AN: I hope everyone is well… Interesting times these days….
Anyway,
Enjoy!
Lost and found 49
Maggie sat quietly by Anna's bed for the better part of an hour. Now finished her paperwork, she was caught up watching the threesome sleep.
Covered in kids, Meredith looked almost unrecognizable to Maggie. Just yesterday, Meredith's features seemed sharp and angular, and she carried a certain tenseness in her body, like she was expecting a fight. It was understandable. Meredith had lived the last five years in a black hole of loss... Never really able to escape.
But Meredith's hard edges had somehow softened. Her defences were down, all fight body was slack, completely relaxed against the girls that covered her.
It made Maggie marvel at the strange turn of events that brought Anna and Zola here. Carolyn had informed her of the circumstances that happened at Dillard that led to the separation of mother and child, and frankly it blew Maggie's mind. That hospital must have been a disaster, because there were protocols in place to keep just this thing from happening. Special labels, chain of custody... signatures and verifications, Maggie pondered. Richard and Janet were right now securing every file related to Anna and her hospital stay since she was born. They were going to get to the bottom of this.
And Zola... Something was up with that too. Just as Maggie had greeted Janet, the social worker had gotten a call from a judge regarding her case. She hoped it was a good thing. And she wished Meredith hadn't had to go through so much pain to get to finally get her happy ever after.
Maggie sighed and put her tablet up, a pair of grey-green eyes met hers. Anna was awake.
"Hi," Maggie smiled, "How are you feeling?"
Anna wrinkled her brow and put a finger on her lips. "Um..." she said and shrugged. Maggie scooted closer on her chair and put a hand on Anna's forehead. No fever... Good. She brushed some of the flyaway locks aside.
"Do you know who I am?" Maggie asked.
The girl shook her head.
"I'm Meredith's sister, Maggie."
"Oh," Anna said. She turned to face Meredith, wincing at the movement.
"Careful, you don't want to tear your stitches,"
"Siches?" Anna reached under the blanket and lifted her gown. "I gots a cut." she said, looking at the bandage. "I remember, the yellow bus crashed... and den-" she made a slashing gesture over the wound. "It hurted."
"Yeah... I'm sure it did."
"It still hurts... but only a little." she gently patted the bandage.
"Meredith... your mommy, she fixed it."
"I member," Anna said. She looked at Meredith's peaceful face and sighed. "She's sweepy," she observed.
"Yeah, she is."
"Was she dockering people?"
"Yes." Maggie had heard that Meredith had operated on Jo. It had been a long and difficult surgery, but she'd succeeded in the end.
"Whozzat?" Anna asked, seeing Zola on the other side of Meredith.
"That's Zola," Maggie said.
"Zola," Anna repeated. "Are you her mommy?" she asked.
"No," Maggie replied, though she could see why Anna might make that assumption. "But she's going to stay with us for awhile… Hopefully, Meredith will be her mommy, and you can be her sister."
Anna's little hands ran along Meredith's forearm until she reached her hand. She pressed Meredith's fingers gently, thinking to herself. "I finally gotta mommy."
"Yes, I know," Maggie smiled. "Isn't it wonderful?"
Anna seemed to ponder all this carefully. "Merediff is really gonna be my mommy?" her voice tinged with doubt.
If Maggie hadn't seen that piece of paper with the DNA results, she wouldn't have answered this question so certainly. But she had, so…
"Yes," she said. "Yes she is."
xxx
Five years ago:
The window pane was cool against Meredith's forehead as she saw the hospital come into view. Beside her, Lexie clutched her hand, watching her carefully. She hated this. She wanted to be strong, she wanted to be fine... but she just couldn't. Derek was gone, and she felt she was too. She swallowed back the nausea she'd been fighting all day.
The bleeding started this morning, and it was light so she hadn't given it much thought. A normal symptom of her pregnancy... But all day she felt sick and light headed. And when she last checked... it seemed like a lot more blood than there should be.
Then there was Amy in the bathroom with the scotch, and if that wasn't enough, there came Lexie, and Addison. She didn't want to go to the hospital. She didn't want Lexie or Addison. She just wanted to lay there and...
But she couldn't. There was a part of Derek alive in her. Multiplying cells. And it wouldn't let her go. So she was stuck in this strange in-betweeness.
"Mere, we're here," Lexie called.
She blinked. They were already at the main entrance. Addison was holding the car door open, waiting for her. "I called ahead," she said. "The hospital gave me privleges. There's an exam room and an ultrasound ready."
