Chapter 24: I Miss You

Meredith's Point-of-View

I'd had one hell of a week. I signed divorce papers for my husband of three years, one whom I was starting to fall in love with. I wanted to do the right thing, and he was already in love with someone else. Then, I got a call informing me that my mother who I had not talked to in four years was in the end stages of Alzheimer's and would probably not make it to the end of the year. Then, to top it off my flight out to go see her I had a seven-hour layover in Las Vegas Airport of all places.

I cried. I didn't want to cry, I wanted to be strong. But that broke me as I sat there in the United Airlines terminal, the spot where we first met. The memories were too painful, but I wanted to move on. I wanted to be an adult, I needed to put my big girl panties on and take care of what I needed to take care of. I moved my mother to a nursing home in Seattle, the best of its kind and at the very least I could spend some time with what she had left. We hadn't had a very good relationship, and though I was bitter about it. I felt I needed to spend as much time as I could for my conscious sake, and because deep down inside I knew it was what she would have wanted, even if she couldn't remember who she was.

In a way I was glad that Derek and I didn't work out. Because with this little gift of time I had left with my mother, I didn't need any other distractions. I hadn't seen nor heard from Derek in the few hours I'd been back to work, and I was trying not to care. I hoped he could be happy with Brooke; his happiness was really all I wanted. I cared about that much.

"Meredith." I heard my name breathed onto my neck and forced myself not to shiver. I slowly looked up from the chart I was writing in and saw his blue eyes pooling.

"Dr. Shepherd." I mumbled.

"How is your mother?"

"You heard." I said surprised, he nodded "She's….my mother."

"Well if she's anything like you I suppose she's already recovered and back at surgery." He said with a little bitterness to his voice, I just looked at him and forced a smile "How are you?"

"Fine." I said through my smile "I'm fine."

"Good." He smiled back.

"How is Brooke?" I made myself ask.

"Good." He said "Brooke is…. good."

"Good." I nodded, then let out a soft sigh "I'm glad we can do this."

"Do what?"

"Be divorced but still act civilly towards each other."

"We can be friends." He said, I looked skeptically at him "What, if we let all the game playing and ex-wife thing go, we can be friends."

"Friends." I said, I kind of liked the idea of it actually. I did miss him.

"I'm getting married in a week." He blurted, and then the stinging was back.

"I have a patient to check on." I said and turned away quickly before he could see the pain in my face.

"Meredith." He said "Please."

"No Derek, I really need to go." I said walking away. "I'll be civil, but I don't think I can do the Brooke thing just yet."

"I'm sorry." He said following me "I shouldn't have, I just…"

"You're in love, and I'm happy for you." I said, turning around to face him "I am, I really, REALLY am happy for you. But I'm not happy, I'm alone. And…" I felt tears starting to betray me as they pooled in my eyes "My mother is sick, she's dying, and she doesn't know who I am. So today…. today I can't hear about you marrying Brooke, ok?"

I sniffled and turned around to take a step away and then I heard it.

"I miss you."