In My Blood

Chapter 21:

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Answered Questions from reviews:

Trixie's baby is a little boy who they are calling Easton.

Easton is really Mark's baby.

Meredith walks into the bedroom to find me passed out on the bed. The sheets covered in a mixture of spilled alcohol and blood, an old box cutter in my hands.

"What the actual fuck?" She asks, pushing the bottles that had fallen to the floor aside, and making her way to the bed. "You said you were going to do 'some' drinking. Not try and give yourself a second dose of alcohol poisoning." She informed me. "I thought we were past this?" She asked, trying, not so gently, to rouse me from my sleep.

She takes the box cutter from my hand, sits it on the dresser, and shakes me, a little too hard, until I make a sound in protest. My head hurts, and my nose is stuffy. My eyes are red and stinging from tears. I am so exhausted. I don't move right away. She grabs my wrists, examining them. I open my eyes just in time to see a look of dismay on her face. 2 new cuts across my left wrist. They are not as deep as I would have originally cut. I think I must have passed out, or… something. I am too weak to object though, as she examines the clotting, and healing assessing if I need to go to the hospital. She looks relieved when she realizes that I didn't do any serious damage.

"Where's Oakley?" I murmur. "Hopefully somewhere fun?" I am thankful that she remembered not to bring her today.

"Derek took the girls to the park." Meredith says, "Oakley enjoys playing on the swing and watching the ducks on the pond." She pushes the alcohol bottles surrounding me aside, and sits on a clean portion of the bed, that hasn't been contaminated by blood or drink.

"You're going to have to stop this. You look a little bit crazy right now."

"I feel a little bit crazy right now." I say. "I told Mark we would work things out." I say, pulling the pillow over my head, why was it, so bright, in here? Why was the world spinning around in circles? "That we would just 'make family' with his baby momma and his adulterous love child."

"That's…. rough. You always were a people pleaser." Meredith says, and then takes the pillow away from me, and helps me into a sitting position. "Is being a decent human being so bad that it's really worth this hangover you have?" Meredith asks, a little amused.

"He wants to go to get coffee again this afternoon, and then meet her, Trixie, at the park around five." My anxiety is skyrocketing. Who is this woman? Is she safe? What if she is a drug addict or a prostitute? It is hard to trust Mark's judgement at the current. I have to try though. I have to force myself to believe that he wouldn't put us in a position where we were in danger.

"That's not news though." Meredith points out. "You knew from the beginning that the baby was his. You knew at some point you'd have to meet her if you want to make things work out between you and Mark." Meredith looks at me crossly.

"It's just a lot all at once." I try and explain.

"What time are you planning on leaving? It's already 9am." She asks, I don't want to leave. I want to burrow myself under my warm blankets and sleep from now until Christmas.

"Can't you go for me?" I plead sticking my bottom lip out a little, whining. "I'm too drunk to…" I make a face and get up, quickly stumbling from the bedroom to the on-suite bathroom. I drop to my knees as a mixture of bile and alcohol come up. I lean against the toilet, trembling. Waiting for a second wave.

"I most certainly cannot 'go for you' It's not my husband's baby mama." Meredith says and I grimace up at her. She holds my hair back as the second wave comes, and rubs my back until nothing more comes up, and the dry heaving subsides.

"I'm too drunk to be around, parenting, momming Oakley and stuff." I finish my initial thought. I know I look pathetic. I feel pathetic. How long have I been in therapy? My coping skills are still in need of massive improvements.

"Well I guess you'd better sober up then, and fast." She turns on the shower, ice cold, and helps me up, helping me step into the shower. I scream in pain, and then start crying angry tears when the cold water hits my skin and soaks through my clothing.

"I can't go alone. I'm scared."

"I would never make you go alone, but do you really want THIS to be this woman's first impression of you?"

