By the time Meredith reached the locker room, she was nearly hyperventilating. She barged into the room and instinctively laid down on the bench in front of her locker, oblivious to everyone and everything she had passed along the way. She hadn't even noticed that someone else was rummaging through a locker she had ran right past. All she could do was think about Derek…and breathing…and Derek…
"Hello? Are you okay?" a tentative voice called from behind Meredith. A small woman with dark brown hair and sparkling eyes poked her head around the metallic bank of lockers and watched as Meredith fought for air. Her breaths were in quick, erratic gasps, and the woman knew that she needed to find a way to help. She stepped closer to Meredith and locked eyes with her. "Hey, slow down! You need to slow down your breathing. Inhale…Exhale…Inhale…Exhale…nice and slow…" Her voice was soothing and there was something kind and familiar about her. Meredith worked to follow the directions and within a few moments she had calmed down fully, physically anyway. Mentally, not so much.
"You had me scared there, for a minute," the stranger continued, a nervous giggle following. "My first day hasn't even officially started yet and I have patients throwing themselves at me in the locker room!"
Meredith couldn't help but smile. A new intern. She remembered how excited she too had been on her first day. How she had almost been late due to the one-night-stand still plaguing her a full year later. This intern, though, clearly wasn't risking being late. Interns weren't expected to report for a full hour yet, the late morning start a small luxury afforded to ease them into the brutal schedule.
Meredith sat up and tried to ignore the visions of Derek swimming through her head. "So you're an intern, I take it?"
"Yeah. I'm Lexie. Lexie Grey," the girl responded, extending her hand out to shake Meredith's.
Meredith's eyes widened and she took in a deep breath. "Seriously? Lexie Grey?"
Lexie pulled her hand back down to her side and shifted nervously. "Um…yeah…is everything…are you sure you're okay?" She studied Meredith cautiously as she slowly realized who she was talking to. "Oh shit, you're Meredith aren't you?"
Meredith nodded, still in disbelief that she was looking at her half-sister.
"Wow. I wasn't expecting to meet you…like this…" Lexie said, collapsing onto the bench next to Meredith.
Meredith resumed the nibbling on her lower lip as she fidgeted with her hands, searching for a way to make sense of this encounter. "You're doing your internship at Seattle Grace?" Meredith asked. She knew it was a stupid question – she already knew the answer – but she felt like she needed to say something.
"Yeah, I was planning to do it out east, but after Mom…" her voice trailed off as she looked back at Meredith. "I thought I should try to be closer to home, to keep an eye on Dad."
Meredith nodded, fidgeting a bit more frantically as memories of Susan's death and her last two confrontations with Thatcher Grey hit her in tsunami-like waves.
The awkward silence continued.
"How is…how is Thatcher doing?" Meredith resumed the conversation, looking back over at Lexie.
"He's a mess. He drinks…all the time…and he cries…and it's…hard. He doesn't know how to cope." Lexie fought down her own emotions, watching Meredith wince at the honest description of their father's behavior. She didn't want to make this conversation worse. "You know," she continued, "Molly told me…what happened at the hospital…the day of the funeral, and I'm sorry about that. I really am."
Meredith winced again. "Stop. You don't have to do this."
"Do what?"
"This. This thing…Where you try to make everything okay with us because we share half of our DNA."
"Meredith, that's not why I'm saying this. I truly am sorry about how he has treated you. I know that it's not your fault that Mom died, and I know it would have meant a lot to her to have you at the funeral. She told me about you and considered you…family."
Family. Meredith wasn't even sure she knew what that word was supposed to mean anymore. From what she could tell, family was just a code word for people that left her or hurt her or both. At least when it came to biological family. In Meredith's mind, Cristina was the only real family she had left.
"Look, I know you were upset about something when you came in here, and I don't want to make you more upset by talking about this, but I would really like for things to be okay between us this year. I don't expect us to do the sister thing where we share clothes or hang out or anything like that, but I know this year will be hard - really hard - and I'd like to know that you don't hate me." Lexie looked up at Meredith expectantly, trying to read her expression.
Meredith stared back, her mouth moving as though she was trying to figure out what to say but couldn't sync her lips with a voice.
"Just tell me you don't hate me already. At least get to know me first. Maybe you'll even think I'm ok," Lexie smiled, almost begging for acceptance from her older sister.
Meredith finally nodded. "I don't hate you, Lexie. You don't need to worry about me." She felt a pang of guilt over the thoughts running through her head. I do hate you. I hate that you had a happy childhood with my dad and a mom that clearly loved you. I hate that you're beautiful. I hate that you're working in my hospital…But she knew that she couldn't really blame Lexie for all those things. She was certainly jealous, but she wouldn't do anything malicious towards her. She wouldn't be her enemy. She didn't need any more enemies right now.
"Okay, then. Now that we've got that settled, what can you tell me about the Nazi?" Lexie giggled nervously. "Everything I've heard about her terrifies me. Is she really that bad?"
Meredith smiled at the thought of Lexie working under Miranda Bailey. She quickly found herself sharing stories and suggestions for handling Dr. Bailey, and for a few minutes, she no longer found herself thinking about Derek. For a few minutes, she thought she might even like this new Grey.