A/N: Thank you thank you thank you for the warm welcome back. I said I'd try to update before the long weekend is up, and I'm skating in just under the wire. Can twice a week make up for my unscheduled hiatus? I hope so. Bear with me and we'll be back in the Sunday rhythm in no time.
Quick warning: if you're just tuning back into this story, make sure you read the previous chapter (29) before this one.
(And for the reader who asked about next stories for updating: I have two gigantic WIPs I need to wrap up, Take Your Life and Light it Up and The Climbing Way and they are both on deck come hell or high (ferry) water.) . Thank you again, as always, for reading, and I hope you enjoy this chapter!
Miracles
Gestational Age: Nineteen weeks, five days
Baby is the Size of a: mango (so many tropical cocktails, so little time for the beach)
Baby's Parents are: practicing for the future
Baby's Cousins are: adorable . . . and exhausting
Baby's Aunt is: not likely to get through a visit to the hospital without leaving her mark
Baby's Grandmother is: even less likely
Baby's Doggie is: not so healthy, but still able to fetch a stick
Baby's Family, on the Whole, is: complicated . . . like all the best things are
..
The break in the rain lasts no longer than the ferry ride, and by the time they reach the hospital wet droplets are falling at regular intervals. They can't get inside soon enough, the girls chattering as their aunt and uncle stamp rain off their feet on the heavy mats.
And then loud throat-clearing makes them all look up.
"Chief!" Derek stands a little straighter, holding onto a giggling Claire.
Richard, for his part, looks unamused.
"I see the two of you do still work here."
Addison glances at her watch, which requires her to lift the hand Lilly is currently firmly gripping, which in turn makes her niece giggle.
"And these two?" Richard gestures toward Claire, currently sitting on Derek's shoulders, her dark curls even wilder from the ferry ride, and Lilly, whose long, tight braids are hanging lower down her back as she tilts her head to take in the new person. "I assume they're not patients."
"No."
"Or very small interns?"
Does owning a Doctor Judy doll count?
"No, sir."
"Addison – "
"Their mother is Nancy Shepherd," Addison says quickly. "She consulted on the case with the patient who had two uteruses . . . it was in the paper," she adds faintly.
When all else fails, go for publicity.
Richard studies her for a moment. "And is that patient in the hospital now?"
"Well . . . no," Addison admits.
"Is there a patient with three uteruses in my hospital today, at least? Four uteruses?"
"No, Chief."
Richard makes a noncommittal grunting sort of noise.
"So two of my department heads are spending their very highly paid time . . . babysitting."
Addison and Derek exchange a glance. Any one of a dozen memories of a cross Nancy over the years, complaining about her husband: it's not babysitting when they're your children!
Of course, Claire and Lilly aren't their children. They're family, though, so the chief's question is difficult to answer.
Claire chimes in instead.
"Now can we go see the doggie again?" she asks dreamily, and with rather unfortunate timing, fisting a handful of her uncle's hair.
Addison cuts in before Richard can question whether the doggie is a good reason for two department heads to come in late. "Chief, we're just going to . . . return the girls," and she gives Lilly's hand an affectionate squeeze to make up for the clinical terminology, "and get back to work."
She's pretty sure she hears Richard mumble back to work as if he's questioning whether they've started at all . . . well, fair enough.
"Right," Derek says, reading her quick glance for support. "In fact, I think I see my mother right – she's here."
Addison exhales with relief, Claire shouts Grandma! with delight and Richard looks like he's rethinking bringing either Shepherd to Seattle.
"Your mother," Richard mutters before they can take their leave. "A family reunion, in my hospital . . . "
Addison and Derek exchange a glance.
"Chiefs don't have family reunions in the hospital," Richard says. He looks from Derek to Addison and back again, his face stern. "I don't see the other chief candidates bringing . . . family into the hospital."
"Actually, Chief," Derek says quickly, feeling Addison gathering steam – and a little smoke around the ears – next to him. "Didn't Burke's mother visit the hospital?"
Richard frowns. "I don't think that's the same – "
"And as for Sloan, well," Derek raises an eyebrow. "He hasn't brought any children here yet, that's true, but give him a chance – there must be a few of them out there."
It's a joke they've made before, more than once, and Addison is relieved and a little surprised that it's somehow no weightier than it was before the revelations about her time in New York with Mark.
Except the audience is different now.
"Uncle Mark has children?" Lilly asks with interest. "How come they never play with us? Where are they?"
"They could be anywhere," Derek says solemnly, as Addison elbows him, shaking her head.
"Uncle Derek is just being silly," Addison assures their niece.
"Uncle Derek is playing the odds," he corrects her. "And Aunt Addie is being an optimist."
"And Chief Webber is losing patience," Richard cuts in and Addison, flustered, assures him of their extreme focus and dedication for the rest of the day.
Together, both girls in tow, they make their way toward the main lobby entrance, where his mother and sister are waiting.
"He had some nerve, bringing up chief," Addison says quietly as they walk, leaning down to tuck some windswept strands of hair behind Lilly's ears. She can't help pausing to tweak her niece's cute upturned nose, getting a giggle in return.
"A hell – heck of a lot of nerve. As if having children around makes you soft," Derek scoffs, as the little girl atop his shoulders uses both small hands to pat down the hair at the top of his head, murmuring pretty underneath her breath.
"Exactly."
They smile at each other.
..
"Derek, dear." Carolyn raises her eyebrows as her granddaughters clamor to be first to describe their Bainbridge outing. "I hope we haven't distracted you too much from work."
"Uncle Derek lives in a dollhouse!" Claire reports to her mother breathlessly, sounding impressed, before Derek can respond. "And he has a dog."
"A great dog," Lilly says, and for once Claire doesn't bicker back, just nods approvingly. Apparently they've found something they can agree on.
"And he said hell," Claire adds happily.
Nancy looks amused. "That's not – " she glances at Carolyn – "appropriate," she says, hastily changing course. "Derek . . . really."
"But Mommy, you say hell too. And you said that other word too, remember, when Daddy – "
"I remember." Nancy raises her eyes heavenward, which is conveniently north of Carolyn's pointed gaze. "Never mind, Claire. Tell me about the doggie instead," she proposes. "And the dollhouse."
