A boy! They were going to have a boy.

"It's crazy, but I didn't think it was possible," Derek said, pulling Meredith to him on the ferry deck. "None of my sisters had a boy first, you only have sisters, your mom only had a sister…."

"He's not our first," Meredith pointed out.

He glanced over to where Zola was sitting on a bench clapping her hands against Lexie's in a mutually clumsy game—Lexie still had dreams of teaching her the fast-paced routines he'd watched two generations of Shepherd pre-teens do at speed. Meredith had been the one to point out that the rhymes were as good for jumping as clapping and Lexie could turn a rope—Then, he looked down at his wife. She had her head turned to him, and he realized what she'd meant.

"He's not," he agreed.

"I wonder, sometimes. I mean, Zola was meant to be ours, but if we'd had a three-month-old…oh, wow. She'd still've been older. "

"Born to be the big sister." They had no idea what her biological family's structure had been, but maybe that was another reason she'd come to them.

"You'd have beaten Mark by a few weeks."

He swallowed, and then kissed the top of her head. He loved that she rarely wore heels, and not just because of all the twisted ankles she'd copped to in her adolescence. "Amazing, the stuff that doesn't matter when all you have is hindsight."

Meredith nodded. Her hand was on her belly, under his, and he didn't think he was imagining how much more settled she seemed. She hadn't turned away from the ultrasound, even though he'd taken the initiative partially because he didn't think that rescheduling anatomy scan had truly slipped her mind for over a month.

"I asked if she's talking about Mark. Wyatt won't let on."

"Gee, I wonder why?"

"I hoped I'd get a twitch or something. Should've known better. Woman has no tells."

He hummed in acknowledgement. In his opinion that wasn't a bad thing. Meredith was perceptive. It was one reason why her friendship with Cristina made sense. She understood subtleties. He'd been confused early on—once he'd understood how her tendency to evade questions about her feelings, or only give the broadest strokes, wasn't being stand-offish, or petulant—She could identify small changes in others' emotions and moods, but she couldn't always identify her own.

She'd gotten the basics, via daycare, Thatcher, Richard, or maybe even Ellis. Then, she'd gone through something that drowned her in a muddied river of feelings she had no words for, and all she was told was don't be scared.

"Do you think it'll ever not matter to Cristina?" she asked, like she'd pulled the name from his thoughts. Maybe she had.

"I thought things were better."

"They are. We mock Alex for pining over the intern he didn't have the balls to ask out, and chew out interns together. But, she's holding me at arm's length. I don't get it. I've always been a time bomb. I've always been a little too self-destructive. When I— The closest I've come to…to giving up…she didn't flinch when I told her how it felt. She didn't try to explain it away, or freak out thinking I was suicidal. She said, 'okay. You stopped. But you came back. So what's it matter?' I guess…it did matter, but…. I just don't see what's so different, and I feel like that makes me the shitty friend."

"You're an amazing friend." He didn't have to see her do it to know she'd rolled her eyes. "Okay. So. As someone who…."

He hesitated. She still woke up from nightmares shivering. It'd happened in the woods. She'd jerk awake after reliving the crash like they all did, but at the coldest points of the night he'd see the difference in her dreams. At one point he'd shaken her awake, panicked. Her lips were tinted blue, and it'd looked like she wasn't breathing. As soon as he'd touch her, she'd inhaled. She'd been holding her breath.

"Who had a different perspective before I heard your side of the story." He paused again, but she didn't stiffen or pull away. "I was…I went over everything, trying to see what I'd missed. That I hadn't let myself see. No matter what happened in the water, it was all there, and I didn't know how to help you."

"I wouldn't let you."

"I could've tried harder."

Her belly shifted as she inhaled to speak, and then she deflated again. He curled his fingers between hers. "You weren't sure if you wanted to. If…if it'd be worth it. I don't blame you. You were running from the mess of your family as as much as anything—someone having a new problem every week, and…and I had a new problem every week. There were…. You…You couldn't be sure I'd even…that I'd pull through. I-I…. That day, I lived, but…but I needed to figure out living for myself, and you—Derek, I was an intern, and you had a chance to be chief."

"That's not..." He clenched his jaw. It wasn't the time to interrupt. She hadn't made her point, yet. "Go on."

"That day was…it was a microcosm thing. You…you breathed for me as long as you could, but eventually you had to let other people take over, and I had to fight for myself. You felt like you'd reached the limit of what CPR could do. It's exhausting, doing that continuously. The problem was, it wasn't the same."

She said it with such finality; he wondered how much she'd thought about that one of his stupider remarks.

"It was like I was drowning, and you saved me," he said. "And when it was the other way around…. You didn't need to be resuscitated, you the underlying issues addressed. Making you do that on your own—"

"I did."

"When you were ready. I didn't push you over the edge, but I'd been shoving you toward it. I didn't want to acknowledge that. I didn't want to face the fact that I could've offered you a hand before you went fully under."

"I might've ignored it." She tilted her head back, and he was surprised by the warmth of her smile. "You weren't ready to admit to making a mistake, and you were afraid you'd make it worse. I figured that out a while ago." She kissed him, and he was grateful enough to let that be it. One day, he might ask what 'a while' meant, but something in her pause made him sure he wasn't ready for the blow.

"As for Cristina…," he said. "That day was different for her, too. She wasn't out there, or in the ambulance. She'd never seen you gliding through the water of our lake—"

"Pond."

