. But I should have figured something out. Told someone."

"No. This wasn't your fault."

"Archer would have listened to me," she says abruptly, pulling back to look at him. Her expression is defensive. "But I never told him. I was afraid he would try to – he was protective. A look of horror suddenly crosses her face. "We never talked about it. What if he was – what if he did something to Archie – Mark," she grabs at him with sheer panic and he holds on tightly.

"No," he says firmly, "No, these predators, they – tend to stick with one gender." He has no idea if this is the case, but he's banking on her not knowing either. He can figure it out later; right now, her fingers are clenched in his shirt, she's breathing in panicked gasps, and he searches for something to reassure her. "Addie … I really think there's no way he touched your brother."

Addison leans back. "You really think so?"

"I do. Archer was protective of you, that's what you said. He would have wanted to make sure it wasn't happening to you."

Tears fill her eyes. "He looked out for me," she whispers. And then without warning she's crying, hard, the first tears she's shed since she followed him reluctantly into the scrub room.

"I know, Addie." He pulls her back into his arms and she clings hard. "I know he did." There are no more words then. Just tears that rip through her body and the nonsense he murmurs into her hair as he rocks her.

He's not sure how much time passes in this manner. Long enough for her tears to die down slowly into hitching breaths, for his skin to turn wet and slippery with salt. Her fingers trail toward his face, tracing the dampness on his cheeks.

"You're crying," she says softly, sounding almost wondrous.

Everyone cries, sometimes.

"He had a daughter," she says suddenly. He feels her body start to shake under his hands. "And the Stocktons had one too. Oh, my god. They were older, but – why didn't I say anything?"

"Addie. Addison," he's holding her shoulders, trying to move her back so he can see her face but she doesn't want to let go. "Look at me. Please. It's not your fault. You can't blame yourself."

She's trying to get closer, pushing hard against him now, and he wraps his arms around her as tightly as he can.

"I've got you, Addie. You're okay. I've got you."

It's not enough though, she seems to need more closeness. She lifts her head from his chest and kisses him without preamble, hard; he tastes the salt water from her tears. Tugging at the collar of his shirt, she reaches for his bare skin.

"Addison..." This feels wrong. He pushes her back gently, trying to tuck her head against his chest again.

"Please." She grasps the sides of his face. "I need you."

She doesn't have to say anything else; he kisses her back.

"Addie … the door," he murmurs against her lips.

"I don't care." She's tearing at the buttons of her blouse.

She won't let go of him; with her legs wrapped around his waist, he carries her with him to the door to lock it. He pushes aside his doubts that this is a bad idea – not to mention that every on call room lock in his career has been flimsy as hell. All he knows is that she needs him, the desperate grip of her fingers telling him she needs to feel him as close to her as he can possibly be.

"You need to talk to someone else about this, who knows what they're doing," he says softly, afterwards, when she's lying in his arms and he's running his fingers through her sweaty hair.

"Yeah." She leans back against him, spent. "I know."

..

She puts herself back together rapidly – she always does.

"I'm not leaving you tonight," he informs her.

She looks confused. "Mark, it's a hospital. I'm not alone."

"We're both sleeping at the hotel."

"What? No, someone needs to stay with Annabel."

"Addie." He grips her shoulders. "She can sleep through the night. Weren't you just saying she has twenty-four hour care? Look, I'll hire a private nurse if that's what you need, or I'll ask Amy to stay with her, but we're both going back to the hotel tonight."

"No, Mark, she had brain surgery not even three days ago!"

"I know that. And you're the one I'm more worried about right now," he says evenly.

"Tomorrow's the hearing," she says weakly.

"That's tomorrow. Tonight we're going back to the hotel."

..

He hears the water running in the shower for a long time. He's two and a half books in with Max, whose head is starting to loll against his shoulder, when he sees Addison in the doorway. She's wearing blue and white striped pajamas, her hair loose and damp around her shoulders. He smiles at her. Her eyes are puffy – it's clear some of the shower was spent crying – but she smiles back.

He puts a finger to his lips, indicating Max, and she nods, then pads over quietly.

She strokes his sandy hair. Max wakes briefly as Mark arranges him against his pillows. "Mommy?" he asks sleepily.

"I'm right here, sweetheart." Addison draws the covers around him and leans down to kiss his forehead. Max smiles up at her. His voice is sleep-garbled and husky but he can make out every word: Good night, sleep tight, see you in the morning light.

There are fresh tears in Addison's eyes when they stand up.

He wraps his arm around her shoulder and she wraps hers around his waist as they walk out of Max's bedroom.

..

"I almost told you once," she says softly, as she lies in his arms in bed. It's dark and peaceful in their bedroom; they've been drawing comfort from each other, gently, without the frantic movements of the scrub room.

"Yeah?" he asks.

"About ten years ago. When I found out he was dead."

Mark doesn't let himself react, physically or verbally, just waits for her to talk.

"Derek was away at a conference and I … I didn't know what to do. I was a mess. I went to your apartment and you pretended you were working on an article and sat with me in that … weight room-guest room of yours until I fell asleep."

"You knew I was pretending?"

"You've always been a bad liar, Mark. It's one of the things I love about you."

They will need to have more conversations. And she will need help that he can't give her. But they know each other best, and for now it's enough for him to stroke her hair as she falls asleep against him.

Reviews are greatly appreciated (x100) and keep me going. I'd love to know your thoughts, whether on this chapter or the story in general.

Title Lyric from Pearl Jam's Just Breathe