Meredith Grey hated her job sometimes. She'd cried over it in her boyfriend's arms many times when she lost patients, and that made her hate her job. She'd tried her impress her superiors, only to be hit with scut for the whole day with not a scalpel in sight, and that made her hate her job. She'd never done it before, but she imagined that if she'd requested a day off because she wanted to go somewhere or do something, and she got denied, that would also make her hate her job. But she didn't know how much that would make her hate it until now.
"Derek-" She called. She knocked, three times. "Derek are you okay?"
Silence.
She sighed as she looked at the time. She'd been stuck in work for five hours. He'd been home, upset, stressed- whatever else he might be, for five hours, without her.
"Derek? Please answer the door. Just let me know you're okay."
Nothing.
She took a step back and examined the house. She couldn't quite look through windows clearly enough to see the house, but she could see whether or not the lights were on, and make out some shapes.
There were no lights on, despite the fact it was getting to the kind of time where you needed some light to do anything without your eyes straining, but his car was in the drive; surely he was home?
"Derek." She sighed. "Please. If you're in there...I just want to know that you're okay."
Nothing.
Just nothing.
She sighed as she took a seat on the floor by his door. She'd knock again in a moment, and keep going for five more minutes. Or maybe ten. Or...maybe twenty.
"Hey- I haven't seen you since yesterday but I heard what happened, are you okay?" She said the second she entered the room. She was just walking peacefully to the room, until she noticed who was inside, and found herself rushing to him.
"Mmm." He muttered with a small nod.
"You went home. One of the nurses said you didn't look well."
"She was just...fine, and then she wasn't." He said after a second. He rubbed his face in his hands. "I'm fine, I'm not ill just...felt nauseous from how...horrible it was."
"You don't look that great."
"Gee-" He sighed. "Thanks."
"I mean, you don't look very well; you look ill." She corrected, although she knew he understood what she meant the first time. He was just deflecting.
"I'm not sick."
"Are you sure?"
"I feel fine now. I do. I...I didn't. I didn't after it happened." He swallowed. "But I'm okay now."
"It wasn't your fault, you know that?"
"I know." He agreed. One part of him agreed, but the other part (the most important part) of him disagreed. What if it was him? She'd trusted him. And he'd failed her. "How are you?"
"No. We're still talking about you." She refused. "Are you okay? Like, mentally- are you okay? Answer me properly this time, please."
"I'm fine now. I promise. I just...it was bad at the time. But we both lose patients all the time. It's part of being a surgeon. It might have been a little worse than normal but...it's what we do, and I've survived it a thousand times before with no worries, so...it's okay. I'm okay."
"And when you went home?" She prompted. She didn't particularly want to admit she was there if he didn't know, that seemed like an odd thing to do as an ex-girlfriend.
"I slept." He explained. "I sleep when I'm stressed. And then I woke up, not tired, not stressed, not sad, not...anything. I'm okay. I promise."
She sighed. He sounded so, so genuine. "Okay. You...you're okay."
"I am, I promise." He vowed again. "So, seriously, how are you doing? This case isn't going to be nice."
She swallowed. "On General, checking the abdomen for any free fluid."
"That's what you're doing, not how you're doing." Derek corrected as she sat down next to him, looking at the currently-blank computer screen, waiting for the scan to come through.
"Out of all the people in the world- out of all the idiots and..." She paused. "The man who did this-"
"Can have a heart attack and you wouldn't even move." He finished for her. "You could run him over, and you'd just keep on driving."
She swallowed, but nodded. He was right.
"I'd support you in prison."
"Yeah?"
"Oh, yeah. I'll be a...what is it? Character witness. Say you're really great." He replied. "I'm not sure I'm up for dealing drugs though, I'm afraid. Cristina would probably have to do that."
She smiled a little. "Thanks. For the offer and...for making me smile."
"No problem."
"How...I mean- I know we haven't got her scans back yet and we don't know everything but-"
"She should be okay. This isn't...it's not catastrophic. It's not good, but we can be hopeful. She's young, doesn't appear to have any pre-existing conditions to hinder her recovery." He replied, knowing what she was trying to say. "I've seen people with far worse injuries survive."
"Yourself, being one example."
He swallowed. "Yeah. I suppose."
"Right- well-" She said, returning to her normal voice from her softer one as she saw the loading sign disappear. "Scans are up. I have to get off and update Bailey and Webber."
"Oh-" She breathed the second she entered the room. She didn't even pick their on-call room, so she was rather surprised. Although, she supposed he might have thought the same thing, so they'd both been avoiding it. "Hi, sorry."
He smiled as he sat up, pushing against the pillow. "No, no, that's okay. I'll be going in a minute."
"How is she?" Meredith asked as she sat down on the bed opposite him. She knew he'd know who she was referring to.
"No change."
"Have you been here all night?" She inquired, although she could tell from his rather dishevelled hair (although she'd probably still judge it to be better than ninety-nine percent of other people's hair) and the general exhaustion on his face.
"Yeah-" He sighed heavily, chest depressing. "Only just crashed in here about five minutes ago."
She nodded, but didn't respond before finally muttering, "I feel terrible for her."
"At least with accidents and illnesses it's no ones fault, this...it's-" He paused. That man had hurt her on purpose. Assault like that could never be an accident. Ever.
"And...she has no one."
"I couldn't-" He paused. They weren't friends; they didn't talk about feelings or memories anymore. "I mean, you need people there for you. In situations like this you...you really need someone by your side."
"We have the same shoes."
He looked up. "You mean...you and-"
"I went out last night. Almost...almost wore them."
"But you didn't, and you're here, and you're safe. You're okay." He reassured her.
