A/N: Thank you so much for your review on the last chapter! I didn't realize I'd be updating this story today but sometimes these things just happen. (I don't know even how it happened, it was just there ... ?) And you guys are the best - I can't believe I actually learned, after the last chapter, how to say, Come on, Addison, we were getting along so well in Portuguese (Addison-fan, you rock). Still hard at work on my other WIPs too, because that's just how things go when you're Addek trash. I hope you enjoy this first update of 2019.

..
illusions
..

Two thoughts cross my mind, one right after the other, when my alarm goes off and I have to face the morning:

First: thank god I'm not still holding the rings

Second: god, my standards are low these days

They're both true.

I do wake up in the aftermath of last night's moping session. Next to me in bed is old-fashioned ice bag the hotel provided, melted and runny by now. There's a crystal wineglass with a runner of deep red sediment and then, sitting on the bedside table next to the overly complicated telephone … are the rings.

The rings, mind, not my rings. They stopped being my rings when we signed the papers, I guess, since that's what Derek and I have both been calling them, seamlessly. You're wearing the rings, that's what he said the night he actually noticed something.

All this is to say I wake up in the wrinkled ruins of Addison Shepherd instead of the shiny new Addison Montgomery I still haven't actually figured out. It's not that it's surprising … but it's still a little disappointing.

I wake up alone, too – which, yeah. At least I didn't sleep with Mark again.

And if, as I watch my tired-looking reflection brushing her teeth, there's a small shameful part of me that can almost admit to wishing Derek had never left last night … ? I hope you won't judge me too much.

It's fine. It's a momentary lapse and stuff it down with the rest of the things I don't want to think about – including the rings, which go back into my drawer, clunking and rolling messily among the fabric in a way that would have given New York Me a coronary.

But this, I guess, is Seattle Me.

I may not quite know who Addison Montgomery is, even if she's the one on my not-even-that-new-anymore hospital badge. I may not know how to make her okay, how to keep her from too many bad choices and too much good wine.

But I do know one thing, at least.

I know how to dress her.

I know how to make her look like nothing's wrong … on the outside, anyway.

So I stand there in the really decent-sized hotel closet and study the rows of fabric. It's not the most colorful – Derek used to tease me about how much black I owned, black and white and grey, but it never looked out of place in Manhattan.

There's some color – and some great dresses, too, but remember when I said dresses are a bit complicated for adulterous divorcees?

(Because of the divorcee part, not the adultery part, to be clear.)

… a skirt it is, then.

Anyone else might worry about running out of fabulous skirts, but I have a pretty decent collection. What's left of it, anyway, but that's not a topic I'm drunk enough to consider right now.

I settle on a high-waisted grey number with perfectly placed faux pockets on the back that's half impeccable tailoring and all illusion – it hugs my body in a way that you could euphemistically say makes me look curvy and Sloanishly say makes me look … something less printable. Because I don't have much to write home about in that particular area but this skirt actually makes it seem like I do.

You can't put a price tag on that kind of illusion.

(I mean, you can, and Derek would feign shock and dismay at what the price tag said, of course, as if he's still an oh-so-grounded resident and not a brain surgeon known to spend a small fortune on impractical luxury fishing gear.)

Once I'm dressed, I turn a few times in front of the mirror. I'm not being vain, really. I'm just making sure the line of it is – fine, I'm being a little vain. I like this skirt, okay? I don't have a lot going for me these days … so just let me have the skirt.

I smooth down the back of it, wincing a bit when my hand runs over last night's bruise.

Ow.

Then I remember that Mark used to tease me about this skirt, he once called it false advertising halfway through shoving me into the wall of his office in Manhattan; he was laughing at me but he was also paying attention to me and that should give you a decent picture of what those two months were like.

It was less funny when I caught him with that blonde nurse who could serve a three-course meal off her perky, perfect … but that's neither here nor there.

The point is, I like the illusion. Even though Derek never had an issue in that area. My husband, as you've probably guessed from his sixteen years with me and his apparently far more meaningful two months with a pocket-sized intern … is not what you'd call an ass guy. Lucky for him.

(Ex-husband. You know what I mean.)