"Body of water. And she was so mixed up herself about Burke, trying to be the happy girlfriend, then fiancée that I'm not sure she could see how different things were for you. She…She loves you, Mer, and now she would, but I think that after the water, she did what I did before it. You said you were okay, and she let herself believe that. By the time she left denial, you were putting yourself together.

"I think she's afraid she did that again. That she missed something. My assurances that she didn't don't mean a lot; I missed so much."

"Four years ago?"

He moved to the side and took her hands again, turning her to face him before the puzzled furrows between her eyes disappeared. "So much more, love. I probably have sand in my ears from burying my head so much.

" The times I was selfish, when I didn't see the options. When I didn't understand what other people meant to you…. You're incredibly empathetic. It's admirable, but it makes it harder for your feelings, and sometimes your foresight, to push through.

"We got through this summer, because I know those things. Because you know all of my patterns. But Cristina was gone, and then she went to Rochester. Her mentor died totally unexpectedly. I have no doubt she thinks she should've noticed something then. She came back, and she saw you were stressed, and tired—something was going on. Then again, there was Lexie, and me, and it turned out you were pregnant.

"When she found out that wasn't all…. She must've thought she was a shitty friend. And…she's concerned that if something happened…."

"I'd think why bother?" she asked. He nodded. "She has a high pain tolerance. I'm not sure she believes that it can be something …that I'm not gonna do that on purpose." She crossed her arms, pulling her hands out of his.

"If she really thinks you'd give in? Then, she doesn't know you. You've been fighting for your life since the woods, and the months before that weren't easy. I'm grateful I didn't screw up this time, and end up giving you another fight."

"You don't think…? I haven't exactly been Team Owen this year."

"He hasn't exactly been Team Meredith this year." Derek had made his peace with Owen over the plane crash, but how he'd yo-yoed her still irritated him.

"I…. If they're trying to make it work, I can respect that, it's just…."

"You don't think it will, and you're worried for her?" She nodded. "All you can do about any of this is be around. But if how she's acting makes you uncomfortable—"

"I can stand up for myself."

"Will you?"

"I…I will. She can believe what she believes. Acting like I'm terminal, or something, isn't okay."

He smiled. "Okay."

"Okay." Her return smile spread more slowly, but once it was fully formed, he noticed a hint of shyness. "You're going to have a son, Derek."

"Yeah," he breathed, returning a hand to her belly. "We are." He kissed her again, surfacing only at the announcement that the ferry would dock soon. "Oh, God. We have to tell my family."

"We could wait, but…. Won't they be happy?"

"Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea. They're going to be insufferable."

"Your grin tells me that you are thrilled about that."

He objected, repeatedly, on the walk to the car, but he was glad that his mom would be available for a call that night. She'd never forgive him if she found out through a chat with Sofia and her mamas.

They made the call from Zola's room, holding the iPad from either side of her. She was thrown off from the change in routine, and while they'd told her they were telling Gram their story tonight, he was sure one of them would still be going through the book pile.

"Well, isn't this a treat?" his mom said once they'd connected.

"Yeah, I treat."

Meredith snickered, causing Zola to turn to her and laugh. Yeah, Mama, I totally meant to be funny. "You remember we told you some big news on the ferry?" she prompted.

"Not too cold!"

"It has been too cold for you to be on the deck, huh? Tonight we sat on the bench, and what did we say?"

"Sit like-a big girl. Ecksy canno' chase."

"Before that, when we talked about the baby."

"Pitter! Grams see pitter?"

"That's a great idea! What's see going to see in it?" As she said it, Meredith cringed at the same time he did. They'd explained everything about the image, including how they knew he was a he. She course corrected quickly, "The baby is a…?"

"Baby is…baby is, uh…baby, he brudder!" Zola threw her arms up, and Derek wondered if she'd been building the tension on purpose.

"A brother?" Mom repeated. "It's a boy? You're having a boy?"

"We are."

"Oh. Oh, Derek, that's wonderful."

"Aw, don't cry, Ma."

"Oh, psh. I cry every time I get this news, boy or girl. But this is special. You're having a boy little boy blue!"

Meredith turned to him, eyebrow arced.

"It's a Shepherd thing," Mom said. "The first Shepherd boy gets called Little Boy Blue. It's gendered and old-fashioned, and Nancy tried to game the system with Squared—"

"But there were still enough relatives afraid that Granny's spirit would come haunt them if they went along with it," Derek cut in. "For the record, I didn't mind."

Mom's lips formed a thin line, but her smile came back within seconds. "All it really means is he's going to end up with a lot of themed gifts from out here. When you invite people to your shower, maybe put a moratorium on lambs. And cows."

"Do we worry about haystacks?" Derek joked.

"I'll see what I can do. Meredith, what was that face?"

Her eyes went huge as she swallowed. Thanks to Ellis's negligence, lying to a mother was one skill she hadn't perfected. "J-Just my face."

"You're having a shower, surely?"

"We really don't nee—"

"This isn't about your finances, son. A shower is as much about celebrating the mother as the baby."

"Don't tell him that."

"Your birthday is coming up…." That got him a murderous look. "We could do a shower-birthday party hybrid—"

"Since when have I—?"

"—or we can make it sort of a new baby, new hospital get together."

"Or you can—" Meredith started, and then settled on glaring.

"We'll table that," he hedged. The thoughts he'd seen on her face weren't the kind she'd voice with his mother listening, and he didn't doubt their sincerity.

"Well, it won't affect the amount of gifts you'll be getting from here, I assure you. Have you thought about names? Since Amelia isn't—"

"Mom!" He'd really hoped the excitement would make her forget about this. Derek Shepherd, you know better.

