A parent-trap?
Like that movie Zola had made him watch years ago? The one with Dennis Quaid and Natasha Richardson?
But how could-?
Why would his children-?
It made no sense, what was Meredith even referring to?
But she was here.
In his home.
With him.
And only a Christmas miracle could do that.
Or, perhaps whatever this parent-trap was.
Derek had started on some hot chocolate while Meredith had left to change.
He'd managed to find brand-new flannel pyjamas for her. He had been sure to mention that.
Brand-new.
So she wouldn't feel uncomfortable thinking it was something of his.
The kids on the other hand were nowhere to be seen, having run to their room at the site of their mother.
Seriously, who knew what those two were up to?
He poured the drinks into their respective mugs, humming an old Christmas song.
The blue Snowman mug for Bailey. The purple Rudolph one for Zola. A plain red one for himself.
Leaving the green with the mildly hideous-looking Santa one for Meredith.
Oh, she would hate it.
He hadn't meant to give her the most Christmas-spirited mug in his house. He hadn't. He remembered her dislike for this holiday.
He just…hadn't noticed it when he'd been sorting the drinks according to the toppings.
Whipped cream for Bailey. Mini marshmallows for Zola. A little cinnamon for him. And extra cocoa powder sprinkled on top of hers.
"Where's the laundry?"
"I can do it."
"No, it's fine. Just point me towards it?"
He pointed out the laundry room to her and got back to his work, willing his heart to slow down.
He'd made sure that he had taken out the brand-new pyjamas for her. He had made sure of that.
Except he didn't have any new hoodies lying around.
Which meant that Derek was about to spend an entire evening with his ex-wife who hadn't had a real conversation with him for almost half a decade, clad in her favourite old college hoodie of his.
Parent-trap or no parent-trap, it was going to be a long freaking evening.
It smelled like him.
That was the first thing she'd noticed when Meredith had changed into the clothes Derek had handed to her.
He had mentioned repeatedly that the pyjamas were unused. Brand-new.
She understood, of course, she did. He had someone in his life now, and sharing his pyjamas with anybody but her would complicate that.
Especially if it was with the ex-wife of almost half a decade.
Except, somehow, he hadn't thought of this when he'd handed her his old hoodie.
It was the black Bowdoin one. The one she'd spent days and weeks and months in. The one she had almost, almost considered stealing when she had moved out.
But, she hadn't.
Because she hadn't needed any more reminders of her old life than the ones she already possessed.
Her old life that she had tried so hard to move on from. To forget about.
And now, here she was right back in the midst of it all.
What was she going to do?
"So, they used the emergency phone to prank you?"
"Pretty much."
"But they know they're not supposed to do that, especially Zola does."
Meredith shrugged in response. To be honest, she had been just as perplexed as he was. And furious too. But now that the adrenaline had worn off, so had the anger. She was just happy her babies were fine. That nothing untoward had happened.
Years and years of tragedy had programmed her body to fight, to run, to expect the worst possible outcome.
So any day that didn't happen was a good day.
Even if it meant that she had missed her flight to see her boyfriend or that she could have potentially died of hypothermia.
It was still a good day.
Crap, she needed to call Nick.
"I called you. Left messages too. You never picked up.", she said, taking a sip of her hot chocolate.
It was exactly the way she liked it. With sprinkles of extra cocoa powder on top. And a single Graham Cracker on the side, for her to dip in.
Because that was what the nurses had been able to come up with the limited resources of the hospital for all those years she'd spent Christmas there as a child.
She was surprised he still remembered.
But then if she had to guess, his mug probably had a sprinkling of cinnamon on top of it.
Because that was how his Dad had made it, year after year. And she knew that he missed him, perhaps the most on the holidays.
She remembered still, too.
Derek closed his eyes and sighed," Bailey took my phone."
Well, that added up.
"Zola. Bailey. Come down here right now."
They'd ignored his calls once already. Except this time, it wasn't a request.
She watched as her children rumbled down the stairs, clad in , surprisingly, the same pyjama bottoms as her.
Red flannel.
Huh.
They had definitely been wearing something else when she had arrived.
Somehow, that made her think there was so so much more to their plan.
"Hot chocolate!", she couldn't help the grin that made its way to her face at the unabashed delight in her son's voice.
Gosh, she loved that so much.
"Careful, it's hot.", both she and Derek warned him at the same instant.
She could feel her daughter's eyes on her, that same mischievous twinkle in them.
They were both parents to the same, playful, impish little children.
Of course, he knew what her son would do next. Of course, he had the same warnings, the same advice, the same answers.
Nothing else.
Zola flopped down onto the chair beside her brother, slowly, carefully.
Evaluating. Strategizing. Watching them.
She wondered sometimes how her little girl had grown up so quickly. And wondered sometimes how she understood so much at just her ten-year-old self.
Maybe, it had a little to do with her parents' jobs. Or their separation, years ago.
Maybe her daughter remembered more than she ever let them believe.
"So, did you two use the emergency phone to prank your mother?"
Nobody answered. Bailey continued to blow on his drink, avoiding their eyes. Zola was determined to stir hers into oblivion.
"Guys? Your mom missed her flight because of that. She got so worried, she walked here in the snow."
"Zola?", Derek urged her again. "You can't do that. You know that. So why did you, Zozo?"
He looked over at her, frustrated and sat up straighter in his chair, rubbing his face with his hands.
They'd never really done this.
Talked to their kids, as a team.
She had talked to them. And he had talked to them.
Never together.
