A/N: Thank you so much for the reviews, they mean a LOT especially for this first-person departure, and I am sorry for the slow update! The block, it's plaguing me. Send well-wishes and chocolate, thank you thank you.

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help yourself
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I eat lunch with Callie.

To be clear, this is far more earth-shattering than it probably sounds at first.

Because it means I actually eat lunch with another human being who is not (1) a patient's husband whose attention I'm desperately drinking in to avoid thinking about my failed marriage; (2) a manwhore just trying to get into my pants – and unfortunately I do mean that literally, you have no idea what Mark is capable of under a table, even an outdoor public one; or (3) the husband who hates me and is eating with me for the same reason he does anything with me: sheer obligation.

(Ex-husband. Damn it, I really am going to get the hang of that one of these days.)

Anyway, Callie is good company, and not just using my personally low bar.

"There's a delay with Hannah Fowler, huh?"

I nod. "I'm waiting for the chief to sign off. There's a … question about gestational age."

I don't know what's stopping me from telling her the question. (How much crappier can Derek make my life? That's the question as far as I'm concerned.) I can't decide if I'm protecting him or protecting myself – I did choose him, after all, and spend a third of my life with him.

"Didn't you do the dating?"

"Yes." I use my fork and knife to pick out another green pepper from my salad and move it carefully to the side of my plate.

"Oh." Callie studies my face for a second. "Isn't dating pregnancies kind of your thing?"

I give her a pressed-lip shrug.

"You're not going to eat those?" She gestures at the little pile of green pepper cubes on the side of my plate, and I shake my head.

"Help yourself," I tell her.

(Which is a little hypocritical, since it's the one thing I can't seem to do, but … semantics, right?)

Callie crunches a green pepper for a moment, looking thoughtful.

"Abortion is funny," she says finally, when she's swallowed. She must see my curious expression because she hastens to clarify. "Not funny, strange. The way no one really talks about it, in my experience, anyway. I mean, they talk around it, a lot, but, like … not about it. Not directly. You know what I mean?"

Do I ever.

I glance over at her. "Yeah. I think I know what you mean."

Her eyes are so understanding. It makes something in my stomach turn over and I want to tell her.

I had an abortion, I want to tell her, and even though I'm an abortion provider I still can't talk about it, not like I should. I was scared, and embarrassed. I was everything a woman shouldn't be.

And not just that. I want to tell her Derek's screwing up this case on purpose and he's going to win because Derek always wins.

And not just that either. What I mean is … I want to tell her everything. I want to tell her why.

I take a deep breath.

"Callie…"

"Ladies," Mark's deep voice interrupts; he's standing in front of our table with a big smile that sets my teeth on edge. "Am I interrupting?" He lifts an eyebrow in that way of his that can turn anything into innuendo, from ten blade to pass the salt.

And I'm irritated. Defensive, even. I mean, it's one thing to flirt with me at the hospital – I pretty much made that bed, so I can't be too upset that he expects me to lie in it – but it's not fair to involve Callie. It's inappropriate. It's wrong. I mean, he's obviously making her uncomfortable, based on the way she's shifting in her seat and not looking at either one of us, and -

Oh.

So Callie slept with Mark too.

For a moment we all just look at each other and then Mark saunters off looking annoyingly pleased with himself.

I'm relieved when he walks away from us, and then Callie and I catch each other's eye and I wait for it to be horribly awkward.

…but both of us start laughing instead.

Laughing.

Honestly, I don't think I realized I still remembered how.

"I'm sorry," Callie says finally, "it's not funny, it's just …"

"…it's just Mark," I supply, and she nods. "So you're … sleeping with him?" I sound as casual as I can when I ask.

"Was," she corrects.

"Me too, was." I don't mention the last time was this morning. Because it is going to be the last time. I can't take anymore. "It's just … self-flagellation in human form."

"Hot human form," Callie acknowledges.

"Yeah."

"Hotter when he isn't talking," she adds, and that makes me smile.

"Callie-"

Her pager goes off then; she glances at it and rolls her eyes. "Ugh, bad timing. Can we maybe – you want to get a drink or something later?"

"Sure."

I find myself flushing with pleasure the same way I did in fifth grade when Missy Lowell asked me over to her house for a sleepover – Missy with the perfect straight blonde hair whose parents actually liked each other, who never caught her father on top of her nanny and had to ask her brother what the hell they were doing.