Then I remember something else, a more uncomfortable memory of the last time I remember wearing this skirt. It was the night Derek told me he wasn't signing the divorce papers.

It was also the night of that train accident that was gory even for your bog standard urban trauma center; Derek was morose and preoccupied after and I wish I could say it was because of the patient he lost … okay, that sounds bad. My point is, Derek has always taken it hard when he loses a patient, but that night – looking back, I know what he was really upset about was losing his girlfriend. Losing that new life he built without me.

Even though it was his choice! That's Derek, he never stopped blaming me for his choice to sign the papers. Not really. He didn't stop punishing me either, which I guess is how even though he's the one who drove the final humiliating, public stake into what was left of our marriage, I still came out the bad guy.

He was upset, though, that night. I remember walking out of the hospital with him at dawn; he was exhausted and I had my hand tucked into the crook of his arm like I used to. I probably looked pretty self-satisfied from the outside – I won, he didn't sign – as we walked out into the morning together … maybe even smug.

But that confidence was another illusion. Like the skirt. I think I was holding on to him so tightly because even then, the night he didn't sign, I could feel him slipping away from me.

… and that's that. And by that, I mean that's what it's like when every piece in your wardrobe – not to mention every other part of your life – tells a story where the main character has already rewritten his part.

On that note, I give the illusion skirt one last tug and my reflection one last okay, Addie, I guess we're in this together, and head downstairs to face what passes for my life here in Seattle.

..

Someone is watching out for me up there – and by watching out, I actually mean watching with amusement, because despite all the time I wasted upstairs turning around in front of the mirror and pontificating about the size and shape of my derriere, I manage to walk through the lobby at the exact same time as Callie Torres.

Maybe I'll get lucky and she won't see me.

"Addison!"

… oh, right, I almost forgot: I only get lucky in the biblical sense.

"Hey, Callie."

I hope I sound more enthusiastic than I feel.

It's not that I'm not happy to see her – hell, I'm happy just that she's happy to see me. But I'm uncertain, too, not really sure how we're going to play last night with the back and forth in the hotel hallway, shirtless Mark and pantsless Derek and all the awkwardness that went along with it.

"You know, the coffee here's not half bad." Callie grins at me, apparently not uncomfortable at all. She smells fresh and floral, which must be perfume, and she looks awfully put together for someone who got the Sloan Special last night. "The elevators have way too much glass for a girl who doesn't really need to see herself at seven a.m.," she continues, "but the coffee … the coffee is another story."

I let her chat, leading both of us across the marble floor to the espresso bar. It's hissing and steaming and there's already a line of early morning guests. She seems to know the hotel – I guess from her other nights with Mark.

"Is this awkward?" She turns to me now, making a face, and kind of gestures between us. "It's not awkward, right?"

I open my mouth to lie, but I realize it's actually not. I smile with relief, and Callie smiles back.

"Thank god. I am so weak," she says, rolling her eyes.

"It happens to the best of us," I assure her and she laughs. Her eyes have that sparkle I recognize of, well, who got worked over pretty well last night and what can I say? She deserves it. It's not like sleeping with Mark screws with her head, unlike me. Just her body, and Mark Sloan is very, very good at the concept of just her body.

I realize she's wearing a different outfit from yesterday – she either packs her work bag with sleepovers in mind or she's been the first woman I know to get Mark Sloan to hand over a drawer. It's possible – in all the time I've spent in his room, I don't think I've ever had cause to look in his dresser.

She seems to notice me looking. "Is there something on my shirt? … killer skirt, by the way," she adds, gesturing to The Illusion.

(Have I mentioned that it's really nice having someone around again who appreciates my clothes without wanting to take them off me?)

"No, there's nothing on your shirt," I tell her quickly. "And … thank you." I pause. "You look good. Put together, I mean."

Considering the walk of Sloan shame, except I don't say that part out loud.

She laughs, though, getting it. "Yeah, I was back in my room by dawn – I'm really doing this late-stage college thing pretty hard."

My face must show my confusion.

"Oh – I thought you knew. I'm staying here too."

"Staying here – " I'm still confused, as Callie gestures toward the lobby that surrounds us. "Staying here like living here?" My voice squeaks with disbelief.

