ADDISON
"He was also a person of interest in the murder and sexual assault investigation, but the lead was dropped. Lack of evidence. The murder of a …" She has to stop again, because otherwise she would choke on the sob building up in her throat. Brooks just looks at her, waiting for her to continue. "…of a six-year old girl. She was just six. Just a baby."
"You knew her?" Brooks asks even though it sounds like he knows the answer. His tone is even softer, though and for a second, he almost, almost sounds gentle.
"My daughter." Her voice is nothing more than a whisper. "Our daughter"
There is this stunned silence, the agonizing gaze of disbelieve, and then pity, that always follows, once people know.
Not that she ever actively tells people. It's not like she walks around and casually drops this little piece of her past over coffee. But in New York most people found out anyway. Neighbours, Co-workers, the moms from Aria's school - all of them heard. Gossip mills are not that different on the east coast. They would recite their condolences, with downcast eyes, or just walk past them with these oh-so-subtle, sad glances. Some would reach out a hand for their own kids, as if to keep them closer. As if they wanted to protect their own children from things, that were to gruesome to even speak about. For these people they were simply an upsetting article in the news, for Derek and her they were brutal reality.
She hates Seattle, she really does, but she has to admit that these encounters are a part of New York, that she doesn't miss. At Seattle Grace, the only person who knows, is Richard, and she knows for a fact, that he would never let this part of their history slip into the hospital gossip. Maybe, this is why Derek likes it so much here. It's easier, if you don't see their curious, pitiful eyes behind every corner of your life.
But more probably, the main reason why Derek likes Seattle so much, is blonde, petite and answers to the name Meredith Grey.
God, her marriage is over.
The headache has only gotten worse as well. Hoping to get some relief, she leans her chin on one hand, that is propped up on the metal table, Bizzy and her etiquette training be dammed. Inches behind her left ear, her fingers brush a warm liquid, and she notices that she's bleeding, a little. The wound is conveniently hidden by thick strands of her hair, that, four hours and one messy street fight ago, were still perfectly arranged curls. She thinks about how carefully she styled this hair a few hours ago in the tiny trailer bathroom, humming, while she was planning this night out in her head: It was supposed to be a good night. Better than her last prom night with the star wars nerd. And most definitely a better night, than the lonely ones in the trailer.
People plan and god laughs buttonight, God had a particularly dark sense of humour.
She is stupid. Naïve and stupid.
"How can you be sure? That it was Daniels?"
Detective Brooks has apparently regained his composure, comparatively quickly. She doesn't answer him right away, half expects the earlier complaints from Brooks, about his dinner dates and overtime hours and all of his other normal-people problems. But he remains quite, waits, until the silence becomes uncomfortable. It's probably interrogation 101, but she speaks up anyway.
"He has a tattoo. I could see it from the car"
"A lot of people have tattoos"
"But not a lot of people have a neck tattoo, that says 08.12.1984 in roman numbers."
And trust me: You don't forget the face of the man, who took away the one person you loved more than anything.
But of course, Brooks doesn't care about that:
" Why this date? What kind of meaning does it - ?"
"I don't know. We don't exactly chitchat with each other"
She laughs bitterly, and it hurts in the swollen half of her lip. (As well as everywhere else.)
The blood is now sticking to the fingers of her propped arm, warm and wet: She smears it on the tabletop in front of her. If she tilts her head a little to the left and squints her eyes, the red prints on the metal look almost like a blossom. Like an open, five-petalled Daffodil.
When Aria had just turned four, they went to that one farmer's market in Connecticut for the day (Derek's idea, of course). They were already headed home, when they passed the little flower stall. It had a huge variety of all kinds of plants, but her daughter went directly to the large bucket the yellow of cut flowers, clapped her hands excitedly when Derek finally bought one for her, and displayed it proudly in her playroom, the minute they arrived at home.
