A/N: Thank you so much for your reviews on the last chapter, and for continuing to read and comment on this story. It's picking up speed here behind the scenes, and you can expect updates to keep coming so long as you're still into reading.

..
worms
..

I stay in the lounge after Karev leaves, drinking my coffee and ignoring the ticking clock on the wall that sounds uncomfortably like a heartbeat.

I linger a little longer in the lounge than I need to. I guess an embarrassing part of me is hoping Callie will stop in. And I know that sounds ridiculous because sure, I'm lonely, but Karev was in here and I could have talked to him – instead of snapping at him and making fairly certain he's going to end up on the list of aborted friendships here in Seattle.

No pun intended.

Now Karev can be certain I'm a bitch and stop angling for my surgeries – he won't, because under his incredibly annoying exterior he actually wants to learn. But at least he won't want to bond.

(Unfair? When I'm the one who kissed him first? Sure. But no one can prove that. And for someone who makes most of her major mistakes in public – that's saying something.)

But Callie's working – as I am too, even if I'm pontificating at the same time – and Karev left on my orders.

So I'm alone.

Back to having long conversations inside my head because no one here is exactly jumping all over themselves to talk to me.

(Mark trying to jump all over me, for reasons that have nothing to do with talking … that doesn't count.)

God, Seattle is lonely. I know that's an understatement. But until you experience it, I'm not sure you can actually know what it feels like to be the subject of stares and whispers and pity even though no one actually talks to you.

When I finally leave the lounge and walk down the hall, plenty of people look at me.

But I'm pretty sure no one sees me.

..

"You wanted to see me, Richard?"

"Come in." He nods expansively. I hover in the doorway anyway; this office hasn't exactly been my favorite spot lately and I'm not quite sure what the chief wants.

"I wanted to see how you're doing," he says neutrally.

I could say, lousy. I could say, I'm not going to answer, because even though you have your Kindly Old Man smile on … I've seen you work a chess board and I don't feel like being a pawn today.

"Fine," I tell him politely. "How are you doing, Richard?"

"Addie." He gestures to the chair in front of his desk. "Please come in and sit down."

So it's going to be this kind of conversation.

I do it. He's my boss, after all.

"You did a good job with the Fowler case," he says once I'm seated, legs crossed – as a lady always sits, at least if she doesn't want her legs whacked with a handbag.

"Thank you."

"I know it wasn't easy."

I'm not sure how to answer that. I suppose he does know it wasn't easy.

But he doesn't know why.

He just leans back a little in his chair, steepling his fingers. I'm getting hard core professor vibes from him now. He's going to give me some sage advice and I'm going to have to pretend I'll apply it to my sad excuse for a life here in Seattle.

Great.

I just wait.

"This job is a stressful one, Addie," he says finally. "I don't have to tell you that."

No, he doesn't, but I nod politely anyway.

"And when you mix in … personal politics …."

Okay, that's a new euphemism for working with the perfect husband you cheated on and the manwhore you used to cheat too, but I can't really argue with the general direction of this.

"I'm aware this has been a challenging time for you," he says, eye contact fixed firmly away from me.

The words are similar enough to Derek's I can appreciate that this has been difficult for you that it makes me a little chilled. Coincidence, I hope. Not, god forbid, Derek and Richard talking about me. I turn automatically to the other guest chair. I don't know what I'm looking for – an ass print? I just want to know that Derek wasn't sitting here before me, with the chief.

"Derek," Richard says.

"What?" Now I'm spinning to face the door. If Richard invited him here, I swear …

"I asked what's happening between you and Derek," Richard repeats patiently.

"Oh. Nothing," I say immediately.

Hopefully not too immediately.

"Nothing." He raises his eyebrows. "Nothing doesn't usually lead to one of my top surgeons – and one of my favorite people – committing spousal battery in my office."

"We're divorced now," I remind him, hoping I don't sound too defensive. "So it's just regular battery." I manage a weak smile at my own joke.

Richard looks at me over his glasses for a moment. "Spousal is less of an issue than battery here, I would say."

