Thanks for the reviews. I apologize for how long this chapter has taken, school will not cooperate. This is also kind of short, but I still haven't quiet figured out where it should go. It's also slowly moving along, but it will get better, somewhere after this chapter.
Derek had tried unsuccessfully to find Addison, but it was a big hospital, and there were places to hide if you didn't want to be found. So he did what he did every time he needed to think, he stood in front of the surgery board. He had always found it relaxing to just stand there and stare at the names of the patients, and there procedures, because he was looking at something that he could fix. He planned his day around this board; unfortunately for him he tended to plan his life around it too.
He was deep in thought when his pager went off. Derek glanced at the name, and saw that it was the chief, telling him to come to his office. "There is only one thing this can be about," thought Derek as he headed towards the elevator.
Chief Richard Webber was trying to figure out exactly what to day to Derek, when he heard the knock on his door.
"Chief."
"Derek. Sit down please. Now I want you to listen to me, apparently somebody needs to help you to realize what a self-absorbed ass you've been."
"Now Chief, just a min…."
"I said Listen. Addison came to me this morning, and asked me to let her break contract and go back to New York. I told her I couldn't, not just yet so she took some vacation time instead."
"Has she already left," Derek asked quietly. "I mean, I'm sure she told you why she is leaving, and I'd like to apologize again before she leaves."
"Do you really think an apology is going to cut it, Derek? I mean for Christ's sake this woman traveled clear across the country and got here to see you with another woman, but she still stayed. She then offered YOU a divorce and YOU were the one who didn't want it. You then proceeded to call her names and treat her like last year's garbage, but she still stayed. Were you just punishing her till you could have the big finale and twist the knife in her heart deeper?" The chief went on.
"Now normally I don't like to get too involved in the personal lives of my employees, but ya'll are more like family. When Addison came in here this morning, she was hurting, her heart was breaking. And I know you've felt some of the same type of heart ache; I know why you first left New York, but Derek, if you didn't love her then why didn't you just divorce her?"
"That's just it chief, I do."
"Pardon me," said the chief, trying not to look too stunned.
"I loved my wife, but I thought that I loved Meredith more. But it took last night for me to finally realize what an ass I've been. It wasn't love, it was infatuation. Like Addison told me when she first got to Seattle, Meredith was the Anti-Addison. I didn't have a past with her, I didn't lose a child with her, and if I would have been honest with myself, I would have seen I had no future with her either." "I tried to tell Addison that this morning, and beg her to stay, but she wouldn't, and I can't blame her. I know what I've put her through, and part of it was to punish her, but the other, I guess I was afraid to let myself really love her again."
"If she leaves Seattle for good, I'm never going to be able to get her back, Chief." Derek looked down at his hands with a defeated look upon his face. "If I could take it all back I would. I would have been there for her after Hadley died, and told her it wasn't her fault. I would have been the husband that she needed me to be, and there would have never been an incident with Mark. And I would never have nicknamed her Satan, but I can't go back, I can only make up for it now."
"Derek, I know she still loves you; she's figuring the farther she can get from you it want hurt as bad, similar thinking you had correct?" "She's going to take her vacation and then come back and work out a two weeks, now that ought to give you a little time to figure what the hell your going to do." "I do want you to realize though, there cannot be anymore long dreamy gazes at Meredith Grey if you want your wife back."
"I was once in a very similar situation Derek, I'm sure you know this. I had to choose, and every now and then I think what-if, but then I realize if I hadn't chosen my wife, I wouldn't have the family that I do now, and that makes me realize I made the right choice."
"Chief I appreciate you trying to straighten me out, and I want you to know, I do love my wife, and I'm going to prove that to her one way or another. Also I might need a few days off, depending on…"
The chief just nodded his head in agreement, "Let me know when."
With that Derek stood up and walked out of the office; he was a man on a mission.
Addison pulled her car back in front of the trailer. When she had left this morning she hadn't planned on being back so soon, but she needed to do something. She sat in her car looking at the small box that she had called home for several months. "I can't believe I lived in this thing," she said aloud. "I swear my closet alone, would have swallowed it."
She reached across the seat, grabbed her bag, and pulled out the picture of her daughter. Grabbing it she headed for the trailer. She stepped inside, and placed the picture on the counter. Addison wanted to make sure Derek wouldn't miss it when he came in.
That was one thing that had surprised her most when she saw Derek's trailer the first time, he didn't have a single picture of Hadley on display anywhere. It was like he was trying to erase his whole life in New York, but he couldn't pretend forever. Their child deserved more; she deserved to be remembered.
As much as Derek had hurt her, she still wanted him to have at least one picture of what they used to be. It would be her final gift to him, besides the divorce anyways.
She then did something that she thought she'd never have to do; Addison took off her wedding rings. As she placed them beside the picture, a single tear fell. For the last 11 years the only time they ever came off of her hand was if she were performing a surgery. Even then they were pinned into the pocket of her scrubs; her good luck. It had been such a beautiful hope filled day when Derek, had placed the rings on her finger, but now that was gone, along with everything else except her medicine.
With one parting glance around the place she called home for the last few months, Addison headed to her car. She was headed to New York to start her vacation, but for the first time in 12 years, she would be doing it alone.
