Accidentally in Love

Grey's Anatomy, Cristina/Burke

By greyeyedgirl

Suppose, we never know.

Cristina stood in Burke's apartment, listlessly sorting through his stack of CDs. Burke had had an emergency surgery, and was due back in half an hour or so. Until then, Cristina was determined to un-Burke-itize the apartment, without actually taking the Burke out of it. The inside of his refrigerator was arranged like the food pyramid, for God's sake.

She carefully took out two CDs from the "C" department. (They were not only organized alphabetically, the individual sections were actually labelled.) She switched them with two from the "N's." Kenny Chesney, meet The Nutcracker Soundtrack. Oh, lord, Burke listened to Kenny Chesney.

Him and his damn coffee.

Okay. He probably wouldn't even notice. Unless he was planning to buy an NSync CD or something, which wouldn't be happening anytime soon, she was guessing.

Damn. That was him coming in, she heard the door close and the familiar rattle of his keys. She quickly turned, flashing him a quick smile that he enthusiastically returned, leaning in to kiss her hello. "Hi."

"Hi," she said, smiling as he pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. "How'd the surgery go?"

"Perfectly. I had an aortic aneurysm. Doesn't happen everyday, you know."

Cristina felt herself perk up considerably. She loved aortic aneurysms.

"How was your day?" He asked.

"Fine. Great case. 13-year-old with trigeminal neuralgia."

Burke smiled at her as he opened the door to the fridge.

"So I was thinking..." His voice trailed off, as he carefully inspected the fridge but didn't say anything. He stood up and smiled.

"Maybe we could just relax tonight. Celebrate our first night together in our apartment."

Cristina felt a twinge of guilt, but forced a smile onto her face. "That sounds great."

He leaned forward and kissed her gently, pulling her into his arms. "Our apartment."

The twinge was quickly becoming like a tumor, weighing down on her and pulling her under. "Yes."

He looked at her intently for a moment, and Cristina felt the whirling feeling in her stomach that signaled she was staring into his eyes. "Cristina, I love you," he murmured.

She had just felt her mind starting to gently drift away when it came crashing down to Earth with a large thud.

"You what?"

This had clearly not been the response he was looking for. He pulled himself away from her slightly, as she forced her eyes to break her and Burke's unwavering gaze.

"I love you."

She felt like her pulse beating so rapidly inside her, it was a miracle her veins didn't catch on fire. "Wha-you-"

"Cristina." He was trying to pull her back to him.

"You-" She was pulling away, she knew it and she couldn't stop herself, her mind was like a television, only now instead of reception she was getting static. The sound was hurting her ears.

"Cristina!" He didn't want her to separate herself from him. But then why did he say such a stupid thing?

"Burke, I-I think I gotta go. Maybe to the-"

Burke took hold of her arms, pulling her close to him with arms that were somehow forceful but unthreatening. "Cristina, you can't leave. This is a big night for us."

Right. Right. Wait-no! Why was it a big night? Cristina's mind went a million miles per hour, and sometimes she thought it didn't even have breaks. Right. The 'move.'

"Burke, I have to go. I just remembered, I told Meredith I'd..." Her voice broke off, she couldn't seem to think, which sucked. Thinking was a major part of her.

Burke was staring at her sadly, not wanting her to go. His eyebrows were shifted together, cringing his large brown eyes. His grip on her had lessened, and she carefully untangled her arms from his hands, breaking away. "I gotta..." she murmured almost silently to herself. She wasn't sure if he'd heard her or not.

"I gotta go," she whispered, brushing her hair back with her hand, keeping her head pivoted towards the floor. Her stride was awkward and nearly unpurposeful. She vaguely heard Burke's voice saying her name as she wretched open the door, but didn't let herself turn around.

Cristina paced around her apartment, picking up dirty clothes and putting them back down again in slightly readjusted positions. Love. What was it, anyway?

What was it, that was powerful enough to cause a brazen, competitive, non-emotional intern to start bawling in front of mother and one of her friends? What was it that allowed her to walk into Burke's apartment every night, unknowlingly on a desperate scavenger hunt for his smile. What?