Fine, but it's a little tricky to separate in our case.

What am I supposed to say to him?

I consider my options.

I've done worse. It's true. I once pulled out an actual handful of Derek's hair – which has got to be a felony in some states, at least ones that appreciate a good head of hair. Okay, it wasn't really my fault, he was halfway down the bed at the time trying something with a half-melted ice cube and I don't know which one of us ended up screaming louder. And once we'd both recovered and I had massaged the feeling back into his scalp and his eyes stopped watering, I did apologize – but he was more flattered than hurt.

Yeah, I know that's not really on point.

And slapping Derek in the face in Richard's office? I also know that's definitely not my finest moment.

But it doesn't even make the top three when I think about the other ways I've hurt him.

The ones people know about … and the ones they don't.

The ones that don't leave marks.

"Addison." Richard looks at me over the top of his glasses. "I need my top surgeons to be able to work together."

"We can."

Do I sound convincing?

I keep going, figuring I'll hit convincing sometime soon.

"I'm sorry we involved you, Richard," I tell him, aware that I'm using we for AddisonandDerek, even though I know I shouldn't. "But the issue is closed. The case is finished, the patient received the services she needed. I'm satisfied."

Satisfied is the last thing I am, under any definition of the word, but Richard doesn't need to know that.

"Good. I'm glad to hear it. And if you need anyone to talk to – "

It won't be you.

" – you know where to find me."

"Thank you, Richard."

I know he's watching me leave his office.

And not the way Mark does, just to be clear. Still.

It gives me the impression he knows more than he should.

..

I don't have much time to wonder about Richard. I'm still waiting for the results of Eleanor's fetal MRI when I end up getting pulled into a consult that's going to turn into a case that's going to stretch out the back end of my schedule.

No problem, not like I actually have anywhere to be.

Not like I actually want to be left alone with my thoughts so my mind can obsessively revisit the conversation with Derek outside Eleanor's room.

One word of that conversation in particular.

Yes.

Yes, he said, when I asked if he meant it.

Okay. But. Yes, he meant … what?

Everything? All of it?

See, this is not productive. This is why I'd rather work.

But planning to work past the end of my shift is also a problem.

It reminds me that the problem is more than not having anywhere to be, after work.

I also don't have anyone to tell where I … be.

It's one of the many strange things about divorce I'm just learning now.

On top of everything else – the pain and the embarrassment and the shame and the endless logistics and making not one but two trips to the DMV – I've lost the main marker of my days.

I don't have to tell anyone when I'm coming home.

(I also don't have a home, to be clear, but that's a separate issue. I think.)

I mean, not that Derek was exactly holding his breath for my updates, toward the end – and certainly not here in Seattle – but I still kept up the pretense.

(Of course I kept up the pretense; I'm a Montgomery. Pretense is my middle name. Or one of them, anyway.)

Maybe in New York he'd stopped noticing me and maybe in Seattle he'd just given up entirely, but I still kept him posted. I still acted like he was waiting for me.

I can't do that anymore.

Here, now? Post-divorce?

No one is waiting for me.

(And Mark doesn't count. He's not waiting for me, he's waiting for one specific part of me. Maybe two. Fine, maybe three, but only if I'm really drunk.)

So, yeah. I'm kind of lost.

I was married for eleven years, with Derek for five years before that. I haven't been single for more than sixteen years. Sixteen years! My inability to be alone could be a fucking debutante, that's how old it is.

And it's a hard habit to break.

Very hard.

In New York, when I lived with Mark – well, lived with is a prettying it up quite a bit, making it far too delicate, the equivalent of saying that at Richard's stupid hospital prom, Derek and Meredith exchanged telephone numbers.

So, when Mark and I were whatever-we-were, I was still sort of living in the rhythms of marriage. Half and half. Half of me was still leaving messages on Derek's answering service and the other half of me was texting Mark to say when I'd be off work even though he never asked and didn't particularly seem to care.

I had to tell someone. It's habit.

