10. ivy

my pain fits in the palm of your freezing hands

At this point in her life, Meredith figured she would be better at paying attention to her intuition. When she rolled out of bed that morning, there was a looming sensation in her gut that something was going to go awry.

It wasn't a terribly uncommon feeling, just look at her life so far and her choice of work, so it didn't take much for her to focus on anything else. Like getting her kids up and out the door before the bus left, or making sure she had her phone before starting her car.

Maybe the feeling was a byproduct of a lower week altogether.

Two days ago was Abbi's anniversary.

She didn't see Cormac that day and didn't expect to. Meredith sent a text in the morning, letting him know he could reach out if needed. Other than that, she gave him the space to be with his family.

He'd rolled into work two days later with bags under his eyes but in better spirits than she'd predicted. He greeted her with a kiss on the cheek and said all he needed for the next few days was the distractions that came with work.

Enter Alya McKinley, a 17-year-old girl with stage four metastatic cancer in need of a resection. Meredith got the page just after setting her stuff down in her office. Cormac was already in deep conversation with Alya and her parents when she arrived.

Meredith knocked on the doorframe before popping her head in. "Hey, you paged?"

"Dr. Grey, perfect timing."

Schmidt was standing on the other side of Alya's bed holding a tablet, he looked to Cormac. "Would you like me to fill Dr. Grey in?"

"If you would, please."

It turned out that Alya's progression was worse than they expected from the scans. There was a tumor in her abdomen that was restricting some blood vessels, and if she wanted to be able to keep fighting through cancer treatment, it needed to be resected sooner rather than later. Meredith took the tablet Schmidt handed her and flipped through the images. It certainly was a tumor that would take more than one experienced surgeon, but at least it appeared to have clear margins to work with.

"So, you think you can give us a hand, Grey?" Cormac asked.

"Easily," Meredith nodded, giving the tablet back to Schmidt.

Early 2020 (Pre-Covid)

Meredith didn't expect to find Hayes tucked in the corner of the Emerald City Bar. She had just gotten off her shift hours later than expected, and she knew her kids were sound asleep at home, so she wandered in for a drink to wind down. Even after spotting him, she fully expected to sit at the bar and nurse her drink in silence. But he met her gaze just before she was going to look away.

He held it steady for a few seconds, and part of her wondered if he was going to drop his head down and move on in their solitude. Instead, a small smile graced his lips, and he gestured with his head for her to wander over. She held up a finger to indicate she'd meander that way when her drink was ready. He nodded and turned back to, what she guessed, was a glass of whiskey.

She took her tequila sour from the bartender with a quiet "thank you" and wound her way through the tables to the corner booth Hayes was sitting in. She slid in across from him, setting her drink on the table. He swept it up and took a whiff, cringing away from the scent, "Tequila?"

Meredith shrugged, "My poison of choice."

"I think I'll stick with my whiskey."

She let them linger in silence for a few minutes, the ambiance of a moderately crowded bar washing over them. Sipping her drink, she checked her phone only to see the group chat with Amelia, Maggie, and Bailey continuously over-run with theories and ideas about what could be happening to Richard. Maggie kept touting the idea of Alzhiehmers, but Meredith was hesitant to agree.

Hayes cleared his throat, "Late night?"

"Researching for Richard."

"Ah. Any luck?"

"More ideas that require more testing, which he hates."

"Well, he's got the best doctors around on his case, so he's got a fightin' chance."

Meredith smiled.

Meredith excused herself from the room before Schmidt and Cormac were done with the patient. Leaning up against one of the nurses' desks, she grabbed a tablet and pulled up Alya's medical history. Scrolling through an abundance of test results and doctor's notes, she kept an eye out for anything unusual.

She physically felt her head draw back in confusion when she saw it: a hysterectomy on a teenager. It was uncommon but not unheard of, given the severity of the circumstances. She pulled up the procedure details and scanned for the explanation.

Fibroids … minimally invasive … follow up scans showing new growths in the abdomen … well, fuck.

Early 2020 (Pre-Covid)

Meredith watched Hayes nurse his whiskey, finding herself admiring how the low lighting on the bar reflected off the top of his head. "I also wanted to thank you for getting up to help Richard during his presentation."

"Ah, well, I was just followin' Pierce's lead."

"Nonetheless, I'm always grateful for people watching out for the ones I love."

Hayes tilted his chin down towards his chest and smiled, looking up to meet her eyes. "Duly noted."

She took a long sip of her own drink and settled deeper into her seat. "Other than that whole debacle, how was the conference?"

