Author's Note: All right, I may have told a small lie in my last author's note. When I told you you were going to have to wait until this chapter for the dinner, I might not have been absolutely correct. Now I've started writing it, it would appear that you will have to wait until the next chapter for the dinner itself. Here is finally where the bartender makes a reappearance – yeah, I liked him too, he seemed to crop back up again.

It was kindly brought to my attention that the "buying the hat" phrase might not make sense to some people. If you're from the UK and watched Saturday night TV in the nineties, you will doubtless remember that being something of a catchphrase for Cilla Black in Blind Date. If you have no idea at all what I'm talking about, "Blind Date" was a gameshow where random people got sent on holiday together (in a nutshell) then came back the following week to reveal how they got along. If the extended date went well, and the couple were going to make a go of it, the presenter would make some sort of comment regarding buying a hat for the wedding. Certainly everyone I know uses the phrase widely, but I don't know if it's a national thing. Not an international thing, clearly, though, so that's the explanation.

And I would also like to thank those of you who have let me know that you like the character of Michael. It's always extremely satisfying to create a character from scratch that people take to. So, thank you. And I'm going to stop talking now…

Disclaimer: As before.

After he was done with Michael, Alex made his way back to his hotel. Just for once, the tube wasn't teaming with people, and he enjoyed the luxury of actually getting a seat. He sat back, staring blankly ahead of him, just like everyone else did, withdrawing into his own world.

What did today mean? On one hand, he was comforted by the fact that he hadn't spent the last seven years of his life living in solitude on a memory of something that had long since ceased to exist, because whatever else today had (or hadn't) told him, there was definitely a spark that was still very much alive. To counter that though, he had moved to England for a new start.

He had genuinely believed it was time to wipe the slate clean and maybe even find someone else, but seeing her again had completely blown that out of the water. There would be no chance of that now. Just over an hour, a mere hour, in her company and already he could see that she was all of things that she had always been, that had drawn him to her from the start, even when he thought he hated her. She was beautiful and intimidating, and still knew exactly how to yank his chain, but still had that air of vulnerability around her that had taken him a while to discover. Sometimes, he felt so privileged to witness that side to her as well. He knew how few people she ever allowed to see it.

But… God, this was a problem. Just because he was seven years older, seven years more mature, it didn't mean that he was seven years less screwed up, or that he could do this any better this time around. Part of him wanted to try though. He couldn't exactly do worse than he did last time after all. It was… petrifying though. He had run about as far as you could do without actually acknowledging you were running, and it hadn't been far enough. She had run too, to the same place. He thought that perhaps that was all that mattered. If, of all the hospitals in all the countries of all the world, they both managed to find their way to the same one, well… perhaps that said it all.

When he got back to his hotel, he decided that he needed a drink, and the stronger the better. He needed his head to stop spinning in order to give himself a chance to think. Over the last six weeks, he had been so busy with work he rarely had the energy to venture very far when he got home from the hospital that on the evenings he did fancy a drink, he usually found himself in the hotel bar. The bartender he had met when he was first here for his job interview was called Steve, and Alex had struck up what was approaching a friendship with him.

'Hey,' Alex slid onto a stool, and leant wearily against the bar.

'You look like you've got the weight of the world on your shoulders mate,' Steve replied.

'Something like that, actually.'

'Would a beer help?' He was already reaching into the refrigerator and pulling out a cold bottle of Budweiser, which was generally Alex's beer of choice. He didn't go in for these traditional English ales.

'When did it not?' Alex said gratefully, savouring those first few sips. The rest of the bottle never tasted as good as at the start.

'So?' Steve had adopted that casual bartender pose of half resting an arm on the bar, polishing glasses with a towel. It had "a problem shared is a problem halved" or some trite crap written all over it. Alex knew that he would end up talking though, he had already discovered there wasn't much point in trying to fight it.

'Eventful day,' he said. He was going to make him work for it; there was no fun in the exchange otherwise.

'Didn't think you were working today.'

'I wasn't, but I had to go in and meet a new consultant joining my department.'

'Oh?' Silence. 'And how did that go?'

