Derek didn't think he'd ever get tired of watching her. Their children obviously felt the same. They were barely glancing at the picture-book spread on the bed in front of them; their eyes glued on their mother. As soon as she pointed to a word, Zola would fixate on it, sounding it out carefully before turning back to Meredith and repeating the sign she demonstrated. Bailey's arms moved a beat behind his sister's, but his handshapes were clearer than they'd been a couple of weeks ago. Every once in a while it would be the iPad they turned to, for her to pull up a video of a two-handed sign. Her determination to make sure they learned correctly was so very Meredith.

He'd read the book often enough to follow their progress. The last page held all familiar words, and the room was almost silent as Meredith translated it. He'd told Maggie she'd be a fast study.

"'Me too,' L-I-S-A said. She gave C-O-R-D-U-R-O-Y—"

"A big hug!" The kids chorused, throwing themselves on her. She'd put Bailey on her right, and avoiding her arm had become habit for Zola. She was the one to notice him standing in the doorway. "Daddy! Momma signed our story."

"I saw. She did a great job. You did some excellent reading."

"I can sound out. And this book is very familyer."

"That's true. It's very, very familiar. You read it every night."

"Not every. Only with you or Mommy."

"Oh? I don't think I knew that." He met Meredith's gaze, and she shrugged, gesturing at the kids. Their decision. They were so good about being taken care of by other members of their cobbled-together family, it was bittersweet to remember how much they preferred having their parents there. They were "familyer"

Adoption had brought a lot of new concepts into their lives, one of which was cocooning. It might feel counterintuitive, the blogs said, but parents were advised to avoid parading extended family in to introduce the new addition. Instead, especially with a baby or toddler, they should take a couple weeks to retreat, until the child recognized them as their preferred and primary caregivers. The difference was Zola going to Janet without complaint that awful day at the hospital, versus her clinging to Meredith on her first day back at daycare, three weeks after she became theirs forever. She'd started non-discriminatory, because she'd had no consistency. The prospect of spending the next month or two as a family, maybe with a couple of sleepovers at Sofia's in the mix was all the more appealing with his resignation taken care of. It'd caused wrinkles, but he was intent on smoothing them out.

"Is it time to brush our outside bones?" Zola giggled. She'd reached the conclusion that teeth were bones herself via a book that showed them on an x-ray, and while he thought their explanations had gotten through, he was concerned that her first loose tooth might lead to some anxiety about her actual bones.

"It is. Can you bring your stuff in here?"

"Yeah-huh. Don't squeeze Momma's! It's my 'ponsability " Zola slid off the bed and hurried off toward the kids' bathroom; Bailey a few steps behind.

He could feel Meredith's demeanor shift as soon as they were out of the doorway. She'd handed him the journal almost as soon as he'd been inside the door.

This should be something I tell you about, but doing it in short sentences and crappy signs isn't fair to either of us. I would rather pretend it didn't happen, and everything was fine, and I can function as well as I could when you were gone for months. Maybe I could've, if I was never alone.

It's kind of why we found each other, isn't it? Neither of us wanting to be totally alone?

She'd gone on to describe the previous afternoon. It was the detail she went into that told him it'd scared her more than the actual words she used.

I knew I'd exerted myself, and that was why I couldn't catch my breath, but it didn't matter. It felt like panic, and it became panic. I knew what to do as a doctor, not being able to do it made me start thinking my career was over. It all seems crazy now. It was. It's not me. It's another part of the aftermath. I'm not going to give you an out here. We both knew leaving the hospital wasn't going to magically fix this part. It's not as simple as avoiding planes, either. Not enough just to have the Xanax in my purse.

There were twenty-eight when you left. There are twenty-six now; Owen tossed the ones I crushed. None of the other bottles in the safe have anything missing. I don't want to give you yet another thing to worry about, but if you've really made this choice, you will. That's who you are. I know it's not about whether or not you trust me. We know exactly how imperfect benzos as treatment options. It's the same with the pain meds, but that's your field. It's lucky that one of your other areas of expertise is me.

While he'd read, she'd been at the table with Bailey, Zola, and a dozen containers of homemade clay. Bailey had been fascinated by the texture, and putting together blobs while he named off the colors. Zola had started off making animals, but around the time her brother lost interest and came to climb on Derek's lap, she'd asked to help Meredith "make Aunt Amy's brains." He'd withheld his questions, and it hadn't taken long to put together the basics of what she was doing.

He'd finished the story of yesterday with a serene Meredith across the room from him, writing down words that most people would consider too big for a preschooler every time Zola asked "What's this part?" He'd taken the journal to the study where it would wait on his desk, and then sat with them.

