"Hello."
"Mrs Shepherd." Mark greeted with a smile.
"Sorry I didn't visit you sooner." Carolyn apologised as she walked into the room and sat down on the chair by his bedside. He definitely looked an awful lot better than Derek did. Mark was sat up with only one IV in his arm and no monitoring. Derek, on the other hand, still spent all of his time resting, still had a nasal cannula and what looked like a hundred IV bags, was still in the intensive care unit, and had his heart rate, blood pressure and saturation all displayed on a monitor. She wouldn't forget that, considering the constant beeping. It was a nice change to find a room without it, if she was honest.
"I'm going to assume that's because Derek is worse off than me, not because you like him more than me."
She smirked. "I don't play favourites."
"Lemme think. Weird adopted son from down the street, or biological charity-case son- I wonder who would win."
"You gave him a kidney, Mark. I definitely still don't have a favourite- but- I'm just here to say thank you."
He smiled. She definitely didn't have a favourite, but at least he was up a few marks.
"But also scould you."
"Scould me?" He repeated.
"Derek's sick and the first thing you do is chuck organs at him? You didn't even think of looking at UNOS, did you?"
He swallowed. That was a good point. There could have been a kidney waiting for him, but he wasn't aware that anyone had checked. "No, Mrs Shepherd."
"And you're his rock for when he's sick. That's what you promised me. But now you're both in hospital! I'm thankful for the fact that you probably saved his life, but couldn't you have got someone else to do it?"
"Carolyn, I think you should go and get some sleep." Mark sighed. "I haven't seen you sleep in two days."
She squeezed her son's hand even harder as she shook her head. "He needs me." Carolyn just about got out through her rolling tears.
"I'm here, and I'm not going to go anywhere."
She sniffled as she looked back to the man lying in the bed. Hardly anything had changed since he day she arrived. He was more stable, but that was it. She knew that was progress, but when he was still lying there covered in thousands of bandages with thousands of tubes and thousands of wires, it certainly didn't feel like he was improving.
"I promise I won't leave him. You could go for two weeks, and I'd stay here. You could go for two years, and I'd stay here. Derek could need to move across the country and I'd pack up my bags, and my job, and go with him. I will always be here for him, and I promise you I'm not going to leave him alone, okay?"
She observed him for a long second before sighing. She was so, so tired. "Derek's key is on my second set of keys, which is at home."
He smiled as he grabbed his own keys and removed the one to Derek's home. "Now, for the love of God, get some sleep before we have to put you in the ICU."
"He has Meredith. He doesn't need me."
"He doesn't have Meredith."
"What do you mean he doesn't-" He paused. He was expecting to have to explain who Meredith was when he said that. "Wait, hold up- you know about Meredith?"
"Of course. But he could only tell me her name because I don't know her, so try not to be offended."
"Right." He sighed. "But what do you mean- he doesn't have Meredith? Is she working?"
"I have no idea. Dr Bailey told me she didn't want to see him, but that's all I know."
"She's definitely in love with him. I saw it."
"Well, I have no idea what happened, but she's definitely not in love with him anymore."
"Dr Grey, have you finished prepping him for surgery? We need to-" She paused when Meredith looked up. Somehow, she looked more broken than she did before. "Are you okay, Meredith?"
She swallowed, and bolted out the other door.
"Grey, where are-" Bailey gave up when the door closed.
What. The. Hell?
"Karev- you're on paeds. Cristina, Burke requested you on his service today so you're on cardio. Stevens and O'Malley, you're on trauma in the pit." Bailey listed off to her students. "And Dr Grey. The chief finally got round to reading your request for more time in general because you think you want to specialise in it, so you'll be on general for the next three days. He apologies for taking so long to approve it."
She didn't answer for a second, too busy trying to figure out what the hell she was on about. She didn't have the capacity to think. She hadn't slept for two nights now, and normally she'd combat a bad night with something sugary to keep her awake, but looking at food made her feel nauseous. Then she got it. Bailey knew that her and Derek had a...thing going on, and she'd formulated a lie for her so she could see him. Unfortunately, she didn't know the update on their 'thing'. The bit where Derek crushed her heart. "Oh- um, thank you so much."
She nodded. "No problem. Now, the rest of you go off to your attendings."
They slowly filtered out the room, leaving the pair alone.
"How are you holding up?"
"I don't want to see him." She stated the second she was sure her friends were gone, ignoring her superior's question.
"You...you don't want to see him?"
She shook her head.
"You've had a day off to process what happened, are you sure you're not ready to see him? He misses you."
"He misses me?" Meredith repeated with a smirk. "Sure he does."
Bailey looked at her silently for a second before asking, "What's this about, Grey? Because when you were in the trauma room, you were pretty obviously still in love with him, and then you ran away when I came in later."
"It doesn't matter. He's just- we're done. I don't want to talk to him- ever again. I'm happy to work on general for the next few days, but if you make me go in there I'm just going to take another day off."