Derek can still hear her last question, fading out as he walks down the hall.
" . . . and where on earth Aunt Addie is keeping all her shoes."
..
"So . . . you have a dog," Nancy says as they walk down the hallway in step, the girls secure with Carolyn and, she'd be willing to bet, in search of a snack.
"We have a dog," Addison confirms.
"My daughters loved your dog."
"Well, he loved them too." Addison rests a hand on her bump, pausing for a moment, not sure if she felt—"wait a minute."
"Addie?"
"No, it's okay, just . . . he's moving around," she says softly.
Nancy stops in her tracks, beaming, and characteristically unbothered by the annoyed people behind her who have to reroute. Her excitement is palpable and undeniably validating: after all, Nancy is one of the few people who really gets it. She's been in Addison's shoes, and not just because they had regular shopping dates when they lived on the same coast. Nancy is an experienced obstetrician, practicing longer than Addison, whose every step up the career ladder was to the beat of one fetal heart after another. Fetal movements? A kick, an elbow, even the very first stirring? It's as ordinary as shrugging into her white coat or hailing a taxi.
When it's a patient, that is.
When it's your own fetal movements?
There are tears in Nancy's eyes when she looks up from where her two hands meet, almost in the shape of a heart, on the bump where her nephew is growing.
"I'm not over it," Addison admits.
"I figured." Nancy flashes her a smile. "It's your first, after all."
"Does that mean – "
"Nope." Nancy tucks a piece of her short hair behind one ear. "It's just as miraculous every time. No less so with Claire than with Katie."
Addison takes this in, the little flutter of excitement in her chest matching the movements of her unborn son.
"You're having a baby," Nancy says.
"Yeah." Addison draws a deep breath, cupping her hand over her bump. "I am."
"And in the meantime – you have a dog."
To say Nancy isn't exactly a dog person would be an understatement.
"You're back to the dog?"
"I'm just saying. A dollhouse – "
"A trailer," Addison corrects her.
" – is pretty small for two adults and a dog." Nancy pauses. "Are there two adults living there?"
"No." Addison takes her sister-in-law's arm to draw her around the corner, seeking some semblance of privacy in a hospital that often seems to lack it entirely. "Not exactly. … what?" she asks when Nancy just looks at her, not speaking.
"Nothing."
It's never nothing.
"I'm just saying," Nancy continues, predictably, "you seem. . . together."
"You said that this morning."
"You seemed together this morning."
"Nance."
"Addie." Her sister-in-law props a hand on her hip, studying her face for a moment. "You seemed more together, this morning, than you did in New York. . . . the last couple of years, anyway."
There's a long pause. Nancy is her sister. Nancy is her family. And Addison has known her long enough to know she doesn't censor herself . . . but still.
"Moving on," Nancy says airily after a moment, wrapping an arm around Addison's waist and starting to steer her down the hall again, "have we finished discussing the dog?"
"You tell me."
"Mm. I'm not sure. Is he housebroken?"
". . . he has his moments."
Nancy smiles, then her face turns serious.
"Did you say before that he's sick?"
"He's . . . sick," Addison confirms reluctantly. "But he's strong. He's receiving excellent care."
She decides not to mention that Doc's excellent caregiver is currently dating her husband's ex-girlfriend.
And Nancy doesn't pursue it, instead launching into a story about the girls begging John to bring them back a golden retriever puppy from Tokyo.
..
This is fine. It's perfectly normal to juggle a workday, a not particularly tolerant chief of surgery, and more Shepherds than Seattle was really ready for, all here in the same hospital. HIs job is demanding. His patients are waiting.
"Derek!"
. . . and his former best friend is currently following him down the hallway.
"What do you want, Mark?" he asks without turning around.
"I just want to – will you just stop and talk to me for a second?"
"Why?"
"Because I'm your friend," Mark says – bluntly, hilariously, divorced from reality as usual.
And the word divorce reminds him just why Mark is anything but his friend. He stops anyway, mostly to gather himself.
"Look." Mark lowers his voice, taking a step closer. "I'm sorry. About before I didn't know that the baby – that there's an issue, I mean."
An issue. Somehow, the euphemism sounds worse than the tentative diagnosis.
"Interesting." Derek glances at the chart in his hand, heart pounding. "But you did know the baby was mine, didn't you? When you flew out here to – do your damage?"
Mark blinks.
"Go away," Derek says simply.
"Look, I thought you should know. That there were things she hadn't told you. I thought you deserved that."
Derek draws a sharp breath. He's not ready to revisit that day, the claustrophobic on-call room and the way Mark lounged against the bunks, seeming almost . . . excited about what he'd wrought. He only has to close his eyes to see the way Addison shrank back from his anger and his accusations, first defending herself and finally, worst of all, the way she struggled for breath when it all became too much. The way she slumped against him with one hand still curved around her body, protecting their son. He was already sorry by then, but it was still his fault.
His fault, egged on by Mark's appearance, by the confrontation he orchestrated.
Addison—and their son, too—in a hospital bed.
That's what Mark thought he deserved?
"As your friend," Mark says. "I thought you should know."
"I already told you. You're not my friend."
He snaps the chart shut and turns on his heel to walk away.
"Derek!" Mark follows him down the hallway while Derek turns away, stabbing irritatedly at the elevator button. "You're going to forgive me eventually."
He's so sure of himself, Mark. Derek studies his former best friend's face for one silent moment. The elevator doors open, and Derek steps on, Mark still framed in the open doorway.
"Go back to New York, Mark."
"You're saying that's what it would take?" Mark puts out a hand as the elevator doors start to close. "For you to forgive me?"
The doors jerk slightly, a stop-start motion, trying to close. Mark doesn't move.
"Don't risk your hands." Derek steps out of the elevator. "I'll take the stairs."
He gets the feeling, as he pulls open the heavy door to the stairwell, that Mark is still watching him.
..
"They said it had to be a golden retriever. Why a golden retriever? I have no idea," Nancy is saying, Addison trying to figure out how to extricate herself gracefully so she can see at least one patient today . . . when they come across the intern she requested to assist.
"Yang," she says, realizing she may be in for an exhausting afternoon.
