A/N: So this is going to be an AU starting from season one. I have a couple of ideas on where I want to take it but haven't decided 100%. It will mainly follow the major events in the show but with some pretty major key differences.
Summary: What if when Meredith started her residency, Derek and Addison already lived in Seattle and they were already divorced. What if it was Meredith making a choice?
CHAPTER 1
Meredith downed the shot that had just been put in front of her and tipped the glass upside down. She met eyes with the bartender and gestured for another one. The bartender poured another shot and asked. "Bad day?"
Meredith smiled. "Not yet, but I'm preparing for a bad day tomorrow."
The bartender laughed and reached his hand out for a handshake. "I'm Joe. I haven't seen you around before. Are you new to the area?"
Meredith shook his hand and nodded. "Sure am. Well, technically I lived here until I was five but then moved away."
"So why are you going to have a bad day tomorrow?" Joe asked while polishing a glass.
"I start my new job tomorrow. At the hospital as a surgical intern. Which means from 8am tomorrow I'll be owned by the hospital for the next year. Actually, the next five years. Maybe seven." Meredith replied before downing another shot.
"Ahhh I forgot it was that time of year. You lot always complain about being too busy but that certainly doesn't keep you away from here."
Meredith laughed. "Trust me Joe, alcohol is the only thing that gets us through."
Joe laughed with her. "I can't complain. Keeps me in business." Another group walked into the room and came up to the bar. "Well, that's my cue. See you around Meredith." Joe smiled at her one last time before greeting his new customers.
Meredith was so deep in her thoughts that she didn't notice someone sit down next to her.
"Hi, I'm Derek. Can I buy you a drink?"
Meredith ran her eyes up him and gave him a flirty smile. She liked what she saw. He was hot, especially with that dreamy smile. It was her last night of freedom. She was drunk and she may as well live a little. "You can do more than that." She whispered while leaning in and kissing him.
Derek was also quite intoxicated and he was stoked. He had been watching her from across the bar the whole night. In the least creepy way possible. He couldn't remember the last time he had been so attracted to someone. The way her laugh lit up her whole face had made him weak in the knees.
Meredith stood up and grabbed his hand leading him out the door. Derek followed, pulling out his phone to call a taxi.
00
Meredith groaned and sheltered her eyes with her hand from the sun streaming in through the window. She had the worst headache and needed coffee stat. She suddenly became aware of someone's arm resting across her body. Suddenly everything from the night before came back to her. At least her last night of freedom had been fantastic. But now she really needed to get a move on. Swearing internally she tried to extract herself without waking up the sleeping man next to her. She had finally gotten herself free and was tiptoeing out of the room when she tripped on a box loudly.
"Shit." She mumbled under her breath.
She heard a groan from the bed. "What time is it?" Derek asked.
"Ahhh it's 7 and I'm sorry but you really need to leave. I start my new job in less than an hour so I don't really have time for… All of this." She gestured towards him.
Derek flashed her a smile. "All of this?"
Meredith blushed slightly. "Yeah, all of this. Look, last night was… It was great. Very great actually but I'm not really looking for anything permanent so it was nice to meet you… Ahh…"
"Derek." He supplied for her, his grin getting larger.
She started backing away, not trusting herself to be close when his eyes were looking at her like that. "Right, Derek. Well, it was nice to meet you but I really have to get going." She turned and quickly ran up the stairs to the bathroom.
Derek stood there shaking his head laughing internally. The attraction that he had felt last night at the bar had multiplied after their nighttime activities and now after her slight rambling, he liked her even more. She was very cute and extremely attractive. As he was gathering up his clothes and quickly getting dressed he was formulating a plan in his head. A plan that involved flowers and chocolate and hopefully a first official date.
00
Meredith was very lost. It was her first day at the hospital and she was already making a fool of herself. Not to mention the fact that she had been late. Although if she was honest she didn't really regret the circumstances that caused her lateness. Thankfully she didn't think anyone had noticed. But now that she had been assigned to the resident they called the Nazi, she knew she wouldn't get away with it again.
"Are we lost?" Her patient Katie said in a chirpy voice from the gurney she was pushing. "I think we're totally lost. I swear we've been down this corridor like five times now."
"We're not lost. I know where we're going." Meredith lied, desperately looking around for a sign to tell her where CT was. Katie continued jabbering on about beauty pageants and rhythmic gymnastics but she tuned it out. She finally saw a sign telling her where to go and she sped up a bit. She was supposed to have met the neurosurgeon there 10 minutes ago.
Finally, she arrived and handed the gurney off to the CT tech and rushed into the room where the neurosurgeon was waiting.