It's memories like this one, the simple and seemingly insignificant ones, that now are the most painful.. Maybe, she didn't appreciated these moments enough. Now, she'd give anything to go back there, just for a few minutes, to just enjoy their little trip to on a sunny day-off, strolling through the small town market, while her little girl hops excitedly from one "attraction" to the other. With the sun warm on her skin and her husband's arm around her shoulder. She'd do anything to go back to being a clueless fool, who had no idea what was about to come.
In reality it's just her, the flickering fluorescent lights, and the detective across the table, who seems to be back to his disinterested self. Disapprovingly, he frowns at the bloody finger prints, she left on the table . "That's municipal property. We can add the cleaning bill to your fine, if you want"
Fuck you she replies. In her head.
Thankfully, Brooks' phone vibrates on the counter, before she has time to say anything out loud.
"Your husband is here with the documents" he announces after hanging up. The plastic chair scratching the floor with an ugly screech, as he hoists himself up " We're meeting him in the office, so we can wrap up the rest of the paperwork for your release."
Awesome, so did you, by any chance also find out, how much he hates me right about now? Maybe we can wrap up the paperwork for our divorce, while we're at it?
It takes her another second to realize that he said "release"
"What about the charges?" she asks, not sure if she actually cares.
He casts her a scrutinizing glance.
"The prosecutor will review your case in the morning. For tonight, you can go home."
Home. The word sounds strange, like a word from a foreign language. Where would Home even be? Her first Home used to be the tiny cramped flat that Mark and Derek shared, near the Columbia campus, which became even more cramped once Addison became its third, unofficial inhabitant. Home used to be the not much larger apartment in Brooklyn they rented once Mark couldn't handle their nauseatingly happiness of the Soon-to-be-Shepherds any longer.
Home was the brownstone, until it wasn't.
The trailer, though?
Brooks clears his throat and she blinks.
He's holding the door open: "What, are you waiting for an invitation?"
DEREK
The last thing he hears as he vomits onto the concrete of the precinct's courtyard is Aldridge's sneering voice from inside, dripping with arrogance: "Oh, this is great. Another nut job"
It takes him ten minutes and forty-six seconds to stand up.
The asphalt of the tiny court yard, he has fled to, is unforgivingly hard and freezing beneath his knees, and yet, right now, this dirty, vomit stinking place offers the only thing he needs . It's empty. Silent. Just him and the pain, and the memories.
So he stays. Just until he has remembered how to breathe and until he manages to get the images out of his mind.
Of Aria, tiny in her incubator, and only a few hours old.
Of coming home to a brownstone filled with childish laughter and the smell of baby shampoo.
Of Aria, older, her hair in pigtails, rambling on about her latest swimming lesson with Mikey, and how she's not scared anymore.
Of the court room.
Of Daniels.
There's an empty trash can standing in one corner of the yard. It makes a satisfyingly loud crash when he kick it against the wall.
The scene must look so laughable, so absurd for an outsider and what just happened in the office might just qualify him for a 72- hour- psych hold. If he doesn't want to actually end up there, he has to pull himself together, go back in, maybe even apologize to that police girl for lashing out and behave like a normal human being.
Emotionally stable.
He has to pull himself together, he knows that. He just needs another second.
Ten Minutes and forty-six seconds to the door. Ten minutes and fifty-eight seconds to finds his way back, through hallways he doesn't remember taking before.
"Mr. Shepherd. How kind of you to join us" The blonde man, who speaks, doesn't even seem to have the energy to sound particularly angry. The name tag on his perfectly unwrinkled shirt reads Det. C. Brooks. Det. C. Brooks gives Derek a look, like the ones that he and Addison preserve for interns, who wake them up in the middle of the night for completely preventable issues: He's clearly annoyed, and too exhausted to hide it behind a mask of professionalism. At 1:30 am Derek can't exactly blame him.
At least, the witness guy's is nowhere to be seen, thankfully. Lea Sanchez, the young officer from earlier is there, though, watching him , or rather studying him. It's like he's a zoo animal, some mysterious creature yet to be examined. It's a similar curiosity that Derek himself would study a rare MRI result or a complicated tumor with: It makes him want to leave again.
To walk away. Supposedly it's what he does best.