"We have brain models," he'd pointed out. She'd rotated to aim her left index finger at the iPad that was on the table next to a stack of how-to articles and her personal notebook, open to a page full of measurements. "You're making Herman's brain?"

She'd nodded, and then demonstrated poking a hole in a spare piece. SEED PRACTICE.

"The 125-I seeds? Mer, that's brilliant."

She'd shrugged. 3-D PRINTED BETTER.

NERVES, VESSELS, FIBERS, TEXTURE.

B/TAKES 2 LONG 2 DO

TUMOR KEEPS CHANGING

NOT GOOD FOR POTENTIAL SHIFT.

He'd put a finger on a piece of the dried clay. It had kept more springiness than he expected, and as he watched, she picked up a coil of wire he hadn't noticed She'd wrapped it in green clay and used a paintbrush from a water-color set to smooth over the seam. That explained the bin of non-clay-related art supplies at the end of the table.

"So, to recap, you're creating a pliable model of Herman's brain so Amelia can practice placing brachytherapy seeds?"

TRYING. She'd switched to signing to add, "Yesterday, they made C-L-A-Y," she spelled, and then showed him the sign for the word.

"It was so fun, Daddy!" Zola had said, not missing a beat in a conversation she couldn't have been following to that demonstration. "All gooey, and Aunt Amelia said it's more icky fun than surgery, because we didn't wear any gloves."

That might've been the case, but Meredith had given the project the focus and precision that made her a stand-out surgeon. He'd played intern, providing hands-on assists and taking care of the logistics around her. While she rested or been dragged away to work with Will, he'd made his primary contribution, shaping the gyri, sulci, and fissures of the cerebrum, resected to provide deep brain access, but also removable so the structures underneath could be reconfigured.

She'd declared it finished not long before dinner, while he'd been being creamed by Zola at ASL Go Fish. Having to sign the numbers hadn't made it more difficult for her in weeks, but it'd been great for memorizing the numbers Meredith had needed most. He could tell she wasn't satisfied with the model, and since then she'd been tense with the agitation he'd sensed in the journal, the anxiety she'd had handing it off.

"Her dolls are going to be so well taken care of once you get that cast off," he said, listening to Zola dashing to her bathroom.

"Maybe. Maybe we need-to discuss D-O-G. I don't know. She-helps me a lot. She's only four."

"And today you played with modeling clay and read her favorite book," he said, sitting on the bed next to her. "You're on a roll."

She shrugged. "Last night Maggie and I read it"

"And I'm sure Amelia had a say in the Anatomy Jane Brain. That doesn't make it less impressive that you made it."

"Doesn't feel real. F-I-B-R-O-U-S parts hard-hard."

"I'm a foremost expert on the brain and nervous system, and it's far better than I could've done in a day with both hands."

"Pah."

"Don't 'pah' me, " He embraced her, taking the fingers on her left hand. She'd taken the sling off to use them signing the story. It'd only highlighted how frustrated she must've been yesterday, between the positioning of her arm, and the thickness of the cast. It'd been hard not to whip out his phone and chew out Karev, but he could see how it'd be easy to believe she'd be all right on her own. She'd assumed it herself. She wrapped her right hand over his forearm and pressed her cheek against it. Meaning, he hadn't stormed out; she knew things were okay, but she needed comforting enough to seize it.

"You were right about Renée," he admitted. "Or, maybe you weren't. I really don't think she was like that when I left. We'd barely spoken about anything except her research."Meredith twisted to look at him, and her amused look surprised him. "What?"

"Sister with A-U-T-I-S-M?"

"That's her. It's not that she's looking for a cure, she—"

"We're back! Here, Bailey, I gotta make Mommy's!"

Derek took the brush from the baby before he could get toothpaste on the bedspread. He'd just gotten him to open his mouth when Zola made her return. Her toothbrush in her mouth.

"Zola! No running with that. S-T-I-C-K.."

"Sticks," he added, not sure where Zola's fingerspelling and spelling overlapped.

"Bonebwushes aren' s'arp." Zola's insistence was no less for being muffled by her "bonebrush."

"It's sharp enough," he said. "Any stick is, if you fall hard enough. That's why we don't run with them.

Meredith made a face around the head of her toothbrush, but Bailey had chomped down on his, and Derek's attention was on trying to tug it away. He used to slide it over and out through the nearest gap. Now all twenty-eight teeth were in place, and Derek didn't think wires could hold Bailey's mouth shut as tightly as he was doing himself.

"Nuh-uh," Zola argued, which must've been what Meredith had anticipated. "Ba-guhns."

"Baggins? The hobbit?" He didn't think she'd been exposed to Tolkien yet, but her daycare-mates had some unexpected obsessions.

"Baduhns."

"Bad ones?"