Something her childhood best friend, Morgan, had once said came hurling back into her mind. Morgan had been intelligent, rivaling Cristina in science fairs and to get certain scholarships and awards. But, to Cristina's disbelief, Morgan had chosen to become a writer. "Cristina, do you ever think about how much time we spend thinking about ourselves? It's what we do with like, 99 of the day! Worrying about how we look, about our problems. Or just thinking about ourselves in general. We don't think about what we're doing as we do it. It's just natural. Everyone's pretty caught up in themselves. Maybe that's what love is. You realize you're thinking about someone else as much as your thinking about yourself. What do you think it's like, knowing one other face as well as we know our own?"

Cristina collapsed onto her couch, pushing an old pair of scrub pants onto the floor. She carelessly grabbed a red blanket and covered up with it, then realized it was the exact same blanket she and Burke had used when they'd been together in her apartment. Ohhhh, it even smelled like him.

The phone rang, breaking her out of her reverie. She reached into her pocket to grab her cell, hitting the talk button before glancing at the screen to see who it was. "Hello?"

"What the hell was that all about?" Burke's voice was a mix of anger and frustration, with the underlining of love coming firmly to her ear.

"Oh...Burke." Why did her voice sound like that? Why was her heart beat suddenly so irregular?

"Who did you think it would be?" Cristina couldn't think of anything in order to respond.

"I told you that I love you. I do love you. Why does that have to be bad?" Preston's voice was pleading with her, but he sounded tired, too.

"Burke, I..." Her voice was quiet. "I don't know. I don't know why I keep running away."

Burke's voice was quiet too, and for a moment she felt so close to him she could actually visualize his presence not two feet away. "When will you figure it out?"

Cristina could hear herself breathing, it broke a pattern and was like a auditory kaleidoscope.

"Cristina."

"I'm sorry. I'm trying."

Burke's voice turned from quiet to just soft. "Where are you? I'll come pick you up."

Well. How was she going to talk her way out of this one?

"I...I could just drive home. Since my car is here."

Burke was quiet for a moment, and she thought he might be mad. Then it struck her what she had said.

"Home?" It was he that had spoken. There was a smile in his voice. Home?

"I'll be there soon, okay?"

"I can't wait."

"Bye."

"Bye. I love you."

Cristina dropped the phone. Damn him.

Him and his coffee.

The rain was suffocating, pouring fast in hard throughout all of Seattle. Burke was waiting for her in the parking lot of the apartment building, his head pointed down, his hands in the pockets of his heavy brown jacket. There was a smile on his face.

She was soaked by the time she reached him. Inside the car it had felt stuffy, but in the cold rain it was much, much worse. Her hair was falling onto her shoulders, she could feel a few wet strands sticking to her face.

"Hi," she murmured.

"Hello." His kiss was deep and heart-wrenching.

It took all her strength to pull away from him. "I still have my apartment." It came out as a whisper.

His voice was quiet. He was sad, she could tell, disappointed but not angry. "Oh."

"I'm sorry. I couldn't tell you. You were so happy. And then you said...the thing..."

"I love you." His voice was still low volume, but he was repeating his words with firmness.

"Right." That was it.

"Are you mad?"

"No. I'm not mad. I just..." He was staring at her, and his eyes had the strength to pull her out of the misery she drowned herself in. "I want you." If anyone else had said that, she would have snickered and told the miniature evil spawn to get a new pick-up. With Burke, it was different. His voice was chemo to a little kid with a tumor.

He was kissing her again, and she couldn't break away. The rain was beating on them fast and hard, but he'd wrapped his coat around her shoulders, shielding her. She felt surprisingly warm.

"I love you, Cristina." He knew she wouldn't respond, but he had to tell her, the setting was perfect, and his heartbeat would not settle it down.

Her voice was breezy, the rain seemed to lessen for the primal few moments, and her response was everything he'd ever wished for. "I love you too, Burke."