Third chapter already. Third update this freakin' week. Methinks I am setting a pace I cannot keep up with. Oh well.

All right, chapter 3 aka Confessions part 2, alternate title Ch-Ch- Changes.

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These are my confessions

Just when I thought I said all I can say

Addison stood at the counter, alternating between nervously tapping her nails, and nervously fiddling with her pen.

"Dr. Shepherd?"

Addison looked up as a receptionist seated herself behind her desk.

"Exciting isn't it."

"Addison mustered a smile, "Very."

"And your husband," the woman questioned future, "He..."

"He has no idea," Addison cut her off.

"Oh," the woman was slightly taken aback, "Well he will certainly be surprised."

"Yes," Addison agreed, "He certainly will," she paused, "What happens next?"

"You'll be getting a call, with any luck by the end of the day, but you never know with these things."

"So I just wait?"

The receptionist smiled sympathetically, "I know, the waiting is the hardest part."

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Cristina rolled her eyes as she watched Meredith fiddle with her cell phone. It had been 2 days since Finn had walked away. The first night she went home and spilled her guts to Izzie and they mopped around together. The next day she tried to pretend that nothing had happened, but needed constant pep talks so she would stay on task. Now what little resolve she had was waning, and Cristina had even seen her check her phone twice to see if it was working.

"You are turning into one of those girls."

"What girls?" Meredith questioned distractedly.

"The kind of girls that sit there willing the cute boy to call her. I hate girls like that," Cristina huffed slightly and turned back to her charts.

"Why do you think he hasn't called?"

Cristina let out an exasperated sigh, "I don't know."

"He'll call though right? I mean he said he would call in a few days, and it's been a few days so... he'll call... right?"

"Meredith!" Cristina started to snap, but quickly curbed it, "You know you were starting to get to happy. Your life was heading in a good direction. You smiled, everything was good. Clearly you upset some sort of cosmic balance."

Meredith glared,"Shut up."

Cristina hopped up off the counter and grabbed her charts, "He'll call."

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Derek could just feel that today was going to be a bad day.

Addison had been gone again when he woke up that morning. For the last 3 mornings in fact she had been gone when his alarm went off. And all week she had been asleep when he got home. He had mentioned it to her yesterday and she had simply said that he was welcome to wake her up if he wanted to talk.

Even though it was clearly starting to annoy her, he had continued to visit her on the maternity floor. The nurses had begun making snide remarks about his guilty conscience behind his back, and sugary sweet remarks to his face about how they should just put his name on the rocking chair in the corner.

He was willing to overlook this, as long as they didn't make comments like those he had overheard, around Addison. Given time things would blow over and go back to normal.

He wondered if he should go back up and look for her. It had been over an hour since he had last tired. She hadn't been around, so he made up an excuse and waited around for a bit, but she hadn't appeared,

He'd try again. All she could do was send him away, again. She had started out being so nice to him, earlier in the week. She'd brought him coffee, ignored his sulking, smiled when he visited excessively. Now she seemed to have lost all patience with him, last time he had visited for no reason she told him to leave her alone unless he actually wanted to talk to her about something important.

This wasn't going to work. Now she was pushing him away too.

This wasn't what he wanted.

Acting on a hunch he changed directions and made his way to the OR's.

She was in OR 3.

He slipped unseen into the gallery and tried to ignore the gossiping interns in front of him.

Clearly they hadn't noticed him, because he distinctly heard Yang and Karev scoff and refer to him as McNeedy numerous times.

And he wasn't being needy. He was making sure that his wife knew that he cared. It had nothing to do with him and his own problems.

Nothing to do with him at all.

"The two of them are driving Bailey up the wall," Alex informed the group, "McNeedy's all like 'BooHoo, Meredith moved on to the sexy vet. I'm sad. Addison take care of me. I'm all alone. WHHAAA.'"

The interns all laughed.