Meredith only nodded, letting go of Lexie's hand to grip the door handle and pull herself up. The world rushed around her, and she remained still until the three Addison heads converged into one. It was hard to breathe. It was hard to think. Derek was dead. Buried. Gone. And her baby was probably gone too.
Somehow, she was moving, walking. To the entrance. Then through security, down the hall, onto the elevator.
The elevator.
If there's a crisis...
Meredith struggled not to faint right there. This time, when Lexie's hand gripped her elbow, she let herself lean into it. They walked through to the OB unit, and Addison opened the door to the room. "Alright," she said. "I'm going to check in and start a chart. I'll be back in a few minutes. Lexie, help Meredith into a gown, and get her some water. A nurse will be in to draw some blood."
The door closed, and she was alone again with her sister. Clinically, she knew what she should do. She should drink some water;she should change into a gown,lie back on the table and put her feet in the stirrups.
But all will had left her. It had gone the moment Mr. Clark shot Derek the second time. Now she was just waiting for the other shoe to drop, waiting for the pain. It was going to happen. Strangely... she couldn't wait. Because after that... nothing would matter anymore.
Nothing would have to matter.
"Mere?" Lexie pulled her from her morbid thoughts, and handed her the gown.
A few minutes later, when Addison walked in dressed in a doctor's coat and carrying her chart, Meredith was perched on the exam table, sipping water. The nurse had only just been there. She didn't even remember the needle.
"Hey," Addison pressed her lips in an apologetic smile. "So, I'm going to ask some questions first, alright?"
Meredith stared at her feet and nodded.
Addison did her job, remaining sensitive and professional as she asked the necessary questions. When was her last period? When did she suspect she was pregnant? Did she take a test? How had her appetite been? Any weight gain? Weight loss?
"How long have you been nauseaous?"
"Since this morning," Meredith said. "It usually goes away, but..."
"And did you eat anything today?"
In all honesty, she couldn't remember. She was a zombie or a ghost, now.
"You had toast this morning, remember?" Lexie said. "I made it for you."
"Oh," Meredith recalled the dry buttered whole wheat toast Lexie had forced on her that morning. "I threw that up."
"How about yesterday?" Addison asked.
"Mashed potatoes," Lexie answered for her, "Callie came over and cooked."
Meredith sighed. Now it was clear how deep a pit she was in. She hadn't done anything for herself at all. Since Derek's death, she'd froze. Halted. Stopped. Her grief made her move like molasses. Everything around her had become blurry and insignificant. Even her baby.
"Okay," Addison snapped on some gloves. "Let's see what's going on." She gently pressed Meredith back against the table and draped her. Cold chilled her lower body. Then Addison prepared the speculum. "Take a few minutes, relax. Breathe," Addison said.
Lexie squeezed her hand. Meredith let loose a breath, thankful for her sister's presence. Even though she was annoying, Lexie being here meant she wouldn't fall apart.
"Okay, you're going to feel some pressure," Addison announced. And then it was in. She lay uncomfortably while Addison fished around in her uterus for signs of life. Meredith stared at the ceiling, waiting for confirmation of her worst fear.
"It's going to be okay Meredith, it's going to be alright," Lexie reassured.
Meredith couldn't meet her gaze. On the edge of a cliff, only the faintest breeze would send her tumbling down.
"Meredith, did you want to look?" Addison asked.
"No," she choked. "Please, no." It was dead. Her baby was dead and it was all her fault. Her heart dropped, flaring painfully in her chest as she struggled to breathe. "Derek... he didn't even know," she said. "I didn't even tell him, and now-" It was too much. Derek's death tore her in half… now her heart had been ripped out. She couldn't save him, and now she'd failed her baby.
Crushing the paper drape over her lower body, Meredith cried. Once again, she was alone in this world. She couldn't save them... now who would save her? Her whole body trembled and wept, and everything collapsed all around her. In her periphery, she felt Lexie move closer, stroking her hair, trying to talk to her- but it didn't make sense. Lexie pointed to the screen, to Addison, but Meredith shook her head, refusing to watch.
"Listen, Meredith. Just listen!" Addison's voice rang. Listen? Listen to what? Meredith couldn't hear anything but her choked up sobs.
And then -
Thumpa-thumpa-thumpa-thumpa.
"Wha-" Meredith sniffed as the loud and bizarre sound overcame her raw emotional state.
Thumpa-thumpa-thumpa-thumpa-
"Is that-?"
"It's your baby," Addison said, tearing up too. "And it's fine. Perfectly fine."
Meredith wiped the hot mess of tears and snot from her face, and turned to look at the screen this time. There it was. The foetus was a strangely squished potato, with a bulging head and slightly smaller body.