"Yeah-" She agreed softly.
"Or you're not okay." He corrected. After a moment of considering what might come next, he patted the bed beside him, saying, "Come here-"
"What?"
"Well in a normal-person situation, I'd walk over to you but- I mean, we'll be here for five minutes if you wait for me to get up to move one metre across the room."
She smiled, just a little, stood, and sat down beside him.
"Tell me what's going on."
"It could have been me. And I just...I can't get that idea out of my head."
"But it wasn't you. Remember you're-"
"Here and safe and...alive and- whatever."
"No- Meredith, not whatever, not whatever at all. You...you are okay, and she is not. And that's horrible, I know, I wouldn't have spend my night in the ICU with her if it was anything less than atrocious but..." He grabbed her hand, and squeezed it as he gave her a small smile. "You're okay."
She smiled back, just a little. "I'm okay."
"So...we're going to go back to breathing now, alright?"
She sighed shakily. "Mmm, perhaps- yeah, that would probably be a good idea."
"Mmm-" He agreed, squeezing her hand again.
"I just...you're right- you wouldn't want to be alone."
"You wouldn't be alone." He reassured her, knowing what she really meant. She wasn't talking about the patient anymore.
"After one week...two weeks? Cristina may be my person, but she's not going to cry at my bedside for two weeks- probably not even two days."
"Well...now that you've told me it's a big fear of yours, I'll make that promise."
"What?"
"You're not going to be in a coma, you're not going to be in an accident or have this happen to you but..." He paused. "If you were, I promise to visit you daily."
"Derek-"
He swallowed. "Yeah?"
The pair stared at each other, silent and motionless for a long second before Meredith leant forward, put a hand on his chest, and-
"Meredith-" He sighed. "We- we can't-"
"Why not? Why can't we?"
"We don't work together, Mer-"
"This...it's just-" She swallowed. She couldn't help it; she needed this, him, his body. "Breakup sex?"
He swallowed. This should be too cruel. For both of them. It wasn't good for her, it wasn't good for him, it wasn't good for either of them. "No, we...no."
"Breakup kiss." She begged. She couldn't help it; she needed this, him, his body...but she couldn't have that. But she'd take this. She'd take anything.
"No. No breakup sex, no breakup kiss. I..." He swallowed as he made a grab for his chair. "I should go back and check on her now. You...stay, rest. You look tired."
"Derek-"
"You know we can't."
"But-" She tried to protest.
"Please." He swallowed. "Please don't ask again because I...I'm not sure I can say no again."
"Dr Grey."
She turned round at the call. "Dr Sloan. Hi."
"I'm just here to check on the stitches I put in."
"And I'm just..." She sighed as she looked to the patient for a second. What happened was bad enough, but the fact that she had no one there with her made the whole thing a hundred times worse. "I'm just...here."
"Just thought she needed someone?" Mark guessed.
She nodded slowly.
"Some people say it improves patient outcomes. Whether it does or not doesn't really matter, I suppose. You just...want to be there."
"How often did you leave?" Meredith asked, knowing he'd know what she referring to.
"First eight days, I only left to go to the toilet. I don't even recall showering which is...rather gross, looking back."
She sighed. "How do you think he's doing?"
"Normally he listens to me. Normally, when he's being Derek and he's freaking out about stuff, he'll take what I say into consideration and change his mind."
"But he's not doing that this time?" She guessed with a sigh.
He didn't speak for a long second, deliberating whether he wanted to verbalise his thought or not, but eventually decided to, "After the accident, I didn't force myself to look after him or anything like that, but...I had an obligation to support Derek as his friend, so did everyone else in the hospital, as his doctors and his friends. We'd all known him for at least a few years, obviously you know that we go back to nursery and people like Richard taught us as brainless interns too so we all go back together for quite a while. But you...you don't have that. Any of that. No connections at all. When you met him, you had no reason to not be an asshole like everyone else in the world. But you weren't."
"Well, I was. Once."
He smiled a little. Derek had told him about that. "My point is...I know you're not forcing yourself to do anything either, you're naturally just a good person, but...what I'm saying is I like you. You make Derek so extremely happy, and you're not lying or forcing yourself to be kind like quite a few people do. So, of course, when I found out, I smacked him round the face- uh, verbally, not physically, told him he was an idiot, told him he'd probably never be as happy as he has been with you and that he was making the world's biggest, stupidest move but he's just..."
"Self-destructing."
"Self-destructing?" Mark repeated.
"I mean, I'm sure he's not doing these things on purpose but he's doing these things that he shouldn't be doing to...oh, I don't know- find control? Ask a shrink what it means." She sighed. He'd always recommended her to be a therapist from the way she always figured him out, but she wasn't doing a very good job right now. "You know he sat with her last night. All night. Didn't sleep. And I...I admitted that I had started talking to someone, and asked him because- he's seen one since the accident, right? But he just...nothing he said has convinced me that he's coping. And I'd fix it if I could but the whole problem is that he won't let me. He won't let me do anything. He won't even let me decide whether I want to love him or not because...he's just so insistent that I can't or...that I shouldn't or- I don't know what to do anymore. I just have to sit and watch and I hate it."
Mark sighed. "He has a stressful life in terms of the chair, and he's got a stressful job, and he's a stressful guy- it's really not a good combination. So we always said that he had to talk to me, or at least someone. And I promise I'm really trying, but he just keeps pushing me away too and I just...can't do anything to help him. But I need to. No one can handle everything on their own."
"No...they can't-" Meredith exhaled. "Just have a horrible feeling that that is exactly what he's been doing for the last few weeks.