"She's nearly forty, Derek, do you really think—?"

"Dad's name is hers. She never—" He stopped, aware of the little girl giggling while Meredith pretended Rawr was going to eat her hand. "Besides, Mer's best friend's a Cristina. We're not against namesakes, but…."

"She'd hate it," Meredith confirmed.

"That's Zola's godmother? Have you thought ab out—?"

"We've known he's a boy for three hours, Ma!"

"Okay, okay, I'll stop. I'm simply excited for you. I assume you'd like me to pass the word?"

"Please. Um… except…."

"You can tell Amy, of course. Speaking of—" "Okay, Mom, can I call you in five minutes?" Her tone told him exactly where that would go, and he didn't want passengers on the ride. "Zo's already up past bedtime."

"That's fine. Good night, sweet Zola. Meredith, congratulations."

"Thank you, Carolyn."

"Love you much, dears."

"Lovamuch!" Zola squealed, and then she yawned, burying her head under Meredith's arm.

"Do we have a sleepy Zo-Zo?" Meredith asked, circling her hand on Zola's back.

"Firs' Llama book."

"Okay, we can read the Llama book and Corduroy."

"Litta Critta baby al-Zo!"

Derek chuckled. "I'll leave you two to haggle. I'm gonna go face that music," he said, climbing over Meredith's legs.

"We're not having a shower," she said, sorting the book pile into two, while Zola moved the ones she deemed not tonight onto the other stack.

"Like you're not reading all of those?"

"We're not."

"We'll see." He tilted her chin up to kiss her. He hoped he'd be able to keep the warmth of her lips with him while he dealt with what was coming.

His mother was not an old-fashioned woman. She'd joined up for the educational opportunities, and become positively dovish during Vietnam. She'd openly objected going into Afghanistan, and even in New York it'd felt like it'd been her, the progeny she could convince, and Michael Moore against the rest of the nation. Her grandchildren had gone in together to get her an iPad for Christmas, and since then she'd made every call to Zola on it, and started reconnecting with people she'd met through the VA on Facebook. It was only when it came to family traditions—particularly Dad's family traditions—that she got…prickly. Kathleen said it was guilt over selling the store, as if keeping it would've been easier for any of them. That would've led to Dad haunting them like Ellis haunted Meredith. It was his family who'd given her hell over it, but keeping her kids tied to them was her way of keeping them tied to Dad.

Derek got it. He did. That didn't mean he had to be beholden to it. Holding himself hostage to the ideals of that world belonged to a different life.

"So, what's this about you offering Amy a job?" she said, in place of hello.

"I offered Dr. Amelia Shepherd my job, if you want to get specific about it. Aren't you the one who taught me to share?"

"Is there something I don't know? Is…what is it, now? Surfside….?"

"Seaside Health and Wellness. As far as I know, they're going strong. Naomi and Sam are back together, did you hear?"

"Actually, your sister did mention it."

"Am—Amelia's the one who told you?"

Okay, he didn't think his mom kept in touch with Addison, but Nancy did, so he'd assumed that was how she'd got the news.. It was far more likely than Amelia calling home to fill her in.

"She was concerned I'd put you up to it."

"Ah." He stretched out on the bed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I can see that."

"I certainly can't. She's hardly stable, Der—"

"Mom, stop. Please, listen to me. If your thoughts stay the same once I'm done, feel free to share them." He waited for a second, half-expecting all three of his names to come from the speaker. When he heard nothing, he double-checked that he hadn't missed the beep of a dropped call. "Amelia showed up here a little over two years ago. We hadn't been talking since I left Manhattan, and I assume she waited so she wouldn't run into any of you—"

"That's—"

"—because it would mean talking about what happened to me in terms of what happened to Dad. She brought a patient, andI…I blew up at her. Told her she wouldn't operate in my hospital, because of what she'd done to my Mustang.

"That was almost twenty years ago. I was a different person twenty years ago, but I could only see her as a kid. I promised you I'd look out for her, and…and you just…. You said a hundred thousand times that the 'Man of the House' stuff was bunk, but the next thing I knew, I was in charge of Amy all the time. That wasn't fair to either of us. I was a kid. I didn't know how to raise a kid, and I really couldn't do it from Brunswick. When she got in trouble… it was my fault. My failure. I resented her for that.

"Before the crash, I was training Lexie. She's not like Amelia at all, but they're both determined and intelligent, and…and outside of work, I'm her brother. That's.… It's not fair to Amelia. When she told me she was going to be a neurosurgeon, I didn't offer to let her spend a quarter working under me at the practice. I didn't take the chance to teach someone who I knew as well as I knew myself. I told her…. Ma, I told her not to start writing out prescriptions for herself.

"I justified it as just how we talked to each other. Snakes are gone from Ireland, but the venom is in Shepherd blarney. That's what Granny said. That's the tradition I've retained. I don't want to pass it down."

He didn't have to see it to know Meredith was lingering in the doorway. That was good, because he couldn't look at her.

"She wrote me a ninth step letter last year. I almost didn't read it. I'm not proud of that. But Zola was home, and I…. I want her to know her Aunt Amy.

"She told Ryan about Dad. She'd never told anyone that. So, whatever else happened, she loved him. And when he died, she didn't go score. That's what we want. It's ideal—and I'm sure it took incredible strength.