"Like that, yeah. On seventeen." She winces a little. "I should have just gone back there last night to wash my face, but I was kind of – busy, and I wouldn't have bothered you but I was leaving these mascara trails on the pillowcases and Mark said you were just down the hall and … I feel like I should probably stop talking now." Her voice trails off. "And I'm sorry," she adds.

That's a lot of information to take in at once. I try to sort through it. Callie lives here too, in the Archfield? I've never seen her around, or I guess I wouldn't necessarily have noticed if I did. Admittedly, I've been kind of self-focused since the divorce.

"You live here too."

"I live here too." She makes a face again. "It's a long story. I'll give you all the gory details another time, preferably when we're drinking something stronger than – triple latte, please," she says seamlessly, grinning at the barista, having realized that we're next in line.

I'm glad her mind works so fast in the morning. I still feel jet-lagged. Then I remember the last part of her disclosure. She's sorry. But why?

I ask.

"Hang on." She waits for me to get my coffee and then we kind of move off to the side as if we planned it and end up on either side of large and rather aggressively green potted plant. "Yeah. I'm sorry about last night, I mean."

I'm not sure which part – maybe the eye makeup remover, which I still haven't gotten back and I don't quite trust Mark not to hand off to one of his twentysomething conquests, not really seeing the difference between my products and whatever synthetic drugstore nightmare they brought with them? Or telling Mark that Derek was in my hotel room?

"The code," she says.

"The code." I take a sip of coffee as if the cup holds answers – it doesn't, but it does hold caffeine, which feels almost as good.

"The girl code." Callie flicks some of her long hair over her shoulder.

"You mean sleeping with Mark? You can keep him," I tell her. I'm pretty it sure it sounds lighthearted even though it would take lot more work – and gin – to know if that's really the case.

"Ooh, no, I don't want to keep him. He was yours first."

"Possession is nine tenths of the law," I say without thinking, somewhere in the back of my mind remembering Savvy teasing Weiss while they argued good-naturedly over who was going to put away groceries in the beach house.

"I don't think that's a thing." Callie frowns, taking another sip of her coffee. "Why do people always say that?"

We both smile a little except it's one more land mine reminding me of everything I don't have anymore.

"Seriously, though." She sighs. "I shouldn't have bothered you last night. You were busy."

She pauses meaningfully, and I haven't been friendless for so long that I don't know it means it's my turn to start giving information. I kill some time drinking coffee instead, wondering if I should fake an urgent email.

"You and Shepherd," she says when I don't respond. She sounds interested, but not judgmental.

"He drove me back to the hotel."

"You mentioned that last night." She lifts an eyebrow. "I know he was at the bar with us and I know I was pretty drunk, but I'm fairly sure he was fully clothed then."

"He spilled – something on his pants." I swallow the word wine at the last minute, even if it's no more meaningful in my hotel room than water. I wouldn't want her to get the wrong idea.

She nods and then I open my mouth to say – I'm not sure what, something about Mark's reaction to Derek's presence except then, as if summoned by the wicked gods of Seattle coincidence, the man himself is here.

"Talking about me again?"

Ugh. Callie and I exchange a knowing look as Mark strides up, smirking at both of us. He's wearing his leather jacket and his hair is still damp; he's got that extra-swaggery posture that tells me he was in the gym this morning.

"We have much more interesting things to talk about, Sloan," Callie says. Her tone is light, and not unfriendly; then again, we were talking about him, so there's not a whole lot of leg to stand on here.

Mark looks amused. "Who wants a ride?" he asks, spreading his hands. "There's only one front seat, but you ladies can flip a coin … or wrestle for it."

Ugh, Mark is much easier to turn down when I'm sober. And surrounded by witnesses.

"I'm driving myself to work, thank you," I tell him politely.

"And I'm driving myself," Callie agrees. "So that's a no on your … rides.."

Mark gives her one of those toothy Sloan grins that used to go right through me and I can see the exact moment her resolve starts to weaken.

Ugh, it's not fair having to watch my own mistakes played out in front of me like this.

Callie seems to figure it out, too, looking a little embarrassed, and then Mark makes no secret of the fact that he knows exactly what skirt I'm wearing. He stares just long enough to make me feel like I'm already naked and then bids us both a cheerful good morning before he strolls to the revolving doors, whistling.