Happy.

Hopeful.

Liked.

God, I'm pathetic.

And obvious about it too; Missy and her gang told me I talked in my sleep and spent the rest of the school year teasing me about it. In retrospect, I never should have gone to the sleepover.

Let's be real: in retrospect, I never should have done a lot of things.

…

Mark is leering at me when I pass him in the hallway.

"Now what?" I'm still annoyed at him for ruining the moment earlier. (And a little grateful, too, which just makes me more annoyed.)

"You and Torres." He nods appreciatively. "I like it."

"What are you talking about, Mark?"

He spreads his hands innocently. "You said you were swearing off men. You have my full support, that's all I'm saying. I'm all for it, in fact. I mean … as long as I get to watch."

Only Mark would interpret saying no to him to mean I was swearing off men entirely. If they could bottle that man's ego …

… knowing me, I'd just get drunk on it and then sleep with him again.

"You're disgusting," I inform him.

"You love it."

"I really don't." I push my glasses down, more for effect than anything else, hoping he'll see how serious I am if he can really see my eyes.

He just laughs. "I'll see you tonight."

"No, you won't."

"Sure I will."

"Mark. I have other plans."

He studies my face for a moment. "Not unless I can watch, you don't," he responds, then flashes a quick grin and takes off before I can yell at him.

Ugh.

I have no idea what I saw in him in the first place.

(Okay, fine, I do know, because I saw him. The man is something else.)

And he knows it. And I knew him. And god, I should have known better. Mark once told me, years back, that he never had sex with the same woman more than five times if he could help it. He had a whole formula and everything. The first time you're feeling it out – pun intended, he said, and I wrinkled my nose – the second time you're building up a base, third time you've got the rhythm, fourth time you push it to the next level and the fifth time you're done.

Everything after that is downhill, that's what he told me. It's all about the energy at the start. That, and the chase.

In other words, the man actually laid out for me his entire formula and I still slept with him. I still let him tell me he loved me, and that things were different with me.

And still I told him I was pregnant.

I wasn't going to, but I did.

I'm still not really sure why. But I've had a lot of opportunity to think about it, from the moment he unfolded that ridiculous blue-and-white onesie and held it up in front of his chest to the moment my former resident finished suctioning away the last traces of the white stick that turned blue.

So why did I do it?

I don't know. Maybe I was so tired of Mark's deciding everything, defining everything. He said I love you and he said nowhere when I asked where he'd been; he left lingerie for me to find or didn't care whether I found it, he told me I was too good for Derek and he scowled when I kept my rings on. My life spun out of control those two months. And then finally I knew something he didn't.

For once I had something that he couldn't tell me first or twist or turn into something else. For once I had control of the narrative.

Except then I told him, and he was … excited.

Which wasn't what I expected, needless to say.

He turned it around on me again.

In a way that whole two months in New York was just one rug pulled out from under me after another. Derek walking in. Derek throwing me out. Derek throwing himself out of my life. Mark still wanting me. Mark still wanting half the nursing staff and three residents. The stick that turned blue. The onesie, the calendar, the suction in the white room. I was still spotting when I flew to Seattle. Pain. Those two months were a haze of pain but that was the first time I'd bled, visibly, since Derek left me.

I was thinking about it the first time we had sex, in Seattle. No anesthesia, and I was so tense, afraid he'd notice something different, that I'd give myself away, that it hurt when it shouldn't. I convinced myself I deserved it anyway, and convinced Derek the gasps meant pleasure and the tears meant happiness because we were reconnecting.

… if he believed that he's more naïve than I thought, but Derek does tend to believe what's most convenient, especially where I'm concerned. He fell asleep afterwards and I lay awake in that uncomfortable bed in the trailer staring at the curved ceiling, wedged between Derek and the wall. Between a rock and a hard place.

Between two choices when I am terrible, the worst, at making choices.

A choice is what I made when I aborted Mark's baby. It's about choices, that's what I said. It's what I say. It's what I told Derek, Savvy, and Weiss while we toasted the aborted Shepherd reconciliation. I never told Savvy I was pregnant; she and Weiss were deep in talks to start a family at the time – they're lawyers, they're always deep in talks about something, and I used to envision a twenty-page contract filled with heretofore and whereas setting out their plans for procreation. That, and were both thirty-eight and I didn't feel like springing a surprise pregnancy on her when the most planning Mark and I had done was when he told me to take off my skirt.