"It's a transition going from private to academic. I'll teach her what I can. But mostly, I'll get to know my sister as an adult. Honestly, Mom, if I had any doubt over whether she could handle it, do you really think I'd be asking her to come work at the hospital I'm trying to save?"

"No. I don't suppose you would. I…didn't know you felt that way. About looking out for Amy. You all took care of each other—"

"Telling people not to mess with your dorky freshman sibling, or giving up a few hours to go over a paper is not the same as being taken out of Algebra II because your little sister had a tantrum. Kath was gone. Nancy might as well have been. Lizzie wouldn't babysit if you paid her. Literally.

"You didn't—"

"Want to upset you," he said. "It was a lifetime ago, Mom. I'm not blaming you. You did the best you could. I can't imagine…." He swallowed, and l Meredith came to sit on the bed, taking his hand in hers. "You did much better than most people could. We're all doctors, for Christ's sakes. But…But we've got to stop punishing Amelia for an addiction that got out of control."

"That doesn't mean she's not responsible for her behavior—You're right about how long it's been, which is why getting that call last year was such a disappointment. I may've been too dismissive of her loss.

"Can I ask why you're giving up your job?"

Derek closed his eyes. He'd just have to keep saying it. "I'm stepping back. Sort of. It's…complicated. We're going to have two kids. It'll be better if I'm working less, but operating more.

"The rest I'll explain once we have board approval."

"Aren't you the board?"

"There are seven of us, and we don't always agree. This won't be a problem," he added, glancing at Meredith. "But it's not official."

"All right, then. Did Lizzie tell you Hannie has her first boyfriend?" He groaned. Hannah had been going into first grade when he'd left New York.

It took listening to a few more details about the kids to get his mom off the phone. Once she hung up, he let his phone drop onto the bed. Meredith picked it up and plugged it in.

"If you think I'm judging you for something you said a decade ago, you've got the wrong girl," she said, putting her head on his chest.

"I'm judging me. I couldn't bring myself to apologize for that specifically, because I couldn't bear repeating it to her."

"Not the worst choice."

"No?" He ran a hand through her hair. It was down in waves that were slightly tangled from the messy bun she'd put it in on the ride home. "Going back over the stupid things I've said helps you."

"I listen too well. With Mom, everything was a proclamation. I never knew when her next words would be what did I say? And…I didn't get a lot of her time. If I paid attention when she was talking…even when she berated me…. It was something.

"Came in handy. I'm not sure it's my natural learning style, I'm pretty kinetic, but I'd record med school lectures and listen driving back and forth from Boston.

"Give it time with your sister. If it needs to be addressed, you'll know."

"Will I?"

"I'll help." She winked at him, and he was entranced by the spark in her pale green eyes. "What's the deal with names?"

"Oh, geez. Nancy had the first boy. Technically, biologically she had the first girl, too. Kath was still with the sleaze…. Anyway, she wanted to name him for Dad. Mom went ballistic. She was insistent that I should get to have a son with my name, and therefore Dad's. I'd just married Addison. We said we were waiting, but since they'd all had kids by the time they were fellows, everyone ignored us.

"So, that was going on. And on Dad's birthday, there was another blow-up that pitted Amy and me against them. They resent that we were there that day They know it was awful, but they don't know. In the thick of it, I said I'd never name a kid for Dad, just to spite them. Then, Amy said 'you know what would really piss them off?'and at the time, her idea seemed hilarious. If the name was mine, I could give it to her. Even once the spat was over, it made sense to me. She was there that day; she got the least time with Dad…. We were being vindictive, but I'm not going to renege on it, even if she doesn't have kids.

"Yeesh. I didn't know name politics were a thing."

"Everything's a thing in big families."

"Mmm." Meredith yawned, and he sat them up.

"Speaking of helping."

"Blegh. I can do it. I'm flexible. S'just annoying," she groused, swinging her legs onto the bed.

"I know that very well."

She smirked. He unzipped her boots, and then rolled her pants leg up.

"I'm not sure I did," she said. "The not physical way."

The cut on her calf was almost closed. He'd replaced the stitches with steri-strips two days ago, and once they fell off, it'd be all right. He hoped that once the baby made it impossible for her to reach it for a while, she'd finally be able to let the wound from the crash heal.

"Came here believing I could… should be…all career-oriented like Mom, but…. if that's who I was, I wouldn't have let George and Izzie move in after a day of needling, or gotten close to Cristina faster than…pretty much anyone. I wouldn't have seen a future with you. I wouldn't be going back to neuro, or…or having a baby."

He paused, poised with the lotion that they were using to prevent scarring held over his finger. It was a brand Mark had sworn by, and a while ago he'd noticed that her go-to stitch was Mark's preference, too.

"Huh. Yeah. I see that," he said. She smiled, and he returned the lotion to the bedside table to put a hand on her cheek. "I see you, Meredith Grey. Every beautiful, shining cell of you. And I love you."

Her eyes glimmered at him, and the next thing he knew, she'd climbed onto his lap, facing him. The swell of the baby landed her almost at his knees. He put his hands at her waist, letting his fingers dip under her pants to find bare skin below the belly band. If the obstacle bothered her, she gave no sign of it. She was pulling his shirt off before he realized she was unbuttoning it. A glanced at the bedside table showed she'd worked his cufflinks off, too.

He took her hand and slid his palm along it. "I hope he gets your fingers."

"So he can be the Shepherd heir?" she asked, raking her nails over his chest. The chill he felt came with the stomach dropping sensation of avoiding a fall.

"So he can do anything he wants to do. Dexterity makes a lot of things easier."