Years ago, when the kids were younger and they were still married, Meredith had assumed that later on, she would be the Bad Cop, he the Good one.
Because that's how it had always been like when they were little.
She was the one who would firmly tell Zola to put her shoes on. He was the one who gave her ice cream, afterwards for it.
She was the one who insisted on the early bedtime. He was the one who was coerced into an extra fairy tale.
But they had never had the chance to discover that.
Except right now, he was on her side. He was the Bad Cop, he had her back.
It was like whiplash.
This entire evening had been like whiplash. From the call to his hoodie to this conversation right now.
"Okay, Bailey, where is my phone?", one look from Zola had him zipping his mouth shut.
Bailey was the weak link, they knew that.
"Bails, you can't hide your dad's phone you know that. We're doctors. What if someone needed him? He needs his phone.", she could have his back too.
They looked at him and waited for a moment until he broke.
"Zolatoldmetohidedad'sphoneimsorry."
"What..what was that?"
"You can never keep a secret, you dummy!", Zola yelled just as she tried to figure out what her son had just guiltly blurted out.
"Zola."
She stormed off, leaving her place on the table to her room upstairs.
"I'll go talk to her.", Meredith whispered taking in Derek's dejected look.
"I'm sorry, Mom. Dad. I should apologize to Zola, too."
"It's okay, baby, let me talk to your sister first.", she said running a hand through his cropped blond hair.
Meredith took off after her daughter without an inkling of what must have happened.
Derek and Bailey were working on the cookies while they waited for Meredith and Zola to return.
He couldn't believe he had hurt his daughter like that. On Christmas, that too. He should have just let it be.
It was just a stupid prank, anyway.
He sighed, rolling out the dough on the parchment paper.
"Dad, should we do Snowman cookies or Christmas Tree cookies?"
"How about we do both, buddy?"
His son lit up at the suggestion and ran over to him with the cutters. Derek pushed the footstool closer to himself and taught him how to gently cut the shapes out of the dough.
"Can I help too, Dad?", he heard as Zola wrapped her arms around his torso.
"Of course, you can, Lovebug."
"I'm sorry, Dad. It won't happen again."
"I'm sorry, too, sweetie.", his arms encircled her body and he kissed her forehead, resting his head atop hers.
"Me too, Zo. I'll be a better secret-keeper next time, I promise."
His daughter chuckled at her brother's pouty face and gave him a hug as well.
"Alright now, enough chit-chat, little Elves, time to get to work!"
"Yes, sir."
"Aye, aye captain."
Man, he loved Christmas.
Meredith entered the kitchen then and made her way towards him, handing him his mobile phone.
"Oh, thank you."
He swiped through it to make sure that he hadn't missed a call from the hospital and found that Meredith had, indeed, called him quite a few times.
And left a bunch of messages too, like she'd mentioned.
"Are all of these messages just you yelling
at me to answer the phone?"
"Yep, pretty much. Some with a lot more…creative words, though.", she replied, a mischievous sparkle adorning her eyes, so similar to the one his daughter had not so long ago. He couldn't help but grin at that.
Oh, he was definitely going to listen to those later.
He also had calls from Amy, Torres, his Mom and, Hannah.
He should call them back.
Especially Hannah.
"Do..you need some help then?", she asked taking in the situation.
"Sure, yeah, we'd love that. Let me grab you an apron."
He handed her a plain white apron that Amelia used. On the rare occasion that she joined him in the kitchen.
"Do you wanna help me cut these cookies, Mom?"
"Yes, that sounds like something I could do without burning down the house."
The children laughed and made way for her to work.
If someone had asked him yesterday what his Christmas Eve plans were, he would never, not even in his wildest dreams, have guessed that it would involve his ex-wife baking cookies.
Next to him. And their children.
In his kitchen. In his old hoodie.
Maybe, it was a Christmas miracle, after all.
Meredith had managed to talk to Zola, and Nick.
The conversation with Nick had been simple. And easy. He had been disheartened that she couldn't spend time with him and his niece but he also, understood.
Even the fact that now her Christmas Eve entailed spending it in her ex-husband's new home.
Well, maybe that's how mature relationships worked. How would she know.
The conversation with Zola on the other hand had been a different story entirely.
She had been agitated, annoyed and frustrated. Meredith had tried her best to explain to her that they weren't mad, that this was a conversation they could have later.
Except she could tell that whatever was bothering Zola wasn't remorse for causing her mother to change her plans because of what they'd done. Or fear of the consequences of it.
It was something else, entirely.
So Meredith had tried to find out.
And the only answer she'd been given was that it was Christmas.
That she just wanted to have a 'Perfect Christmas'.
And that her mother didn't understand, she couldn't.
Except, perhaps, she did.
Perhaps, she understood better than anybody else did.
So if Zola's Perfect Christmas meant playing house with her ex-husband, brushing aside all of their differences and all of their history, then she could do that.
And she knew that Derek would, too
She would do anything to give her children the happiness she had missed out on.
The happiness that their actions had potentially taken away from their children, too.
A/N: and there's the new chapter!
So not a lot happened in this chapter, I know but this fic is going to be smaller chapters until we build up I think. So I hope you stick around for that! I do have a lot planned from this family lol.
Anyway as you can see Meredith is clearly in denial about all things Derek while Derek isn't so much.
And Zola clearly has more tricks up her sleeve.
Let's see where this goes.
Hope y'all liked this chapter and do tell me what you thought of it, please.
Thank you so much to every single person who liked or reviewed this fic, I appreciate you so much.
Happy New Year everyone!