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"Take her to recovery and page me if anything changed in her condition," Cristina said as she was drying her hands in the scrub room after she successfully performed the heart surgery on her French patient.

"Alright," Dr. Ross replied. Cristina nodded and opened the door of the scrub room. "Dr. Yang," Ross called her, making her stop and turn around to look at him.

"What's it?"

"Thanks for letting me work with you on this case," he said, smiling thankfully.

"You're the only one who I could trust," she smiled at him.

"I'm glad you're back," he said and smiled more.

She stopped smiling and shook her head, "I'm not back Ross," she said and turned around leaving the room.

"Right," Shane said quietly, sad that he would lose his best teacher again. Dr. Yang was a great teacher, he always believed. She had a great influence on him and she was the reason why he was going to be a cardio surgeon and he had promised himself he would be great_ not the best, because The Cristina Yang was the best, he believed.

"What would you like to drink, ma'am?" asked the bar tender.

Cristina looked up at him and smiled. "The usual one, Joe," she said and observed his reaction.

"Cristina? Cristina!" he grinned. "You're back?"

She smiled as well. "Just for two weeks," she said.

"2 week. That's good," he said nodding, "So you're my guest tonight." He went and found the best bottle of tequila from the shelf and poured for her.

"You don't have to do that, Joe."

"But I want to," he smiled, nodding at her, and then went to take the orders of the other customers.

Cristina smiled as she sipped on her tequila, admiring its greatness, and looked around herself. Except for some new bar tenders and new pieces of equipment and bit of modernity, the place had barely changed. It was the same as the day she first stepped in it when she was an intern. She took another sip of her tequila, realizing how much she'd missed that place. Emerald City Bar held so many memories, good ones and bad ones, the ones when she was celebrating something and the ones when she was mourning the loss of another thing. It felt nostalgic to remember all those bittersweet memories in this not changed place.

Probably its customers hadn't changed either. True, because just then the bell hanging at the top of the door rang as more customers entered the bar. Subconsciously, Cristina turned around to look at the people, as if she was waiting for someone. And among them, she saw Meredith.

Meredith found a table at a corner and took off her rain coat, putting that and her bag on the other chair and sat down, waiting for someone to come get her order. All the while, Cristina was observing her. She saw one of the bar tenders taking her order and after some time he went back to her and placed a glass of tequila in front of her.

Tequila, their usual one. She looked down at her own drink. She hadn't been a tequila girl, she used to prefer vodka to everything. That was until she met Meredith. She tried tequila once and after that, she, simply, turned into a tequila girl. Tequila was always their usual. It was their signature. The Twisted Tequila Sisters.

Cristina had quit so many of the habits she had in Seattle when she had left, but she couldn't quit tequila. She would keep telling herself it was a means to forget, while it was a reminder itself. It was the only thing from Meredith she could keep. She needed something, anything, from her to keep, even if she wanted to forget her. And she chose tequila.

Cristina just sighed and took the last sip of her tequila and put the glass down. "You want another one?" Joe asked.

Cristina shook her head and grabbed her coat, ready to get up and leave. "Thank you. And tomorrow I won't be your guest." She said to him and he laughed.

"Of course, you should pay for it."

Cristina laughed too and said goodbye and then, walked towards the door, glancing at Meredith for one last time. She was glad Meredith was not looking at her direction to see her. She didn't know, though, that Meredith was looking at her when she wasn't looking, just like she was looking at Meredith when she wasn't looking.

"Bonne journée. Je vais vérifier plus tard." Cristina said, in French, to her patient as she left the room. She would have to stay in the hospital for 2 weeks until she would be able to get on a plane and go back home. So Cristina would have to stay in Seattle as well.

Cristina wrote some notes in the chart and then gave it to the nurse at the nurses' station and started walking to the Attendings' lounge to change to her clothes and go back to her hotel. She wasn't expected to stay in the hospital when she wasn't needed because she didn't work there and that way, she wouldn't have to confront more people from her past, fortunately.

She opened the door to the lounge and looked around, sighing inwardly. This was going to be awkward as almost everybody were there. As she went towards her temporary locker to take her clothes, she could feel all gazes on her. Now almost everybody knew she was bac in Seattle. After only 2 days the news had spread so fast, which wasn't surprising. Gossip would always spread faster than any infection in that hospital, as Cristina always used to say.

She grabbed her clothes and went to change into them. When she came back, dressed up, everyone was still there, against her hope. She sighed again, inwardly and grabbed her bag and coat. "Have a nice day," she said and left the room. She knew better than go out without saying anything.

"At least she cared to wish us a nice day," Meredith commented, as she was still gazing at the door through which Cristina left, and grabbed a magazine to busy herself with.

Callie nodded in agreement and sipped on her coffee. And then Alex got up from his chair and, shaking his head, left the room.

Meredith frowned, staring at the door again. "What was wrong with him?" she asked.

Callie shrugged and then went to sit next to Meredith. "I saw the two of them eating lunch today," she said, shrugging again.

Meredith looked up at her, confused. "Cristina and Alex?"

Callie nodded and Meredith frowned, more confused. "Do you think something is up with the two of them?"

"No! He's with Jo."

"Not… that way."

Meredith looked up at her and shrugged. "I don't know."

"She still is carefree about us," Callie said after a while.

"And why would we care." Meredith replied looking back at her magazine.

Callie just nodded and sighed. "I'm just worried about him. He'll be back home, still joyed about his family vacation and then, pain will come back to him." She said and looked at Meredith, waiting for agreement, but Meredith just pretended to read the magazine.

Hope you liked it.

And if you know French, and that French line is wrong, I'm sorry. I used google translate and I'm not sure if I wrote correctly.

Reviews, as always, are so very much appreciated. Thank you so much for being so kind and letting me know how much you like this story. :)