"Excellent answer. You get a prize." There was a purr in her voice. It wasn't her la mincina purr; the one that once had them brainstorming—namestorming—words for baby cats that wasn't reminiscent her of her mother recapping her sexcapades with Richard, or "pussy," which she hated.

He kissed the base of her throat where the low sound had come from. Raising his head, his eyes fixated on her lips. He could still them shape the word cunt for the first time, as if he'd asked her which word she preferred yesterday.

In the breath before she'd answered, she'd tried to make her gasp into a simpler inhalation, but he'd heard the catch. He'd felt the muscles in her side tense under one hand, and the resulting wetness gathering on the fingers of the other. Bossy. Doesn't ask for what she (thinks she) can't take for herself. Likes...wants…needs… someone to ask her what she likes/wants/needs. Does she like being told?

She didn't. She like being taught.

He returned to the moment in time to catch her under her arms as she slid down his legs. "What are you doing?"

"C'mon, babe," she said. "It hasn't been that long." Babe. She didn't let pet-names slip into her speech often. More with the kids, and, lately, Lexie. When she did, he caught a glimpse of a younger Meredith, one who had to learn the patterns of the terms of endearment other girls threw around. It was entirely possible that she'd disdained them from Go. That she'd forgotten why waitresses and teachers calling her honey made her eyes burn and her fists clench. That Ellis had an adage about their silliness, when really she couldn't ignore her own pain to let her daughter know she was loved. (He'd yelled at Ellis Grey to avoid his own role in dragging Meredith down. That didn't mean he regretted it.)

He didn't think so, though. Not when the words crossed those cautious lips. Her eyes didn't go unfocused for the second it took her to pull up a word she wasn't used to—especially one that made her vulnerable. He could easily imagine the snags of adolescent friendship and overuse by guys who didn't know her name causing a thrombosis.

"You're exhausted, Mer."

"You're not." She unfastened his belt, but instead of pulling it out, she squeezed his crotch, her head tilted, like it was a casual gesture. "Not quite. I'm rallying."

"Mer…." He couldn't keep his teeth clenched. He'd appreciated having her on his lap; he always did, to a point where her devious streak led to him carrying his coat or bag in front of him like he'd never left tenth grade. Yet, here in there bedroom, his cock had decided to wait for her signal to really get with the program."Sweet Jesus." He reached behind him, grabbing a pillow and dropping it beside her. "Here, at least be comfortable"

Meredith laughed, resting her forehead against his chest. When her giggles escalated, he eased her the rest of the way down to see her face. "Tell me the joke."

"Wh-What if he can hear?" she spluttered.

Last night, he'd wanted to snatch the pamphlet about fetal development from her and burn it. He was doing the research, right? But that wasn't really about the birth. She was planning, in her way, for a real baby. One who was developing ears. (And if not, they'd figure it out.)

It wasn't a fair thing to do while insisting that she needed to be resting, but he pulled her up again. In that moment, she was too perfect for him not to kiss, and she needed to know it.

"Then, he's hearing me tell his momma that she is beyond extraordinary. And he'll have something in common with his grams."

"Derek!" She giggled this time, a higher-pitched peal with a hint of bashfulness that only made it more adorable. "You're horrible."

"I'm horrible? I was just sitting here, minding my o-own business—" He swallowed, trying to track the thought that'd gone on ahead of him on the trail when she'd rubbed her knuckles against his pants while pulling the zipper down tooth by tooth. The memory of what he'd been able to hear under the sound of the shower that day didn't help. "He'll be fine. Oblivious aural voyeurism is completely benign."

"You saying that shouldn't be hot." She tugged away from him, but kept one elbow propped on his knee as she knelt. Her mouth scowled, but the annoyance wasn't even strong enough to affect the rest of her face.

Snickering at her got his belt pulled out, which wasn't a deterrent.… "Do you know what I think?"

"That you wanna take your pants off for me?"

God, yes. "That your sense of self is strong, but you were taught to strive to be who you were told to be—and that's incredibly confusing. When you got in to Geisel, you were done figuring out who you weren't; you were close to accepting that you wanted to be a surgeon—but not to be your mother. You'd got stronger. You were entirely yourself with us, even with her in your head telling you to zero in, to ignore distractions. Never considering the her connection with Richard, as competition and support, helped her get where she was."

"Oh."

"I never gave you clear cut instructions on who I wanted you to be."

She bit her lip, and he wondered how he'd never seen it before. That habit had other triggers, but this…she reacted to the memory of emotional pain by giving herself the other type.

"Ellis woke up, and had all new opinions. What I wanted, what Ellis demanded, what you needed, the overlap and the gaps were all too much. What happened with your intern exam….

"I don't blame you for pulling away. You almost lost the one thing you were sure about. But you got yourself to a place where you knew that wanting something different was okay. Where you could trust your instincts. None of us can totally escape from how we were shaped. Sometimes you need reminding. I promised to do that, didn't I?"

"When I have Alzheimer's," she said, earnestly, like he was the one who needed a refresher. It was too damned cute for him to counter with if. He did wish she could extend that certainty a little.

"Whenever you need it."

For most of her life she'd thought doing one of the bravest things a five-year-old could do had made her mother resent her. It was no wonder that when she dove in without looking, it was because she believed she could help someone. The consequences didn't matter when you'd lived with worse. Trying to rein her in had been futile. He needed to ensure she'd be right. To explain why the limit was there, not just assume she'd accept it. And to trust when she passed it.