"Nuho!" Zola's tone pitched into the kind of whine that could've told anyone it was bedtime. She started to take the toothbrush out of her mouth. Meredith managed to balance hers against her lip, held her finger up to silence Zola and then spelled out "B-A-T-O-N-S."

"Ba—oh, relay races. Show me your teeth, Bails. Go grr, like Mommy."

"Grrr!" Bailey clawed at the air, and if his nails had been longer he'd have scraped Derek's arms. The bristles touched the front of his teeth, making it a win.

"Good job. Yeah, that's true, Zo, but batons are really wide, and narrow things puncture—make holes—more easily. Plus, runners hold them like this." He demonstrated with Bailey's toothbrush. "Away from their bodies. It takes practice, but I shouldn't have generalized. Can you get your mom's mouthwash?"

"I he'p," Bailey insisted.

"You can get it." Zola said, magnanimously. "Gimme your bonebrush. I'll put it up for you."

"Thank you, Z," Meredith signed.

Zola beamed. Bailey's diapered butt had turned to the counter in their bathroom when he realized that their daughter had willingly chosen the chore that took her further from Meredith.

"We need to find her a brush with a skeleton on it," he said. "Do they have Tim Burton themed toothbrushes at Hot Topic?"

"You ask me?"

"You expect me to think you never hung out at the Prudential?" He took the end of her toothbrush and tipped her chin up. "Let me see."

She rolled her eyes at him again, and mimicked Bailey's clawing, more with the pads of her fingers than her nails. At the beginning, this had been an opportunity to check for wires that needed to be covered, and examine the lingering bruising on her face without being totally obvious about it. There were spots he'd press dental wax over once she finished flushing out old pieces with the mouthwash, but she could apply it to new spots when they started rubbing. He didn't have to find the wires that looked like they were going to bend out of place before morning. Mostly, he was keeping up a ruse for the excuse to hold her gaze on the days she avoided his.

Today hadn't been one of those, but in the hours since he'd arrived from the airport, there'd been several times where he'd caught her looking at him while she rolled clay into a ball or sliced it with a Play-Doh knife. In writing, she insisted she wasn't afraid of how he'd react to her anxiety attack yesterday, but that didn't mean she felt secure about it.

"Swish, swish, swish!" Bailey announced, coming in with the kidney basin that held the bottle of prescription mouthwash.

"That's right!" Derek said. "Can you hold this?" He handed him the cap while he measured out the liquid into a medicine cup and gave that to Meredith. She didn't like to have anyone watching this part, so once he'd closed the bottle he pulled Bailey up onto his lap. "I missed you, bud."

"Yeah, miss-oo. Daddy in D.C.?"

"I was. But no more. We're all done with D.C."

"Aww done." Bailey swiped his arms in the sign for "all done."

"Daddy?" Zola marched into the room and put her hands on his knees, staring up at him seriously. "What about hockey sticks?"

"They're tall, and skating is different than running. If they break, they can hurt someone, but it's not usually a fall."

"Oh." She wrinkled her nose, and then tapped her lip as she thought. "What about…um…doggies run and fetch."

She could spell dog. She hadn't…No, no way she could've seen Meredith sign that.

"They do, but they're lower to the ground, and they hold the stick in their mouth horizontally, like this." He demonstrated with Meredith's toothbrush this time. "A person could fall against something held this way, and if it broke, it could stab you. But dogs are low to the ground, and they balance on all four legs. If they held it like this, vertically—" He showed her. "—what could happen?"

Zola screwed her eyes up dramatically. "Um…he'd fall, and it'd stab it in his throat. Poor doggy!"

"That's why they don't," he said. "They hold them horizontally, like this, and they can run as fast as they want with a stick. It's dangerous for a person."

"Dannerus get hurt." Bailey said.

"Yeah, that's what 'dangerous' means," Derek confirmed. That his not-quite two-year-old knew that word threw him far more than "Baggins," but why not? They didn't speak to them exclusively in single syllable words—Meredith had recited flashcards to Zola while preparing for her boards.

"Is that how Momma got her hurts?" Zola asked.

"No, baby girl." They'd agreed to be honest in their answers, trying to form them around not scaring her being a priority, but Zola's next question was "will Aunt Amelia be home tonight?" She was four, and the speed at which her mind moved already reminded him of Meredith's. She might've intended to follow-up, but her thoughts had gone from Momma got hurt to that's why Aunt Amelia baby-sat so much, to Aunt Amelia isn't here, or something far less traceable.