You know … good old muscle memory.

So I shopped for groceries in Mark's kitchen. I found lingerie I'd never buy in the bed we were sharing, but I still kept his cabinets stocked with the espresso beans I liked. Fresh fruit on the counter, cream in the fridge for his coffee – but never mine – paper towels for the weird little magnetic silver thing I never would have chosen.

Fine, I never went into an actual store, but I was the one who placed the FreshLocal orders, and I was the one who left a tip with the doorman for the delivery guy. In my world, that's June Fucking Cleaver.

My point is, Mark never asked me to do any of those things. He thanked me once in a while, sometimes even verbally, and he certainly never complained that I remembered he only liked granny smith apples, nothing sweet, and that his preferred brand of organic half-and-half was the one with the rosy-cheeked girl on the carton, not the one with the smiling cow.

(Big shock there, Mark Sloan preferring to look at a pretty face. Even if it's a cartoon milkmaid in a pink-flowered bonnet. It's more of a surprise he never tried to sleep with her.)

And I don't know why I did it. We never cooked in his apartment anyway – the idea of it is laughable – and takeout bags have their own plastic silverware and chopsticks. I didn't need to do it. I just – did it, because I was used to doing it.

I'll be home by nine. It was habit.

Okay, fine, toward the end of those two months it was also a warning to get whoever was warming the bed in my absence out of there so I didn't have to have any awkward run-ins in the elevator.

Any more awkward run-ins in the elevator.

… God, those two months are embarrassing.

Even by my newly honed adulterous-bitch standards.

You think it was embarrassing chasing Derek around the hospital begging for him to pay attention to me? Or losing my shit on him in front of half the hospital, including the intern he couldn't admit he was still having an emotional affair with? Or knowing every single person at Richard's prom knew what Derek was doing with doing with Meredith in that exam room half a hallway away from me while I stood there like an imbecile with a cup of punch, waiting for him to come back and finish our dance?

It was. They were.

All of those things were embarrassing. Were … and are now, too, when I remember them.

But calling Mark to tell him I was getting in a cab, pretending it was so he wouldn't worry about my taking the subway or so that he could pour me a glass of wine, and not so that he could shower off whoever he slept with that day – yeah.

That's a little rough. Even for me.

That might take some time to get over.

Mark and I weren't married. We weren't anything, no matter how many times I updated him with my ETAs or put grapes in his crisper drawer or even poured his morning coffee.

But I was married, those two months. I was still married to Derek. I was sleeping with Mark, and Derek was sleeping with Meredith, and Mark was sleeping with half of Manhattan. And I was wearing my wedding rings.

And now?

Now I'm living in Seattle. I'm divorced from Derek. I'm not sleeping with Mark – not anymore, this week. Derek, well, it seems like he's not sleeping with Meredith either, not anymore. Mark is now sleeping with half of Seattle instead – very consistent guy, Mark Sloan: same MO, different time zone. And I'm not wearing my wedding rings.

Except I was wearing them yesterday.

And this morning, I woke up in bed with Derek.

Fully clothed, with a couple of shreds of dignity left, but still.

In bed.

With Derek.

And the rings I'm not wearing were sitting on a washcloth for all the world like I'm the Dr. Shepherd half the hospital still calls me.

Is it any wonder I'm confused? That maybe a little part of me can't seem to remember we're not still married?

Derek might ignore me, he might even hate me, but hell, that's not so different from 2004, and we were still living together then, in the brownstone, and Mark had never seen me naked.

So, yeah.

Confusing.

And I don't know what to do about it, not really.

The thing is, I had a plan. It was to keep my distance, and keep my dignity. Derek told me he never wanted to see me again, I went back to the hotel and knocked on Mark's door and pretended I didn't feel like someone had just pushed me off a cliff. Like that last moment in a dream where you feel like you're falling until you jerk awake, terrified for no reason.

At least now you don't have to feel guilty anymore.

That feeling.

But then Hannah Fowler happened. That supply closet I can still smell if I close my eyes, where I wrong-footed him and then he tore me apart.

