Chapter Ten

George was lying in bed on his day off. Callie had to go in, and so she had left over half an hour before, but he did not want to get out of bed. He had flown solo for the first time in a year the day before, and it had gone well, but having Dr. Hahn breathing down his neck the entire time had not been exactly comforting. He had heard, straight from the horse's mouth actually, that Burke was coming back in a few weeks and he couldn't wait.

Before she left Callie had crawled over him to kiss his cheek and had told him that she loved him. It was so natural, so simple. It was new to George. He hadn't had this long of a relationship in… ever. He thought about Meredith, going through the same thing. A few days before, he had come in at five in the morning to find her sitting in the kitchen staring at an open galleon of ice cream.

"It's so weird," she said. "He's up there, asleep. He'll be there every morning. Waiting for me. He turns to me when he needs something and I turn to him. There's a future." She fingered her ring as she was wont to do lately. "I love this. Having an actual relationship."

George sat across from her after grabbing a spoon from a drawer and dug into the ice cream.

"I mean, my other relationships didn't tend to last this long. They tended to last until the tequila ran out. I wasn't serious with anyone during med school, because for some reason the guys I was attracted to were the ones who would have gotten me in trouble." She smiled. "I don't mean in the family way, either. I mean in the showing up to class still drunk way."

"I know what you mean," George said vehemently and Meredith looked at him in surprise. "Bad girls like me. Bad girls aren't particularly good at the relationship thing. They're good at the 'cheating on you with their dealer' thing."

"You're a fixer, George. I told you so."

"Yeah. But not any more; I am determined to stay in this and just accept the happy." He stuck the spoon into the ice cream with each word, and when he pulled it out and licked the ice cream off she laughed.

"It's not easy, is it?"

"Not at all. Does Derek know you came downstairs?"

She laughed. "I'm a rebel. Don't tell."

"I won't." They smiled at each other

Now, George decided, he liked having a friendship with Meredith and a relationship with Callie. It was easier that way. Speaking of Meredith, he should probably get up and check on her. And make it look as if he wasn't checking on her, of course. He got up and had his pants half on when he heard her cry out from across the hall. He threw on the rest of his clothes and raced into the nursery, where she was almost-obsessively putting up pictures.

One of the frames had fallen to the floor and Meredith was standing in front of it with her hands placed protectively on her stomach. Her face was contorted.

"Mer?" he said, approaching her carefully. She turned to him with a look of fear on her face.

"George," she breathed, and then walked slowly over to him. He offered her his hand and she took it.

"Here we go," he said, leading her to the staircase.

"Yeah," she agreed, picking up the bag that was just inside the doorway of her room. "Izzie's project last week was making sure that I was ready, I just didn't think…" she trailed off. "This is really happening."

George nodded and took her arm to help her down the stairs. In the car she sat next to him, staring out the windshield and he wondered what she was thinking. The next contraction did not come until they were almost to the hospital and she grabbed his hand tightly, reminding him of a patient he had had a day or so before.

"George?" she said, when it subsided.

"Yeah, Mer?"

"I'm glad you were the one, who was there."

He smiled at her, and realized how small and vulnerable she looked. Small minus the baby, anyway. "Where's Shepher—er-- Derek?" he asked, as they pulled up to the ER.

"In surgery, it should be over in an hour, I think. By the time they prepare an OR and everything."

"You know what? We should have wheelchairs out here, like supermarket buggies." Meredith burst into laughter, which was what he was going for. She seemed to relax for a minute after that and she was smiling when they went through the automatic doors with just a hint of fear in her eyes.

They took her back immediately due to the risk and George was banished to the hall while Mer changed into a gown. He attempted to give her an 'I've seen you naked' look, but she only laughed and shoved him out. Izzie found him there a few minutes later.

"George? What are you doing here, is Mer--?"

"Yeah, she's in there," George indicated with a finger. "And I have a boy-penis so I can't come in 'til she's changed. Her words."

Izzie smiled and knocked on the door. "Mer? It's Izzie, can I come in?"

"Um… yeah. And George can too." Izzie opened the door and George followed her in. Meredith sat on the bed in the hospital gown, her clothes neatly folded in a chair in the corner.

Izzie had her stethoscope out before anyone could say anything and was examining Meredith. George looked at her and smiled. Izzie was in her element. "Sounds good," she said, with a smile. "I'll go find Dr. Montgomary. And do you want me to page—?"

1"No. Wait for him to be out of surgery, okay? I don't want to worry him. Brain surgery trumps baby."

Izzie nodded and left the room, as George pulled a chair over to the side of the bed. "Not sure he'd agree with you there, Mer."

