NINE

Owens phone had gone silent. Cristina hadn't returned any of his pages, or phone calls and she hadn't called him in the day, not once. That was not like her. She was definitely avoiding him, obviously stewing over whatever Meredith had told her but what that was he didn't know. He had a surgery to attend, but after that, if she wasn't busy, they were going to talk.

*

Bailey was right. She was Cristina Yang, even though she loved Owen and they were going out together, he was a guy and she was a girl, and while she was at work, she was a kick ass bad ass doctor rocking surgeries. The girly confusion and depression and chocolate munching could wait until she got home, and really she was over crying and filling her face. She was explaining all of this to Meredith and Izzie and Alex, as they late lunched in the cafeteria. They listened amused while Cristina ranted between bites of her salad. She had surgeries to rock. She had a name to make for herself in the Seattle Grace history books, not freak out over some guy thing. The gang looked to one another and smiled. While Cristina was defining the exact path of greatness she was going to travel in the next few years, one by one they looked over her shoulder and kept their stares there.

"What?" She mumbled after a while, her mouth full of lettuce leaves.

Alex nodded over her shoulder. "McDude at three o'clock."

The gang sat and watched as Cristina tried to appear nonchalant. Owen did his best to ignore the staring, but pretending not to stare pairs of eyes. Except Meredith, she stared at Owen and didn't hide the fact that she was glaring.

"Cristina?" He walked round the table so that Cristina could see him.

"Owen." She munched concentrating on her salad.

"You all right?" he asked puzzled and a bit embarrassed at her demeanour.

"Awesome." She said.

They had long gotten past the secrecy of their relationship so speaking in front of her friends wasn't a big deal, just a bit awkward.

"I just wanted to know about tonight, are we still on? Do you want me to come and get you at the apartment or do you want to meet me at Joes? I'm off at eight."

Cristina couldn't deal with Owen right then. She knew they would have to have a talk about what was or wasn't going on between them. But until she could get a control on her emotions, that talk wasn't going to be anytime soon, she kept her tone light and tried to buy time.

"Meredith and I have a thing remember? I left you a message."

"You didn't say what the thing was."

She looked at him "Do I have to?"

"Well, is it a thing I can pick you up from? Is it an early thing, a late thing, what?"

Meredith, Alex and Izzie's, heads pitched back and forth like they were watching tennis, Yang's turn.

"It's just a thing with my friend. I can have things with my friends. You have things in private with your friends don't you?"

"Well when you have finished your thing with your friend." Here Owen looked at both her and Meredith. "Can you call me?"

"If it's not late, if I'm not tired. I'll see."

He kept his gaze on her. They stared each other out. "Well. I finish at eight. You know what to do, when you finish your 'thing'. " Said Owen. Then he left.

Alex chuckled through the rest of his lunch.