It was ironic that the women raised by a surgeon couldn't adhere to a hierarchical system. But then, he'd never heard anyone cited as Ellis's protégé, or even her student. There were attendings no one laid claim to; they weren't usually Harper Avery recipients.

"Please give me credit for not ruining that with a dirty joke," she said, totally oblivious to him contemplating how not to blast their marriage apart in the process of keeping that promise. "Pants off. Or down. I can work with this, but it's more of a challenge if you're not comfortable."

Halfway to rising, he smirked at her. "You love a challenge."

"Your son loves kicking me, but he's gonna stop eventually, and I could pass out with your dick in my mouth."

"Could not."

"Um. Could. Actually." She ducked her head, but he could see the pink creeping along the shell of her ear. He followed her direction, and she made a point of folding his trousers before draping them over the back of a chair. "Mer?"

"Hmm?" She looked up, her bottom lip hooked soundly under her front tooth. The smallest hint of the flinch. Why? It'd been gone for so long. They talked about her past all the time. He'd heard about clubs, an event she insisted was an "accidental" orgy. Passing out during a blowjob was practically ordinary. A little awkward. Embarrassing, unless you were—

"Meredith Grey. You're embarrassed by that?"

The murderous look returned. He took a second to acknowledge that he might've just jerked the wheel on where the night was going. But instead of dragging herself up to get huffy, which he could've definitely worked back around to something more mutual, she swiped the lotion from the bedside table, squirted it on her hand, and all but slapped it against his dick.

"JEE-sus, Mer. Oh. Okay. Okay, that's…. Baby, that stuff—you might not wanna—"

"Yeah, I'll dig out a condom before I jam you down my throat."

He felt a jolt at that, and her smirk blossomed into a devious smile. "Like that idea?"

He'd never been with anyone who talked like her. Addison was assertive, and very descriptive. There were no jagged edges. That had been refreshing, after years of euphemisms that ended in laughter. He'd been raised by a nurse, in a loud, brash household. He'd been called every word for male genitalia.

None of it matched Meredith. Not exactly.

"I like everything you do."

"To your dick, anyway."

He reached down, and threaded his fingers into her hair, pulling hard enough to make her look up. Her exaltation was heavy, and instead of making proclamations he reached down farther and unhooked her bra to take it off along with her shirt. The moment she had to pull away from him was well worth it. Her breasts were uncovered all at once, and he couldn't resist stroking along the side closest to him. Her nipple and areola had darkened, making them stand out all the more against skin that hasn't seen sun in months. It took her a moment to bat him away, more than long enough to roll her nipple and feel how firm it was.

"Enough," she said. "I'm not gonna be able to be down here forever."

She put her slippery, silky hands to work, and before long his primary thoughts were again about her fingers, and what they could do on his balls. He had no issues with how she'd learned what she'd known five years ago. It'd all been adapted since, and she played him like he was an instrument she'd studied for decades, for passion's sake, not coercion or to please someone else. Except, of course, pleasing someone else was integral here. (He'd return to that thought, once she was asleep. Had she ever done that—taken something on purely out of passion? Drumming in high school, but she'd stopped after a few years. She'd dived into preparing for Zola's homecoming, but that wasn't for her own sake.)

"I was nineteen," she said, pinching the condom wrapper with both hands and slowly pulling it open. "Way too old to end up that sloppy, or so I thought. But I'd gone straight from my last final to a guy's house. Probably hadn't slept in two days. I went from totally awake to gagging myself conscious. I narrowly avoided puking on him, but he wasn't so caught up on that nuance. Took a while to live down."

Mother Mary. Of course O'Malley wasn't the first idiot who'd spread something that should've stayed between them.

"He should've…the nuance…. That's a…regrettable experience."

Meredith met his eyes as she placed the tip of the condom and rolled it down. "Yeah?" She injected so much into that single syllable.

"Kimberly Dawson, sophomore year of college. I coulda handled it better—I do think I was…less explosive than…than the other guys on the team woulda been…but, uh…in the first moments…."

"I can imagine." She ran her tongue along the posterior side of his cock. "You didn't blow up at her for emasculating you?"

"I didn't," he confirmed.

She grinned. He'd just noticed how sharp its corners of her mouth were when she started working the cock-ring on over the condom. He hadn't seen her get it out of the drawer. He'd been too busy listening to her mutter to herself about the flavored sample condoms they'd collected.

"Our kids are gonna pull things on you, and I'm just gonna watch the show,"

"Are our kids going to be smarter than you? Because even you can't always get one over on me," she bragged. "What…did happen? With the girl?"

He could still see Kimberly's face crumbling before she dissolved in tears, and the hot defense player on the women's team had become a full person. He'd comforted her as well as he could, gotten her into the shower, and cleaned himself up before she reappeared dressed in the pajama pants Kath had left when she visited, and chewing the Flinstone's vitamins he'd given her for the taste. She'd commented on him knowing what to do, and suddenly he was talking about Amy.

How she'd call while he was in class, and make whoever answered the phone copy down a poem where the first letter of each line spelled out FART. How she wore his jersey on game days, no matter where she was. How he'd arranged his classes to be able to talk during the time between her after-school activities and the end of Mom's shift. By the time he'd run out of things to say, they'd been sitting knee to knee on the bed, and Kim's eyes were clear. She'd said, "You're deeper than I thought you were, Derry," and for several panicked heartbeats they'd stared at each other in horror. Then, they'd burst out laughing, and the next thing he knew he had the taste of fake grape on his tongue.