Bailey sighed. "Okay...well, I have an appy this morning in 2432 who needs pre-op done."
Meredith smiled. "Great. Thank you." She returned before hurrying out the room in the hope that Bailey wouldn't ask her any more questions.
No.
Come on.
Not this.
Anything but this.
She'd just recieved a 9-1-1 page that directed her to room 3174, and, of course, ran to the room. Except, before she could reach it, she found the patient lying in the hallway.
"Doctor- I uh- I need help. It's my first day, I don't what I'm doing." The nurse confessed when she looked up to see Meredith stood a few metres away.
She sighed and hurried to the patient, dropping to the floor besides him. "Seizure?" She assumed.
"Yeah." She agreed. "He wanted to go out for a walk and he just collapsed and then- then he started seizing and I didn't know what to do."
"A tonic clonic seizure?" Meredith suggested.
"I um- yeah." She agreed hesitantly. She had learnt so much at nursing school, but it all seemed to disappear from her mind in the face of emergency. "Convulsions, muscle contractions and loss of consciousness."
"Did he stop by himself or did you give him something?"
"It had been going on for a few minutes and I was told to go and get some anticonvulsants."
"Which ones? How many?"
She swallowed and shook her head before looking up from her patient to the man who had given her the instructions. "I don't- I don't remember. It was all so fast, I just couldn't- I don't know."
"Five of diazepam, five of phenobarbital."
Meredith looked up for a second before shooting her eyes back down to her patient. "Thank you, Dr Shepherd." She said reluctantly. "Now, you should go back to your room, you're a patient, not a surgeon right now."
"I'm fine, Dr Grey." He returned in an equality passive-aggressive tone to Meredith.
"You had a serious abdominal surgery four days ago, you shouldn't even be out of bed."
"I said I'm fine." He repeated.
"Dr Shepherd-" She protested. This wasn't even her not wanting him to be there, she just knew he shouldn't be out of bed.
"Are you a neurosurgeon?"
She swallowed. "No."
"So if this patient seized again, would you know what to do? What drugs to give?"
She looked at him for a long second before admitting, "Fine. But no moving and no stretching and just- no nothing, okay?"
He sighed. "Fine."
"Hey, don't-" Derek sighed as Meredith approached him, then stepped behind him. His custom chair didn't have any handles because he didn't ever require anyone to assist him, and it meant people were less encouraged to push him without asking, so Meredith simply grabbed the backrest of his chair instead.
"For the fiftieth time, you are a patient right now."
"I can do it myself though." He protested as he moved his hands off of his lap.
"Maybe you can, but that doesn't mean that you should."
He sighed. "Fine."
She smiled weakly before clutching the rest a little harder, and moving him. "It's um- 3177, right?"
He swallowed. She'd know that if she cared about him, or visited him, or even thought about him. But she clearly didn't. In fact, she did the opposite of caring about him. "Yeah."
"Have your labs improved?" She asked, hoping to keep distanced from him if she worked in numbers rather than asking about how he felt.
"I'm not yellow anymore, so I think I can say yes." He replied optimistically.
She almost laughed, but suppressed it. "Well, that's a positive."
"Wasn't my best look, if I'm honest."
"Mmm, I must say I do like the nice pale pink skin more than the yellow. Or the blue; your fingertips were a little blue." She stated as she paused herself, and by extension him. She stepped to the door to open it, before returning to him to push him through the doorway.
She allowed him to position himself by the bed as she lowered it a little, presuming it would help him. Despite the fact that she had seen him do it hundreds of times, she wasn't confident enough to get it right.
"What's the best thing for me to...grab?" She asked after a few seconds of trying to figure out what she was going to say. Even after that, her question was still extraordinarily awkward.
"I can transfer myself."
"You are not going to transfer yourself." She rebutted, despite the obvious fact that he had already done it once himself when he, presumably, heard commotion and perhaps a call for help in the hallway.
He sighed, as he placed a hand on the bed. "I'm fine, Dr Grey."
Dr Grey? Who the hell was Dr Grey? She was Meredith, or Mer. Never, ever, ever Dr Grey, unless he was trying to be professional for the sake of secrecy. "Okay, Dr Shepherd."
He paused too. He supposed it was fair enough, but it stung. He sighed before pressing his weight into his hand, and moving himself across, only for an excruciating pain to strike his side. His face creased with heavy wince while his mouth dropped open as he doubled over, clutching at his abdomen.
"What?" She asked, just as he removed his hand from his side to reveal a blood-covered palm. "Oh, crap-"
"Oh- Mrs Shepherd!" Bailey called at the sight of her. "You know we finished Derek's stitches? He'll be just fine, but maybe give him a talking to for getting out of bed and being such an idiot. I think-"
"I know you finished." She interrupted with a smile. "But Dr Webber said he's okay, and that's enough for me."
"You don't want to sit with him now?" She asked, knowing that Carolyn was always there for Derek throughout his time in both hospital and rehab.
"He's with Meredith. I don't want to disturb them, so I'm just waiting."