In five weeks, she'd asked every other conceivable question. Was it attributing too much to a preschooler to wonder if she didn't want to know more? Between Meredith and Amelia he knew how much a little kid could overhear. He knew it would be hard for her. He'd be there if she wanted, but he thought it'd be better for Meredith to explain it. He might be passing the buck, he'd acknowledge that, but Zola would want to confirm everything he said with her. She didn't like to let anyone speak for someone else. Even with Bailey, she was less likely to exasperatedly talk over him than to say, "try again, Bay-Bay."

Meredith was also better at anticipating what they'd understand. It was something she denied every time he pointed it out. She'd say he had far more experience with kids. He thought that might be why. With his sister's kids, or even Amy, he'd tried to follow their parents' lead. In their eyes, Uncle Derek treated them like grown-ups, but he'd known the lines. It wasn't until they were teenagers that who they were as individuals mattered more than what they'd report to their moms. Meredith didn't have as many preconceptions; she hadn't been in the background of conversations about what would scar a kid for life. She knew what she should've been told, and she knew Zola and Bailey. Occasionally, she took her fear of repeating Ellis's mistakes too far. Not bringing them up to her hospital room was one of the few times that'd happened. He could follow the logic. They could've been scared. He had no doubt she'd still be in the hospital if they had. That was difficult to imagine after only a week, seeing her smile as Bailey popped up right after he laid him down in his crib to plunk a kiss on her.

"How many days 'til daycare again?" Zola asked, climbing into her bed. The pile of stuffed animals was piled below her feet, a slight nod to the conceit that she'd be staying there. Meredith sat on her bed and tugged Rawr out of the pile, giving him to Zola before she held up two fingers.

"All the weekend?"

"Mmhmm." Meredith cast her gaze down, and he pressed a hand against her back. He wanted her to realize that he didn't think she'd done anything wrong by working as much as she had with him gone, but it might take until the effects of her separation from them wore off.

"Can you take us, Momma?"

This time, Meredith looked up at him, an eyebrow raised. Better or worse? He didn't know. "Momma can't drive yet, Zo. We're all going to go later this week for her to see her doctors. Maybe another day we can take you together. We'll see."

"Why can't all the doctors come here? Aunt Maggie could, and Aunt Callie, and Dr. Jackson, and Dr. Owen lives in the trailer, and Aunt Amelia is in her bedroom when she's not on-a-call. We have lotsa supplies."

"But we don't have an x-ray," he pointed out. "Or an MRI." Or a cast saw, or bracket removal pliers. They weren't getting the kids' hopes up, but it was unlikely that either injury wouldn't be healed enough to get rid of the stabilizers. There'd be a second phase of soft foods and more PT. Getting her out of the knee brace, and processing the whole situation would be the priority. Then, there'd be a court case to bring it all up again.

"We could…" Zola said, her fingers flipping Rawr's tail just like Meredith did with her fox. "We could make another hospital at our house."

"Building a hospital takes a long time."

"Longer than a week?"

"Much longer," he said.

"Oh. I guess I like our hospital."

"Me too," Meredith signed. She looked at him again, defensiveness shining in her eyes. He kissed her, and then leaned down to kiss Zola good-night. He lingered in the hall to close the door after Meredith tucked her in.

"You know I did nothing but work the whole time I was up there?" he asked on the way to their room.

"B, Z with me."

He started to point out that his mom had worked nights and six-day weeks, but that'd only started once Amy started school. It'd also affected Amy more than the rest of them.

"A few extra nights in a place where they're comfortable and safe, with you a couple of floors up didn't hurt them, Mer. Not seeing you for twenty-odd days wasn't easy for them, but they hadn't seen me for just as long, and I'm only counting Christmas because you'd make me. You didn't neglect them. Half the things they said when I got back, I hadn't heard before, and they couldn't have come from anyone but you. You were doing great.

"I think you know that. It's hard to face, because of where things went, but if you hadn't had the home side of things together, I wouldn't have been able to take over. You obviously had the work part locked down."

She picked the fox off the bedside table and threaded its tail between her fingers. "I know. Now."

"About what? Your streak? That's not what makes you a great surgeon."

"No. I know." She dragged the white board over and flicked the marker cap off. He caught it, which got a partial smile.

DOESN'T FEEL REAL.

SOMETHNG SOME1 ELSE DID.

NOT THAT I WANT

I DON'T WANT TO QUIT, BUT

She shrugged and started spiraling the tip of the marker over the board.

"You don't have to know right now. You can go back and not know. I'm with you. Even if your mind tries to tell you otherwise. I'm here."

"You came back."

"I did. And I brought you something."

"Mm?'

"Yup. Let's hook you up, and you can have it." He took the marker and clicked the cap upside down into the top before handing it back. She was making the face Zola had before brushing her teeth had become part of the "helping Mommy" routine. She'd start making it again once "bonebrush" stopped being hilarious.