"From the look of it... I'd say you're about eight weeks," Addison was saying. "See, that's the head... two little nubs for arms..."
It was just a collection of cells no bigger than a kidney bean. But… Underneath the ultrasound, thick jagged white lines scratched out her baby's heartrate.
Thumpa-thumpa-thumpa-thumpa...
At close to 170 beats per minute, it was still alive inside her. How was that possible?
Meredith watched the black and white image of the ultrasound as Addison worked the screen, taking screenshots and measurements, the speculum shifting slightly inside her. She thought it had died. That she had let go just long enough that her body stopped caring. It made her cry more. She'd given up again… and it almost cost her everything. But her offspring was fighting, against all odds.
Meredith lost track of everything else around her except the rapid pulse of her baby's heart echoing in the room. It was alive, still. This little bean inside her was a piece of the love of her life, and it was still there, fighting.
She had to fight too, now.
At some point, Addison removed the speculum, but she saved the sounds and images on the machine and played them on a loop for her. Meredith heard words like 'exhausted', 'dehydrated', and 'low blood sugar.' An IV line was inserted. Her feet were removed from the stirrups. Lexie covered her with a blanket. Exhausted, Meredith curled up, right there on the exam table, falling asleep to the rhythm of the life inside her.
xxx
Now:
Meredith drifted slowly awake. She heard voices... kid voices, and quiet laughter, if that was a thing. She sighed... trying to prepare herself for the waking world. Had it all been a dream? Had she made it up? That Anna was her daughter? Maybe she was delusional. Maybe she was in a coma all this time and dreamt it.
But then she woke up. And the voices were still there.
"Wait, I'm gonna... I'm gonna draw a smiley face..." one high pitched familiar kid voice said. Anna.
"Smile?" came another voice. This one softer, more hesitant. Zola.
Meredith knew she should open her eyes. She wanted to… just not yet. What if she opened her eyes and they were gone?
"Yeah, like dis," Anna instructed. "No, just... yeah," she continued. Then she giggled, "That's not a smiley face, it's a squiggly face!"
"Squig?"
"You talk funny. But it's okay Zola, cause you're my sister, and I gonna help you."
"Help too."
Meredith felt their weight at the foot of the bed. She heard the rattle and roll of writing utensils, and the scratching on paper as they colored and drew.
She thought she could even smell the markers. If this was a dream…
It felt very, very real.
"Yeah you help me too," Anna nattered."Cause you're good at coloring. Can you pass me... pass me the purple marker? Thanks."
Too real.
Meredith felt her throat constrict, and swallowed a lump. She shifted, trying to roll onto her back.
"Hey, she's wakin up."
"Wake up?"
"Yeah, she's movin'!"
The weight from the foot of the bed shifted, and Meredith could finally move onto her back. But still, she was scared. She'd had dreams before… and waking up always broke her. Tears welled behind closed eyelids, and she couldn't help but blink.
"Cry?" Soft warm skin touched her cheeks and under her eyes. She heard, and felt Zola breathing on her face. "No cry Mama," she said. Meredith opened one eye. Zola's Hershey eyes studied her somberly.
Then a pale hand pulled her other eyelid open. Anna's long curls hung over Meredith's face as the girl perched over her. Two. Two kids. Was this really happening?
"You're awake," Anna said.
An eternity seemed to pass by as Meredith studied her own flesh and blood. The events of the last twelve hours tumbled back into her mind. Lexie's freakout, the earthquake, finding Anna, seeing Zola… Jo's surgery. Penny pricking her arm with a needle. Lexie in the scrubroom. Lexie telling her-
You'll be a great aunt.
Janet. Zola.
You're not finished.
Richard.
Meredith, you are Anna's Mother. She's your daughter. There's no question she's yours.
This was real?
Anna had Meredith's eyes and delicate features… But she saw pieces of Derek in her. Her mouth was Derek's, and her hair. And she was chatty… definitely a chatty girl, like her father. Zola's little hand patted her shoulder, and she pinched the fabric of her scrubs. "Mama," she said.
"Hi," Meredith rasped. Cautiously, she reached out thin trembling fingers to the girl's face.
Zola has come to see you. She'll be staying with us for a few days.
This wasn't a dream? Her fingertips grazed Zola's warm cheeks and touched her crimped hair. It was amazingly soft, amazingly real.
Thumpa-thumpa-thumpa-thumpa-
"Merediff," Anna leaned right up in her face. "Izzit true? You're really gonna be my mommy?"
Oh God... She was a mother.
AN: Thanks for reading! Please review!