Cristina Yang, though, seems distracted, her eyes on Nancy. "You're back? Mc—I mean – "
"Dr. Shepherd to you," Nancy says.
"We already have too many of those," Yang mutters. Meredith shoots her a look, then turns back to the gathered Shepherds.
"You're back," Meredith says, the same words but in an impressively neutral tone considering Nancy's first impression.
"I'm back. You must have realized by now that Shepherds are hard to drive off." Nancy raises an eyebrow, glancing toward Addison, who shakes her head with a frown.
"Nancy . . . "
"Sorry." Nancy flashes them both a grin, not looking particularly sorry, rather like an overgrown version of –
"Mommy!" Lilly jogs up, seeming perfectly at home in the hospital, and pats the side of her mother's leather purse. "I can't find my Judy's red outfit."
"And you brought reinforcements this time," Yang says, nodding toward Lilly. "I thought you wanted me to assist on a surgery. A human surgery."
"I did." Addison frowns. "I do."
Lilly seems to realize she's being sized up, meets Yang's gaze and for a moment Addison is pretty sure she's about to witness a staring contest between a rather surly intern and a very small Judy-doll-clutching girl. Thankfully, they're interrupted.
"You didn't wait for me!" Claire bounds up, Judy doll in her hands too and visible pout on her little face. "You forgot me!"
Now Addison has to hide a smile.
"We didn't forget you, honey," Nancy says with a sigh, as Lilly, ever so slightly, sticks her tongue out at her younger sister. "You're supposed to be with Grandma."
"I told her I needed you," Lilly shrugs. "I couldn't find my Judy's red outfit."
"A regular Code Blue. Or – Code Red, I suppose." Nancy shakes her head in Addison's direction, then fishes in her oversized purse. "Here, Lil – is it this one?"
"No." Lilly shakes her head, long braids swinging. "That's burgundy, Mommy."
"Yeah, burgundy," Claire says, cottoning on to the conversation.
Mother and daughters spar briefly over the color wheel before Nancy digs back into her Poppins-sized purse in pursuit of the right outfit.
It's all fairly typical, really unremarkable except that Yang, who Addison has seen take all manner of blood and gore without flinching, is looking at Nancy's small daughters with a combination of horror and fear.
An awkward silence falls over the group.
..
"I hope the girls aren't bothering Addie."
"I'm sure they're not," Derek tells his mother.
What else can he say?
Addison doesn't have much of a gauge for bother, not with their nieces and nephews. More than one holiday at his mother's, in residency, he'd have to peel her away from the children knowing she hadn't slept in 48 hours. She'd be white with exhaustion, her hands trembling, but unable to say no as his sister's children clamored adoringly around her. It's fine, honey, I'm not that tired, she would protest, even when he knew it was a lie.
"Good." His mother looks at him. "She has a way with children."
"She does."
"And soon it will be your own child." His mother's tone is fond, reminiscent even. "You've waited a long time."
He glances at her, confirming for himself that he means the plural you, that this isn't one of the remarks his wife would pounce on as proof that Carolyn Shepherd blamed Addison and only Addison for the lack of children in their marriage.
"Both of you," she says, and he nods.
"It will go quickly," his mother adds.
"The pregnancy?"
"That too." She pauses to smile at him. "Sometimes it feels like yesterday that we were expecting our first."
"Yesterday . . . are you sure about that?" He keeps his tone light, not quite ready to explore the we of that memory. It's not that he doesn't want to talk about his father. He just – he has to be ready, is all. He doesn't like surprises.
"Are you calling your mother old?"
"Never," he assures her, and his mother pats his hand.
"Good. Now, I know you need to work. Why don't you show me to the cafeteria, and I'll have a cup of tea while I wait."
With one hand, she indicates her old leather pocketbook, and Derek has to hide a smile. Of course his mother has her own teabags stashed in there, and plans only to ask for a cup of hot water in the cafeteria.
Some things don't change.
..
Nancy's youngest is the one to break the increasingly awkward silence.
"You're pretty," Claire says, without warning, gazing up at Meredith with interest.
". . . thank you." Meredith smiles down at her. "So are you."
Yang looks like she's fighting back another wave of nausea.
"'Cause you look like my Judy doll," Claire continues, beaming. "See?" She thrusts the little rubber doll – clad in one navy high heel, a faintly wrinkled gauzy looking skirt, and nothing else – toward Meredith.
Nancy, next to Addison, is doing an admirable job of stifling her laughter. It's true that the doll has long, wavy, dark blonde hair and there's something familiar about the tilt of her green doe eyes too.
"Oh, is that doctor Judy?" Meredith inquires politely, taking it in stride.
I guess once you've had your ex-boyfriend's wife faint on you from a secret pregnancy, nothing really throws you.
"Nuh-uh." Claire shakes her head, dark curls swinging, and holds the doll even higher. "It's Stewardess Judy, just her clothes fell off."
"I guess the two of you do have something in common," Yang murmurs to Meredith, who shoots a glare at her, but looks like she's fighting amusement nonetheless.
Nancy clears her throat. "Girls – "
"Girls," another voice repeats before Nancy can continue. "Girls, who are not doctors, in the hospital, with my interns, when my interns should be working."
"Sorry," Addison says, glancing at Miranda Bailey.
"Mm." Miranda doesn't look upset, not really. But Addison would never point that out; pregnancy doesn't make a woman soft.
Just like children don't make doctors soft.
Not at all.
Then Nancy is re-introducing herself with a callback to the uterus didelphys patient, Miranda's expression making clear she's putting two and two together. She looks down at the girls.
"So these are – "
"Derek's nieces," Addison supplies.
"Addie's too," Nancy corrects loyally, and Addison feels tears pricking her eyes.
(Not because pregnancy is making her soft, though.)
"Family," Miranda muses. "It's a beautiful thing, family. Do you have work to do?" she demands, her tone changing, turning on Yang and Meredith. "Do you need me to find work for you to do?"
And then Miranda's pager goes off.
"You are not saved by the bell," she tells her interns firmly, gesturing with said pager, before taking her leave with a gust of busy in her wake.
Nancy looks thoughtful, adjusting one of Lilly's braids. "Do you ever miss being an intern?" she asks Addison.