"Hey, I'm not above taking advantage of the power of positive reinforcement."

BRIBERY.

"Call it whatever you want, it works."

UR GONNA +LY REINFORCE DRUGS?

"If you want to cut the painkiller down next week, we can. You want to do it first, or the diazepam and NSAID?"

She held up two fingers. The second one. She wasn't falling asleep as easily with the opioid anymore, but he'd expected the choice. It was easier to see when the anxiety took the wheel once he knew where she navigated without it.

He was surprised she hadn't shown more signs of residual pain from yesterday. Owen, Maggie, and Amelia must've been steadfast on keeping her down afterward. Today, it'd been obvious that she was trying to prove her competence. He could only imagine what that'd looked like last night. That's probably where the idea of signing Corduroy had originated. An excuse to pile the kids on top of her.

By the time he'd gathered the supplies from their boxes, she'd gotten the cuff over her IV down. "Nice trick."

To his relief, she smiled at that. "Practiced yesterday."

"Yeah? Was Maggie impressed?"

She swiped her palm across the block of red covering the board before writing SHE PRETENDED NOT 2B.

"I'm sure. Give me your hand. Looks like Tom Hanks' before he named the volleyball." She gave him a blank look. "You didn't see…? Oh, man...'Wilson.' Not…. Joe Fox. That's Tom Hanks too." She nodded. You've Got Mail was one of those movies people might assume she didn't know, but she actually had firm opinions on. "Hey, Siri, when did Cast Away come out?"

"CAST AWAY WAS RELEASED ON DECEMBER 7TH, 2000."

"Pearl Harbor Day? That's a little on the nose for a shipwreck movie starring Tom Hanks. Oscar bait. Wouldn't have been your scene. Hey, you better hope Bailey never figures out how infrequently you use that eraser. That'll really traumatize him."

Her response was a sign he could guess at only because he'd seen a different Oscar-award winner. "'Asshole?'"

Meredith's eyes went wide, and then he noticed her cheeks were turning the same pink of the palm he'd scrubbed ink off of.

"Ah. Maggie didn't teach you that one."

NOT 100% CULTURALLY ILLITERATE.

"You couldn't sign the alphabet a month ago; you want me to believe you held onto 'asshole' for what? Twenty years?"

Her noise was a mix of exasperation, resignation, and amusement. He saw through her, he always would, and she loved it.

MAGGIE HADN'T SEEN IT. DUNNO HOW.

"Did you…Mr. Holland's Opus. does not seem like a movie your mom would go for."

WASN'T ALWAYS A CHOICE.

WEEKEND?

DON'T WANT 2 TALK 2 UR KID?

MOVIE. B/I THINK IT WAS ON TV

ABC/ DISNEY CHANNEL/WHATEVER

DIDN'T HAVE A TEACHER WHO CARED.

NOT TIL COLLEGE

"In terms of schools to hate," he said, as he slowly pushed down the plunger on the diazepam. "Yours seems like a good one."

"Eh."

"Mer, you went there from right after Maggie was born to the day you graduated, and you don't think your teachers should've…. You didn't talk for, what, a year?"

BARELY TALKED.

WHAT COULD THEY DO?

I WAS FED, CLEAN, SAFE

He screwed the cap on her IV into the tubing on the PPN bag turned on the infusion pump, and then swiped all the trash into the wastebasket. "Were you safe?"

MAYBE NOT ALWAYS. She paused, the marker hovering.

DID THE STUFF FROM BOSTON

DO U NO WHO ALERTED DCF?

"Uh, it said 'a neighbor.' There's an address, so you'd know. Other than that, you were six, so I figured the baby-sitter who asked about your nightmares."

CHRYS. MAKES SENSE.

HER DEGREE WAS KID-RELATED.

MSW? EARLY-CHILDHOOD?

MUST'VE KNOWN SOME1.

THINK I HOPED

She shrugged.

"That someone else noticed, too? They should've. Someone should've noticed you, and Felicia, and even…I can't say what would be different, if any one tragedy hadn't happened, but…."

MAYBE SIGNS.

"Probably, at some point. Mom sent Amy and me to therapists. It might've been worse, sooner, if she hadn't."

Meredith capped her marker, indicating that she was done with this line of questioning. He didn't blame her. "You brought me what?"

"Where's your phone?"

She looked around, and then signed, "don't know," looking chagrinned.

"Maybe the drawer?"

Her eyes narrowed, but she opened it. He'd put her phone down face up, and so the suspicion didn't turn to puzzlement until she'd lifted it out fully. "What?"

He took it and popped the accordioned back. It was a weirdly satisfying action. "Apparently, they're everywhere. You can swap out the design on the circular part. Like…you know the phone cases they used to have for Nokias?"