I exchange a look with Callie – the patented, universal, oh my god we both slept with him look. She opens her mouth to say something, then I see her gaze lock on the big gold wall clock and she curses softly. "It's late." She points a finger at me as she starts to dash to the door. "I need to give you something – later, okay?"

"…okay," I say to the back of her.

So Callie lives here, too. In this hotel.

I'll be damned.

..

Okay, so my white coat does hide the best part of my skirt, but it still gives me enough of a boost to get me through most of the morning. It's the little things, you know? And here, in Seattle, after Derek and all of that … little things are pretty much all I can hope for.

Especially when you're a virtual hostage to a very frustrated and very pregnant patient.

"Why won't anyone tell me anything useful?"

I give Eleanor Rivers my most sympathetic look, even though I've just spent the last fifteen minutes updating her on the triplets, breaking down the latest information and answering all her questions.

She gives me one of patented downward-tilt annoyed looks in response.

"If you have other questions, Eleanor, I'd be happy to answer them."

"Forget it," she sighs in a put-upon way. "Basically, you're not doing anything."

"Not today, no. That's right." It's a pretty oversimplified way of summarizing the last fifteen minutes, but she's right that there are no procedures on the schedule.

"All these overpaid doctors and you never actually do anything."

She's glaring again.

I'm guessing from her hostility that Colton hasn't shown up yet. Her husband is supposed to be coming today, which she's been announcing with a fanfare that should probably be less royal wedding and more the emperor has no clothes.

And it sucks. I get it. I don't have to fake the sympathy, not really, and I even get a slightly less hostile glare when I assure her I'll be back to relay all this information to Colton, too, when he shows up.

When he shows up. Let's hope she's not holding her breath – not when she's breathing for four.

On that depressing note, I leave her room with every intention of doing some charting between patients – but my blackberry buzzes, summoning me to the lounge instead.

..

"I may be a tad hungover," Callie admits, looking somewhere between embarrassed and amused. She's propped her hips against the counter where the coffee machine sits, chugging out pots of the sludge that tends to taste as burned out as the doctors who drink it.

"I know the feeling."

Not this morning, thankfully. It's kind of nice not to have a throbbing headache. I wouldn't say I feel good, but again … low bar.

"Yeah, I brought it on myself." Callie sighs. "You know, drowning my troubles and all that, except I can't drink like I used to. I'm getting old."

"You're not getting old." I frown at her. "I'm a lot older than you are."

She looks like she's about to retort but then stops, tips her head back and just takes a few breaths.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine." She massages her temples. "Just your garden-variety penance for last night's overindulgence. But never mind self-flagellation … how about some coffee?"

She's holding out a white paper bag. When I don't move she nudges it in my direction again and, confused, I take it.

"Open it," she prompts.

I do, reaching inside and pulling out … a mug. A dark blue mug with a grey S on it and a little compass-looking design. There are words, too; it says –

"Mariners." Callie gives me a rueful smile.

Oh, right. A Seattle team. I turn the mug in my hands, puzzled, and then offer it back to her.

"It's for you," she explains patiently.

"For me?"

I think I must sound idiotic, but she doesn't seem bothered.

"Yeah. I know it's kind of lame, but you can consider it a placeholder if you want."

I must still look confused.

"You needed a new mug," Callie says bluntly. "You've been drinking out of that – visitors' thing."

She's right. Of course she's right.

That white mug with the blue SGH, the one sitting on my desk when I signed my contract. It marks me as a stranger here in this hospital, a nobody.

Nice mug, that's what Derek said the other night when we were sparring halfheartedly in this very lounge, while he drank smugly from his old Bowdoin mug that was so familiar it might as well be another limb. Derek's never had to worry about being a stranger.

I look over at the ledge where the … visitors' thing … is waiting for me, then back at the mug from Callie.

"My options were limited … but it seemed like time was of the essence," she continues. "And, uh, I don't know you that well yet. I know you don't like green peppers in your salad, but that wasn't exactly available on a mug, at least without a lot of lead time. And I know you're not sleeping with Mark Sloan anymore, but surprisingly – considering how many women he's probably already screwed and then pissed off in Seattle – that wasn't available either."