And everything else after that.

I'm not saying it's not on me. I know I opened a can of worms telling Derek about my abortion that day.

And now … they're everywhere.

..

"Dr. Shepherd?"

"It's actually Montgomery now," I say. Practicing.

If I opened a can of worms, then there's only one solution I can think of, and it's to – grab those worms and stuff them back in.

"Oh!" It's a blushing intern whose name I can't remember, with an overlong braid down her back. "Sorry, Dr. Sh – I mean, Dr. Montgomery."

"It's fine. What do you need?"

"Dr. Goldberg wanted me to let you know that there was a delay with the fetal MRI."

"What kind of a delay?"

"A backup," she says.

God, interns are frustrating. It takes some tooth-pulling to get useful information out of her.

"And she said to tell you Dr. Russo is going to read it as soon as they're finished," she adds, a little breathless.

Russo – the head of radiology. Interesting.

I dismiss the intern and focus on Eleanor for a minute. Russo will read the MRI, and if I know Derek then he and Graves will look at it together. But Derek was a consult in a pinch, that's all, so it will be Graves who contacts me so we can look at the scans together and make a decision.

Derek will sign off on the chart and hand it back and then he'll be done with the case.

More worms back in the can.

… okay, metaphor officially dead. Fine.

But the point is: I think I need distance.

No more consults, no more rings … and definitely no more hotel rooms.

Because we're not married, Derek and I. We're divorced, and I have to stop spending any more time with him than I need to. No more circular conversations that leave me raw and confused and definitely no more sharing space in that way that makes my whole body tense with regret and – stop reading if you don't want to hear this, because I'm not proud of it – longing.

Distance. I need distance.

At least until I figure things out.

Okay, then.

I breathe on it: inhale, exhale, and other than the hollow pit inside my stomach, I feel something like … pride, at this decision. Maybe? Mixed with surprise, I suppose.

Can you imagine? Addison Shepherd – Montgomery, sorry – making a good decision? A healthy one? A mature one?

(I'm not offended. I certainly know my track record.)

But this is actually a healthy decision. It is.

I'm making the decision sober, too, and I'm starting to feel almost good about it.

Like maybe it's the start of something.

Like maybe things might turn around for me if I can take some control.

So.

It probably won't surprise you that of course … this is the exact moment Eleanor Rivers decides to have me paged.

For two reasons, as I learn when I get to her room.

The first: to complain that the temperature is too warm in her room. I refrain from informing her that I don't work for maintenance and instead put on the sympathetic face I perfected when Bizzy would complain about the help. Yes, of course I'll have someone come check the thermostat. Yes, of course Carmella should pay more attention to the scrollwork around the credenza when she's dusting.

I know what Eleanor is really complaining about – because his absence is as loud as ever in the room. No Colton, no mercy from Eleanor. I can take it, so I let her tire herself out a bit and then assure her I'll elevate her temperature complaints to the highest level.

Maybe I'll get Richard involved; a little part of me thinks he kind of deserves it.

(I love Richard – I still do, but he wouldn't be the first man I loved who sometimes feels like he's patting me on the head with one hand and screwing me over with the other.)

So I'm connecting with my patient and I'm still a little bit congratulating myself for that mature decision a couple of minutes ago when she hits me with the second reason she had me paged.

And it's a kicker.

The second reason: so she can tell me she wants Dr. Shepherd on her case permanently instead of Dr. Graves. Whatever the scans say, whatever the procedure, she wants Derek on her case. Nay, she insists on it.

On my case. My – ex, my case.

Ex-husband, non-ex-case.

Oh, and the cherry on top? I get to tell Derek myself.

In other words … metaphor no longer dead, because apparently it's going to be goodbye healthy decision, hello worms.

Lots of worms.

Worms everywhere.

To be continued, of course. Lots going on in Addison's head in this chapter - next time, Derek actually makes an appearance outside her head again. I love hearing what you think, so I hope you'll review. Thank you for reading!