Against All Odds
Chapter 2: Like We Never Loved At All
She heaved a sigh and leaned back against the door. He was gone. At least for the time being. Her gray eyes scanned the room, checking to see if anyone was there. Miraculously, no one was there. It was only then that she allowed herself to let go. She felt her body slide down the door until she was in a heap on the floor. Holding her forehead in her hand, she allowed the tears to fall. "What did I do…..?" She whispered to herself, attempting to pull a breath in, but her throat was so tight, she could barely breathe.
Addison had witnessed the whole scene. She'd seen the pain in both sets of eyes. The pure, raw pain radiating out of Meredith and the confused and concerned pain pouring out of Derek. She felt like she was watching a car wreck. She knew she shouldn't be looking, but she couldn't help it. She hadn't been able to get Derek's words out of her head. "I fell in love with her." "I fell in love with her." "She wasn't just a fling." "She wasn't just a fling." Over and over again. She watched her husband stare at the door Meredith had shut in his face. The look that crossed his face next was an expression she'd seen before, but not to this magnitude. The last time she'd seen something remotely close to this look was when he found her and Mark in bed together. But this time… This time, it was different. She'd been convinced that nothing would have ever hurt him as deeply as her infidelity. But she was wrong.
He sat in his office, staring at the paperwork in front of him. He'd been staring at the same piece of paper for the last hour. He sighed and pushed away from his desk. There was no way he was going to get any work done right now. All he could see was her face when she told him not to follow her, when she told him not to make her cry. When she told him that she already did that at home, not to make her do it here. He'd felt his heart split in two when she said that. That was the thing about Meredith. She'd tell you just how it was, no hesitation, no sugar coating. It was a refreshing quality. A quality that he loved. He stood at the window that overlooked the parking lot, and farther in the distance, a view of the ferry boats he loved. His eyes drifted downward, toward the parking lot.
24 hours later, she was done. She'd made it. Barely. Her first shift back was over. She was exhausted, mentally and physically exhausted. Every part of her body ached. But there was only one part that she really felt. For the first time in her life, her heart hurt. Really and truly hurt. Sure, she'd had heartache before. But this, this wasn't heartache. This was pure, true heart break. She pulled her coat closer, wrapping it around her petite figure. "Keep it together Mere. You can't let it show." She muttered under her breath. She sighed and glanced back at the hospital and froze. One floor above the lobby, there was an office with a light on. An office she knew too well. And the person to whom the office belonged was watching her. Him. Always him. She turned from the window and hurried to her car before she did something she might regret.
Somehow, the car felt safer. She gripped the wheel tightly, her breath still visible in her cold car. Thankfully, Joe's wasn't too far away and she was inside the warmth of the bar within minutes. "Hey doc. Happy New Year!" Joe called to her. She smiled softly and she glanced around the bar. Empty as usual on Monday night. "What's your poison?" Joe asked, striding up to her. "Tall, dark haired married men. Do you keep that on tap?" She asked dryly. "No, but only because it seems to drive away my business." He responded, setting a beer in front of her. She took a quick gulp, letting the liquid cool her throat.
Joe leaned forward on the bar. "All right, spill." He told her, his calming brown eyes meeting hers. She shrugged. "Meredith. You've been coming here awhile now. You can't shrug at me and expect me to buy it." He chided. "Joe. I'm the other woman. What else do you want me to say?" She asked glumly. "You, Doc, are a lot of things, but you weren't just the other woman. I watched you two come in and out of here for months. That man loved you. Probably still does. To him, you were never the other woman. To him, you were it." Joe said as he dried and stacked glasses. "Yeah, well, that doesn't really matter now does it? He picked her. How much could he have loved me?" She shot back, taking a swig of her beer. He raised his eyebrows at her.
"Understand something. Just because he chose her, doesn't mean he didn't care about you." He said, pointing his finger at her. "No, it means he just didn't care enough. Obviously he'd rather be with the woman who cheated on him than the one who wants nothing more than to just love him. Good call." She spat bitterly.