I'm rinsing the new mug as I listen.

"… so I went with sports."

"Baseball," I say as I realize what the Mariners play.

"Yeah. You like baseball?"

Oh, it's a complicated question.

"I know you're from New York," she adds before I can answer. "So that's one more thing I know about you, but there's not a lot of gear around here for the Mets or the Yankees or whatever."

… which is good, because I think a Yankee insignia just might push me over the edge.

"No, this is good." I force a smile. "It's great. I do like baseball … enough to know that it would horrify Derek to see me with a Mariners mug. So it's great."

She blinks and for a minute I wonder if I've been too open. I mean, why does it matter what Derek would think of my mug?

But then she smiles, wide and disarming, and I feel a warm gush in my stomach again – friends, we're friends.

"Oh, and you have to let me make last night up to you," she says. "I know you're at the Archfield and you know I'm there and I also know that they have a pretty decent spa, so … what do you think?"

What do I think? I have a brief vision of lounging in a fragrant teak sauna with cucumbers on my eyes, blocking out the world.

"I think I'd like to go right now."

She grins, looking pleased. "Ditto, but I'm due in the OR in … twenty minutes. I'll definitely be done by six, though – meet around seven?"

I just nod, a little dazedly.

"Callie?"

She turns around.

I ask her before I even realize why. "When did you buy the mug?"

And then I know it's because I want to believe it's not some kind of apology for the bar last night, the eye makeup remover in the hotel or the unfortunately way we keep passing Mark back and forth.

"Yesterday morning," she says, "why?"

"No reason." I feel almost shy, embarrassing relief wobbling my legs. "So, um, see you at seven?"

She points a finger at me, grinning. "You'd better."

..

I stand in the lounge for another minute after Callie leaves, drinking coffee out of the blue Seattle Mariners mug. Spa. The word is turning over in my head as I remember last night in the hotel room, needling Derek about keeping his own post-marital calendar. Kathleen's birthday is next week, that's what I told him.

It's on my calendar, along with a note the day before to confirm her present.

Her present.

I've been giving Kathleen the same gift certificate to Frederic Fekkai for the last eight birthdays. When you have a classic, there's no need for change. She wants it, she uses it, we meet afterwards for a drink and she pretends she doesn't have kids and I pretend I don't think about waiting until the right time. It's tradition.

I was always in charge of that stuff, in my marriage: cards. And gifts.

I signed them from both of us, of course.

With love from Addison and Derek.

Not anymore.

Now it's just me.

With love from the loneliest divorcee in Seattle.

Suddenly the back of my throat starts tingling. Kath's birthday is in my calendar, of course it is, and what am I supposed to do when the date comes? Not send her gift, her card, not acknowledge it?

I have no idea.

I have no idea what I'm supposed to do.

I announce this to myself as if Kathleen is actually here and we're teasing her like we used to, how do you feel about that? There are endless jokes when your sister-in-law is a shrink.

I guess she's not my sister-in-law anymore, though. She's a Shepherd and I'm not. I'm Addison Montgomery and she's just … my ex-husband's sister.

The only problem is that Addison Montgomery disappeared from this earth on a warm spring evening in 1994. She was twenty-seven years old, she was a second-year resident, she had no smile wrinkles or eye lines and she had her whole life in front of her. I doubt she'd recognize the old, sad me of today – even if she'd probably like the skirt – and I'm glad she doesn't have to see me.

But yeah, that was the end of Addison Montgomery.

Everything else I've achieved – everything I've done from that day on, everything I've learned, everything I've published, every presentation I've given, every introduction at a patient's bedside or signature on a check, was Addison Shepherd.

So who the hell is Addison Montgomery?

..

The best part of practicing medicine is that work tends to be too busy for the sort of really high-quality moping my disaster of a life requires.

Who the hell is Addison Montgomery? I still have no clue. But I'm distracted by patients, at least, by colleagues – even if half of them call me Dr. Shepherd. So the adrenaline of treatment, combined with the lure of an impending spa date with a friend (a friend!) … … it's enough to get me through the afternoon and then I'm back in the caucus room with Team Triplets, discussing babies A, B, and C with Derek and Walter Graves once again.

Three of us, three of them.