"Yeah, well, I know what's best for him. He tends to not."

"He knew that you were good for him," George pointed out, surprising himself.

"One moment of clarity does not make up for bad choices," she pointed out, in that teasing way of hers. She was calm, for now. George had expected panic, and suspected that panic might come, but for now she was calm.

"Have you thought about names?" George asked.

"Derek wants to name it after Mom if it's a girl, and I would, but my oldest half-sister, her name is Ellie, so that would be—"

"Awkward, yeah. Must have been awkward for your dad."

She shrugged. "Guess so, I never thought-" she broke off and grabbed his hand. When the contraction subsided she fell back on her pillow and smiled grimly. "I asked mom once, how I got my name. I expected some great-aunt somewhere to have been named Meredith, you know? She said no. She said that I came out and she took one look at me and said 'Meredith'. No one knew where it came from."

"Lucky. George was Mom's maiden name. That's all." Just as he said this the door opened and Addison came in.

"Hello there, Meredith. How're you holding up?"

"I'm… okay Dr. Montgomary."

"Good. Stevens, go book an OR. We'll get this going, Meredith. As soon as the baby's born I'll repair the spine, and then we'll run the tests for hydrocephalus and check for other complications, okay?"

"Okay," Meredith said, meekly.

"Good. I'll be back in a few minutes to check on you."

She left as quickly as she had come and Meredith turned to George looking pained. "I feel as if I should be asking her how she's holding up. Is that crazy?"

"No. it proves that I was right about you, you can't help but care about people." Meredith smiled and lay back on the pillow.

Derek closed the incision delicately, as he always did. He took his time with this. Too often surgery was a traumatic time in people's lives, they didn't need the constant reminder that a scar gave. Plus, this guy was bald and thus the scar would be visible. He smiled at the scrub nurse who held the suture tray for him, trying to avoid the look she was giving him. The surgery had gone perfectly; surely they would soon realize that his personal life did not affect his surgeries?

He went into the scrub room, disposed of his gloves and scrubbed out. In the hallway, as soon as he left the scrub room, he ran into Izzie who was standing just outside the door.

"Dr. Shepard?" she said, and he knew.

"Where is she?" he asked quickly.

"This way," Izzie began to walk, and he followed. "She's doing well, baby's vitals are stable; George brought her in just over an hour ago."

'Why didn't you page me?"

"She told us not to, you were in surgery. You know Mer, she doesn't put herself ahead of anything."

Derek grunted in agreement, concentrating only in getting to the maternity floor as quickly as possible. He burst through her door and focused only on her face, there was a look of relief on it as he came up to her, and he barely noticed George move out of the chair by her bed as he came in and kissed her on the forehead.

"Hey," he said softly, smiling at her.

"Hey. How'd the surgery go?"

"Perfect. Just like you." He brushed her hair out of her eyes with his fingers and saw himself reflected in her eyes.

She shook her head. "Flattery, you're too good at it, you know?" she said, and he laughed, sinking into the chair next to her and clasping her hand.

"I've heard that," he admitted, trying to ignore the flood of relief that was washing over him. She was okay, and they were going to do this.

"Derek?"

"Yes?"

"We're going to have a baby," she said, in awe.

"That's generally the next step, yes," he said teasingly.

"Yeah. I just… we're going to have a baby. In a few hours there will be another living, breathing person in this world, and it will be ours. Ours." She looked over at George. "I'm doing the 'I repeat things when I'm shocked' thing again, aren't I?" she asked and George snickered.

"I would say that qualifies, yeah, Mer." He laughed. "Cristina's not here yet; feel free to repeat things all that you like."

"We're going to have a baby."

Derek vaguely thought that she was going to keep saying it, but then a contraction came and she gripped his hand and fell silent.

They were in the hospital room a while longer, Cristina came in, but she had a surgery she had to scrub in on. Alex stopped by and checked on Meredith in what Derek could only call an older-brotherly way. At some point George went to get coffee and it was only Meredith and Derek in the room.

"This is going to sound very weird," Meredith said, after a particularly bad contraction. "But I wish my mother was here. Not now, but before, before the Alzheimer's. I don't like to admit it, but she was very good at taking care of people when they were in pain. She was good at taking care of me." She smiled.

"You said once that if something were wrong with me, Mom would be flying specialists in from Prague. It hurt when you said that, because it was true. I had pneumonia once, and she totally let my pediatrician have it. Funniest thing I've ever seen or it would have been if I hadn't had a one hundred and four degree fever."