"Eh," he grumbled. "I only really went to pull my weight as the newbie and I can't say I acted in ways that would have made the Chief proud."

"What happened?" Meredith asked with a huff.

Hayes dropped his head into his hands, rubbing his brow ridges before gliding his palms over the top of his head. He hooked his fingers behind his neck and let them rest there for a moment. "Altman and I came across a bastard selling the same type of device that led to the cancer that killed Abbi. I may or may not have told him to go to hell."

"Well, damn. What device?"

"It's called a power morcellator or some shit. It's meant to tear up the tissue during a hysterectomy and be more non-invasive than the traditional way. All it really does is break up possibly cancerous growth in an otherwise healthy woman and spread them all over her body."

Hayes was trying to keep his tone light and joking, but Meredith could hear the tight, angry sarcasm leaking through. He lowered his arms and took another swig of this drink. Meredith waited a moment before reaching across the table and clasping her hand over his wrist, giving it a comforting squeeze.

"Given everything, I think calling him out is a perfectly understandable response."

He gave her a tight smile. "Understandable, maybe, but certainly not professional."

Meredith snorted, trying to repress a grin. "I'll tell you what's not professional. Standing up during the trial determining if you get to keep your medical license to yell at one of the men behind the table deciding my future as a doctor."

"You didn't."

"I did."

"Why?"

"He was the doctor who stood over my dying husband and made the decision not to do the burr holes that could have saved his life."

Hayes stared at her, blinking, before taking his other hand and placing it over hers.

Meredith was able to corner Cormac an hour before the surgery. She found him in one of the prep rooms, looking over Alya's scans again. He turned and nodded at her when she stepped into the room, quietly shutting the door behind her.

Her eyes fell over the scans displayed on the walls of the rooms. The tumor was advanced, but there was an ironic beauty to the way it was able to navigate and invade Alya's body. Meredith didn't doubt she had the skill to help pull off a successful surgery, but it would be obvious to any doctor that it was going to be risky nonetheless.

Meredith's voice sounded louder than she anticipated when she spoke. "I looked over her medical history."

"Aye, good."

She hummed, leaning against the wall near the door. Cormac's shoulders were tense, as was his jaw. She could see it flex as he ran his tongue over his teeth as he concentrated.

"I was surprised to see she had a hysterectomy at such a young age."

His jaw froze, and he turned his head towards her just enough so she could see his profile and the outline of his nose, which was backlit by the scans in front of him. Cormac cleared his throat. "It's unusual, yes, but it does happen when the circumstances require it. I've seen it a time or two in my career."

Meredith pushed herself off the wall and walked over until she was standing next to him. Turning to face him fully, she crossed her arms and watched him avoid looking at her completely.

Finally, he did, raising his eyebrows at her. "Yes?"

"I'm not questioning your surgical ability to handle this case, but it does have some shocking parallels to Abigale."

Saying his late wife's name felt odd in her mouth like she was stepping into territory that she didn't belong in. But they hadn't come this far by ignoring their pasts.

"I know," Cormac sighed. "There is a difference, though. Alya's got a fightin' chance."

"You're right, she does." Meredith bent her head towards his until she caught his eye. "What I'm asking is if you feel clear-headed enough to be the one to go into battle with her?"

He held her gaze, steady and confident. "I do."

And he was.

Cormac and Meredith performed the surgery as flawlessly as one could, clearing out the tumor with mastered precision. She watched the tension in his forehead relax as Alya's heartbeat stayed steady the sooner they got to closing her up. The crinkle in his eyes as he smiled at her through his mask when they lifted the last of the tumor from her body was contagious. There was a bit of a high in the OR as they were able to pull off an almost 9-hour surgery without calling time-of-death.

Cormac let Schmidt close up as he went to inform Alya's family of the good news. She felt her own stress begin to melt away as she scrubbed up. Alya's wasn't out of the woods yet, but with no known complications, her recovery should be smooth.

Meredith found Cormac outside of Alya's room, updating some information on her chart. A grin cracked across his face as he moved to meet her halfway. "We did good in there."

Meredith nodded. "Yes, we did. You sticking around?"

"Aye." He looked back at Alya's room. "I just want to keep a closer eye on things for the first night."

"I understand. Need any company?"

Cormac rested his hand on her upper arm and squeezed. "I appreciate it, really, but I know you haven't been home in over 24 hours. Go and see your kids."

She smiled at him before reaching up and placing a kiss on the corner of his mouth. "I'll see you soon."

"I'm holdin' you to that!"