"I'm sorry I took so long, we just got ahh… held up." She said to the back of his head.
Meredith furrowed her eyebrows slightly. She knew she had seen that hair before but she couldn't quite place it. Her confusion quickly turned to shock as he turned around and his face came into view. His eyebrows were raised slightly and he had a smirk on his face.
"Fuck." She muttered under her breath.
"We meet again. You know you ran out so fast this morning I didn't even catch your name." Derek said his smirk growing.
"Meredith, no actually it's Dr. Grey." She replied, trying to keep things professional.
"Dr. Meredith Grey, I'm Dr. Derek Shepherd." He said, reaching his hand out for her to shake.
Meredith looked at his hand for a few seconds and then sighed, taking his hand in hers and giving it a quick shake. She quickly pulled her hand away and took a step backward. She knew what those hands could do if they were given the opportunity.
Derek noticed her moving away and his eyes twinkled in humor. "Is something scaring you Dr. Grey?"
She blushed again. "No. I'm perfectly fine, thank you very much."
Derek laughed. "Whatever you say Meredith."
She was saved by her pager going off. She quickly looked at it and let out a sigh of relief. "Look at that, I've got to go. Can you organize for someone to take her back to her room when she's done?"
"Of course. Think of it as a favour" Derek replied. He waited till she was almost out the door before he added. "I'm sure I'll come up with a way of how you can repay me later on."
His words caused an immediate reaction between her thighs and she stopped to take a breath to regain her composure. Once the feeling had passed she turned to glare at him before flicking her ponytail around and storming off.
00
A few hours later Meredith was sitting in the conference room surrounded by her fellow class of interns. Sitting next to her was Christina who she had taken an immediate liking. Already she could tell they were very similar and she hoped they would become friends. She wondered why Bailey had paged them all here. Bailey finally walked through the door followed closely by Derek. Meredith groaned quietly. Christina shot her a questioning look as Meredith slid down her chair and tried to hide behind her hand.
"Have you pissed the Nazi off already?" Christina whispered.
Meredith just ignored her and listened as Derek explained a case he needed help with. Most doctors wouldn't ever ask for help even at the expense of their patient and it made her heart soften very slightly that he was willing to put his ego aside. Everyone in the room sat up slightly when he said whoever found out what was wrong with the girl would get to scrub in. She cursed internally. That would be an awesome surgery to watch but she could not deal with Derek for that long.
After he had finished his speech everyone rushed out of the room straight to the library. Christina pulled Meredith aside.
"Do you want to work together on this? When we figure it out we can both tell Dr. Shepherd at the same time and then we both have a 50/50 chance of being picked for the surgery." Christina asked.
"I'll help you but I don't want the surgery. You can have it."
Christina narrowed her eyes "So it wasn't Bailey that had you cowering in there. Why don't you want to work with Dr. Shepherd?"
"No reason." Meredith replied flippantly. "Do you want my help or not?"
"Fine. But you may as well tell me now. I'll drag it out of you eventually."
They both headed towards the library and picked out a couple of books and were reading intently. Meredith was determined to find out the problem. Obviously not because she wanted the surgery but because she wanted to prove to herself that she belonged here. She had heard the whispers from the other interns and she knew that they knew about her mother. Ellis Grey. One of the most famous general surgeons in recent times. Meredith was forever living in her shadow and her mother had always made sure she knew it. She didn't care what the other interns thought about her but she needed to do this for herself.
Christina's voice broke her from her thoughts. "I'm trying to figure it out. You and Dr. Shepherd I mean. Did you screw up in front of him this morning?"
Meredith gave her a look. "No. I don't screw up in front of anyone."
Christina pondered her words for a second. "Then you must already know him. Is he a friend of your mother?"
Meredith rolled her eyes at the mention of her mother. "No. I'd never met him before this week."
"This week huh? So you knew him yesterday?" Christina asked.
Meredith blushed and avoided Christina's eyes. "Maybe."
"No one blushes that much if there isn't sex involved. You slept with Dr. McDreamy." Christina whispered loudly in pure glee.
Meredith shushed her quickly. "Shut up! You tell anyone and I'll kill you."
Christina just laughed at her. "Was it bad? Is that why you're avoiding him?"
"No, I'm avoiding him because I didn't know he was my freaking boss when I slept with him!"
"Ohh so it was good. And now you're avoiding him because you're scared he'll flash that dreamy smile and you'll fall straight back into bed with him." Christina teased her.
"I can control myself, it's him I'm worried about." Meredith said sassily and flicked her hair back.