Derek chuckled softly and kissed her cheek. "I can see that. You're a lot like her, I think. In a good way," he added, just in case she hadn't inferred that.

"I know. I don't always like to accept that, but I know." She paused. "I was born in this hospital, you know. My mom was a second year resident too. I've never really figured out if it was planned or not, though as a teenager I figured it wasn't." she shrugged. "And now I don't care. Because it doesn't matter, they loved me anyway. And I'm babbling, feel free to tell me to shut up."

Derek laughed, but he wasn't anywhere close to telling her that, he was just watching her come to these conclusions, watching her eyes as she settled things with herself. "Bed rest obviously gave you time to think," he said teasingly.

"Yes, think and make all the hats our child will need until kindergarten. Except once we find out the sex Izzie will make more in pink or blue."

"Will she have time?" Derek asked, trying to hide the horror. The knit items were slowly but surely filling up the drawers in the nursery.

"We're talking about Izzie; she knit a sweater in a day. While working."

If Meredith were the type to use the random sayings she heard from her touristing southern patients the phrases 'speak of the devil' or 'are your ears burning?' may have come out of her mouth when Izzie came into the room just then. But she wasn't, because she was a girl brought up in Boston.

"Hey Iz," she said, simply, smiling tightly as another contraction came. Derek ran his thumb along her fingers.

"Hey. Time to prep you for the OR although you could probably prep yourself. And Dr. Shepard, I assume you want to be in there?"

Derek nodded and stood up, but Meredith clutched his hand. "Mer, relax, I'm just going to go ditch my coat and change my scrubs, okay? Izzie's here, and George. I'll be back in just a second."

She nodded and relaxed, though he hated to leave her it was necessary. In the on-call room where he had stashed his gear for the day he sat down on the bottom bunk and ran his fingers through his hair. Meredith may say things over and over when she was shocked, but he thought them, and all that was running through his head was that in an hour or so he would be a father. It was an incredible thought.

He quickly shook himself into the present and changed scrubs. He needed to get back to Meredith. He left his lab coat on a bunk and took a deep breath before he emerged once again out into the hospital hallway.

Addison was in the room with her when he got back, helping Meredith breathe through a contraction just before the anesthesiologist put in the local anesthetic that would numb her for the surgery. Meredith flinched when the needle went in, but she had a look of determination on her face.

"You ready?" Addison asked her, smiling, and Derek felt an overwhelming gratitude for his ex-wife. It was amazing, really, how quickly he added the "ex" even in his thoughts. Kind of sad. But then he looked at Meredith who had a smile in her eyes, if not on her mouth, and he knew what was right for him.

They went down the hall to the elevator and Derek held onto Meredith's hand. He saw nurses and interns look their way, but there were a few smiles among them, not the usual looks of disgust. Derek knew it was because of the excitement on Meredith's face.

The OR felt different when he wasn't scrubbing in to cut, it felt somehow unfamiliar and cold. Meredith was transferred onto the table and he knelt to whisper in her ear. "You are undoubtedly the bravest person I know, Meredith Grey."

"Again with the flattery," she teased, but she turned her head and kissed him.

Derek stood, his eyes still on Meredith, and smiled as he heard a whispered conversation between Addison and Izzie going on in the corner.

"Seriously?"

"You need to learn distance still, Stevens. What better way? You're experienced enough, and I need to be free to correct the spinal opening."

"Okay." Izzie came over to the table with Addison following. "Mer—er, Dr. Grey, I'm going to be performing the C-Section so that Dr. Montgomary can operate on the baby, okay?"

Meredith looked at Derek, who nodded. "Sure Izz. I trust you."

She looked away, and didn't see Izzie let out a breath, but Derek did. "Okay. Let's do this."

To his surprise, Derek found that he couldn't watch. There was something about watching the scalpel cut into Meredith, a scalpel that he couldn't control or guide, that bothered him. Instead he watched Meredith's face.

He barely heard Addison's directions to Izzie, but he did hear Meredith, who despite the fact that she was on the OR table, was encouraging her friend.

"Okay, seriously Mer? I think I should be the one comforting you here," Izzie commented. "Now shut up and let me get your baby out."

Derek laughed and Meredith stuck her tongue out at him. "You're doing beautifully," he told her.

"All right, I'm in. Got it." Derek turned in time to watch the baby be lifted out of Meredith's womb, and was surprised to hear the squall that came with it. A preemie crying, definitely a good sign. Meredith seemed to realize this too as she squeezed his hand. "It's a girl, Mer!" Izzie exclaimed, handing the baby to the nurses who began to clean it up.