Walter's brought tapes from a previous procedure, and we set them up while we continue to bat around dates. She's twenty-nine plus right now; Derek's fine with opening her up at thirty-one – of course he is – and willing to try at thirty, but I'm still hoping she can make it to thirty-three. We go back and forth a bit, the three of us.

Babies A and B, sharing a placenta, with their normal CNS systems and their dependence on the same womb as damaged little Baby C with her complex malformation. Anything we do with one affects the others, and anything we don't do affects them too.

In medicine – like in marriage, come to think of it – inaction is action too.

Derek pauses the tape to point out the technique, praising it while he holds a paper cup of coffee in one hand, and Walter brushes off the compliment with genuine modesty, turning the topic of conversation back to the procedure itself.

"It's an excellent learning opportunity," Walter says, "and an unusual one. You'll have interns champing at the bit when they hear about it."

Two things happen then: Derek chokes on a mouthful of his coffee, and I bite the inside of my cheek hard – really hard – to keep from laughing.

Walter pats Derek congenially on the back. "Careful, now," he says.

Yeah. Wouldn't want to bite off more than he can … champ.

(And seriously, if Walter weren't Seattle's most straight-edge surgeon and if I weren't, well, me, I might be turned on just from hearing him say champing instead of chomping. A little linguistic precision goes a long way.)

"Are you all right?" Walter asks.

"I'm fine," Derek says, frowning at me as if the whole thing is my fault. What? he mouths, looking somewhere between offended and annoyed, when he catches my eye.

Marital shorthand for the very necessary question: what is it you think I've done this time, wife of mine? I don't say anything. I'm annoyed with him now, it's true. But it's not like I can tell him that the reason I'm annoyed with him is that I have no idea how I'm supposed to acknowledge his sister's impending birthday. Not when it sounds so unimportant compared to everything else.

Derek is still looking at me expectantly and I shake my head, looking away from that too-familiar tilt of his head and trying to telegraph drop it without saying anything out loud.

He does drop it.

Then he clears his throat. "Actually, I've already discussed the procedure with one of my interns," he announces, "and she's interested in assisting."

Seriously?

"Ahead of the game, that's terrific. Which intern?" Walter asks, sincerely.

"Yang," I say quickly before Derek can answer, in my most innocent tone, ignoring the dirty look he shoots me. "It must be Yang. See, Derek has a thing for surly brunettes."

"It would be a nice change from surly redheads," he mutters.

"Yang, eh?" Walter repeats with interest, apparently picking up on none of the oh-so-subtle post-divorce undertones.

(Undertones, though? Really? They're more like overtones at this point.)

"Yang. Well. That's a fine idea. She shows a lot of promise," Walter is saying now and Derek glares at me again. "I didn't realize she was so interested in neonatal and … am I missing something?" Walter asks now, sounding puzzled, looking from one of us to the other.

"No, of course not. Dr. Montgomery just finds herself very amusing," Derek says tightly, directing his words to Walter Graves. "You'll have to forgive her."

Funny choice of words when he still hasn't forgiven me … but I guess I take his point. Still, the Dr. Montgomery stings.

After last night's conversation, after everything, it stings.

He can't know that, though, not if I can help it.

"Yes, please forgive me, Walter." I give him my best deb smile before I turn to address Derek: "Go ahead … Dr. Shepherd. Tell Walter which intern you really meant."

Derek shakes his head at me, just slightly, which if we were married would be a sort of half-warning, half-we'll deal with this later ... but we're not married.

Not anymore.

Walter is looking from one of us to the other again and now I feel a little guilty. Walter Graves never asked to be caught between us. At least Derek and I are reaping what we sowed here; Walter never sowed anything except actual professionalism that seems to have escaped every other surgeon here … so, yeah.

"He means Meredith Grey," I say since Derek hasn't responded. "She's very good," I add with some measure of guilt, since hey, it's true, but I can't seem to stop being petty, so I add quietly, "including in the OR."

"Seriously?" Derek glares at me.

"What?" I ask defensively. "She has a good manner with patients."

It's just my luck that I'm actually trying to dig myself out of the hole here, but it comes out sounding enough like bedside manner that Derek flushes visibly and I'm thinking we probably crossed friendly banter a few miles back.