Back in New York, the first year after it happened, his shrink sister Kathleen would silently watch both him and Addison with the same kind of scientific interest. Analyzing, almost like she was waiting for the first psychotic breakdown to happen.
They haven't seen her in years now.
Then there's the third person.
"Addison"
The dress is black, low cut at the back, made out of some shiny material, he isn't familiar with. He doesn't think he's seen her wear it before. It would look pretty, beautiful even.
Except it doesn't match with the deep purple and red of the bruises. He's seen a lot of injuries before, the worst kind anyone can imaging, the kind, where you don't know, where the blood stops and the patient begins. The little swelling of his wife's lower lip and the hematomas on her face and neck are comparatively minor. They are startling in a very different, personal yet they are not even the worst part. The worst are her eyes. The resignation.
After eleven years of marriage and fifteen of knowing her, he knows how to read his wife's facial expression, how to read her. He can detect frustration, anger, or enthusiasm from the slightest movement of her eyebrows. He has her frowns, glances and of course the death-glares, memorized like words of a second language. He can tell how her last surgery went just from her posture.
Since Mark happened, he has been trying his very best to unlearn these little things. To unhear the silent accusations, and constant confrontation, the We should talk about this and the Are we okay. It would be so much easier to ignore her and her attempts at reaching out, if he didn't see the hurt, everytime he declines or brushes her away. Like that one time on the ferry when he pretended not to see her. But has to brush her away because frankly, nothing in the world scares him more than these talks that she's begging for. These terrifying, Capital T Talks, that he fears might lead them from uncomfortable topics like Meredith over painful ones like Mark to the unbearable topic of his daughter.
His daughter. He had a daughter.
Nobody in Seattle knows McDreamy ever had a child. Or any kind of tragic past: It's not part of his character description. McDreamy is the uncomplicated guy in the bar, the brilliant god of neurosurgery, the minimalist that lives in the woods despite his million dollar pay checks. No strings attached. No dead child. No crumbling marriage.
And no wife, that has apparently given up all hope. Right now, all he sees in Addison's face that is still so painfully easy to read, is emptiness. Her eyes almost look dead.
He does what he does, when he's at a loss. He focuses on the safe areas, on the one thing he knows, he's good with. Medicine. Medicine is easy. He focuses on the visible wounds, the ones you fix with ice packs or patches. Or in his wife's case, sutures, because the longer he sees Addison's face, the worse it seems: there is even a bleed on the left of her temple.
"She's looking like that and you people are worrying about goddamn street regulations? How about calling an ambulance first?" He raises his voices at the officers, suddenly he doesn't care about a making a second scene anymore .
Brooks massages his temples at the loud volume "Mr. Shepherd"-?"
"There's always a risk of subdural hematomas with head injuries like this. You should have gotten medical attention first."
"Derek-" Addison starts
"Sir, would you please- "
"No, I will not calm down. I'm sick of you people not doing your goddamn job."
Just, like your colleagues in New York. The ones that were supposed to lock my child's murderer behind bars for good, and failed.
"We offered to get medical care, actually " Lea pipes in "But Mrs. Shepherd insisted that she didn't need any"
"Well, Dr. Shepherd should know better than to underestimate head injuries" He throws a look at Addison.
There's something else in her expression now. Is it Surprise? Confusion?
"Derek, I'm fine. would you please stop making a fuss?"
"I'm making a fuss?! Addison, have you looked in a mirror? You look absolutely horrifying"
For a small second, she's stunned, silent, then makes a small, joyless laugh
"And they say romance is dead"
ADDISON
Okay, this is definitely worse than prom with Skippy Gold. Times one hundred. It's humiliating and pathetic, and exhausting, and all she wants is to get out of this horrible precinct as fast as possible.
Not only because of the interrogation or because of Brooks. But because after all, all precinct, east or west coast look similar, with their plastic chairs and replaceable interior. This place brings back memories of another precinct. Back then, she wasn't under arrest, she was just a mother. Or at least, she was praying, that she was still a mother.