"Tuuh." With the eye-roll, she made the attempt at duh redundant. He wasn't going to mention that, or how adorable it was. There were only five days to get her to do it again.

"Knew you were a mall rat. But what I saw was this." He took her wrist and balanced the narrow center of the device between her index and middle fingers. She grabbed the phone instinctively, and when it stayed securely in place while she unlocked it, her tentative smile grew. "I should've found something like it sooner. I know not being able to talk to Cristina, or—"

His phone, only one now, buzzed. Trying not to smile at her exaggeratedly innocent look was harder than it was when one of the kids did something inappropriate and adorable. He grabbed it off the bedside table.

MEREDITH GREY: shut up.

I love you.

DEREK SHEPHERD: I love you, too.

It's 6am in Zurich.

She nodded, but before she started texting Cristina, she held her arm up to him. The happiness on her face whenever she pulled back and the phone was still in her hand was almost as good as the kiss.

Typing with one thumb wouldn't put her up to her former texting standard. For that week, and the time it took to get her left hand used to working again, it'd be exponentially better than what she'd had. In some situations, it could replace the white board. It was so simple. Everywhere he looked, now, he noticed rings and stands meant to make smartphones easier to hold with one hand. Sure, for a while she hadn't been able to handle blue light, or font that small, but he could've been prepared. The idea he had percolating now was far less simple. He decided to solicit additional opinions.

BEN WARREN: I say go for it

Miranda says you're the one who needs an MRI

AMELIA SHEPHERD: ask mom

ALEX KAREV: U no it was her idea last time? Nvr got why.

CALLIE TORRES: Is this like buying all that land to prove you were staying in Seattle?

"Do you think it's weird that Callie was friends with Addison before she and Mark... What, hooked up?"

MEREDITH GREY: never say that again

"Hooked up? We hooked up, the first time."

MEREDITH GREY: we had a one night stand. Hooking up is like doing it in Joe's bathroom.

"In..."

MEREDITH GREY: maybe we were hooking up during the s&m period, but it had a name. A hook-up is Alex and Heather or Leah, not Alex and Jo.

(yeah. once. whatever. we've done stuff in there.)

"Yeah, I—"

CALLIE TORRES: Given everything, is it a good idea for your sister to plan on doing Herman's whole surgery herself?

I mean, I'm just asking.

You're here.

She'll have help, right?

MEREDITH GREY: why is your face doing that?

He scanned his conversation with Callie to make sure nothing above her first question was visible and sent Meredith the screenshot.

MEREDITH GREY: She cannot say that to Amelia.

"I know."

Meredith put her phone down for the first time in half an hour. "Cannot."

"I know," he said, adding the sign to prove he was following her.

"You'll tell her what?"

"That I don't know." He sighed. "'Given everything?' What's that supposed to mean? Callie's never said anything to me about Amelia's addiction. I don't think she knew until we were looking into the nerve donation, and I refused to call her. She'd just gotten out of rehab. A surgery that could cause chronic pain was setting her up for relapse."

MEREDITH GREY: while Arizona was finishing her own kind of rehab.

Herman & fetal surgery are the first thing that's been hers; she's excited about it. If Herman doesn't make it, Callie's afraid Arizona will have a major setback.

She could anyway. Recovery will be long. Once she goes under, Arizona will be our fetal surgeon. Like if the president has surgery.

Of course she'd known that the whole time.

MEREDITH GREY: I told you what she did the yesterday?

"The 'sleeping with her mentor' assumption? Yeah."

The depth of concentration on Meredith's face was beautiful, and he couldn't recall the last time he'd seen it with that smile.

MEREDITH GREY: She's caught up on her queer lady tropes. They'd fit the mold perfectly. aloof, sharp expert & the bubbly blonde fellow. I think The Devil Wears Pradastarted as a queer story, & that's why the boyfriend is so milquetoast.

Point is, if it was the eager student thing, no one dies. Mentor passing on an entire service? That's a story that doesn't end happily. Either way, Callie doesn't have a role. She thinks she failed supportive last time, which she didn't. She went too deep.

She doesn't have a place in the surgery, either. I don't know how someone as bright as her ends up on the outside so much. She came into her cohort late, ended up hanging w/ours. we started splintering. Then, the crash. She wasn't in it, but was part of it. She lost Mark, too & Lexie. she started to lose Arizona, and she lost a lot of personal confidence.

On the other side of it, she had you. Your wrist gave her work to focus on. She was confident there. Same thing w/the brain-mapping. she&I are friends. Apart from Alex, she's probably my best friend here.

Gotta say, if the way she was early on in this is how she treated Arizona at all…. Whatever. She wants to protect Arizona. She doesn't know Amelia well. She trusts you.