"Well . . . " Claire is lounging against Addison's legs now, attempting to put her Judy doll in some sort of acrobatic split that Yang seems to find very amusing.
"Do you have a boyfriend?" Lilly asks suddenly, and all Addison can do is pray it's directed at Yang.
It is, but then –
"Why," Yang quips, "are you interested?"
Lilly looks confused.
"Cristina." Meredith shakes her head.
"No, I'm just wondering. It's Burke, isn't it? Because I said yes." She turns to Meredith. "That's why. It's that obvious."
"It's not."
"It must be." Yang points at Lilly, who is gazing back serenely from much closer to the floor. "Why did she ask if I have a boyfriend? Why isn't she asking about my running whip stitch?" Yang demands.
"She's seven," Nancy offers. "She doesn't care about running whip stitches."
"I cared about running whip stitches when I was seven," Yang mutters.
"And on that note . . ." Meredith checks her pager. "I really should go. It was nice meeting you," she says, directing her words to Lilly and Claire. Claire beams up at her, waving her Judy doll in farewell.
"What do you know. My daughter has the same taste as my brother," Nancy says very quietly, making a face.
"Nancy . . . " Addison shakes her head.
"I'm just saying!"
"Do you have a case for me? I can ask Bailey for a new assignment . . . ." Yang sounds so hopeful Addison almost feels sorry for her.
"I do. I'll see you later," she says pointedly, waiting until Nancy and the girls are gone before turning back to her intern.
Her sometimes surly, not very pleased looking, but undeniably smart intern.
"Dr. Yang . . . ."
She waits for the other woman to look up.
". . . I care about your running whip stitch," Addison says gently.
Yang looks surprised, a little confused. "You do? Um . . . thanks."
"Don't mention it. Oh, and Yang? That running whip stitch had better be flawless, or I'm giving your surgery to Karev."
The intern's mouth drops into an o.
It's a strategic threat, really. Karev has proven his mettle with her delicate patients and Yang is gifted, if not exactly tender. Either way, Addison wins.
Who says a woman can't be chief of surgery?
..
With Yang prepping her patient, Addison has time to drop back to her office, take a quick break from the shoes she's not giving up any time soon but that occasionally don't feel that great by midday.
Massaging the sole of one stockinged foot, she finds herself a little embarrassed to admit how nice it would be to turn the job over to her husband. He's good, a facet of how long he's known her – and her feet – and those surgeon's hands.
She pauses, a little chill running through her.
Hello, second trimester, I almost forgot about you.
But there's no time for that. She has an arch to support, a surgery to perform, an intern to teach, and a number of in-laws to manage.
She has a followup conversation with her mother-in-law, as yet unscheduled.
There was something I wanted to give you, but it's . . . well. It's private.
She's curious.
She's not worried.
Okay, fine, she's a little worried.
It's not just her mother-in-law's decidedly old fashioned parenting that makes her wary of the impending gift. There's a whole history of gifts there like the rest of the decade and a half she's been knitted up in this family.
Lots of gifts.
Carolyn is generous, in her way. She's just also . . . well, she's Carolyn. Her gifts say something. How to count some of the more memorable ones?
One. The Chia Pet. What was she saying about dated gifts? She took this one as a sign of her mother-in-law's increasing desperation when it came to Addison's unproductive uterus: she was willing to spend money on a brand name terracotta nightmare just to plant the seed – pun intended – that Addison could actually keep a living thing alive. (And yes, she is and was then a wildly successful surgeon but keep a living thing alive has always been baby-based for Carolyn, and not her patients' babies either.) She stashed it in the basement, then panicked that the damp soil would actually make the damn thing grow and had Seymour-esque nightmares off and on for weeks. She still sent a thank-you note though, of course.
Two. The gloves. White cotton gloves – to sleep in, "so you can stop spending so much money on hand lotion." Except the joke was on Carolyn there, because the gloves were actually a lovely addition to her nighttime moisturizing routine – they kept the so-much-money lotion on her hands and allowing her to use, and therefore spend, even more each night.
Three. The goldfish. See chia pet: except she gave this one to one of her nieces instead of stashing it in the basement. She may not have been maternal, at least in Carolyn's eyes, but she wasn't a fish murderer either.
Four. The Knitting for Dummies book. Self explanatory. Addison is no dummy, but she's also not a knitter. When Derek tried to brush it off – knitting is good for surgical dexterity – Carolyn just laughed it off. Not everything is about being a surgeon, she said, and that was proof, for a second-year-resident Addison, that her mother-in-law just didn't get it. At all.
Five. The Baking for Dummies book. See above. "Baking is scientific, dear!"
Six. The Cooking for Dummies book. Okay, the theme is pretty clear. Is it any wonder that, despite there being affection on both sides, Addison couldn't help but think her mother in law saw her as, well . . . a dummy?
Seven. The scrunchie. They were "overpriced" in stores, according to her mother in law, and it was the nineties. Oh god, was it ever the nineties. So Carolyn sewed her own and Addison received one at Christmas crafted from a rather sturdy looking corduroy – slightly lumpy, handmade, and when she commented on the interesting fabric was told it was from a pair of Derek's childhood pants. And then Nancy caught her eye across the table and neither of them could hide their laughter even when Carolyn was cross about it. To make up for it, she had to wear the brown lumpy scrunchy in her hair all evening, producing a particularly unflattering series of photographs. Speaking of which . . .
Eight. The framed picture. She'll go to her grave refusing to budge on this one, though she and her husband argued back and forth about it for years. Derek swore up and down that he loved the picture and Addison was being ridiculous, but a year into their marriage Carolyn framed a picture of the two of them and presented it to Addison. And it was a lovely picture, a candid from the previous summer. Except Addison's eyes were half closed, and not in beachy ecstasy but more in a mosquito just landed on my nose non-ecstasy. There was sand on her legs. Not sexy sand either. Sand that looked, in the light of this particular picture, like she had particularly hirsute calves. And then there was her salt-frizzed hair. "You two look so happy!" was what Carolyn said and of course Derek took her side. (And Derek looked beachy-breezy and handsome. Her sole consolation was that her beachy-breeze, handsome husband was beaming at his frizzy, sandy, squinty wife in the picture, so . . . at least there was that.)
