Day 6

Meredith stood quietly at the counter of the kitchen, glancing into the bedroom at Cristina sleeping, her body molded against a pillow that she could only assume was Burke's and she dabbed at the tears forming in the corner of her eyes.

She had tried so very hard to get Cristina to talk last night, to get her to let out the tears, the frustration, but all that remained in her was anger.

Anger that Derek had given him the wrong antibiotic. Anger that she couldn't work.

There was no sadness within her, or so it seemed.

She laid her elbows on the counter and brought her face to her hand as she cried again for the third time in thirty minutes, frustrated that she couldn't help her friend, that she couldn't help her to grieve for what she had lost, that she couldn't get her to grieve at all.

Cristina woke with a start, her face buried in his pillow and she heard Meredith's stifled sob and rolled her eyes.

She couldn't understand how people could be so pathetically mournful.

She rose from the bed and walked to the closet grabbing a pair of his pajama pants and his favorite Tulane t-shirt and pulled them on, his scent wrapping around her, tugging at her heart, but she pushed it away.

Meredith stood with a jolt when she heard Cristina shuffle to the doorway, and wiped the tears away, "Good morning." She mumbled, "I'm going to make breakfast, are you hungry?"

She turned to the cupboard she'd seen Burke open so many times while he was going 'all Iron Chef' in the kitchen as Cristina referred to it, and a black velvet box tumbled from the cupboard to the rim of the sink, knocking it open and landed to the floor, its contents skidding across the floor to Cristina's feet.

Cristina knelt down to the floor, afraid to pick it up for a moment, the she'd been working so hard to suppress rushing upwards, the tears building up in her eyes, the lump in her throat growing larger.

Her gaze was fixed on the diamond ring laying just inches from her, and she reached out for it, and picked it up, the cold metal in her hands, and slid it on her finger. Simple movements.

Simple movements that he was supposed to carry out.

Not her.

She fell the rest of the way to the ground her body overcome with grief and she began to sob violently against the door jam of their bedroom, her heart exploding with a million emotions she couldn't identify, her mind racing with the possibilities that lie before them.

That had lied before them.

Now they were gone.

Meredith came to her side, enfolding her in her arms, "Cristina..." She breathed, tears coming from her own eyes.

"He's gone...he's gone..." She could only choke out the words. She couldn't get anything else out, over and over again, she mumbled that he was gone. Making it more painfully real each time.

"Cristina...his body is gone, but his spirit is here with you." Meredith sniffed, hugging her tighter. "He's not completely gone."

"He's gone, dammit! Quit trying to make me feel better with that spirit crap, because that's just lame!" She raged tears still flowing freely.

Meredith tried to stifle a minute chuckle, even in grief, Cristina was still herself, "I thought I'd try..."

"Meredith?" She managed to get the words out in between sobs.

"Yeah?"

"Shut up." She continued to cry in her friends arms, losing count of the tears she allowed to spill down her cheek, losing control of the weakness and vulnerability she worked so hard for the past two days to mask.

He was gone.

After she had no more tears to cry, she looked down to her hand, the ring that he'd left for her, or so it had seemed and swallowed hard, her fingers running over it.

"I never told him that I loved him...not while he was awake. I couldn't ever say the words. He was going to propose to me, and I couldn't even tell him that I loved him." She was empty.

Numb.

"He knows how much you love him."

"He knew, you mean. Past tense." She reminded her friend, her voice bitter.

Meredith wasn't able to say anything, but persisted after her with a sadness in her eyes that was undeniable. There were no words to make it better. To take away her pain.

There were no words to make it easier.

Cristina's finger slid over the ring he'd gotten her, and her heart ache as she came to realize the meaning behind it.

It was a past, present and future band, and tears began to spill once again as she came to realize that while they had a past, there was no present, and there was no future.