He said he understood why I did it. That he was disappointed, but he understood. Then he invited my favorite nurse back to his apartment and screwed her in his bed when he knew I was coming home.

(Not home, never home, but back to his apartment.)

I stood in the doorway of his bedroom watching a perfect blonde ten years younger than I was undulating under the man who helped me destroy my husband and I realized that in some ways he did understand. And I understood too. I still do.

What I understand is that Mark and I deserve each other. He's my punishment for what we did to Derek ... and I'm his scarlet A.

…

I'm tense, checking my blackberry whenever I can, waiting for Richard to tell me next steps. I have one of the nurses keeping an eye on Hannah and sending me updates. I hate making her wait. I hate that this is out of control. I hate my husband.

Ex-husband.

And then my blackberry finally buzzes with Richard's summons and I'm in his office, trying to keep from tapping impatient toes while he spells out what's going to happen.

"Dr. Gilmer, the head of OB-GYN, is going to review her records as soon as possible."

"Fine." My hands are on my hips. It's not my most respectful posture, but I'm having trouble caring right now.

He examines me over the rims of his glasses. "I don't need to tell you that the procedure is off the table until we get clearance."

"No … you don't."

"Addison." His brow is knitted now. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Richard. My patient, on the other hand…"

"You've explained the delay to her?"

"Yes, I have."

There's a knock on the door.

Oh, great.

"Who invited you?" I can't help muttering it as Derek walks into the room, looking for all the world like he's the most welcomed keynote speaker of the day.

(It must be nice to feel like every room is just waiting for you to grace it with your presence. I wouldn't know.)

"Richard invited me," Derek says simply, "so take it up with him if you have a problem."

"Oh, I plan to."

We're speaking in low voices but Richard is already glaring at us.

"Richard," Derek says in full voice. "You asked me to be here."

"Yes." Richard frowns. "Dr. Gilmer would like you to review the sonograms with her, Derek."

"Of course. I'll -"

"Why him?"

They both turn to me when I interrupt.

"I just mean I should be there too," I explain.

"Dr. Gilmer is providing a contrasting opinion, Addison," Richard says.

"So why is he going to be there?"

"…to explain what his issues were with the previous designations. This isn't a competition. This is an attempt to secure accurate information about-"

"Richard," I cut in, past caring about hierarchy at all right now, "are we really going to pretend that this is a hunt for accurate information? No offense to Dr. Gilmer, I'm sure she's an excellent OB-GYN, but there's no way she's going to read an ultrasound better than I can."

"It's not about skills, Addison, as I've explained to you."

I'm starting to feel reckless.

"No, it's about Derek trying to delay the procedure. It's about Derek's power play."

There we go. Reckless.

"Addison," Richard says sternly. "Derek has already said that he's not trying to delay the procedure."

"Oh, well, if Derek said it, then it must be true. You don't want to call the head of neurology in to second guess him?"

There's a pause in which I'm pretty sure I've gone too far, I'm breathing heavily and glaring at Derek and just waiting for Richard to – I don't know, stop me?

The thing is ... I've never been great at stopping myself.

"Addison." Richard just shakes his head. "What's gotten into you?"

"Yes, Addison." Derek is glaring at me now. "What has gotten into you?"

"Oh, shut up," I snap at him.

"Addison," Richard says sharply. "If you can't maintain a professional-"

"He's the unprofessional one!" I raise my voice even though I know I'm only digging myself in deeper. "He has no right to interfere with my patient, she's my responsibility, not his-"

"-like last time?" His voice is low, but cutting.

"Shut up," I say again, my voice starting to shake this time. "Derek, I mean it."

"Richard doesn't know," Derek says quietly.

"Richard doesn't need to know," I counter, mustering every ounce of confidence into my stance that I don't feel right now.

"Richard is losing patience," the chief responds, looking from one of us to the other, and he doesn't seem amused.

"Addison…" Derek has a strange expression on his face. "I'm going to tell him if you don't."

"No, you're not. You are not. Derek, stop, it has nothing to do with him, it has nothing to do with you, don't you dare-"

When he opens his mouth to keep talking anyway all I see is a red haze and then I'm moving forward and I have a sudden, searing pain in my right hand.

And Derek is holding his hand up to his face and looking, especially for Derek, pretty damned shocked.

"What the hell, Addison!"

It's not a question, it's a scathing critique.