Nine. The Christmas robe. Thick and sturdy – but not, thank goodness, made from a pair of her husband's old pants – it was a "dressing gown," naturally, "so that you won't get cold in the family room." It might as well have been chain mail, several sizes too big and covering enough skin that she could have survived an arctic Christmas. When Derek snickered she kicked him under the table and when he didn't sufficiently defend her, threatened to wear that robe every night at home until he made it up to her. (He did, thank goodness, because that was one threat she had no interest in carrying out.)
Ten. The Sewing for Dummies Book. Well, you get the idea.
..
She's keeping busy, purposefully, before they have to leave for the fetal echo.
There's the case she assigned to Yan; they'll operate in the morning but she's always taken a breath before. Some headspace, to think through her plan.
There's little Laura Grey-Thompson, whose delicate condition still needs monitoring.
And of course, there's her own breakfast-loving baby who's not a patient at all, and no one needs to know that she sometimes ducks into an empty call room or her own office, when things are quiet, just to check in.
"Everything's going to be okay." She says it very softly, but out loud, resting a palm against the swell of her belly as she does. Somehow it feels different every time. "It's just a test," she tells the baby, "like the other ultrasounds, and you aced those. So don't worry, okay? Just – do your best." She pauses. "You come from excellent test taking stock."
And then her phone rings for the third time and she's already in an empty call room, so she flips it open.
Why not?
Children in the hospital, family reunions, leaving in the middle of the afternoon for fetal testing, and taking calls from friends. Might as well really go for employee of the month today.
"Finally!" Savvy sounds as impatient as she's heard her.
"I was working."
"Well, so was I, Addie, but you can't text me everything is coming to a head and then not follow up. That's just cruel."
She has a point.
And so, drawing one long, deep breath, she fills her best friend in on the last twenty-four hours, starting with unexpected descend of the additional Shepherds, and leading to the hotel sleepover and finally the farcical showdown at the elevator bank this morning."
"Slow down, Ad, I can't keep up."
"Well, neither can I." She pauses. "Where was I?"
"Mark and the elevators."
"Right." Addison sighs, checks her pager – nothing. Apparently the universe knew she needed some best friend time.
. . . and then she tells the rest of the story.
"So they're all still there. Nancy too?"
"Yeah. Derek has been taking it pretty well, considering." Addison pauses, shaping her hand around her bump. She's waiting to get tired of this – just touching it, mapping it, but it hasn't happened yet. Not even close.
"Considering Nancy drives him crazy?" Savvy finishes the sentence for her.
"That's putting it mildly."
"Addie."
"Hm?"
"Nancy drives Derek crazy."
"I know."
"But she's there, in Seattle, driving him crazy."
Addison moves her hand slightly, smiling as she feels movement, then pulls her attention back to the call. "I know, Sav."
"She's there, in Seattle," Savvy repeats, and Addison gets the sense she's winding up for one of her closings, "why? Why is she there?"
Scratch that. Not a closing, a cross examination.
"Because Derek called her," Addison says, confused. "I already told you. He asked her to come."
"He asked her to come!" Savvy repeats triumphantly. "Even though she drives him crazy, he sacrificed his sanity . . . why?"
"Sav – "
"For you."
Addison is quiet for a moment, processing.
"I rest my case," Savvy says after a moment.
"You told me lawyers don't really say that."
"I'm not a lawyer right now. I'm a friend. I'm your best friend, and best friends do say it."
She takes it in.
"Sav . . . I miss you."
"I miss you too, Addie." She pauses. "And so does Derek, it seems."
He doesn't have to miss me, she almost says. He can have me.
Except he can't.
And she knows this, because she was the one who put the brakes on it, who told him they couldn't fall back into bed or back into what passed for a routine in their Seattle life. Who told him he had to choose her, take action, do something.
Which is all well and good, she's realizing now.
As long as she doesn't miss it when he does.
..
"So this is your office."
"This is my office." Addison glances around. "It's not much," she adds modestly.
It's bigger than Derek's, but who's counting?
Her mother-in-law asked to see it, and since this is a recordbreaking day in her career where she's done so little work she might as well be one of the overwatered plants in the hospital solarium, of course she gave her the not-so-grand tour.
She has an ulterior motive, anyway.
(Distraction.)
They'll have to leave for the fetal echo in less than an hour, Derek's with a patient, and even though she promised the baby everything would be okay . . . she could use a little distraction.
"That's a nice picture," Carolyn says, studying the frame on Addison's bookshelves.
It's the same frame she had on her shelves in her Manhattan office, shipped along with the rest of her things. Her favorite gold skirt from two seasons ago, her favorite husband on her arm, they're not wearing scrubs but their heads are inclined toward each other, as in sync as if they were conducting a joint surgery. They're together and they look . . . well, they look happy.
What's that Nancy said?
You seemed more together, this morning, than you did in New York. . . . the last couple of years, anyway.
Addison swallows hard. "Yeah, well . . . the skirt," she says lamely.
"It's a nice skirt." Carolyn looks pensive. "I hope you didn't pay full price for it, Addie, I'm certain I could have made the same one with my eyes closed. I still have the gold fabric I used for Amy's mermaid costume."
. . . in 1976.
"I wish I'd known," she says as sincerely as she can manage, because her mother-in-law may be enthusiastic about her pregnancy, forgiving of how she hurt her son . . . but she's still Carolyn Shepherd.
"Well. You'll think of it next time, I'm sure." Carolyn looks around the office for another moment while Addison debates whether she herself or this pause is the more pregnant one.
"I wanted to give you something," her mother-in-law begins, and Addison exhales with sheer relief.
Time to get it over with.
A burlap muumuu to hide her delicate condition.
An all expenses paid trip to (free) summer bible camp for her heathen child.
Or maybe another book: Cheating Daughters-in-Law and the Stupid Sons who Forgive Them, perhaps. Or a guide to geriatric childbirth, complete with vintage advice for keeping "Daddy" comfortable in the waiting room with a cigar while she labors all alone.
How bad could it be?
"Why don't you sit down, Addie."
. . . oh. So that bad.
..
He has nothing to feel guilty about.
Not when it comes to Mark. Not ever when it comes to Mark.