Alex sighed. It was still sinking in to be honest, that Addison was actually in London, back in his life. This time yesterday, he had no idea of the impending hurricane that was about to envelope him. 'You remember the first night I was here, and you decided that there was a girl involved?'

'Which you denied, as I seem to recall.'

'Guess who the new consultant is.'

'She's a doctor?'

'Actually, she used to be my boss.'

Steve nodded approvingly. 'So, how long has it been since you last saw her?'

'Seven years.' When he said it out loud, he couldn't help but laugh wryly at how pathetic it sounded. How can you still be in love with someone you haven't seen for seven years? 'Seven years,' he repeated, 'and I haven't so much as spoken to her in all that time. And now…'

'Did she follow you here?'

He shook his head. 'No, she had no idea until she saw me today.'

'How did she react?' He could gauge Steve's level of interest by the fact that the glass he had been polishing had, along with the towel, been put aside, and he was no longer even keeping up the pretence of doing any work. There was a middle aged couple at the other end of the bar who were trying to attract his attention for a top up of their gin and tonics, but he was oblivious to them.

'Well, all things considered. But that's Addison, always in control, always dignified.' Except… He allowed his mind to wander just for a moment, before firmly dragging it back to the present. 'It'll be good to work with her again.'

'Mate, the love of your life has suddenly reappeared and all you can think of is working with her again?'

'When did I say she was the love of my life? Besides, it's complicated. Working with her is part of being with her, because her work is so much of who she is. I don't know, I can't explain. I never could explain it. Just, she's beautiful and fascinating and I've never known anyone like her.'

'See, love of your life,' Steve said with satisfaction. 'So, what now?'

'Nothing. I screwed it up, and I don't deserve my slate to be wiped clean simply because several years have passed. I just need to make sure that we can work together.'

'Yeah, because that's all that matters. Jesus Alex, I've never met anyone who thinks about work as much as you do. You need to have a think about what's important to you.'

Alex knew what Steve was getting at, and appreciated the point, but he was wrong. Being a brilliant and gifted surgeon was an enormous part of who Addison was, it was something that she had been able to hold on to while her personal life splintered and fractured, and he knew it was something that she valued. That need to be the best at work, because sometimes it was the one thing that was in your control, she understood that. And he wanted her to see that in him.

He couldn't explain that to Steve though. He was hopelessly ineloquent when trying to explain in to himself.

'Anyway,' he said, not exactly changing the subject, but at least taking it off in a different direction. 'I needed to ask you a favour.'

'Fire away.'

'Where's a good place to eat? Somewhere nearish, or in the city maybe. I don't mind what it costs but not one of those places where I'm not going to know which knife and fork to use.'

Steve grinned. 'You bastard. You could have told me you were taking her out to dinner. Perhaps you're not quite such as lost cause as I thought you were Alex Karev.'

'Yeah yeah, I was saving the best til last, okay? So, where do you think?'

The barman was positively glowing in excitement. 'Leave the whole thing to me. I'll book you a table somewhere and sort it all out. You concentrate on getting yourself ready. What time are you meant to be meeting her? Where's she staying and I'll send a cab to pick her up.'

He should have guessed the laid back Steve was a closet romantic. The guy had sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to follow the girl he loved, after all. He could imagine the sort of thing he would set up though, and it wouldn't do at all. He had given Addison enough mixed signals and wrong ideas to be far too wary to do so now. It wouldn't be fair on her to allow a softly lit, romantic dinner for two imply things he wasn't sure he was capable of following up on.

'Woah, hold on a minute. Don't go booking something romantic. No vendors selling cellophane wrapped red roses out of a wicker basket, and no serenading violinists. And there's no need to send a cab for her, she's far too independent to consider that a compliment.'

Steve's face fell. 'I thought…'

'No, it's far too early for any of that yet. I want to apologise and clear the air, not mess her up all over again.'

'There's nothing wrong with a bit of romance.'

'Tonight, there is,' he said emphatically. 'I mean it mate. Please do this my way.'

'Fine,' Steve replied with an air of martyrdom. 'But I'm going to want to meet her.'