"You're right." Is all I can think to say through my tears. I don't even know why I am crying, but now that they've started, I can't get them to stop. She leaves for a few minutes, and comes back with a couple of aspirin, and a yellow drink on ice. She must have found my Banana bag oral solutions in the kitchen cabinet. I am shivering as I take them from her, swallowing the aspirin and slowly sipping the drink.

"You have to be strong, I will help you with your make up, so you look more like…. yourself. Put on the mask, and play pretend, it will get easier eventually."

"I said the same thing about Oakley." I grumble miserably.

"See how well that turned out?" Meredith says cheerfully. "You've gone from barley being able to be in the same room with her to keeping her for long weekends, and visitation several times a week. You're making progress Addison."

"Mark wants to regain full custody." I panic at the thought of this and bite my lip down hard, causing it to bleed. I wasn't able to handle having her here before. What if things go back to the way they were once she comes home? "He wants us to be a family again."

"I know that's a scary thought." She sits down on the toilet, watching me carefully. "You've made so much progress in such a short amount of time Addison. The goal was always reunification before she's one, before she can truly remember what's happened."

"This changes thing though. Mark is going to have shared custody of Trixie's child. What judge is going to grant him shared custody when they see what I've done?"

"You didn't do anything Addison, that's the whole point."

"I gave Oakley away. I'm an unfit parent."

"You kept her safe."

"I wanted to hurt her." I still carry around so much guilt from this, every single day that I look at my beautiful girl, it hits me all over again what I almost did.

"And instead you loved her enough to give her to someone who wouldn't."

"I am an idiot. I want Mark to come back home. I hate how much I need him."

"You do need him." Meredith agrees. "I mean, you'd survive without him, if you had to obviously, but you are both so much better together. You give each other strength. Any judge on this earth would look at what you did as an act of sacrifice, to keep your baby safe. I don't think we need to worry about this." I finish the drink, and we wait for awhile longer. When it stays down, she helps me out of the shower, and back to the bedroom to dry off. She steps outside while I change, and then comes back in. Nodding in approval at my outfit. She places the medical kit she had grabbed from the bathroom on the bed, taking out alcohol swabs, anti-bacterial rub, and the type of medical wrap you'd usually use for stopping the bleeding after getting blood taken. It works better than traditional medical tape.

She looks at me expectantly, and I move closer, turning my wrist upward so she can clean and wrap the cut.

"I'm sorry." I say, looking down at the two angry gashes.

"If you ever feel this way again, I want you to call me." She says, finishing the wrap, and then forcing me to look at her. "Do you understand me?" I nod, but I am crying again. "I don't care if it's two am. I don't care if you're drunk. I'll come over here. I'll move back in if I have to." She had only just taken her things back home a couple of weeks ago when my therapist gave the 'all clear.' for me to be alone for extended periods of time.

"I'm sorry." I say again. "I don't know what happened."

"Maybe you're not ready, maybe it's too soon." She says, and I can see her formulating plans of taking up her place in the guest bedroom again.

"You have to live your life. The girls need you; Derek needs you."

"They're fine. They're safe Addison. You're the one who's struggling. I'm sorry, we should have taken things slower." She says, hugging me tight. "It's OK. You're going to be OK."

"So that's what you were going for? The anti- Addison?" I ask Mark, taking a sip of my iced green juice, glancing at the picture he was showing me on his cell phone. She is leggy, and beautiful, her hair the purest of platinum blondes. She had to be at least as tall as I am. Mark likes his women tall, not as tall as he is. Just taller than average.

"You promised you'd try." Meredith reminds me gently.

"Seriously Meredith… that was before I had a massive hangover." I say, sitting my elbows on the table and resting my head in my hands, rubbing my temples hard. Meredith had forced me to change clothes before we left the house, so instead of leggings and a ratty shirt I am now fidgeting uncomfortably in a stripped cream and blue cardigan, with a white kami underneath, skinny jeans, and high heels that she had found in the back of my closet. My hair has been brushed out and styled. I mean I guess I would have done the same thing if the roles were reversed, but still. Seriously.