Mark is the one who should feel guilty.
But Mark is a sociopath.
Everyone knows that.
(Sociopaths maybe wouldn't have looked at him in the hotel room the way Mark did, something even more than empathy clouding his face, when Derek finally burst out with the news about their baby.)
But that's not important. He has one more patient before they leave for the fetal echo, and that's what's important.
He concentrates on that and lets the rest of it fall away.
..
Seated on one side of the couch – a stiff faux-velvet she never would have selected, but adulteress-beggars can't be choosers when they desperately need a Seattle job – and her mother-in-law on the other, Addison waits.
"Addie."
She looks up.
"I have something to give you. But I want to tell you something first."
"Okay," she says cautiously. "I'm listening."
"I told you I was tired, when I was carrying Derek." Carolyn's expression turns fond, perhaps remembering her pregnancy with her only son. "But I was tired before that. I was very tired."
Addison touches the clasp on her bracelet, not sure where this was going.
"I had three little girls, all in stairstep. Nancy had hip dysplasia, you remember that? She was my breech baby, and she was stuck in that awful brace. It's what made her want to be an OB, you know. And it was rough." She exhales audibly. "It was rough, and Christopher was my rock. Every moment of it, he was there."
Addison nods, recognizing the tone in her mother-in-law's voice when she talks about Derek's father. Long before Addison was the one with the perfect husband . . . Carolyn was the one with the perfect husband. Christopher, as she's heard over the years, was perfect. She's not surprised he was a rock during the stressful early years of their family.
"And then things got better with the girls," Carolyn continues. "Nancy stopped fighting the brace every night and Kate stopped pulling her hair when no one was looking and Lizzie suddenly remembered she'd been toilet trained all along. Things got better," she repeats, "but I was . . . distracted. I'd forgotten what it was like for things to be better."
Addison just listens.
"I was distracted, and Chris was my rock, when things were rough. And then when things were better, he was back on the road, trying to build the business."
Addison nods, recognizes the rhythms of their early marriage from other stories.
"He was gone almost every week. Before that, we were always busy, but we used to make time. Sit down when our schedules allowed it, share a slice of cake. Even if I was nursing a baby between bites, I always made the time. But we were busy, and the children were better, and it got so the only time we saw each other we were passing one of the children back and forth or I was packing his suitcase. Or unpacking it." She pauses. "That's how I saw it."
Neither of them speaks for a moment.
"I didn't ask," Carolyn says firmly. "Things were different, then, not like you young people, but I didn't have to ask. Maybe I already knew."
Addison has never heard this before, or anything like it. Christopher Shepherd lived on in stories every year of her life with this family, and in all of them . . . he was perfect.
"And Chris didn't ask. But he must have known, too. It . . . wasn't good," she says after a moment, and it's the closest Addison has heard in more than sixteen years to a shadow in the elder Shepherds' marriage.
But they must have been married a decade and a half after that, or close to it. Things must have improved.
"How did you fix it?" she asks quietly.
Carolyn is silent for a long breath and there's a moment Addison is suddenly terrified she's misunderstood, read too much into it – but then her mother in law gives her a knowing look.
"Christopher's mother took all three girls for a whole weekend—Nancy was healed by then and oh, was she a handful, like four of Lilly and Claire. But it was her idea, Mother Shepherd's idea. She said Chris and I seemed tired and, well . . . that's as close as she came to talking about it. You asked how we fixed it," Carolyn repeats. "We had to learn to trust each other again. It takes two people to break down a marriage and it takes at least two to build it back up again."
Addison finds herself touching her rings as she listens, twisting them around her finger.
"Derek doesn't know about – all of that. I never told him." Carolyn clears her throat. "Maybe it's my fault he sees things the way he does, so black and white. It was so important to me to build up Christopher after he died. I wanted the children to have good memories. I never wanted them to question any of it. It was all we had."
She pauses, fussing a little with the upholstery on the armchair. Addison gets the sense she's pulling herself back together. When her mother-in-law looks up again, her expression is resolute.
"But if not for that . . . indiscretion, then Derek wouldn't be here at all."
Addison takes this in, and Carolyn nods, affirming it.
"With my mother-in-law watching the girls, Chris and I were able to . . . get reacquainted and, well," she smiles suddenly, looking quite a bit younger when she does. "Derek was born about nine and a half months later."
The office goes quiet again, the click of the industrial clock the only sound in the room.
"He was a surprise," Carolyn says, a smile playing around her lips. "But then so was Lizzie. I don't care what the church or anyone else says, you can't plan a family. You can plan . . . but you can't decide. It's the wrong time or it's too much work or you're too young –"
Addison can't help expelling a little puff of air, thinking of her own lack of youth, and her mother-in-law doesn't miss it.
"If you were young, you'd have another set of problems." Carolyn looks pensive. "You know, I was 42 when I was pregnant with Amy."
The math adds up, but she had forgotten this.
"I thought I was finished having babies, but . . . we plan, and God laughs, because I was pregnant again with four children at home, the youngest already seven, and the doctors made me feel terrible. I half expected her to be born with three heads but she popped out after what, less than an hour of labor, just as fat and red and healthy as all the others. Louder," Carolyn adds, smiling fondly, "but just as healthy."
There's a pause.
Is this what her mother-in-law wanted to give her?
Her present?
A glimpse of a marriage more real than fantasy . . . an admission of imperfection?
I understand, Carolyn said this morning, when Addison tried to explain how she could no longer regret her mistake, hurtful though it was. Not when a new life grew out of it.
She understood more than Addison could have realized at the time.
It's as inexpensive a present as her mother-in-law has ever given her, typical – and priceless, all at the same time. She studies the fabric of the couch to avoid eye contact, embarrassed about the tears in her eyes.
"Addie."
She looks up.
"Do you want your present?"
"That . . . wasn't my present?" she asks faintly.
Carolyn laughs – a hearty, full-throated laugh. "Oh, Addie, you must have had a sadder Christmas out here than I could have imagined if you thought that was a present."
The reminders – sad and Christmas – sting, but not badly. Like so many other things, it's muted by what happened next. The baby, neither planned nor expected.
We plan, and God laughs.