Meredith looked at him over the phone and signed, "Sorry." She repeated the sign for talk several times.

"Rambling? You really think I mind now?"

She peered at him, and he caught a flash of the intern who'd needed him to assert 'I want to know what you're thinking' whenever she thought she'd talked for too long or strayed too far from the topic.

MEREDITH GREY: Renée the quiet type?

She wrinkled her nose as the text sent, and he caught her fist before she could bring it up to sign sorry again. "Not particularly. She's smart, and she cares. Her work was great. I would've happily mentored her remotely. But I don't want to be the guy in the Sting song, Mer. I want this. Us."

Meredith's thumb didn't fly across the screen this time. It hovered over one letter after another. He had suspicions about what she was thinking, but no clarity on what he could say to smooth it out.

"That's not what I told Addison. I wanted you, and frankly…." God, this wasn't something he'd ever considered saying aloud. He'd hardly admit it to himself. "It wouldn't have been right, but… There was a point where I couldn't call it, but if you'd been willing…."

"Then, we did."

"The lie ended there. It was cheating. It had been an emotional affair on my part. It wasn't, physically. Whatever fantasy this woman had created in her head, it didn't involve making me choose. You had your insecurities, but you knew you were worth more than that. When…when it did happen, with us...prom... I realized how selfish…how much of it was revenge, and using you like that…. It isn't the person I've ever wanted to be.

"Everything I've been telling you for weeks stands, Meredith. I love you. You, the kids, this family is everything to me. Beyond that, I don't want anything else. This, you…I can't imagine a situation where you're not it for me."

He'd forgotten how intently she could stare at her phone, preventing him from searching her eyes. When the swish of a sent message broke through the silence, he thought he might be the one to stop breathing.

MEREDITH GREY: Plus, I'd kill you.

"Plus, you'd kill me," he agreed. "Attack me with the cast on purpose."

Her smile was hesitant, but it spread. She typed for a minute, and if he hadn't been watching her as closely, he might not have noticed that she'd started double-tapping the delete key. The Popsocket kept her face safe from having the phone dropped on it. It also made it easier for him to pluck it out of her hand. She growled and made a half-hearted attempt to grab it back. He worked his other arm under her shoulders. "Do you really not want me to see it?"

"Read."

He kissed her, tugging her protruding lower lip enough to let her know he'd noticed the pout. When he returned his focus to the unsent message, she pressed her face against him. That she didn't have much pain from yesterday didn't mean it hadn't taken a toll, and he wouldn't be surprised to discover she hadn't slept well on Tuesday or Wednesday night, either. While Amelia had been banished, Zola had admitted that she'd "started my sleep" in Mommy's bed, and he'd been relieved. She hadn't been alone overnight since January. He didn't think they could rely on having another adult in the house being enough when she was barely awake and tethered by the PPN.

He twirled pieces of her hair around his fingers while he read

MEREDITH GREY: I believe you. It's times like yesterday, when I couldn't control my thoughts that I think that if you could leave me in November, what about this makes you want to stay? You've got the student who isn't an Alzheimer's time bomb. Who's trying to help someone she loves. Who doesn't break rules because they don't feel fair. Who doesn't put your family & your reputation at risk. She could die. You're 2/3 in replac

"Mer?"

"Mmm?"

"I could never replace you. I can see how…." He sat up so to see her face, taking her hand but holding it lightly enough that she could pull away. He could feel that they were on the brink of something; a thick branch that bridged a deep canyon. They needed to cross it, but going too far too fast would send them over. "I screwed up with the Alzheimer's trial. We'd been together for long enough at that point; I should've seen…. There's a lot I should've seen, but just the situation itself; Adele being a patient…. It's hard not to consider what we know now, about the way Richard lied to your mother, and everything else, but he's always been manipulative….

"The day I found Mark and Addison, I'd come home early. For me, anyway. We'd closed up hours earlier. I was doing insurance paperwork, and Richard called. He said he was glad he caught me, and he'd only realized the time as I picked up. Then, he gave me his pitch. I'd had other offers. Plenty that'd also came with positions for Addison. They'd never implied I'd be tapped for more. I pointed out that Addison would never get on board. He told me to go home and run it by her."

Meredith's hand closed around his.

"Would I be surprised to discover that he'd called the brownstone and hung up on Mark? No. Not at all. It took a long time for me to wonder. Too long to justify anything as concrete as checking phone bills. Now, I don't want to know. It doesn't matter how I got here.

"And...I should've been there with you that night, not just because Zola was home. I should've talked to you. No running."

