A/N: Thank you all so much for the positive feedback on the first chapter :) Here's chapter two for you, as promised, with more characters. Hope you like!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything.


Chapter 2

One month later

February, 2012

Los Angeles, California

She couldn't sleep anymore. All she could do was lie in bed and think about how one side was empty – too empty.

I couldn't sleep, and I kept trying to tell myself that it was from something other than Sam but I mean, come on. How can I ignore the fact that my bed is half empty? It's like this…space that I can't…occupy. You know, it's his space. It's Sam's space. He belongs there.

She had said this to her therapist just this morning, in the hopes that he would have some words of wisdom to make her feel slightly less crazy and clingy to this (now ex) boyfriend who didn't even treat her all that well to begin with. But that was the thing; Addison knew, as soon as she made it clear she wanted a baby, she knew Sam was not treating her how a significant other should be treated, how she deserved to be treated.

Still, the therapist offered little help…as usual. No matter how many times she fit the phrase "I couldn't sleep" into a sentence, all he seemed to do was respond to her with a question.

"Why couldn't you sleep?"

"Are you afraid to sleep in 'Sam's space'?"

"What was so captivating about that television show on shin-kicking you watched in the middle of the night?"

"Oh give me a break," Addison scoffed to herself in the middle of the night, lying in bed.

What the hell was she paying this guy for anyhow? To play 20 Questions with her for an hour?

That morning, before even going to the therapist's office she had stood on her bedroom balcony overlooking the ocean, clad only in her pajamas and bathrobe, when who should appear but the (ex) boyfriend himself. She had felt a pang in her chest, seeing him – all tall and muscular with that "just woken up" look she had loved so much – and not being able to do or say anything. On the outside she looked calm as he glanced over at her, watched her for a moment, but internally she was screaming; her heart was beating so fast she felt like she could run five miles.

He had walked back inside, leaving her alone with her thoughts and screaming insides. Then again, that seemed to be the theme of her life lately; alone.

Since the failed adoption, the days at work all seemed to flow together – nothing special, just work. Patient after patient with the occasional hospital visit. Oh, and the occasional questioning of Addison's sudden exhaustion at trying to have a baby.

She was pretty sure Jake was going to call her out for going insane when he caught her dumping coffee beans straight into the case, forgetting to add the filter.

"You all right there?" He asked.

"Yeah," she chuckled sarcastically. "No. Sam and I broke up."

Jake had questioned her, trying his hardest to seem surprised, when really he's just as bad at faking it as Sam was when he apologized for her "not getting what she wanted."

Amelia had encouraged her to go down the surrogacy route; "Why not surrogacy? You get your baby and someone else's boobs take the hit."

As much as she wanted to laugh at her, and as right as her former sister-in-law was, Addison wasn't in the mood to jump through any more hoops. She had jumped through so many, just to get…what?

Two failed attempts at IVF, passed over for an adoption, and forced to give her only daughter away twenty-nine years ago.

So many people seemed to be having children, or at least already had them. Sam and Naomi had Maya, and now Olivia. Violet and Pete – both of whom never even wanted children! – had Lucas. Cooper just found out he had a son, Mason…when was it going to be her turn?

Her conversation with her best friend Dr. Violet Turner in the St. Ambrose ER played through her head over and over again too.

What do you do when the one person who can make you feel better won't talk to you?

Oh she wished with all her might that Sam wasn't that person. Why couldn't it be Violet, or Amelia – her little sister – or Jake, or even Mark for God's sake? Anyone but Sam Bennett.

Addison sighed, turning over onto her side facing the window. She thought about Violet's words again, her suggestion to try sleeping sideways. Rolling her eyes, Addison shuffled around in bed until her legs were at the corner opposite her head. Her feet immediately felt cold, like they were crossing a line into some foreign territory they weren't supposed to be in.

"I'm waiting…" she mumbled, waiting to get that "oddly comforting" feeling Violet described getting after Pete left her. Nothing. "God, why can't I just sleep?!" She yelled, scaring Milo, her orange tabby cat, awake and out of his favorite sleeping spot by the floor vent.

This was not what she meant when she said she wanted her life to change. It definitely was changing, but not for the better. Every guy she met turned out to be the wrong one, and still, five years later, she didn't have her baby. Quickly, she threw off the sheets and got out of bed, walking back outside to stand on the balcony. She may as well turn this into a nightly ritual, she thought to herself. Eventually Milo came outside and rubbed against her leg, wanting to be picked up.

"Hey buddy," she cooed, scratching behind the cat's ears. Milo purred, nuzzling his face against her neck; although he was just a cat, she relished in the affection.

Staring out into the ocean once again, Addison realized she was in for another long night, another long, sleepless night wondering when it was finally going to be her turn.