"People make choices kiddo. Fact of life. You're a doctor, you should know all about choices, good and bad." He replied. She cocked her head at him. "I know all about decisions and choices. But those aren't the same. Those are medical choices. They are related to logic, calculations, they have explanations. This doesn't have any 'explanation' to speak of." She told him, holding her head up with her hand. "Yes it does. You just don't want to face the explanation behind this." He said, meeting her gaze. She didn't say anything. "You can't blame the man for feeling a sense of obligation. Her cheating aside, he said those vows, he made promises. He feels it's his responsibility to follow through with those promises. Make good on them. It's understandable." Joe explained, hosing off the floor of the bar.
"That's your great 'explanation' Joe? It's ok because he felt 'obligated'?" She exclaimed. Joe sighed. "I said it was understandable, I didn't say it was right. People make mistakes. They make them all the time. And in this case, I think it's pretty safe to say he made a mistake. There is one thing that he doesn't understand yet and that is that sometimes the person you are married to isn't the person you should be with. Love does crazy things to people. It makes people who've been married 20 years get divorced. It makes crazy people sane. And sadly, it makes sane people crazy." He told her, handing her a napkin for the tear rolling down her cheek.
She sniffed, choking back the sob. "I really thought he was it Joe. He made everything better for me. He helped me deal with my mother, he got me through my first few weeks here. I thought I was the luckiest woman in the world getting to wake up next to him. Everytime I opened my eyes and saw him laying there next to me, I felt like nothing could touch me, I knew that it would be a good day. Every day was a good day with him…." She trailed off, her voice cracking with emotion as she dabbed the tear soaked napkin under her eyes.
"They were good days. Every single one of them." A voice came from behind her. Her heart hit her throat. She squeezed her eyes shut and refused to turn around. She heard his soft footsteps approaching. Like he could, she always smelled him before she saw him. She knew he was behind her. She felt his hands on her shoulders right before he spun her around. She found herself face to face with the man she loved, with a man she was trying very hard to hate.
I did this to her… I made her like this… Derek's eyes searched her face, as if looking for signs of physical damage, looking to see if she was ok. "Umm.. How- how long have you been standing here?" She stuttered, shoving the napkin in her pocket in a feeble attempt to hide her tears. "Right around where you were telling Joe that you thought I was it. And for the record, I thought you were it too. And for what it's worth, I still think you are." He said softly, reaching over to tuck her hair behind her ear. She jerked away as if she'd been burned. Her rejection of his touch hurt him, it was evident on his face. "Please don't do that. When you touch me, you make it impossible to forget." She told him, her head down as she tried to keep her voice from cracking.
He'd had just about enough of this. He couldn't stand it anymore. He could stand doing this to her, putting her through this. He loved this woman and she was in her own private hell at the moment and it was his fault and all he was doing was watching as she tried to push him away. "I'm tired of pretending like I don't care about you Meredith. I'm sick of it. You're all I think about, you're all I dream about. I can't get one miserable piece of patient paperwork filled out because it had your signature on it. I spent an hour just staring at it. I'm going crazy." He said and as soon as she looked up (because he knew she would), he let instinct take over. He grabbed her red, swollen, beautifully painful face in his hands and covered her lips with his own.
His entire body electrified at the feel of her lips. His body hummed to life. He thrived off of this feeling. He needed this feeling. He HAD TO HAVE THIS FEELING. He held his grip on her face and on her lips until he felt her respond. Her small hands came up and gripped his upper arms in a way that made him crazy. Whenever she did that, he always felt like she was clinging to him like he was her lifeline to this world. He loved that he made her lose control like that.
As fast as it began, it was done. He pulled back. She was panting, breathless from the heat and passion. "Is that what you're trying to forget? Because if it is, good luck. I can't.
It's all I think about. You're all I think about. And I think it's just as hard on you. You want to know why, no matter how hard you try, no matter what you do, you can't forget it? Because
it's real. It's real and it's love and we have it. If you figure out a way to forget, do me a favor, don't tell me. I don't want to know. Cause honestly, even if I can't have you, and even
though I didn't do everything right, I'm never, ever, giving up what we had. Those are my memories. I will keep them with me until the day I die." He said softly, holding onto her hand as
he spoke those words. He gave her hand one last squeeze before letting go, and walking out, leaving her dumb founded and speechless on the barstool.