"What happened to your wrist?" Mark asks, I run my fingers through my hair, and look up at him, I hadn't realized that my sleeves had fallen down.

"Just an accident. I'm fine."

"You don't look fine… Addie?" He reaches out to touch me, but I pull away, too quickly. He moves his hand back, looking shocked, like I had slapped it away vs, simply moving out of it's reach.

"I'm sorry." I say automatically. "I don't know what's wrong with me today." Meredith goes to hand me Oakley, thinking maybe baby cuddles would make it better, but I shake my head 'not now' and Mark takes her instead. My head hurt too much right now, and the world hasn't quite stopped spinning. I rest my head back in my hands, listening to them catching up, talking about this and that, listening to Oakley babbling and laughing while they play with her, staying silent through it all. I wonder if they would notice if I went back to sleep. As long as no one called and told my mother I fell asleep in a coffee shop we should be-the thought is interrupted when I realize they are talking about me.

"Maybe this is just all too soon." Meredith suggests.

"What did you do to her?"

"Me? What did you do to her? She's been like this since she came home last night."

"We could just cancel and do this another time. She's too fragile." He suggests.

"We need to just get it over with, rip the band aid off so to speak, it will only get harder the longer we wait, her anxiety can't handle…."

"Guys just shut up already!" I say, quietly, but it catches their attention. "I'm not fragile, or broken, I'm just hungover, so if you could please quit arguing I can drink my green juice in peace, and then we can go meet this woman so I can get on with my life. Why am I even here? You don't need me to introduce your daughter to your girlfriend, do you?" I demand, looking at Mark with annoyance.

"I want her to meet you. You'll like her Addison; I know you will." He says, like he is trying to set me up on some kind of blind date. I cringe at this just a little. "Please try and be nice. She's really sweet. I don't know that she deserves your wrath."

"Maybe you should have thought about that before you had an affair with her. I don't know how either of you got the impression that I'm a nice person." I say, looking at them with a certain level of loathing. Why did I agree to this?

"You don't give yourself nearly enough credit Addison." Meredith says, glancing our way, distracted from her riveting game of "peek a boo" with Oakley.

"Can you ever really like someone who screwed your husband?" Genuinely, but Mark laughs.

"Well you still like me, and I am that husband, so maybe you can like her, or at least tolerate her, for the baby."

"Our lives are so screwed up. How did we get this way?" I ask. I am so angry all of a sudden. I want to throw my green juice against the wall. Instead I just get up and toss the ¾ full cup into the trash can, as we get up, and gather our things to walk to the park.

"I don't know, but we have to find a way to get back to where we were. You had a mental break down, I had an affair. You gave our baby away; I got another woman pregnant. We've both done things we wish we could change, but that doesn't change the fact that were perfectly unperfect for each other."

"Hello!" A woman in a short yellow, flowing, flowery maternity dress says cheerfully. "You must be Addison!" She says, extending her hand. "I'm Trixie, Trixie Johnson."

"I am…." I say, giving her a little fake smile, really wanting to add 'unfortunately.' I hate preppy, cheerful people. I hope this is just a front and isn't this woman's true personality. Who goes into something like this with such a bright and shiny temperament? Maybe she's just as fucked up as I am, but better at hiding it. I try to give her credit; it makes her slightly more human and less perfect and robotic. "So where did the two of you meet?" I ask, my attempt at small talk.

"I know this must be hard for you." Trixie says, gently, her voice laced with honey. "I just want what's best for Easton. I don't him growing up without a father like I did." She looks down at her baby bump, so fondly. I nod, but then stare off into the distance, making show of watching Meredith, who had taken Oakley down to the pond. Sitting in the grass with her on her lap, watching the ducks floating around, and bobbing for fish. I hate 'happy' pregnant people. Months of therapy and I now know it is because I am jealous. Everytime I see someone casually talk to their unborn child or place their hand just so on their bump to feel the baby kick I feel sick. I am taken back to being pregnant with Oakley. To absolutely dreading every moment that she moved or kicked. To feeling trapped, and isolated and suffocated as she grew inside of me. I don't know how I will ever return to work. It's kind of a rough position to be in when you're a gynecologist. I had that with Heavenly, but I will never have that again.