Meredith laughed as she walked away to change out of her scrubs and grab her things, but quickly found herself tracking down Schmidt before leaving for the night.

"Page me if anything goes wrong."

Schmidt nodded fervently. "Of course, Dr. Grey."

Meredith was jolted out of deep sleep when her phone went off with a page. Her hand slid out from underneath the covers as she grappled for it on her nightstand. She blinked into the bright light on the screen, trying to make out the words as her eyes adjusted.

'Schmidt: 9-1-1. Post-op hemorrhaging. Rushing back into surgery with Hayes.'

Throwing off the covers, Meredith scrambled into some clean sweats, half-zip hoodie, and sneakers before grabbing her keys and rushing out the door. Before starting the car she texted Zola that she had to get back to the hospital and to help make sure Bailey and Ellis got on the bus in the morning.

The roads were quiet as Meredith drove down the route she could navigate in her sleep. The clock on her radio read 3:32 am.

(If she pressed the acceleration peddle just a bit harder than usual, no one stopped her.)

Holding a mask to her face, Meredith pushed open the doors into the scrub room, where she found Schmidt drying his hands. He looked up at her with puppy-dog eyes and gently shook his head. Looking through the glass into the OR, Meredith could make out the outline of Alya's body under a white sheet as they prepared to take her out of the room.

Schmidt followed her back into the hallway. "Dr. Hayes went to inform her family. They were staying at one of the nearby hotels."

Meredith nodded as Schmidt gave her a sympathetic look before walking away. She took her time walking towards the elevator and decided to take the stairs at the last minute. Her pace was slow as she descended, wanting to give Cormac as much time and space to spend with the grieving family as she could before she found him.

'It's not your place.' Maybe not. But if not her, then who? They've been there for each other in emotionally charged situations before. All she was going to do was check in on him. If he wanted to be left alone, she would respect that. If not, then she'd stay.

When push came to shove, Cormac didn't have the support system in Seattle like she did. After coming back from her first-year post-Derek, Meredith had a collection of people in her corner when the widow-dark-and-twisties reared their ugly heads. Between Bailey, Webber, her sisters, and Alex, she had never had to look far for a shoulder to cry on. And knowing Cormac, there was no way he was going to call up Irene at this hour.

She recognized Alya's family sitting in one of the quiet rooms alone and holding each other.

And so the hunt for Cormac began.

First she texted. (Nothing.) Then she called. (Nothing.) Okay, let's look in the storage rooms on this floor. (Zilch.) Call again. (Voicemail.)

This time she took the elevator to go down into the tunnels. She peered around the corners, listening for the quiet sound of pebbles hitting the wall or floor.

Nothing.

Meredith pulled out her phone again and checked her messages only to find continued silence.

'If you see this and want me to stop looking for you, just thumbs up this message.'

She called once more but to no avail. With a sigh, she put her phone's ringer on so she would for sure hear any messages. Making her way upstairs, there was one other spot she could think of.

Most of Meredith's time spent in Cormac's office was when they were drinking. She's honestly not entirely sure if that was a good or a bad thing, but it was what it was. Outside of that, she wasn't aware of how much time he actually spent there; if it was just a place to get paperwork done or if it acted more like a safe haven away from the chaos of the hospital.

When she arrived in front of his office door, it was locked, and the blinds were shut. The door being locked seemed normal when he wasn't there, but she couldn't recall ever seeing the blinds in the hallway window drawn. She knocked just loud enough to be heard but not so loud that it would startle him if he was there.

Pressing her ear to the door, she was able to make out faint shuffling on the other side.

"It's me," Meredith said, as if it would be anyone else at 4:45 in the morning.

She was only met with silence.

"Knock once on your side if you want me to go away."

Only quiet.

Meredith sighed and resolved to slide down the wall across from the door and wait. After a few minutes, the cool tile floor began to make her butt go numb. She shifted, trying to get more comfortable. Pulling out her phone, she texted him once more:

'I just need to know if your okay to be alone and I'll go. One word, please.'

Another twenty minutes crawled by, and Meredith was about ready to convince one of the janitors to give her a key when she heard a click from the other side of the door. Pushing herself to her feet, she was ready to be told to go home and that he was fine.

(It's what she would've said.)

Cormac isn't sure what urged him to cross the room and reach for the door. Meredith's calls and texts had been filling up the notifications on his phone. He didn't even know how she knew what had happened so quickly. Part of him wanted to immediately respond, asking her to come, but the majority of him was wired with a seething fury.

