I believe you pretty much all know this song. It's a good one. Writing this fic is hard because I'm trying to keep the chapters true to the songs I've picked for them without just making it the song in Grey's-verse. Ya know? Well, I hope I've accomplished my goal with this one. Lemme know with more awesome reviews =)

Enjoy!

Chapter Two: What Hurts the Most

Numbly, I lay on the couch, wishing the over-sized cushions would swallow me up and take me away from this world. Thoughts raced through my head at speeds that would have made light jealous, but I was able to comprehend the basic meaning of them. Each and every thought was about Erica and what I had just lost.

My phone rang. It was on vibrate, placed on the coffee table, so a loud buzzing filled the uncomfortably silent room. I jumped and grabbed at my phone before it buzzed itself right over the edge of the table. Air that I hadn't realized I had been holding inside left me in a heavy sigh. It was not the person I wanted it to be.

I considered not answering it, but then Mark would know something was wrong and I didn't think I had it in me to answer those questions left. I took a deep breath and tried cleared my throat before answering, hoping my voice would sound relatively normal.

"Hey," I said in mock cheerfulness.

"Are you working tomorrow?" Mark asked. So much for 'Hello'.

"No, why?" I wondered what he could possibly be thinking.

"Good, get your ass down to Joe's. Lexie went home to get some sleep before her shift and I'm lonely."

Translation: "Lexie's leaving and I don't know if I'm strong enough to resist the women. Help!"

"Uhm….Yeah. Sure. Why not?" I replied. Getting up and driving myself to Joe's to play manwhore-handler was one of the last things I wanted to do. But Mark was a good friend and helping him not screw up with Lexie was the least I could do to pay him back. Mark cheered and hung up. Something told me he was off tomorrow too, and therefore going a little heavier than usual on the alcohol.

Getting off the couch was harder than I thought it would be. Not just because the cushions were so soft and low that you practically sank into them, never to be seen again, but because it offered a sanctuary to me. I felt safe as long as I was curled up between the arm rest and the back of the couch. Getting up left me vulnerable with nothing but my self-strength holding me together.

Still I managed it. I also managed to drive all the way to the Emerald City Bar safely. And I even managed to smile at Mark when I got inside, finding him chewing furiously on a straw at the far end of the bar. He was blatantly staring at a couple of blondes across the room, but every few seconds he'd looked down at his drink, try to hold his gaze there, but ended up losing it and going back to eyeing the blondes.

"Well, you seem to be staying out of trouble," I joked upon reaching him. Mark didn't find it very funny, and truth be told, neither did I. But Callie Torres always teased Mark about his manwhore past and so it seemed like something I should do.

"What took you so long?" he snapped. "Did you have to get rid of your girlfriend first?"

Breathe Callie, just breathe, I instructed myself. It took me a few minutes to answer Mark, but he was so preoccupied that he didn't notice.

"Uhm…not exactly." I quietly answered. Mark looked at me sideways, face scrunched up in confusion. Before he could ask anything though, Joe was over to take my drink order. I ordered something very strong.

Sitting with Mark acting like nothing was wrong was hard. Very. But it wasn't impossible. After the first ten or fifteen minutes, I began to talk normally with less effort involved. I don't know if this had to do with the fact that if I took even one more sip of my drink I wouldn't be legally allowed to drive home, but I didn't really care. And since Mark had switched his order to water shortly after I arrived, I continued drinking. And soon the words were coming out of me so fast they were being mixed together mid-sentence.

"I think it's time for you to go home," Mark said, his voice hiding laughter at my nearly incomprehensible speech. Mark supported me out of the bar and into his car. My distorted mind giggled at the rhyme.

"I love you Mark," I slurred when he pulled over outside my apartment building. "You're always here for me, unlike some others who just leave when things get too complicated." At least, that's what I was aiming for saying. I'm not sure how it came out, but I think Mark caught the gist of it.

"Who left you?" he asked, grabbing my arm so I couldn't get out of the car.

"Erica, silly!" I responded. Mark looked confused and worried. He got out of the car and walked around to my side, helping me out and up the steps to the door. Despite my feeble protests (actually, he probably couldn't understand what the hell I was saying), Mark's arm guided me up the stairs and through the apartment door. "No, the couch!"

"No. Trust me, in the morning, when your head is pounding, you'll be thankful you're in your quiet bedroom and not out here where Cristina's getting ready for work," Mark said in response, ignoring my words and bringing me into my bedroom. He sat me down on my bed, where I preceded to fall over onto the pillows like a tree that's been cut down. "Looks like you got in just in time; it's starting to rain. Lucky me."

Sure enough, rain was pelting the glass of my bedroom window, growing louder with each passing minute. That's okay. The rain was kind of nice once you got used to it. I could deal with it.

"I should go before it gets any worse. Are you okay?" Mark asked me, honest concern in his voice. I nodded slowly into my pillow. I heard him talking to Cristina out in the hallway between the bedrooms and the living room before he left. Mark was telling her what had happened, and then they seemed to arguing.

"You let her drink like that? Like that's the best solution?" Cristina scolded. Since when did she have human feelings such as empathy?

"Well, I didn't know, obviously. She only just told me when we got here, and I don't think she meant to." Mark retorted. They went back and forth for another minute or so, and then Mark left. I was fairly certain that Cristina looked into my bedroom before retiring to hers for the night.

As Mark had predicted, I woke up earlier than I wished too with a headache so bad that I was tempted to take the entire bottle of Tylenol. But being a doctor and figuring that was kind of dangerous, I settled on taking two and crawling back into bed, burying myself under ever pillow and blanket within my hands' reach. While searching around for the sheets that had been pushed to the bottom of the bed by my feet, I discovered a tee-shirt. It was not mine.

The sight of Erica's tee-shirt and the feel of it in my hand brought the pain directly from my head and into my chest. Uncontrollable tears began to fall from my eyes, racing each other down. Every memory, every thought, every unsaid word came back in a rush. It hit me so hard I felt sick.

This was the part that sucked the most. I could deal with everything else, like acting normal, because that was only skin deep. But the knowledge penetrated every molecule of my being and there was no escape. I couldn't get away from my thoughts, no matter how hard I tried.

With every breath I took, thoughts of Erica entered my mind and refused to leave. Thoughts of us. Of how it was my fault she was gone, how I drove her away. That's what killed me. It was because of me, but I'd been trying so hard! If only she could have seen that, if only I could have showed her before it got too late. Instead, she ripped the end out of that book and burned it. Now neither of us would ever know what could've been.

I tossed Erica's tee-shirt to the floor beside my bed and flipped over onto my right side so that I was facing the window with my back to the closed door of my bedroom and the shirt. The sun was shining, promising a bright new day for Seattle. I closed my eyes against its offensive rays, squeezing out a few tears as I did so.

Tomorrow I would go to work and pretend everything was okay. Tomorrow I would act like I'd never met a woman name Erica Hahn. Tomorrow I would play ignorant to my friends' worried questions.

But today I would let it all out. I would stay in bed and cry over ever mistake I'd made and every wrong ever done to me. Today I would set my mind free and allow it to explore ever lost relationship and every experienced regret. Today would definitely hurt the most out of all those in the healing process. And I was so ready to take it on.

What hurts the most
Was being so close
And havin' so much to say
And watchin' you walk away
And never knowin'
What could've been
And not seein' that lovin' you
Is what I was tryin' to do