"She was…on the women's team…D-line. We dated…for the rest of the year."

Meredith hummed curiously around the head of his cock.

"Fuck, I…I'll…I'll tell you the whole thing later." He put his hand back in her hair. "Mer, if he can hear, he'll know…he'll know we're all…beholden to our bodies… and the guy who made fun of you for hitting a limit is…is a jackass. It's sex ' n' mockery, not sex 'n' meanness. 'Cause you…you're not mean."

She rolled her eyes, He wasn't sure if she'd forgotten he could feel her smile or not. He could feel, see, hear so much of her. Could see her eyes close as he ran his fingers over her scalp, and hear the hitches in the rhythm of her steady breaths, and feel the shifts she always tried to make subtlety. Usually, he teased her about it. Not tonight.

"Do you know…how…how hot it is to have you getting turned on down there?" He anticipated her upping the ante in response, and tightened his grip on her hair, keeping her from taking him in further. This wasn't how this game typically went, but she'd given him the advantage.

Her eyes had gone almost fully dark. He raised a leg carefully until the top of his sock touched the seam of her pants. She made a noise that wasn't intelligible, but definitely wasn't negative. When he started moving it, her sigh made him gasp.

"This is a two-player activity," he reminded her, and then he loosened his hold on her hair, letting it slip through his fingers.

She raised up on her knees to move her mouth further down on his cock, and when he moved his leg to compensate, she moaned.

"God, yes. Let me hear you, Mer."

She could always take his ideas and make them into something beyond what he'd pictured. It took only a minute for her sense of rhythm to kick in, and the movement of her neck flowed along her spine to her hips. That she needed more reached him in hints. She leaned forward, angling her pelvis against him, until his calf was against her crotch. She swallowed more as her mouth went dry. Her moans changed, tuned with the higher pitch of frustration. They'd become almost whimpers when he tugged her hair again. Her body shuddered at the added tension.

"You wanna take your pants down for me?" he asked.

That tiny the sound was absolutely a whimper.

"Gonna be able to touch yourself from there?"

"Mmhmm."

"Good girl. Sit up. There's a water bottle under the table."

"Too dry?"

"I don't think you are."

She smirked at him, turning to the side while she downed the half full water bottle to give him the best view of her neck while she swallowed.

"You've got 'til he kicks me in the bladder, now," she said, undoing the button on her pants. She took them down to her knees. He seriously considered drawing her up onto the bed from there, but determined he'd let her plan play out. She replaced her mouth before working her hand between her legs, and he felt it through her cry, like he felt her cunt contract when he was inside her.

Her devious streak was something he should've appreciated so much more. He'd have been long spent without her trickery, and if she'd grabbed the ring they used the most, he'd have insisted on bringing her up here, claiming that keeping the bullet vibrator right under her nose would be a crime. He'd never be tired of how that thing undid her; how wild she'd get, until her energy was sapped. She'd land sprawled on top of him, and suddenly push up on his chest, howling as she reached a final peak.

She would've arranged for that if she'd wanted it. How she treated her own desires was one of the things that made his wife seem like a contradiction. Those had frustrated him in that period when he'd felt like he'd wasted months, if not years, with Addison, and deluded himself that everything Meredith had gone through could be washed away. If he'd been patient with her—If he'd watched more than he listened, or even listened instead of teasing her when she'd explicitly told him what she needed.

He could remember the first time she'd put her hand in her pants while sucking him off during that period. He'd already loved how unabashedly she did that. She took him over while her fingers disappeared into her cunt; it'd been fantastic. That time, she'd apologized, saying she didn't want him to think she wasn't focused on him. He'd laughed, saying there wasn't any doubt. He hadn't realized she'd been trying to explain that she wasn't in it only for her own benefit, like she'd been with other people. That it was a big deal.

She wasn't progressing as fast as she had that night. Not overly frustrated, but past the point where just playing with her would be enough. The small hums of pleasure she was emitting signaled that was the stimulation level she had going. Even she couldn't isolate her movements enough for her rhythm to be unaffected once she was really feeling it, and hers was perfect. She shifted, opening her knees, and he confirmed the problem.

"A-Ah-Angle issues, angel?"

She zigzagged the tip of her tongue on his cock, and it really could've been his imagination, because focusing on anything other than the pull coming…coming from his cock, but it seemed to have more than an objection to being called angel behind it.

"Th-This…This way?" he asked, holding a flat hand out at about the angle her hand would be going from. She hummed agreement."Try…Try another…another approach." This time she definitely meant she was sticking her tongue out at him. "Not what I me—Mer, yeah, like that, baby…I…ah…I didn't mean…. A d-different me— M-Me—agh, God, I-I-I…." He gave up, gave in—he'd wanted to—wanted to feel her come—would get to…help her—to make her—help her have her—

Her other hand cupped his balls, pulling them away from his body, and she leaned forward, taking him deeper, her lips still sucking, still pulling-pulling-pulling—His eyes squeezed shut; everything in his body squeezed-tensed—

Release left him slumped back on the bed, his senses returning one by one. His panting breath. The fan circling. Meredith's lips sliding off him; her fingers removing the ring and tugging the end of the condom.

"Freeze."

"'Scuse you, boneless?"

"Where on your body are your pants, Meredith?"

"I won't fall. I'm just going to—"

"Nope!" He swung himself up, finding her crouched with one hand on the ottoman he was starting to regret purchasing. "How confident are you that you could actually get up from there?"

"I don't like your tone."