Carolyn hands her a brown paper bag, encouraging her to open it, and Addison pulls out . . . a necklace. Dark blue beads, not quite evenly sized, on a thick string that looks like it's been repaired more than once. Tentatively, she rubs her thumb over one; the texture is tough, rubbery. A little rough.
"Christopher bought it for me when I told him we were expecting our first baby." Carolyn's eyes are faraway, reminiscent. "It was a cheap old thing, not that I would have told him that, but we had no money then. Chris was trying to get the store running, cleaning office buildings at night, and I was working two jobs to put myself through nursing school. But he bought me this. And it ended up coming in handy, because the babies gnawed on it – first Lizzie and then Kate and all the others too, and what do you now, now they sell necklaces that look just like these for outrageous prices . . . thirty dollars, even."
Her tone makes it clear what she thinks of this kind of indulgence. But in spite of herself, Addison is touched. But before she can express her thanks, her mother in law is handing her something else.
"I brought you this too," she says, and Addison takes it from her hand.
It's a faded photograph on the thin paper they were printed on then, fragile edges a little crumbled from the passage of time. One of the corners is slightly torn, but the picture is clear: an unmistakeable young Carolyn, her hair dark instead of grey, her face soft and youthful against what looks like the same rocking chair Addison has seen for years in the Shepherd home. The younger image of Carolyn is wearing what looks like a striped housecoat, but it hangs almost elegantly on her slimmer body – Addison could blink and see Kate or Lizzie, easily. She looks warm and maternal, not matronly, and with good reason: she's beaming down at a plump sleeper-clad baby in her arms who is – yes, she looks a little more closely – stuffing that very same necklace into its mouth.
"Is that Lizzie?"
"It's Derek, actually." Her mother-in-law looks fondly at the picture as if she's saying goodbye, then pats the necklace Addison is still holding.
"Here," she says.
Addison leans down, Carolyn reaches up, and she carefully places the string of beads around her neck, then helps her daughter-in-law pull her long hair out of the necklace.
When she sits up, there are tears in her eyes.
And she's not the only one.
"It's not much," Carolyn says after a moment, clearing her throat.
It doesn't seem like enough, but she says it anyway:
"I love it."
..
They meet in the lobby just like they planned, Nancy clad in her trench coat and prepared to accompany them.
Which is why she came.
It makes perfect sense.
And yet . . .
"Are you sure?" Addison finds herself asking.
"I'm coming with you." Nancy glances at Addison. "I planned to come."
"But what about – "
"Mom will watch the girls."
"The space needle," Derek proposes, and his mother frowns, the set of her face very much spelling out tourist trap and admissions fees.
". . . or you can take them back to the hotel and play Judy dolls. I'll drop you off and meet you," Nancy gestures to Derek and Addison, "at the place."
Derek and Addison exchange a glance.
There are no words, but somehow . . . consensus, nonetheless.
"Actually," Addison glances at Derek, who nods encouragingly, and then turns back to her sister-in-law: "maybe this would be a good time for you to take the girls to the space needle."
Nancy tilts her head. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah." Addison tucks a lock of hair behind her ear, her fingers brushing the string of blue beads around her neck. "I'm so glad you came, Nance, and I appreciate everything. And we'll see you after. But yeah . . . I'm sure."
..
The fetal echo is in the same high-rise building as Melissa's office, but that's where the similarity ends. Derek and Addison follow signs to the pediatric cardiology practice, a few floors away. It's bright, with wide windows overlooking the city skyline and colorful murals on the walls.
Clear effort has been taken to make the space cheerful for the patients and their families, some of whom are also waiting.
There's a pale, big-eyed toddler is turning listlessly at the pages of a picture book.
Another little girl about the same size as Claire, with feathery blonde hair, is leaning on a man who must be her father. They both look exhausted. "I know," he's saying quietly as they pass, "but you need to rest."
At reception, a woman wearing an infant in a carrier against her chest is leaning on the counter. Derek picks up snatches of conversation as they walk by. ". . . the second surgery," she's saying, "but his doctor said she wanted him – "
The second surgery.
The elevator doors open and a man pushing a wheelchair emerges, holding a scowling preteen with a handheld video game on her lap.
". . . another stupid appointment," Derek hears her complaining.
He swallows hard, reminded of how much more stressful this could be. How much more stressful it is, for these families. Wordlessly, Addison squeezes his hand, and he can tell she's thinking the same thing he is.
..
It's just another test.
Just another hour on her back, staring up at the ceiling, waiting for news.
A different ceiling. There's a skylight cut into it, the first thing she notices, with a bluer sky than she's seen in Seattle—but wait, they're on the twenty-sixth floor of a high rise with two dozen floors above them, so it can't be a skylight.
It's painted on, she realizes, feeling a little foolish.
Painted on and so lifelike she almost believed it.
That, combined with the brightly painted tigers on the opposite wall, each cheerfully holding a stethoscope, is enough to make her want to cry.
Derek folds his fingers through hers, his other hand resting at the top of her head. Slowly, he strokes her hair, apparently realizing what she's feeling, if not why.
And then together, they wait.
Addison alternates watching the flickering black and white image on the screen and the glittering blue skylight, and then her husband's face, pursed with concentration.
Back to the screen.
Back to the skylight, tears gathering in her eyes, though she's not sure why.
Back to her husband, who is gently wiping her cheeks.
And back to the screen.
It's long, longer than any other ultrasound.
What are you seeing, she wants to scream, just tell me, but she doesn't.
She doesn't try to take the wand, either.
She just lies there, feeling the weight of her body holding her down, the pressure of the machine, the blue light above her, the rubbery, slightly rough feeling of the necklace against her skull. And Derek's hand, warm and firm in hers.
The test is long.
The test is pressure in the same spot, and then moving slightly; it's not comfortable but it's fine. It's just . . . long.
It goes on and on.
What are you seeing.
Just tell me.
This is why Melissa said she preferred for her patients not to have fetal echos if they can help it. She knows this. She knows it.
But how could she be anywhere but here?
What are you seeing.
Just tell me!
And then, finally, the sonographer is talking to them.
"Just tell me." Addison grabs onto her husband's arm, not sure which one of them is lifting her up, helping her sit.
His face tells her without words.