"Trixie is a pediatric nutrition and endocrinology nurse. She actually consulted on Oakley's case when she was first born and couldn't gain weight. She's worked at the hospital for what is it? Ten years now? It's odd your paths have never crossed." Mark says, I must look weak because he squeezes my hand tightly.

"The hospital's a big place." Trixie supplies when I don't say anything right away.

"So, the baby's a boy?" I ask her.

"We found out at the ultrasound today. I'm twenty-five weeks, but he was being so stubborn during the last scan the doctor couldn't get a clear look." She says, looking up at Mark with such admiration. I frown at them. Has he seen her through this entire pregnancy? Of course, he has. Why wouldn't he have done? He takes an ultrasound picture out of his wallet, and shows it to me, beaming with pride. I feel uneasy. They are meant to be broken up, but they seem a little too close, too comfortable with each other. Maybe I am reading into things. Sometimes people break up but remain good friends. He is allowed to have friends of the opposite sex.

"Congratulations, he's beautiful." I murmur, looking quickly, but then getting distracted when Oakley begins to fuss. Meredith takes out a bottle from the diaper bag and starts feeding her. Talking to her about all the different animals that in the park, and how if they're really still and quiet maybe they will be able to see a squirrel or a chipmunk. I try not to notice just how perfect Mark and Trixie look together. She is so healthy, and her skin is glowing. I look like he found me in a dumpster somewhere. Even though I am wearing make up you can still see the dark circles under my eyes. My cheeks are still too hollow. My clavicle too pronounced. My knees feel knobby as a schoolgirl in these stupid jeans.

"How old is she?" Trixie asks, watching Oakley and Meredith fondly. Clearly making more of an effort than I am at continuing the conversation.

"She's six months." I answer. "Is this your first baby?"

"He is…." She says, and makes a little expression, asking Mark if he wants to feel the baby kicking. He looks to me, silently asking permission and I shrug. So, he allows her to take his hand, placing it over the spot where the baby is. I know the exact moment when the baby kicks again because his eyes feel up with so much…. Light… and he gasps a little, and then smiles, like it was unexpected. She must be one of those women who do not feel any real kicking and movement until after the 20th week. Completely normal with first pregnancies. I look away. It feels too intimate of a moment. "Easton may have come about in a rather, unconventional, way, but I love him, and I am so thankful that he is here now."

"If we're going to do this, we need ground rules." I say, and Mark looks at me, worried. I notice just how thick and luscious her hair is. My hair has been thinning at an alarming rate since Heavenly died, and post-partum hormones exacerbated the issue.

"I know. I was thinking the same thing" She says.

"He's my husband." I inform her.

"I'm aware."

"We need to protect everyone involved."

"What were you thinking?"

"How much involvement do you want Mark to have with the baby?" I ask her, and she stops to think about this for a moment. I go back to watching Oakley. They are playing patty cake now. Or at least attempting to anyway. Oakley can't sit up unsupported just yet, and we hadn't brought a seat for her other than the stroller, but she's working on it hard.

"This is Mark's child. I want him to be involved with the remainder of the pregnancy. We got into this 'situation' together I want us to both be as hands on, proactive parents as we can be."

"Ok, but this relationship between the two of you…. It stops now." I say.

"Addison we're not even toget-" Mark protests at the same time as Trixie says:

"We stopped being anything more than friends in February I took a pregnancy test. I think it freaked us both out enough that birth control and protection could fail that hard." She says, and to be fair I see a hint of that in her eyes. She looks afraid of what's to come.