"Damn straight." Christina said nodding. "We aren't letting good sex get in the way of taking over the world."
Meredith shot her a look.
"Okay maybe if it's really good sex we'll consider letting it be our stress relief." Christina amended.
Meredith nodded. "That's better, we have needs."
They both looked at each other and laughed, drawing the attention of everyone around them. Unable to control themselves they gathered up their books and left under the glare of everyone else in the room.
It was in the corridor that Meredith had a brain wave. "When I was taking Katie up to CT earlier she was going on and on about rhythmic gymnastics and how she sprained her ankle. What if when she fell she also hit her head? She could have an aneurysm that wasn't initially detected!"
Christina processed what she had said for a second. "Yes! Let's go!"
They both turned and rushed in the direction of the ICU to try and find Derek. After running through what felt like the whole hospital, they finally found him walking into a lift. They quickly explained what they thought was wrong with her and he shook his head explaining that the chances of what they thought was highly unlikely. They moved out of the way of the door and sighed simultaneously as they watched the elevator shut. They both turned to walk away when they heard the elevator ding. They turned to see the doors opening again.
"One in a million chance but we have to check. Let's go." Derek said, striding past them.
00
Christina and Meredith were both standing at the coffee cart when Derek approached them.
"You were right. Congratulations. But I only have space for one of you to scrub in. Dr. Grey, she's technically your patient and you gathered her recent history so you can scrub in."
Christina looked at Meredith waiting for her to decline and give her the surgery instead. Meredith opened her mouth but closed it again and just nodded. She would be stupid to give up this surgery. It was an amazing learning opportunity and she wasn't going to let a stupid one-night stand get in the way of that. Derek met her eyes and smiled before walking away.
"Unbelievable. You are unbelievable." Christina hissed at her.
"Christina I'm sorry but how could I give up that surgery! You said it yourself. We both had a 50/50 chance of getting it." Meredith pleaded with her.
"Yeah, it's a real even playing field when you're sleeping with the boss. Not to mention the only reason you're probably even here is because of your mother." Christina scoffed at her and walked away.
Meredith stood watching her go, refusing to let the pain she felt at her words affect her. Instead, she took a deep breath and walked away in the opposite direction. At the end of the day she wasn't here to make friends. She was here to learn to be a great surgeon.
00
Meredith and Derek walked out of the OR and both started scrubbing out. Meredith watched him out of the corner of her eye. He could feel her eyes on him, so he turned his head to look at her and smiled. His smile was contagious and she couldn't help but reciprocate it.
"That was pretty amazing. Thanks for letting me watch."
"You're welcome. Thank you for helping to diagnose the patient." Derek replied.
"Well, it wasn't just me. Christina helped." Meredith said, not wanting to take all the credit.
"We should go celebrate. Let me take you out for dinner." Derek said holding the door open for her to walk through.
Meredith sighed. "Derek… I think you're great. You're smart and funny and really good in bed. I mean really amazing. But you're my boss and it's inappropriate. Really inappropriate. I'm sorry but I just can't do this."
Meredith started walking away but Derek reached out and grabbed her hand and pulled her into a nearby supply closet. He shut the door behind her and pushed her up against it. He ran his fingertips up and down her side causing her to shiver in anticipation and stretch her head back. He took advantage of her exposed neck and softly blew the spot he had found the night before. She moaned softly and tried to push her neck up to get him to make contact. He chuckled at her eagerness and slowly kissed along her collarbone down to as far as her scrubs would allow.
Derek paused his assault. "Do you still not want to do this?" He asked. "Just say the word and I'll stop."
He smirked when she didn't say anything and slowly started to move his hand from her side further south. He started tracing circles on her inner thigh slowly moving closer to her center. When he finally got there, he gently pressed between her legs. Meredith's legs buckled slightly and her moans increased in volume. He reached for the drawstrings of her pants and paused before untying them.
"Tell me what you want Meredith." He said softly.
She looked up at him with darkened eyes and her pupils dilated. She opened her mouth to reply but was interrupted by an annoying beep coming from Derek's pocket. He fished his pager out and looked at the screen.
"Saved by the bell. I've got to go." Derek said before leaning in and whispering in her ear. "Think about it, I'd urge you to reconsider." He pulled back and winked at her.
Meredith stepped out of the way and watched him pull the door open and walk away. She took a deep breath to steady herself. She couldn't remember the last time anyone had made her feel like that. She knew without a doubt she was in trouble. If he kept pursuing her like that, she didn't stand a chance.
Please let me know what you think! And if you want me to continue!