Derek suppressed a sigh and watched Addison. She glanced up at him momentarily, but went right back to work. He wasn't sure, but he thought he might have seen her roll her eyes.

"And Meredith," Cristina picked up the story, "Hides out all week, finally comes back bringing with her a whole new meaning to the word skittish, but that's okay because for once at least she is smiling, then she gets dumped by the 'sexy vet' and sinks into the most depressive funk that I have ever seen. Bailey has her doing scut just so she doesn't have to deal with people. She is that depressing to be around."

At that, Derek quietly got up and left.

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Meredith continued to twirl her cellphone between her fingers as she sat at the bottom of the stairwell.

Hiding. Again. It was her thing.

"Meredith?"

Meredith glanced up, her pulse increasing slightly, "Leave me alone."

"I just want to talk to you," Derek took a step towards her.

"I don't want to to talk to you, or see you for that matter, ever again."

"Meredith..." Derek moved closer again.

Meredith stood up in order to move further away.

"Meredith, we have to talk at some point, if for no other reason then we work together."

"We don't work together now, so leave."

Derek faltered slightly. He jammed his hands in his pockets and examined the wall, "I heard you broke up with Dr. Dandridge."

Meredith's head jerked up and her eye's flashed, "That's why you are here?" she spat, "You are unbelievable! No we didn't break up, he dumped me because of you. You have single handily managed to screw up the best relationship that I have ever been in. I was happy. Actually happy, which is a huge thing for me. I just want to be around him all the time, just be with him, and you ruined that for me by turning me back into your dirty mistress. He won't even talk to me. I will never forgive you for that, NEVER."

Derek grabbed her arm as she went to storm by him, "Meredith."

"Stop!" she ripped her arm out of his grasp, "We are over. Do you hear me? OVER. Because now I really am the mistress. I knew you were married, and you weren't separated from your wife, you were with her, really with her. I don't care how many problems you have. You are with her. I can never forgive you for putting me in that position, you turned me into the other women. So we are definitely not ever going to be together, we are not friends we are not not-friends we are NOTHING."

"Meredith!" Derek stood in front of her as she tried to leave, "I just..."

"I know what you want," Meredith exclaimed ripping open the door, "And I am going to make this very clear, I can't be with you, I can't love you, because I cannot respect you."

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Addison was completely lost in thought when her phone rang. So lost in thought in fact, that she jumped and had to take several deep breaths before answering.

"Dr. Shepherd," she stated.

"Addison? Great news."

Addison sighed. There wasn't really any turning back now. Everything was moving ahead whether she wanted it to or not.

"Addison?"

Addison shook herself out of her daze, "That's wonderful. Everything is coming together? Everything is on schedule?"

"Of course. I took the liberty of calling some people on your behalf. Your looking at about 6 weeks if you go with the best, but these things almost always take longer."

"I want the best," Addison said firmly, "Money isn't an issue."

"Of course."

Addison could hear the greediness masked as respect in the woman's voice. "What about an apartment in the mean time?"

"I found the perfect place for you and your husband," the woman gushed.

Addison rolled her eyes,

"It's available for sublet for the next 3 months, which is perfect for you, if you don't mind paying out once the renovations on your house are complete."

"I don't care," Addison exclaimed evenly, "I'll come by this evening and sign all the papers."

With that Addison flipped closed her phone, flinching at the finality or the click.

She was leaving Derek. She had decided on a week, and she had given him a week. He hadn't told her.

So she was leaving. Not because she wanted to, but because she had to. She couldn't stay with the knowledge that her husband had cheated on her and hadn't even had the decency to tell her, to apologize.

If he had told her, had apologized, and had wanted to continue working things out, she would have stayed.

She didn't have a choice, she had to leave.

"Dr. Shepherd..." Meredith stood nervously at the door holding the lab results a nurse had sent her to get, "I have your labs..."

"Meredith, not now.," Addison replied bitterly.