It's still there.
The fake skylight burns her eyes.
"Addie," Derek is saying quietly. "Addie, just listen."
So she does.
..
She's on the table again, but she's sitting this time, fully dressed, Derek next to her.
"Melissa?" Addison glances at her husband when the door opens. "I was waiting for the paperwork. I thought we'd have to go to your office."
"Most patients do. But hey." Melissa raises her eyebrows. "I like the exercise. I took the stairs," she adds, unnecessarily.
". . . and you thought I'd be freaking out," Addison supplies.
"No comment." Melissa studies her, hand on hip. "But you're not freaking out."
"I'm not freaking out." Addison glances at Derek, who tightens his grip on her shoulder. It feels sturdy underneath his palm. Strong. If anything, he's drawing strength from her, not the other way around. Or maybe it's both, and he doesn't have to choose.
Marriage is a compromise. You know, it's a give and take.
"So, as you saw . . . at this point, it's just north of two millimeters." Melissa taps the ultrasound screen with its frozen image of their son's beating heart. "It's still there, but the size is reassuring. At this size, there's a sixty percent chance it will close up on its own by the time he's born. An eighty-five percent chance it will be closed by his second birthday."
Addison and Derek exchange a glance.
"What happens next?" Melissa asks, rhetorically, so they don't have to. "We keep monitoring him, we keep an eye out, but there's no reason to assume surgical intervention at this point. In fact . . . it's very unlikely."
Derek lets out the breath he forgot he was holding. He knew this, he's read the numbers, of course he has, but there's something different when it comes from Melissa and not his own late-night, keep-it-away-from-Addison research.
(Not that he's not aware she's been doing her own, of course. It's the kind of thing you don't mention, even though you know.)
"Shepherds . . . this is good news." Melissa smiles at them. "It's still there, it's not closed, yet, but still . . . good news."
"Good news," Addison echoes. She turns her face up to Derek, who pulls her close without thinking about it first. His other hand still rests on the spot where their son is growing and for one moment—long but all too short at the same time—three hearts beat as one.
Then Melissa clears her throat, and they move apart, Addison blushing a little. Derek moves a loose strand of hair away from her face with his free hand, never taking his other hand off their baby.
Good news.
"So if there's nothing else, I'll see you in . . . a week and a half," Melissa says, consulting her notes, "for your second anatomy scan. And, guys – "
They both look at her.
"Congratulations," she says simply.
They both thank her, but they're distracted, hardly noticing when she closes the door behind her. Each of them has a hand on the swell of the pregnancy now, their attention fully taken.
"I knew you could do it," Addison whispers, cupping the bump, her thumb moving back and forth in a rhythm he knows by heart. Something tells him their son will learn that rhythm just as well. Then his wife is looking up at him, her eyes glistening. "He's a good test taker."
"He takes after you."
"He takes after both of us."
They take a moment to enjoy this.
"He's strong. You're strong," Derek says, directing the second iteration toward the space where their son is growing. "You're so strong."
"And he's moving." Addison places her hand over his and moves it, carefully. "See?"
Somehow, it's just as incredible as each time.
"He kicked me." Derek looks at her with wonder. "Just now. You think the echo bothered him?" he asks, a little worried.
(It's not medical. Not now, not today. It's parental, and that's all there is to it. And he knows his wife would agree.)
"No." Addison cups his hand again, moving it slightly so he can keep feeling the reassuring pressure of their son's movements. "I think he's saying hello."
"Yeah?" He glances at her and she laughs a little, her expression just a touch self-conscious.
"Yeah," she says.
"Okay, then." He applies the gentlest pressure he can, encouraged by Addison, and a fluttering kick fills his palm. "Hello to you too," he says quietly.
..
Good news.
But it's better than good. Even though it's still there.
It doesn't make sense, not really. They're Addison and Derek and they don't usually accept any results that are less than perfect.
Except somehow –
"He's perfect," Derek says.
He's right, and he's not.
There's something better than perfect. This, she's learned.
This, she knows.
Getting better is better than perfect.
Improving.
Fighting.
Trying.
Perfect is stasis. Perfect could be the moment before it falls apart.
But improvement?
That's not stasis.
Improvement . . . is a journey. A step in the right direction.
She opens her mouth to try to expression this, but finds she can't form the words. The rushing pulse of the baby's heartbeat, that reassuring sound, is still echoing in her head. A whole career filled with fetal heartbeats and somehow this one sounds completely different, every time, every beat a miracle.
One look at her husband's face and she knows he gets it.
..
There's a lightness in the air as they wait for the elevator. A sense of joint relief, and something else too. As if permission has been granted to be excited again. Derek is leaning slightly against the wall, something about his posture making him look young enough to be the medical student who caught her eye. Or the intern who could make her laugh with just a look, even on her longest days.
It's the results of the fetal echo.
But it's more than that too.
Distractedly, she fingers the strand of beads around her neck. Some of it is tucked into her collar and she adjusts it, the rubbery material rough-smooth against her thumb.
It doesn't feel cheap anymore.
"The rain stopped," she says, pausing as they approach the wide glass doors in the lobby.
"The rain did stop." Derek is watching her. "New necklace?" he asks, gesturing to the string of beads around her neck.
"Yeah. Well, your mom gave it to me. Today."
"It's from Mom?"
Lightly, he touches the beads and she just nods, a little self-conscious.
"That's nice of you to wear it," he says.
"I like it," she says, her throat feeling tight.
"So she finally gave you a present you like?" He raises an eyebrow. "Miracles never cease."
Addison nods. "Actually, she gave me something even better than that."
"Yeah?" He smiles at her. "What was that?"
". . . hope," she says simply.
And she tucks a hand into the crook of her husband's arm before he can say anything else, her other hand resting on the bump where their son is growing, so that all three of them are connected as they walk out into the unlikely sunlight.
To be continued next week. I love hearing your thoughts, so I hope you'll review and let me know while I give my tired fingers a much-needed rest. There's still a lot of Sheplet pregnancy to go - you can expect some time jumps in the future, but the Shepherds' visit to Seattle isn't over yet. After all, Carolyn hasn't gotten to meet their friends yet . . . so stay tuned, and I'll see you next Sunday. xoxo