"You come back. Then. Now. "

He pointed to the Post-it. "That's not what it says." She shrugged. "Not soon enough. Mer…it's not your fault they took her. We'd only been legally married a month, and I left the house. That mattered far more to them than you losing your job for less than a day. I should've protected you from that. I'd told you my family rallied around each other for years, but you've outshone me there, every time." She started to shake her head again, and he put his other hand on her cheek.

"I didn't stick up for Amelia when that woman outed her addiction. Saving her from the bad guys was something I'd always gotten right. That was the most important part of being her big brother. The other part was teaching her about the world. I came here the year she did her fellowship. She'd been trying to convince me to take a sabbatical from the practice, and get a job somewhere she'd been accepted. Think she sensed I needed a change, and that if I stayed there, I was never going to pass on what I'd learned, or do anything all that interesting. I'd thought about it. I wanted to do it, truthfully. She could be stubborn, but even back when I was helping her with Algebra homework, the way she'd get once she caught on—so triumphant, so sure of herself—it was always rewarding. But I knew that if I changed anything in my life, I'd tip my hand. The whole card castle would come tumbling down. We know I was a coward. I couldn't push myself that far.

"Then fate, or Richard, did it for me. I took off for a hospital Amelia had never heard of. What you wrote about me seeing her whenever you stopped breathing definitely has merit, but I also saw her in Lexie and Heather. Not in you. Not as a student.

"Amelia is brilliant. She's surpassed me, in a lot of ways, but you…you could take what I taught you and build on it in a way that made me sure you'd outshine me in the OR too."

She balled her fist as she drew her hand away from his, and her cast made it difficult to tell if those fingers were shaking. But when she started to respond, he could hear the stammer that almost never surfaced anymore.

"You…you should tell her. Then, she was right."

"Amelia? Yeah, I probably should. Mer…"

"I can't…I can't discuss this now."

"But there's a conversation we need to have?"

'I think…yes. Maybe…Before, no, maybe," she admitted, lowering her eyes, and then raising them again. Something changed in those seconds, and he wasn't sure he could've identified it to anyone else. A single lightbulb among dozens had been turned off, and having it turned on again made an unbelievable amount of difference.

"Whenever you're ready."

She nodded. Pressed a finger to the wire between her front teeth, and then signed. "Time?" and twisted her finger by her arm, identifying that it hurt. She'd definitely used it more today manipulating the clay brain. And if she was just ready to go to sleep, he didn't blame her.

"Yeah. We can do that. So," he said, handing her back her phone. "It's always personal. It's only taken me a few decades, but I think I got that part. What the heck do I tell Torres?"

"Truth," she signed, and then while he pushed her meds and returned her line to the PPN infusion, typed out:

Herman might die.

Everyone knows it's a possibility. S

he might not. She deserves the chance to fail.

You don't think that will happen.

"Am I talking about Amelia here?"

"No."

He remembered the year of Addison's fetal surgery fellowship. She'd spent the whole time as buried in her notes as Amelia had been lately. Robbins was getting that in four months. Success would buoy her into a new part of her life, one where she wasn't the person who'd been married to Callie, much less the one who'd married her.

Meredith understood most of it. She'd said it when she'd wanted Dr. Shepherd to be hired by the NIH, not her husband. As dark as she got, he didn't think she was willing to acknowledge that part of her friend wanted Herman to be back at work in a few weeks, and Arizona to return to being head of pediatrics. She wanted things to rewind; to have another chance. If it took Herman dying—well, of course, she didn't want that; she'd make sure the neurosurgeon she'd known to pull off incredibly unlikely procedures was waiting in the wings to make sure that didn't happen.

He didn't know why things had fallen apart for her and Robbins while he and Meredith were holding together, but he knew they weren't all that different. He was trying to learn from Callie's missteps; the least he could do was give her advice from his own.

While he was trying to figure out how to word the response, Meredith asleep next to him, and the rustling of stuffed animals being gathered coming from the monitor, a reply to one of his earlier texts came in.

OWEN HUNT: I agree that it's a good idea, and I'll help out with logistics if you'd like. I did some research for you while Amelia closed on an MVA.

You should run it by her, though.

Derek opened the links he'd sent and swiped back to the thread with Callie as Zola backed into the room. Her elbow was up just high enough to get the door open even with her arms full of guys. They really would need to dissuade this at some point prior to her getting her driver's license. For now he set his phone aside where neither of the most observant members of his family would see more than they needed to and helped her arrange them around Meredith.

"All safe, Momma," Zola whispered, reaching over her penguin to put her hand on Meredith's shoulder. He wished he could promise her that protecting her loved ones would always be that simple.

A/N: I have a Christmas story (mostly) all ready to start posting, but I need opinions! It's novel-length, and what I need to know is, would you rather have all of it go up around the holiday with less time between updates? Or does no one care if Mer/Der Christmas goes on into January?