Cormac didn't think he had ever felt this level of anger at a situation before, and as intensely as the emotions were that the clouded his mind, he knew it wasn't fair to direct them at Meredith. So, he left the phone alone.

Then she knocked on his office door and he wanted to scream. Not at her but at everything else.

His last week had been filled with more thoughts and memories of Abbi than usual. Between dealing with Austin and Liam's pain and Irene's grief, he had hardly had time to focus on his own mental state. Then it was time to go back to work and he got saddled with Alya.

It was a real punch to the gut to see her patient history, but he had been determined to not let that company's fuck-ups take another life. When rushing her back into surgery, he had tunnel vision, desperately trying to control the bleeding. Unfortunately, it was all too much.

He remembered the following moments in fractured pieces. Trying to scrub the feeling of failure off his fingertips, telling a nurse to call the family, sitting Alya's parents down, and seeing their faces splinter with grief.

He had beelined for his office, slamming the door and flipping over his loveseat with a shout. Only then did he draw the blinds and lock the door. He reached for his bottle of whiskey but ended up setting it on his desk. Instead of drinking it, he just stared at it, like he wasn't sure what came next.

He didn't know anything in those moments except anger.

The rage didn't start to dissipate until after Meredith knocked. He looked at the whiskey bottle and saw how low it had gotten. Since hiding it in his office, he had rarely had a drink alone.

Coming back to work to see Meredith had been like a soothing balm being rubbed on a raw wound. Her presence was a better distraction from his own mind than work itself. He'd forgotten how lonely grief could be. Then she went home for the night and it was: Abbi, Abbi, Abbi, Alya, Abbi, Death He reached over to grab the glass bottle before pausing and instead grabbed two glasses from his desk, setting them next to it.

Then, he was on his feet across the room, opening the door. He turned back towards his desk before Meredith could get a good look at him. Her quiet steps filed in behind him, shutting the door once she was in the room.

He leaned his hands against the surface of his desk, bowing his head. Meredith came to stand beside him, looking around the room, at the loveseat, at the whiskey, and then at him. She leaned down and grabbed the arm of the loveseat, and pushed it back upright, making sure it was flush against the wall.

Cormac still wouldn't look at her as she walked back over, but didn't flinch away when her hand came to rest on his shoulder. Gently she guided him over to the loveseat until they were seated next to each other. Her hand trailed up and down his back rhythmically and slowly some of the stiffness in his shoulders relaxed.

Seeing Meredith still on the other side of the door had made the overwhelming emotions of the night swell back up in his body. Despair over everything the past week had represented and became weighed heavy on his chest. He could feel a sharp, stinging sensation form in the back of his eyes.

One of his hands came up to cover his face, and she began to feel stifled, shaking beneath her palm. Meredith's chest tightened as she drew her arm around his shoulders and pressed her cheek to his upper arm. After a moment, a ragged sob broke the silence in the room and she felt him turn his body into hers. Meredith responded in kind, adjusting so her chest was flush to his and her arms came around his neck. She used one hand to guide his head to her shoulder, where he buried his nose in the hollow of her collarbone.

Cormac's breath came in heaves, choked out with overwhelming exhaustion and sorrow. His tears soaked the collar of Meredith's shirt, but she didn't care. She just held him in silence and allowed herself to be a space where he felt safe enough to collapse. Without realizing it, she started to rock him back and forth just enough to create a consistent motion. His hands gripped the back of her shirt with a fervor; as if he would wake up from a dream and find himself alone with his own emotions once more.

With time, his breathing evened out, and the sobs were reduced to occasional sniffles. Meredith took this chance to adjust their positioning so they were laying down on the loveseat, with her back against the cushions and Cormac draped on top of her. They had to curl up to completely fit, but it was still comfortable. He rested his head against her chest, allowing himself to relinquish into the embrace of someone he trusted. Meredith's heartbeat was steady under his ear as he found himself drifting off into a dreamless sleep.

Cormac woke up to delicate ministrations on the back of his neck. He was still tucked up against Meredith on the loveseat, and by the movement of her hands he took it that she was well awake.

Exhaustion still pricked at the back of his eyes, but there was calmness flooding his body that he hadn't felt in days. Stretching, he turned his head to try and look up at Meredith. "What time is it?"

"Just a little after nine."

He groaned and tried to rally himself to be enthusiastic about the upcoming workday.

"Hey," Meredith chuckled. "None of that. We both have the day off."

"What?" Cormac pushed himself up on his arms so he was looking down at her.

"I texted Bailey not long after you fell asleep saying we both caught a stomach bug. Don't worry, I know all the best ways to sneak out of this place."