Meredith laughed in joy and Derek leaned over to kiss her.

"No surprises that I can see," Addison said, from where she was leaning over the isolette. "We're going to take her directly into surgery now, okay?"

"Okay," Meredith said. "Can I see her first?"

"Of course," Addison said, and she carried the baby carefully over to Meredith. Meredith and Derek both gazed at the perfectly formed little face.

"She's beautiful," Derek whispered as Addison took the baby to a nearby OR.

"Lydia." Meredith said in reply.

"What?"

"Her name, Lydia. Lydia Ellis Shepard."

"No," Derek said firmly. "Lydia Ellis Shepard-Grey. You said you weren't changing your name from your mom's right?" One night, late, she had admitted to him that she liked being 'the next Dr. Grey' in a way. "And this is our baby."

"Okay," Meredith agreed. "I like it. Izzie, are you done yet?"

Derek and Izzie laughed as Izzie worked on the sutures.

Back in the hospital room, they found Cristina, George and Alex waiting for them. Meredith looked at them from her bed and a worried look crossed her face. "Could one of you… could someone…. Go watch in the gallery? Just make sure she's okay?"

"I'll go," Cristina volunteered, and Meredith smiled at her as she left.

Derek sat down in the chair next to Meredith and just stared at her, unable to believe the miracle that had just happened.

"Mom was right," she said. "You do just know when you look at them."

"Do you really look at me and think Georgie?" George said from where he stood by the window and Meredith and Alex both cracked up.

"I could reply to that in so many ways," Alex said and George glared at him. Meredith smiled and pushed up on her pillows.

"How long will this take?" she asked suddenly. "All this time and I never asked that, I won't know if something's going wrong if it's taking too long because I don't know—"

Derek put a finger to her lips. "Meredith, relax. You sent Cristina to spy, remember? She'll tell you."

"Okay. But I can't. I can't relax. I'm not good at relaxing."

"Grey? Seriously, you're about to have five years of sleepless nights, now is definitely the time for you to not worry," Alex put in, smiling at her. "Let us do the worrying for you."

"Alex Karev actually admits he cares about something, story on the news at eleven," George retorted.

"O'Malley, I think your ability to make a joke died with the Egyptians and was mummified."

George was quiet, and the room was quiet and Derek wasn't sure that he could bear the quiet until Meredith spoke up, "You know, someone mummified a rat? Like, for fun. I found it online the other day. Seriously disturbing."

Derek blanched. "Sounds like something some of my med school friends would do for fun."

"Remind me that I don't want to meet them. She looked perfect, didn't she?"

"Absolutely so. Ten fingers, ten toes, your eyes."

"Derek, babies' eyes change."

"Hers won't."

"Oh, so now you're psychic?" she teased, and he just smiled at her.

They continued in this manner, of chitchat and random facts, and at some point Alex launched into a seriously disturbing game of Would You Rather? that carried them through a full hour.

They were discussing 'be on a desert island without food or with food and only the Paris Hilton-esque plastics resident for company' when the door open. Meredith's smile flew from her face and she looked at Addison and Izzie in fear, as Cristina ducked in behind them.

"Okay, Meredith," Addison said, and then she smiled and Derek felt Meredith's grip on his hand relax. "Good news and not-so-good news. Good news is that the surgery was successful, and Lydia did fine. Not-so-good is that I went ahead and did the scan to test for hydrocephalus to save you extra worry time, and it's there."

Derek looked down at Meredith who looked slightly fearful, as the chief came in just behind Addison.

"Derek? Can I talk to you in the hall?" he said.

"Dr. Webber, I--."

"Now, Shepard." Derek kissed Meredith's hand and smiled her before following his boss into the hallway. Dr. Bailey was waiting there. "Shepard, we don't have an on-call neurosurgeon with the skills in pediatrics needed for your daughter's surgery," he said bluntly.

"What?" Derek exclaimed. "My baby needs a shunt and there's no one here to do it? That's first year work! Where's Dr. Weir?"

"In Jamaica," Bailey replied, bluntly. "But we're not about to let anything happen to that baby, so shut up and listen to the man."

Derek glared at her, but crossed his arms and looked back at Webber.

"Dr. Bailey thinks she can do it. Her fellowship's in cardio, but—"

"But I scrubbed in with you on four of these last year and a few with your predecessor as well. What I will need is you in there to walk me through it, as it's been so long."

"You will not cut," Webber said firmly. "That's against policy, but you will be in the OR."

Derek put a shaking hand up to his face as Meredith's door opened and Addison stepped out.