"I just meant – "

"We all know what you meant," Derek interrupts coolly. "Did you have a better idea?" he continues, cutting me off again when I try to edge in: "Please, share it with the group. Assuming there's an intern left here who's willing to work with you."

Ooh, low blow.

You might think he's throwing a guilt trip about the little lie of omission before Hannah Fowler's procedure, but Derek's nothing if not a multitasker: I know him well enough to know he's adding in some extra layers here: Izzie Stevens and our aborted mentor-mentee relationship, such as it was, and then the general tendency of everyone in Seattle to want nothing to do with me.

We get it, Derek, no one likes me. You don't like me so much you divorced me. It's old news, no matter how many stupid moments of weakness I have when even for just a second when you're there and you seem like … you.

"Actually," I say with as much dignity as I can manage, "I've also spoken with an intern who's interested in the procedure."

Derek makes a faint noise somewhere between disgust and disbelief.

"The more, the merrier," Water says, somehow still managing a hearty tone. He gives me an encouraging nod. "Which intern?"

"Alex Karev. He's shown some real promise in my specialty."

"Which specialty is that?" Derek asks, very quietly, for my benefit only.

I guess it hasn't escaped his notice either that Karev's a bit of a mini-Sloan. It's my turn to blush now.

"Well, this year's cohort is very strong," Walter says in a tone of neutral positivity like he's interviewing medical students. "I'm sure there's room for everyone."

Oh, he'd be surprised how small an OR can feel.

Derek and I are studiously avoiding each other's gaze and I just stand there, staring at the HIPAA chart on the wall, before Walter – who's apparently had enough divorce counseling for the day – tactfully moves us back to the topic at hand.

..

We get along fine when we're actually talking about the triplets.

The three of us go back and forth for a while longer, jotting some notes on the tapes and then plotting our options on the software that spins out various scenarios – we're going day by day here, update by update, that's how it works. We agree on a daily course, in these team meetings, and we move on.

Easy.

Right?

Except Walter gets paged out of the caucus room as we're wrapping up and then it's just me, alone with Derek.

I'm trying to figure out if I'd lose too much face by slinking sideways out the door to avoid him – admittedly, I'm a little ashamed of pushing things earlier, especially after last night – but he starts in before I can.

"Really, Addison?" Derek has that haughty-judgmental expression on now that I know so well. "Was that necessary?"

He doesn't have to say Meredith for me to know he's annoyed that I brought her up. That she doesn't deserve to get dragged through whatever we were doing in front of Walter.

And I can't even be annoyed that he's so – protective of her, or whatever, because he's right.

And I hate that he's right … and I hate that he knows that I know that.

I should just apologize and move on and friends don't let friends mock each other's ex-mistresses in front of their esteemed colleagues or whatever.

That would be the right response.

The healthy one.

So you can probably guess which I choose.

"'Really, Addison,' what?" I ask, repeating his words with scorn. "What's the issue here? You think throwing your ex-girlfriend a rare fetal surgery is going to make her your girlfriend again?"

(Look, I did stop at two glasses of wine last night, but not all my decisions can be healthy.)

Derek's eyes at my words. It's classic him; he dishes it out but he's still managed to be surprised to get it dished back. I wait for him to tell me in some vaguely-less-blunt way what a bitch I am … but then he surprises me.

"She's my ex-girlfriend?" he asks, his tone deceptively mild, leaning just enough on the ex to make the point.

Okay, I wasn't expecting that one. Point, Derek.

It's targeted enough to stop me, a little.

"You're the one who said you weren't dating her." I feel my words start to tumble around each other, not liking how my voice sounds. "You said you weren't dating, that … ."

I stop talking. I know I sound like an idiot and I don't want to ramble, not to him. "So that means she's your girlfriend again?" I ask.

"I didn't say that." Derek has the nerve to look annoyed with me again. He exhales audibly, half-put-upon and half plain-old-tired. "Addison – "

So now I'm Addison again, just Dr. Montgomery when he's pissed at me in front of Walter, good to know.

" – did I miss something?"

He missed a lot, obviously, but that's not the issue right now.

"Is there some reason you're being so hostile – other than your natural charms?"

The thing is, I get it.