Derek stands there glaring at me, working his jaw back and forth.

I can't believe it.

I've never slapped anyone like that in my life.

Which I guess is why I didn't realize how much it would hurt.

(…hurt the giver, I mean. I'm well aware, from experience, how much it hurts the receiver.)

Richard is gripping my arm now, pulling me away from Derek, which is too bad because it's keeping me from rubbing my sore palm.

"Addison." He sounds as shocked as Derek looks, and disappointed to boot. "I have known you since you were an intern and I have never seen anything like this. I have half a mind to suspend you right now and sort out the details later."

Richard is still holding onto me and I'm going to have to start panicking soon because I realize that I need him to let go. I need him to let go now so I can press my fingers to the corners of my eyes because I can feel my breathing start to speed up in that way that means – but I won't, but I might, and for one horrible second I realize I'm going to start crying.

Panic surges through me. No. No.

"Richard."

We both look over to Derek.

"It's fine. Just forget it." He's touching his lip, where it seems like his teeth interfered when I surprised him with that slap.

"Derek," Richard says. "Are you-"

"I'm fine," Derek says, and nods in my direction. "You can let her go, Richard, she's not as vicious as she looks."

Richard lets go of me and then my fingers are on my temples and the feeling of tears recedes, thank god.

"Addison. You're very lucky-"

Oh yeah, that's me, lucky Addison. Can't you see how terrific my life is?

"-because if it were up to me, I would-"

"Chief." Derek is looking at him. "Forget it."

"Sorry," I mumble.

Richard nods and then walks over to his desk, fussing with a file on his desk and leaving me face to face with Derek.

He doesn't say anything.

"Derek … I'm sorry," I say again, taking a quick glance at his face. There's a red mark on his left cheek where I hit him; half of me feels like the world's biggest heel and the other half is actually a little envious that he gets to wear his injuries on the outside.

He just nods. I guess he's going to let it go; that's Derek for you. Acknowledging that I hurt him would be like acknowledging that I matter, and that's not something he does anymore.

I don't know why I keep talking – probably because it's uncomfortable, because I'm shifting on my heels and I want to fill the silence and part of me is still shocked that I actually did it.

"Um … you can slap me back if you want," I offer.

He stares at me. "You think this is a joke?"

"Which part? Slapping you?"

He just shakes his head. "Addison … face it; you're in over your head."

"What is that, a threat?"

"No, a threat would be telling Richard to suspend you like he wants to." We're speaking quietly, out of Richard's earshot.

"You wouldn't do that." I'm not sure if I'm calling his bluff or asking for reassurance. Both seem misguided when I think about. He looks serious; his eyes are cold and determined.

And very blue, which I hate that I still notice. I hate everything about him right now, and I hope he can tell. I really, truly do.

He's just studying me like I'm a none-too-interesting sample under the microscope.

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't," he suggests.

"How about … it would be petty, vindictive, and pointless."

"That's three, not one."

How about you promised? How's that for one reason?

I don't say it out loud. But for just one second I think he might have heard me anyway, and I see something in his eyes that's warmer than cool disgust.

And then it disappears.

"Addison, just – don't do this."

"Don't do what?"

He shakes his head mutely.

"Addison." Richard walks back over to me, a chart in his hand, and gestures toward his couch. "Have a seat, please. We need to talk. Derek – "

They make eye contact and then Derek just nods, like they're sharing some sort of secret man code I can't understand.

Then he turns around to leave. But first he moves close enough to me to say something only I can hear, not Richard, his voice a low and cutting whisper.

"Tell me again how you're capable of handling this."

And then he's gone, and I'm standing there, frozen … wishing he had just slapped me back.

TBC.

PP folks may recognize Addison's quote about her abortion - remember those innocent days when we thought that would be the saddest reference to it we'd ever get? We were so innocent then. THANK YOU again so much for reading and please keep me accountable for frequent updates. I know there are open questions now - I'm sure Richard has a few too - but all will be answered eventually. I'm gonna be direct and shameless here: pretty please review and tell me what you thought.

PS Okay, y'all, I wouldn't normally do this but I want to take your temperature about something in this chapter. Does what Derek does for Addison in Richard's office come through? Is it too subtle? Is it too poorly expressed? I'm too close to the story to figure it out. Help me help you, as Dr. Cox on Scrubs (tied for my favorite medical program) would say. Thank you!