Meredith was taken aback. She was silent for a long time as Addison ignored her presence, "You know, don't you?"

"Meredith..."

"When you asked..." Meredith stuttered and stumbled over her confession, "When I told you... It was the truth... but..."

"But now it's not... I know."

"He told you?"

"No," Addison sighed, "No he didn't."

"I'm so sorry, Addison..."

Addison stopped her, "Was it just a one time thing? Or is it just about the sex? Or ..." Addison paused, "Was he planning on leaving me or just cheating on me?"

Meredith looked at her curiously, "I am never going to sleep with your husband again. I am tired of this whole thing. I am tired of not being able to move on. I am tired of being the other woman, the dirty mistress. I will always come second to you... and I want more then that."

Addison laughed bitterly, "I think you have it backwards, since I got here, I have come second to you."

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Finn walked purposely through the courtyard and up to where Meredith was standing talking to Alex and Cristina.

"I need to talk to you," he insisted, pulling her away before she had a chance to respond.

"You fell in love with Derek," he clarified.

Meredith nodded.

"Your in love with him?" he asked.

"Was."

"Was?"

"Was."

"But you had sex with him at prom."

Meredith nodded again, trying her hardest not to flinch.

"But you don't want to be with him, you want to be with me."

"Yes."

"And your not in love with him?"

"No."

Finn nodded and turned, "Okay, that's all I wanted to know."

Meredith quickly stepped in front of him, "So now what?"

"Now I go out to my truck, call you, and ask you out to dinner for tonight."

Meredith's face lit up and she bit her lip in order to contain her smile, not that it really worked, "Really? We're ok?"

Finn grinned back, "We're okay."

Meredith bounced slightly as she stood on her tiptoes to kiss him quickly, "Okay, go call me." She grinned pushing him away.

"Okay, okay," Finn grinned back, "Don't push me woman."

Meredith smiled as she headed back to Cristina and Alex, who were standing where she left them, pretending they hadn't been watching her the entire time.

She smiled contentedly to no one in particular, "He is going to call me"

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"What are you doing?" Derek quietly approached, kissing Addison's cheek, furrowing his brow when she pulled away.

"Just organizing some papers."

"Are you okay?" Derek asked, gently rubbing her arm.

She pulled away and turned to face him, "You had sex with Meredith," she answered in an angry whisper, "At prom. You had sex with Meredith.

Derek hung his head.

"Are we even now? Is it out of your system?" She spat.

Derek nodded.

People began to look at them, not because they could hear what she was saying, but because it was clear that Addison was furious, and most people realized why.

"Good," Addison reached into her briefcase, "Sign these."

"Divorce papers?"

"Our lawyer said they are okay."

"I am not signing these," Derek exclaimed loud enough for people to hear him.

"Derek," Addison moved to grab them back.

"I am not signing."

"Fine," Addison turned on her heel and stormed away.

"Addison!" Derek called after her, "Addison!"

Addison held up her hand and continued down the hall and to the stairs.

"Addison!" Derek raced after her.

"Leave me alone Derek."

"We can fix this," he insisted as they approached the front doors.

"Fix this? Fix this? We were fixing this. We were working things out. I waited for it to pass. You promised me that I had no reason to be jealous of Meredith Grey. But less then 8 hours later you were having sex with her in an exam room when I was what? 100 feet away?"

"Addison!" Derek grabbed her arm and forced her to look him in the eye. People all around them were now blatantly watching them, "We can fix this. I want to fix this."

Addison wrenched her arm from his grip, "Why? Because after everything she wants to be with the vet? It doesn't work that way. I refuse to be your second choice." She lowered her voice and leaned slightly towards him, "Now do us both a favor, and sign the papers!"

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Derek is having one hell of a bad day. I would feel bad, if he didn't deserve it. I think that Meredith is my favorite character in this chapter, she kicked some McDreamy/McNeedy ass.

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