I do.

I know last night was different. Callie wasn't the only one who was weak in that hotel. Derek was there and his eyes were so soft and I was this close to saying something stupid – or worse, doing something stupid. But now? Here, in the cold light of day under his cold gaze with the weight of everything I've lost, from that stupid spa birthday reminder to being the one Derek looks out for. I don't want him to be nice to me. I'm not sure I want him to be mean to me, either ... but I think I might prefer it right now.

I'm so tired of feeling stripped raw when we breathe the same air.

He's just standing there, waiting for an answer. It's a caucus room and not a supply closet, not a hotel or even the four claustrophobic walls of a trailer, but why does it feel like we always end up here?

I open my mouth to say – I don't even know what, but I'm tired. I'm so tired, and there's no more wind in my sails.

"Forget it."

"No, please go on." Derek's tone is clipped as he gathers speed; I guess my exhaustion has energized him. We used to take turns carrying on the fight, like this, when we were married. Back then, I don't think I realized how much it took out of us. "Let's hear all your excellent relationship with the interns whose reputations you were happy to risk to settle a score."

So we're back to that again: the standoff outside Hannah Fowler's room before her termination procedure, the one Derek didn't know the hospital authorized.

I draw myself up a little taller than my full height, even knowing he's just going to do the same in return. "The interns' reputations were never on the line, Derek, and you know it."

"But they didn't know it, did they? What would have been the fun in that?"

I don't even understand it. Why we're fighting when things were so – calm, between us, yesterday. I just know we are.

And my hackles are up. Fun? Really? I glare right back at him.

"If you think any of that was fun for me … then you weren't paying attention. But then what else is new?"

He shakes his head, annoyed. "This again. Doesn't the divorce mean you have to stop nagging me? Or is that why you want Karev to assist," he continues before I can defend myself, raising his eyebrows, "he gives you attention?"

There's enough awkward truth in there to sting, even though I'm fairly certain he's just shooting in the dark. When all else fails, call me a whore, that's how it goes. He can't possibly know – no. There's no way.

But I have to come out swinging just in case.

"Look, Derek, maybe this is all fun and games to you, but we're talking about an extraordinarily delicate fetal surgery here – not some – consolation prize for your girlfriend because you finished before she did."

It's a touch more graphic than I'd usually go, and in my experience it's most likely to be patently false too. The things is, he's not going to be offended my slights about his prowess; we both know they're hot air. He has to be the good guy though, Derek, so the suggestion he's not a giver? … that won't go over well.

His face proves my prediction was right.

"Excuse me." He doesn't raise his voice, but his tone is even colder – if possible. "You'd be wise to keep our … personal lives … off the table."

"Like you did?" I feel reckless all of a sudden, full of hot anger. "You kept it on the table, as I recall, or do exam rooms not count?"

His face darkens; I'm a little surprised myself – I don't throw prom in his face, not like this, and it doesn't feel particularly good to do it.

Some of the anger dissipates, leaving an ache in its place.

"Derek – "

"No." He cuts me off with a shake of his head, his voice is tight. "You're not going to – "

But the door bursts open behind me before he can finish.

"Dr. Montgomery!"

I swivel around, a little surprised again to hear that name, my correct-post-divorce name. It makes me think the skirt isn't the only illusion that's working today – and then I'm not thinking about it at all because the voice who called my name, the intern who's standing in the doorway with his chest rising fast under his scrubs like he ran here, is Alex Karev.

"It's the Rivers triplets," Karev says urgently before I can ask what's going on, and my heart sinks before he even finishes his pronouncement. "They're in distress."

Derek and I exchange one wordless glance before all three of us shoulder out of the room, moving as fast as we can toward babies A, B, and C.

To be continued. These two drive me crazy - they were doing so well, but it wouldn't be season 3 whiplash without a little ... well, whiplash. Thank you for reading - as always - and I hope you'll review because I love reading your thoughts, and because Addison isn't the only one out there who runs on validation. Now excuse me while I go balance getting work done on this grey Tuesday with my unofficial other job: crying over Addek. Keeps a girl busy ...

(PS: the grey skirt from "Into You Like a Train" is 100% authentic, for anyone not shallow enough to have already noticed)