"Did you know all the guys went out last night?" Violet asked, walking briskly into Addison's office the next morning.

"Really?" Addison looked up at her, doing her best to appear unperturbed.

Violet sighed, falling into Addison's plush office couch. "So Sam could get his mind off you."

"That's why he didn't come home," Addison answered automatically, not even thinking that she just admitted to stalking her ex to her best friend. But Violet just sat there, flipping through a magazine. "I was up all night again," Addison continued. "I did not hear the garage open, I did not see the lights go on."

"I feel like Pete is using this separation to have the bachelor party that he never had," Violet huffed. "You know, he wants to sow his wild – old – oats."

"He told you that?"

"Yeah…I pretended not to care."

"Do you?"

Violet paused. "Well, I don't want to. I mean, intellectually I understand where Pete is coming from, but emotionally, I...I haven't processed him being with other women yet! Does he think our marriage is over?"

"Maybe he just has a different idea of what separation is, you know?" Addison suggested. "You prefer sleeping sideways; he prefers sowing his wild, old oats."

Violet gave her a look.

"Oh come on, a part of me hopes that Sam moves on, you know? I mean, I wonder if I didn't hold him hostage…with all the baby stuff." What Violet doesn't know is that Addison wondered that more often than not.

"You're trying to be happy!" Violet said.

Addison leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest. "Maybe Pete is too."

The two women sat in silence for a moment, contemplating.

"No, you know what, whatever Pete's doing…" Violet paused, sitting up straighter. "You do not go looking for happiness by sleeping with every big-busted blonde in Los Angeles County. What he's doing is…I don't know. It's like he's getting back at me for…something."

"Like what?" Addison asked incredulously. "Taking care of him after he had a heart attack?"

"I have no idea," Violet admitted. "I don't know if I'll ever understand. In fact, I'm not sure I'll ever understand men. Let's just hope Lucas doesn't grow up to be one of those guys who spends all his time running from woman to woman…"

"No, do not even worry about that. Because you're gonna raise him to be better than that," Addison said.

"Well, one can hope," Violet sighed.

Addison replayed that over and over in her head too – one could hope that all was not lost for the adult male species.


Once five o'clock rolled around, she thought about going home, but what was the point anymore? It's not like Addison had anyone there waiting for her. God, she sounded so pathetic; she felt like she was complaining to literally everyone with a pulse about one thing or another. The baby, the boyfriend, all her hopes and dreams…it was a wonder no one had hit her yet, she thought to herself.

She just…she just wanted a sign, a sign that everything was going to be okay, that she could move forward with her life and leave Sam and all those babies in the past. Getting up from her desk, Addison plopped down on her office couch, resting her head in her hands. She doesn't know how much time passed before the sound of footsteps drew nearer.

"You still sulking?"

Of course it had to be Dr. Jake Reilly; the Fiji guy, the guy Addison had absolutely no idea her feelings for. Perfect.

"I'm not sulking," she sighed. "Too much energy. I am too far past exhaustion to sulk."

"Looks like sulking from here," Jake muttered, standing in her office doorway and taking a sip from his coffee mug.

Addison leaned back, annoyed. "You know what you are? You're a peddler…a baby peddler."

"Is that right?" Jake raised an eyebrow.

"Mhm," Addison replied, nursing her own mug of tea. "It is. And you're probably here to give me some sort of pep talk where, to summarize, you'll tell me to get back on the horse. You're a peddler."

Jake chuckled, sitting next to her on the couch. "Are you getting back together with Sam?"

This time it was Addison's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Why would you ask that?"

"Well, you gave Sam up because you wanted a baby," Jake said. "And if you're not getting back together with him then a baby is still what you want."

Damn Jake Reilly and his way of putting words into sentences and making them come out perfectly. Damn him and his logic.

"Give me your hand," he said.

"What?"

"Until you have a baby I consider you my patient. Give me your hand."

Addison laughed, setting her cup down. "Okay."

"I have heard every word of this before," Jake began. "And I have told women when it's time to throw in the towel, and you are not there yet. You're not even close. If you want this, we can make it happen."

Staring straight into his eyes, Addison was mesmerized by his words, by the softness of his hand, gently holding onto hers…

"I know you've felt alone in this before," Jake continued. "But you don't need to feel that way anymore because you've got me. I will always be there, Addison."

She continued to stare at him in silence and not before long he began rubbing soft circles on her hand with this thumb.

"You say that to all your patients?" Addison asked after a moment.

Jake smiled softly. "Not all of it."

Suddenly, her eyes began to feel very heavy, like sitting here with Jake could actually make her fall asl-

Her pager beeped, snapping her out of it. "Oh!" She sat up with a start, pulling the pager out from her bag. Speak of the devil, it was Pete, paging from the ER.