"You're a nurse and you…" I say turning to Mark. "…are a fucking doctor, married to a gynecologist with two children, and a baby on the way so not knowing protection can fail is a sorry ass excuse." I catch myself and look down quickly, realizing I said 'two' children. Heavenly's death was not a secret. It was a great tragedy. It was in the news for months because who in the hell shoots up a hospital daycare? I am sure Trixie knows what happened to her, she's been at the hospital long enough, but I have to accept the fact that this can't be how I word things anymore. It is not our reality, as much as I want to cling to Heavenly. What I should have said was something along the lines of 'He's a doctor, married to a gynecologist, with a child and a baby on the way.' Or something like that. I miss Heavenly so fucking much. I wonder what she would think of Oakley. She'd probably be over the moon to have Oakley and then another younger sibling. She always loved babies, begged us for a younger sibling from the time she could talk. Would Mark have still cheated if Heavenly had lived? If I wouldn't have fallen down so hard in the depths of grief and despair? If I had been there for him?

"I want Mark to have equal time with Easton when he is born. I don't plan on breastfeeding, and I'm not taking extensive maternity leave, so there is nothing stopping equally shared time. I could have my lawyer draw up a custody agreement and have them send it to yours to make sure that it's ok. We wouldn't have to go to court."

"That sounds… fine." I say waiting for the bomb to drop. Didn't have to wait long.

"I want him at the hospital when the baby is born. I want him to be in the delivery room, to help me welcome this life we created into the world." She says. "I know we're not together, and we will never be together again, but this baby was made in love, and should be born surrounded by those who love him as well."

"Of course, you do, because you're not already asking enough." I say, feeling myself getting annoyed. She's not asking that much. Support from the man who put her into this position, but the old feeling of terror fills my soul thinking back to the day Oakley was born. Lying about being in pain so they wouldn't give me anything that would possibly hurt her if the labor was real, the sheer panic when my water broke, trying so hard to convince myself it was anything but. Laboring without him, and then feeling the gush of blood, and being rushed to emergency surgery because the baby's cord was prolapsed. Screaming for him as they made the cuts to save the baby's life. Having the anesthesia mask put on over tears, because my last thought was 'I'm dying and he's not here'. Meredith was there for me, and I am thankful that she was, but it wasn't her place. I needed Mark. I needed to know that the love of my life was with me that he supported me. That despite all of the fucked-up things that happened I wasn't alone in this world, that things were going to be OK between us.

I look to Mark, who looks like this is nothing new to him, they must have discussed it already, they have had months to discuss this together. He is giving me 'that look' like 'she's not being unreasonable; did you really have to say that?' My watch beeps. I give it a great look of annoyance before I realize it is Meredith texting me.

'are you ok?'

"I'm sorry I just…. I need a minute." I say, quickly, looking for any excuse to get myself out of this situation I'm in. I stand up and walk over to where Meredith and Oakley are playing. "Mama!" She squeals reaching out her fat little arms to me. I know she doesn't really know what the word means, but It makes me feel a little bit better anyway. I pick her up and hold her so closely to my chest, sitting down beside Meredith. Oakley accepts this, and seems to think it is nap time, because she wiggles and squirms until her head is in the just right position to hear my heart beating on my chest and stills. We sit in silence for a few minutes, just watching the water, me feeling Oakley's tiny little chest risking and falling on mine with each breath.

"I'm not ok." I say quietly, but the park is always noisy, there isn't much of a chance of conversations being overheard. "I just want to go home."

"Things not going well?" She asks. Packing up the picnic blanket that Oakley was on, and the toys into the stroller.

"She's perfect, and beautiful, and she has everything I can't have."

"What are you talking about? You're wealthy, you could have anything."

"Money can't buy what I want."

Authors Note:

Thank you everyone for reading I think Addison doesn't know how to feel at the moment. I am really loving this 'tension' between her and Mark. I agree that Addison would try and make things work. She wouldn't want the kids to be without a father. That doesn't mean that the whole road will be easy though. Please review and let me know what you think! I love hearing from you! : )