Bailey smiled. "You know about Meredith?"
"I ate a very nice happy five-hundredth day of living anniversary cake that she bought over last time I visited, and Derek told me- well, not an awful lot about her- but I could tell how in love with her he was. I hadn't seen him that happy since...it-" She sighed. "It's been a long time since he's smiled like that."
Bailey swallowed as she nodded. As she had mentioned to Meredith, she had had a much larger impact on Derek than she had realized.
"But, for a reason I still don't know, she hasn't seen him since he was admitted."
"I still have no clue either. I offered, and she said she'd take the day off if I forced her to treat him. But- she's there now and I don't hear either of them killing each other so- well, I suppose that's something."
"Do me a favour and don't go in there. Give them a little time."
Bailey nodded. "Of course. Page me if they do start killing each other."
Carolyn smiled. "Will do."
"Meredith-" Bailey called as she stepped out of the room. Honestly, she was a little surprised to see her there.
"How is he?"
"Partial dehiscence. We re-sutured the wound. He'll be absolutely fine. We're going to move him back to the ICU for a little bit, considering the elevated risk of infection, but he should be fine."
She sighed. "Okay...okay. He's going to be okay." She muttered to herself.
"Do you wanna go with him? He's sedated right now, but not fully so it will only probably be about an hour until he wakes up. You don't have to if you still don't-"
"I'll go. Definitely. Thank you."
Bailey sighed as she watched Meredith rush to greet Derek's gurney. She was glad she had changed her mind but still, what the hell?
"Hey-" Meredith greeted as his eyelids started to flutter, and he groaned. "Derek, it's Meredith. Do you remember what happened?"
"Stupid." He muttered as he finally got his eyes to stay open, and focused them on her.
She laughed. "Yeah, you were pretty stupid if I'm honest."
He smiled at her laugh.
"Bailey and Webber stitched you back up. You managed to pull almost all of them out, but luckily it wasn't bad enough for you to need surgery, just a patch up. They sedated you, so you're going to be pretty out of it for a while. I'm not sure how long you're going to be here, but I'm guessing it's not going to be any less than a week now."
"Right." He sighed in agreement.
Neither of them spoke for a while as their conversation died away, before Derek finally found the courage to ask what he'd wanted to know for three days now. "Meredith-"
"Yeah?"
He swallowed, scared of what was to come. "Where'd you go?"
She didn't speak for a long moment before inquiring, "Do you remember what happened after you collapsed? You woke up for a few minutes just before you went into surgery, do you remember that?"
"Yeah."
"So..." She swallowed. He didn't agree like he was sure of what she was talking about, but she was pretty sure a huge love confession was pretty significant. "Do you remember what I said?"
Derek, the reason I wanted to find you today- the reason why I wanted you to meet me in that room was because I...I wanted- needed- I...I needed to tell you that I... love you, Derek. And that I've been in love with you for freaking forever. And that I don't care about whatever crap you're going to come up with about you being undatable because I fell in love with you like this and- the only time I didn't love you was when I didn't know and I was shouting at you for being a lazy ass, so just- no excuses. No saying no. Unless you just hate me but- God, Derek I hope to god you don't hate me because I am not doing all this stupid love stuff with someone else all over again. And that means no dying as well, because then it'd be the same. Okay? You hear me? No dying. I, Meredith Grey, am telling you I'm in love with you. And that's insane because I- I don't like stuff like this. I don't like cheese and I don't like romance and I don't like boyfriends but I want a cheesy romance with you. I want anything I can freaking get with you. Anything. But to have that, you've got to live. So no dying, because I love you, okay?
He shook his head.
"You don't remember what I said?" She concluded, surprised.
"I had a headache. My ears were ringing. I couldn't hear a thing." He answered honestly. "I knew you were talking to me but I have no idea how to lip read. I thought you kept talking about gloves, but I don't think that's right."
She snorted. "No, I don't think that's right." She agreed with a beam, because didn't hate her. He didn't not love her. He didn't even let go of her hand at a precise moment on purpose, he just couldn't hear her and was probably half conscious and weak and dying, as Cristina had suggested. She could never help the fact that her mind jumped to the worse situation every single time, but she still hated herself for being like that.
"So...what did you actually say?"
Now she was stumped. "I um- it doesn't really matter."
"You sure?" He pressed. "I know you, Meredith Grey."
"And I know that you, Derek Shepherd, need to rest." She instructed. She could see his eyelids wanting to fall and how hard he was trying to keep them apart. "Go back to sleep, I can tell the sedation is really doing a number on you."
He sighed, knowing she was right. "You'll be here?"
She smiled as she squeezed his hand. "I'll be here. Well- I better go and grab some charts so I don't get fired but- then I'll be back."
"See you soon." He said as she stood and walked to the door.
She stepped through the door, but paused to look in from the other side. "Bye, Derek." She returned before sliding the door closed. It felt good to call him by his name again.
The second it was sealed, both parties muttered an 'I love you' for no one to hear.