"Derek? Look at me," she said firmly, and he obeyed. "You have a very scared fiancée in there, who may be good at hiding it, but who needs you to tell her that this will be okay. The only way you can do that is if you assist with this."

Derek sighed and met the eyes that he had once loved. "Why are you so rational?" he asked, and then looked up at Webber. "Okay. Okay, I'll do it." The chief nodded, and he and Bailey left the hallway. Derek turned to return to the room, but then looked back at Addison. "So… you know?"

"It's a pretty ring. Good choice."

"Addie-."

"Don't. I'm happy for you Derek. I promise."

He nodded and opened the door.

Meredith held onto Izzie's hand tightly as Derek came back into the room and knelt by her bed. "Mer? I'm going to assist Bailey with the surgery, okay? I'm not cutting, but there's no one else to do it. I have to go now, and scrub in. It's going to be okay."

She watched his face, knowing that as a surgeon he was not allowed to make that promise, but she needed him to, and so she accepted it. "Okay," she said, quietly, and also accepted the kiss he gave her. "You'll be great," she said, and he smiled at her, before leaving the room.

Addison came in just after he left with a consent form. She was signing a consent form for her hours-old baby's brain surgery.

"I want to be there," she said suddenly after handing the pen back to Addison. "I want to be in the gallery. I can't just sit here and wait any more."

"Meredith you're a patient-." Cristina broke in.

Addison held up a hand to her and studied Meredith's face, drawing the clipboard back. "Okay," she said. "Let me go get a chair."

"I'm coming too," George spoke up, and the others in the room echoed him. Addison nodded and Meredith sat up, looking around at her friends. Izzie was already digging Meredith's robe out of her bag and Alex helped her sit up.

"Thanks, guys," she said, slipping into the robe and letting Alex transfer her to the chair when Addison wheeled it in.

"You'd do the same for us," Izzie replied.

"We're in this together, Mer," George said, as he held open the elevator door. Meredith nodded and turned her head to glance at the nurses' station. The nurses were watching her, but there was something different on their faces now. Maybe they were realizing just how many people they'd have to go through to cause her problems.

Or maybe they were looking at the woman pushing the wheelchair. Meredith glanced up at Addison's 'no nonsense' face and was suddenly grateful for her. The surgery was just starting as they entered the gallery. Addison parked Meredith's chair in the front and the others sat around her. Meredith was surprised when Addison sat right next to her.

Lydia looked so small on the operating table, and Meredith found that she couldn't watch Bailey cut. Instead, she watched her sleeping baby's face. She looked so little and peaceful. Undamaged. Meredith vowed there just then to work as hard as she possibly could to keep her baby from ever being scary and damaged.

She could hear Derek's voice through the microphone in the gallery giving directions, but she couldn't focus on this, all she could do was let his voice swim around her and keep her eyes on her baby. No one said anything while the surgery was being performed; seeming to know that she needed quiet.

The surgery was going smoothly; she could see Derek beginning to close the skull flap when a rapid beeping sounded through the speakers and Meredith's breath caught. She reached out, blindly, for someone and felt Addison's hand go into hers.

"It's okay," she whispered. "Look, her heart rate is up all ready, and they're almost done."

Suddenly the gallery door opened, startling Meredith. Nurse Debby stood in the doorframe. "Dr. Montgomary?"

"Yes?" Addison said, standing up but keeping her hand on Meredith's shoulder.

"There's someone here to see you. A Dr. Sloan?"

Meredith looked up at Addison, startled, but the older woman squeezed her shoulder and responded to Debby. "Tell him to wait, I'm with a patient." Debby nodded and Addison sat back down next to Meredith.

"He's here?" she asked, as she heard Alex's excited whisper, "Sloan's back? Seriously?" and Izzie whacked him.

"Yeah. I need him."

"I know," Meredith replied, her eyes on Derek, who looked up and smiled at her.

An hour later, but what felt like a lifetime, Meredith sat in her wheelchair in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit her hand in the side of the isolette, stroking the baby's cheek. Derek stood above her, his hands on her shoulders.

"She's perfect, Mer."

Meredith nodded, and then sat back, looking up at Derek. "Derek? Thank you. For being with me through all of this." He knelt beside her and she grasped his hands. "You're going to stay with me, right? Because I couldn't take it if you decided to leave once I'm yours."

"Meredith Grey, I swear to you. I'm here to stay."

"Okay. Good. 'Cause I love you."

"I love you too, Meredith."

He kissed her, just as the door to the nursery opened.

"Well, isn't this sweet?" a voice said. Derek pulled back sharply.

"Mark? What the hell are you doing here?"

A/N Review please!