It brings back memories of Derek, also yelling, just like now, at Detective Bernard at Detective Spielberg and anyone who would care to listen.
Yelling and begging, all at once.
Just do your damn job!
Luckily, Derek seems to want to get away from here to. Maybe it's the first thing they agree on in a while. They fill out the required paperwork quickly and obediently, while they avoid each other's gazes painstakingly.
After what feels like fifty signatures, it's time to leave. In the precinct elevator, the fluorescent lights are humming quietly above them. Derek stay quiet as well.
But unfortunately, she was never good at handling silence.
"I'm sorry, okay? About the fine, I mean. I can pay it my trust fund, if you…"
" I don't care about the fine, Addison. Don't worry about it" He doesn't even sound rude or unfriendly, just preoccupied. Like his mind is somewhere else. There, but not there. What else is new.
She sighs, fidgeting with her rings, a habit that used to be comforting: "Right. Well, I'm sorry for ruining your evening, then."
"It doesn't make any sense" he says and sounds like he's thinking out loud more than talking to her.
"What?"
"Why is Daniels in Seattle?"
Yeah. She's been pondering that exact same question for the last hour, too. "I have no idea"
"I mean, even if he's out of jail, on a bail or whatever, he would be in New York, right? It just doesn't make sense.
"I- "
"Are you even sure it was him?" The first time, he actually speaks to her, not just at her, and his eyes are full of distrust. Of scepticism.
She needs a second to stomach it, before the anger sets in.
"Yes, I'm sure, Derek. Do you really think I would lie to you? About this? Do you really think I'm that kind of person?"
Yes.
Yes, I do, because I didn't think you were the kind of person to cheat either, but then you taught me otherwise.
She waits for the comeback, for Derek to pull out his ultimate weapon to silence her: her betrayal. Lately, he seems to have had a automatism installed, that provides some sort of cheap shot about her affair, in every argument.
It surprises her when it doesn't come. Derek just massages the bridge of his nose, like he can feel a headache building up behind it .
Welcome to the club, honey.
"Sorry." He says finally. It almost sounds genuine. "But you could have confused him."
" I didn't, Derek" Her voice is softer now. She's too tired, too sad to yell at him. After all, Denial is the first response to these kind of things. It's natural for Derek to deny, that the monster is in the same goddam rain hole, where no person with a choice would want to be.
She is good at denial, too. In fact, if Passive- Aggresiva should ever expel her, she'd make a decent queen for the land of denial as well. When she picked up that frantic call from Derek, and he told her he couldn't find Aria anywhere around the public swimming pool where he was supposed to pick her up, she denied it. She hold onto the logical, harmless explanations. That Aria had gone home, with a friend with Lydia's son Trevor, maybe. Later, when there were police cars parking in front of her house and uniformed officers were searching Aria bright yellow bedroom from clues about her whereabouts, she still denied that it was all real. That it wasn't a movie, or a nightmare. That she wouldn't wake up.
"What would Daniels even do here?" Derek sounds fragile. It's like he is genuinely asking , really looks at her. He doesn't have any bruises, no visible ones. But he still looks so broken that she has to swallow back tears of her own. It's so out of character for him. It seems like he's really at a loss, really reaching out for her, for an explanation, for comfort, anything.
Whatever he's looking for, she can't offer it. She is just as helpless as him.
When she answers, there is that weird voice again, watery and ridiculously weak. Not like her. Dr. Addison Montgomery Shepherd doesn't cry.
Tears are for the bedroom, dear. A lady doesn't bother others with her emotions
There was a time when Derek was the exception. There was a time when Derek would take her into his arms and stroke her hair and assure her that he could always be bothered. That he cared and would always care.
"How would I know?"
She can feel her upper lip tremble under his gaze. His eyes soften and she wonders what he would do if they were still okay. If they hadn't screwed up so enormously.
"He was just there. He was just there, walking down the same streets as me, breathing the same air as me. I wasn't thinking. I just … snapped"
The elevator dings cheerily. They've reached the ground floor.
AUTHOR'S NOTE:
To be continued! Until then, tell me what you think!