A grateful smile crossed his lips. "Aye, I'll bet you do."

He flopped back down on top of her, making her grunt with the sudden impact. Wrapping her arms around his upper body she helped settle him back into her. They laid like that in the quiet of his office. The ambient sounds of their breathing and the ticking of the analog clock on his desk became the background noise to their contentment.

"How were you here so fast?" Cormac asked, his voice hardly above a whisper.

Meredith huffed mirthfully. "Before I left, I told Schmidt to page me if anything went wrong." She paused. "I was really hoping nothing would go wrong."

He hummed in agreement. "Thank you for comin'."

"Thank you for unlocking the door."

She let them sit there for another few moments before patting his back. "C'mon, we've got a full free day to either do something or nothing. I'm good with either but that doesn't change the fact that I am hungry."

"I don't want ta." Cormac's voice was muffled as he buried his face deeper in the crook of her neck.

"Look, I know I'm being very sweet right now, but that will change if I don't get carbs and caffeine ASAP," Meredith said with a laugh.

He heaved out a sigh, finally relenting and moving to roll off of her. After sitting up he stretched his arms out, feeling stiff joints crack back to life. Reaching down, he helped pull Meredith up before bending down to press a quick kiss to her lips. "What're you in the mood for?"

"Honestly? Diner food. I know of a place not far from here."

So, they crept out of the hospital to avoid Bailey's wrath if she found out she'd been lied to. Meredith drove them down the road to a local diner that had been there since she was a kid. 'Sally's Family Style' had become a staple for hangover food during her intern year.

They ordered take-out and headed to a nearby park. The sun had broken through the clouds and was dappling through the trees as they found a bench to sit at. Meredith brought her paper coffee cup to her lips and took a tentative drink. Realizing it was a safe temperature, she took a larger swig.

Cormac sat next to her, the side of his arm and leg flush with hers. Both of them had decided on a breakfast sandwich, hers on a bagel with bacon and his on an English muffin with sausage. Some pigeons were pecking on the ground in front of them, lurking around in case either Meredith or Cormac were feeling charitable. She picked off a small piece from the edge of her bagel and watched them scramble to get to the crumb first.

The sight made Cormac laugh and the joyful sound intertwined beautifully with the birds chirping in the trees above them. He pressed his body into hers, jostling her gently. She pushed back and rested her head against his shoulder.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Meredith asked.

"Do you ever find yourself grapplin' with the conflicting emotions of desperately missin' them but also findin' yourself happy and grateful for the life you're now livin'?"

"Constantly. I try to remind myself that allowing myself to be happy again isn't disrespecting his memory or what we had. I'll always cherish the life we built together and adore what it gave me, but I've also come too far and been through too much to stop myself from building something new. I try not to shame myself for either emotion. They can both co-exsist in the fucked-up psyche that is my mind."

"Is it weird to say that I think she'd really like you?"

"Not at all." Meredith smiled. "I think you and Derek might've butted heads in the OR, but overall would've gotten along."

Cormac chucked. "You think?"

"I know, actually. When I was on the beach when I was out with Covid, Derek gave me his stamp of approval."

"Oh, he did, didn't he?"

"Hey!" She turned to look him in the eye with a laugh. "Don't mock me and my visits from the dead. You knew what you were getting into!"

Cormac reached over to cup the side of her face. "Aye, that I did." Resting his forehead against hers, he took a deep breath. "I love you."

Meredith's eyes widened, but a fierce grin broke out on her face. She leaned into his touch. "I love you too."

There was a brightness that lit up his eyes as soon as those words left her mouth. They looked at each other for a few heartbeats before laughter began to bubble out of him. It didn't take her long to join in. And to anyone on-looking, they must have looked crazy, foreheads pressed together and shaking with laughter on a bench surrounded by pigeons.

Abbi's voice, from that one conversation in the hospital that seemed like ages ago, whispered in the back of his mind. 'You deserve to be happy.'

At that moment, it had been a harrowing and foreign concept that felt like the ultimate betrayal in light of everything Abbi was going through. He would bet his medical license that Meredith had once felt the exact same way. Hell, maybe on some days, she still does. He knows he does. And there was no shame in that for either of them.

He pressed his lips against hers, pulling away for a moment to whisper, "You were right."

"About what?" She matched the volume of his voice.

"This first," he said, grinning wide enough that it crinkled the corners of his eyes. "It is really good."

A/N: thank you for reading! any comments and favorites are appreciated (and honestly really do help with motivation). i hope to see ya'll soon!