Title: Sound And Fury

Authors: Sara And Lizzie

Rating: T for language, mild sex

Disclaimer: we don't own grey's anatomy, or any anatomies but our own at that.

Author's Note: Ok. Our first Grey's Anatomy fic. Set after Derek picks Addison and Meredith sleeps with George. Review. No matter how you feel about it, review. Chapters will get longer. Thank you so much to temptest- races for keeping it real and telling it to us like it is. We'll work on the technical stuff. You rock.

"Go on, go on, put your hand into the fire." – Thirteen Senses

It was ungodly hot. The kind of heat reserved for places like Los Angeles and Miami. Definitely not Seattle's normal kind of weather. Especially not in early June. Even the breeze seemed to merely blow theheat between the buildings.

And it wasn't the only kind of heat being thrown around. Derek and Meredith hadn't come close to touching in days, and neither of them was handling the tension well.

Meredith sighed and trudged through the hospital. She stopped short at the sight of Derek, who smirked at her in that you know you want me kind of way usually reserved for frat boys.She was defenseless now, especially against his smug maneuvers. She sighed again, this time out of gratitude that Derek wasn't perceptive enough to see how deep her feelings went.

She turned blatantly away from him, only to come face to face, this time, with Bailey. "Grey, do you remember the skinny brunette that refused a tox screen last week?"

Meredith's brow furrowed. She did recall the girl. Obviously on drugs, brought in by her mom because she was throwing up everywhere. "I think so."

"Well she's back. And so hopped on amphetamines, she's probably taken her room apart by now." It was Bailey's turn to sigh. "Normally, I turn this over to psych, but she's asking for you."

Meredith shrugged and headed in the direction that her superior pointed her in.

"Hi," she said, upon entering the room, "Riley, right?" The girl nodded. "I'm Dr. Grey."

"I know." Riley said in a shaky whisper. "I asked for you. I can talk to you right?" she asked, speaking rapidly. Meredith nodded. Riley nodded back. "Give me about half an hour." She instructed.

Meredith nodded again, and this time left, letting the nurse who bustled into the room take care of Riley for now.

She headed out of the room, and for the second time in time minutes almost crashed into Derek.

"Hi." She said.

"You sure that's a good idea?" Derek asked, gesturing towards the room. "Could get messy."

"Thanks, but I think I can handle myself with messy."

His face softened. "I know, Mere, it's just that…." He trailed off. She stood there, waiting for him to say more, but he didn't.

"Derek, please don't waste our time with half sentences. If you say have something to say, just say it. If not, don't try to make this easier by pretending to care so much." She crossed her arms and waited. Derek stared at her, then looked down at the floor.

"That's what I thought." She told him before once again, walking away, leaving him to stare at her retreating back.

She walked through the hospital, angrily reliving the events of the last week in her mind. She hated Derek, she hated Addison and she hated herself. Doubling back, she entered Riley's room forty minutes later and the girl had calmed down quite a lot.

Meredith shut the door and raised her eyebrows.

"I asked for you because you were the only one that stuck out to me." Riley said. "You're not like, forty, and you seem like you might get it."

"Get what?"

"My, um, my situation."

"What's that?"

"My boyfriend. I'm pretty sure he's trying to kill me."

Meredith raised her eyebrows. "Oh." She said. "Well that's not good."

She shook her head to clear it as she left Riley's room. She had heard the whole sordid tale. There was another girl, and she suspected that her boyfriend was hooking up with her. It was cool, because Riley was 'totally into someone else too', and she didn't know why, but she was convinced it was Greg who got all of those drugs into her system.

"All I take is speed." Riley hadinsisted. "Never crack, never meth, never coke."

Meredith couldn't even handle her own life, for God's sake, and now she had to deal with the intricate, crime ridden life of a wayward seventeen year old?

Lost in these thoughts, she breezed through the wing that held the rooms of the rehab patients. It seemed to be desolate, but all of a sudden, she heard the intrusive, tell tale beep of a heart dropping into cardiac arrest. She looked around the hall. She shouted. No response. Meredith Grey sprinted toward the room, grabbing a nurse as she went.

Seconds later, she was positioning the defibrillator onto the chest of Addison Montgomery- Sheppard.

"What the hell happened?" Meredith asked Addison's doctor an hour later.

"Lack of nutrition. The meds she's on aren't conducive to any kind of appetite and we took her off the IV this week. She's been progressing quite well until now."

"So what, the lack of energy just caused her to shut down?"

He nodded. "Thank God you were around, Dr. Grey. Dr. Sheppard just got out of surgery, and he's on his way."

Meredith nodded. "Glad I could help. Tell Derek I'm glad she's okay." She ran for the nearest exit.

Derek sat in a chair next to Addison's bed. "Jesus, Addison that scared me."

She smiled. "How do you think I felt? Thank God Meredith was passing by when she was, or who knows?"

"Meredith?"

"You didn't hear? She responded first. Walking down the hallway, heard me crashing. Grabbed a new nurse, shocked me a few times. And now I'm fine."

Derek nodded. "Meredith huh?"

Addison smiled and nodded back. "She's a good doctor."

Derek noticed that she didn't feel the need to add person to the list of things Meredith was good as. All of a sudden he was stunned that she had done that, stunned that she hadn't waited around for him and stunned that she didn't even want to tell him about it.

He couldn't stop wondering what it meant. Even hours later when he was sitting in his trailer, he couldn't decide. Maybe she hated him. Hated him for dangling her, hated him for not being able to tell her what she needed to hear. Or maybe it was the other end of the spectrum.

He couldn't exactly be sure. The knocking at his door broke his reverie.

"Meredith?" he said, surprised.

"I'm not sure why I'm here." She blurted out, without making a move to stay. She didn't make a move to leave either. "I don't know if it's Addison or you and me or what ever we feel or don't feel or don't want to feel, but here I am."

There she was. He grabbed her hand and pulled her inside, knowing she was the only person who could cause his temperature to rise when it was ninety degrees outside.

They stared at each other, eyes locked, hearts racing. She was waiting for him to say something, give her something. But he couldn't.

It was too hot for words. Seattle was steaming, and their attraction fueled the fire. It was too hot for this city, and too hot for this trailer.

Derek pressed his lips to Meredith's and kissed her. Her hand moved to his zipper.

It was almost too hot for the confused and ineligible to handle.