Addison looked at Jake apologetically. "I…have to go. It's Pete, he's got a patient in the ER."

"Say no more," Jake said. "You just remember to keep all your options open."

"Right," Addison replied quickly, but giving a genuine smile. "Thanks. I mean it. You're a decent guy, Jake."

Decent enough that I wish it were you I stayed up all night thinking about.


As soon as she entered the ER, stethoscope wrapped around her neck, she craned her neck searching for Pete and his – well now their – patient.

"Hang another unit!" Dr. Pete Wilder's voice sounded throughout the room. Addison ran to it, but when she got there she realized that it wasn't just Pete in the room, there was another doctor there too, pushing two doses of Epinephrine.

"We have to get her to the OR, or she's going to bleed out," the woman ordered. She had to be the youngest doctor at St. Ambrose Addison had ever seen, tall with auburn/brown hair and a slight Eastern European accent she couldn't place.

"Oh good, Addison you're here," Pete said upon noticing her arrival. "This is Alexis Miller, thirty-two weeks, brought in by ambulance after getting hit by a car…came to me for a holistic birth plan in her twelfth week."

"Oh God," Addison muttered, immediately going to check for a fetal heart rate. Pulling up Alexis' shirt, she immediately noticed bruising on the abdomen. "No," she said. "There's no time. We have to get this baby out right away."

"I'm sorry Dr. Montgomery but we can't do that just yet," the woman stopped her.

"I'm sorry who are you?" Addison asked without even looking up.

"This is Dr. Levin," Pete answered for her. "She's one of our new emergency medicine fellows."

"Oh, well Dr. Levin I can assure you I've been doing this since before you could walk so if you'll excuse me…" Addison began wheeling the patient toward the trauma OR.

"She has a severe intestinal bleed and that baby is the only thing keeping her from bleeding out!" Dr. Levin followed behind her closely, not giving up. And where the hell did Pete go? "Her scans indicate multiple-"

"Well lucky for you that's not your call anymore because this is no longer your patient," Addison snapped, interrupting and not wanting to deal with this woman, wherever she came from, who has not even half the medical training Addison does. "Stay out of my OR." She looked around frantically for Pete. "Pete!"

As soon as Pete returned to her side, she left to scrub in. She had to move as quickly as possible, to ignore the angered look on this new fetus-fellow's face, and to get that baby out of there before…


Both mother and baby died. Addison had later learned there was no father in the picture, no one to call. The mother and her daughter were all each other had, and neither of them survived. Worst of all, the fellow was right; as soon as Addison had reached in for the baby, Alexis had started bleeding out, and fast. Within seconds, there was no saving her. Yet, Addison was at a loss of what she would have done if she had left the baby in.

She was exhausted; if she didn't feel like going home from her office earlier, now it seemed like there was no better place. Today was not a good day, and Addison was not in a good mood.

Carrying her scrub cap tightly in one hand with her nails digging into her palm, Addison threw open the door to a dark on-call room, needing to take a few minutes to settle before even thinking about getting into a car. She was just about to crash into the bed when she noticed it was in fact, already occupied. Dr. Levin was sitting up, staring her straight in the eyes like she already knew what happened.

"Oh," Addison scoffed. "Just wonderful."

"I'm not going to say 'I told you so' if that's what you're thinking," the young doctor said. "You couldn't have known. You didn't even look at her scans."

"Okay, spare me the condescending lecture, there was no saving that woman and you know it; she would have bled out no matter what we did."

Dr. Levin sighed. "There's no use arguing it now; Alexis and the baby are gone."

Addison felt a pang in her chest at the softness of the young woman's voice. "Since when did you work here anyway?"

"Three weeks ago," Dr. Levin replied. "I've already completed my residency in pediatrics with Harvard at Mass. Gen., but then I found out about St. Ambrose's emergency medicine fellowship program…"

"St. Ambrose has a fellowship program?" Addison interrupted, just now remembering she'd never heard of such a thing.

"It's new this year…didn't you know? Or does Dr. King not keep her attending surgeons in the loop?"

"Apparently she doesn't," Addison said through gritted teeth.

"Well if you don't mind I'm going to go find another room to sleep in. You look like you could use this one more than me." Dr. Levin stood up to leave.

"Wait," Addison found herself stopping her.

"Yes?"

"What…what did you say your name was again?"

"I didn't, Dr. Wilder did. But it's Dr. Levin, Alina Levin."

The young doctor turned and left without so much as a handshake.

Addison fell back onto the bed. Alina. Her stomach churned from the mixed feelings behind the name. She may have been looking for a sign earlier, but this just seemed like a cruel joke.


Thanks for reading! Reviews are always welcome! Chapter 3 to come soon :)