"Because you usually have an accurate awareness of your own abilities, but I'm considering reconsidering that."

"If you wanna know the truth, your current chattiness has me reconsidering my abilities."

"Aren't you the one who says I'm always chatty? You can be stubborn, insist on getting up yourself; maybe manage it, maybe fall on your ass. Option two, you let me help, I can tell you what I was trying to get across, in spite of your unmatchable skill at making me forget why words exist, and we'll get you there before your son headbutts you in the bladder." He meant the emphasis to remind her that he was safely head down, but Derek wasn't sure she heard that part.

"My…." Meredith's eyes widened, and she sat back on the floor. She didn't fall on her ass, so there was that. He grabbed her legs and took her pants off. Definitely would've tripped her. He got their clothes in the hamper, and tossed the condom before he held his hands out to her. She let him pull her up.

"Your son," he repeated, both charmed and baffled by her mystified expression. She'd all but replaced fetus with baby tonight, and he worried he'd pushed her too far.

"My son."

No. This wasn't a shutdown, or a storm. Those words were sunshine even before the accompanying smile rose.

He took her face in his hands and kissed her, thinking of her, for the first time, as the mother of, not their children, or their daughter, but their son, his son, her son.

"You never imagined this, did you?" he asked, guiding her to the bed.

"No. We never got that far, and…and Zo just came to us, and…I guess I always…."

"You pictured yourself with a daughter, because that's what your mom had." He ran the back of one hand over her belly, and she shivered. "We made a boy, Mer. That means you're going to have a son."

"Unless he tells us otherwise. It's not even…. I just…Zola's getting a brother." Her smile brightened, and she pressed her lips to his, giving it to him. Then with her arms wrapped around his neck, she got onto her knees again. "Tell me."

"Give me your hand. You're a kinetic learner."

She threw her head back, giggling, and his lips were magnetized to her neck. "Oh," she gasped. "Mmm. Derek…. Derek, you're gonna…. I can't wear a turtleneck into the O.R. "

"You've been hiding marks left by overwhelmingly negative emotions. Why not let the overwhelming positive ones show?"

"I'm gonna regret this."

"No, you won't." He moved around behind her, and took her hand, guiding it around the swell of her belly—made by their son, and everything her body was providing to keep him safe and alive for two and a half more months—"I meant try a different method. You're used to this." He arranged his palm over the tuft of her pubic hair and brought two fingers down to compress and circle her clit.

He returned to his work on her pulse point, and she moaned at the addition of suction. "Good, huh? Nice and easy." When he retracted that hand, she whined, turning her head into his shoulder. "Down there, you tried this." Using the hand he was holding, he rubbed two of her fingers over her glans diagonally.

"Aghh." She bucked in his arms. "You're better."

He chuckled, and kissed the pout she turned up to him. Sleepy and frustrated was adorable on her. "I've got a little bit of a head start." Rearranging her fingers slightly, he pressed them down on her puffy labia and rubbed there.

"Ooh! Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is good. Really…ahhh…no-no-no, Derek!"

He closed the fingers he'd laced through hers, keeping his hold, and very decidedly not laughing at how much it reminded him of trying to keep Zola from grabbing two cookies in each hand.

"Not a different method," he reminded her.

"S'a good one," she complained, still jerking her hips, her free hand toying with her tit.

"But it wasn't working for you on your own. Maybe start with your thumb here?" He stroked his over the top of her glans, where her hood would be if she was starting alone while he was on call. She moaned again, rocking back on her heels, and he dragged their fingers through the wetness that had gathered at the opening of her cunt. Sweat was beading out on her forehead. Good. She'd remember that.

"You can try a lot of things if you know you have a fallback. And you do. I don't pull this out of my bag of tricks much, because it works so quickly, but I'm gonna have to do it more often if it slipped your mind, drummer girl." He'd kept stroking her as he spoke, so it didn't shock him that it took a moment for her to turn to him, confusion in her eyes, if not quite making it to the muscles on her face.

He put his hand on her mons again, letting his middle finger rest just to the side of her glans. Her breath was heavy with anticipation, and he let her wait a little, stroking her labia with his index fingertip. Then he tapped the middle finger against her clit in a simple one-two rhythm, effectively becoming a phlebotomist encouraging her blood to the spot. Two repetitions got her crying out, her hips bucking with the rhythm. A few more, and she was twisting, writhing against him, her fingers clawing at his chest.

"There you go," he said into her ear, wrapping his other arm around her. "Your turn."

Again her even rhythm surprised him—It shouldn't. He'd seen her play; she became as frantic than he'd ever made her. Seeing such a different side of her, he'd understood how she could say his life in New York could seem so unreal—It only got jagged when she got close enough for her clit to retract. Her breath quickened, and her instinct took over, telling her she needed to rub, hard and fast. The forty-five degree difference didn't feel right, denying her the instant gratification that had brought since she was fourteen. She shrieked in frustration, and he caught the sheen over her eyes.

"Shh. We've got this. Keep tapping through. It'll work. I've done it for you, remember? " That was the problem here. He'd done it; she hadn't. He considered it his job to make sure she got what she needed. In the past, if she was with someone who wasn't attending to her needs, she did what she knew worked, without making it obvious. On her own, it was that or a vibrator; how she got off wasn't the point.

"I can't. I'mma surgeon," she mumbled, her head back on his shoulder. "And my hand is rebelling."

He knew the feeling. That she didn't realize that was maybe the best sign of the night. "You want proof of concept?"

"I remember. See, do…don't plan on teaching."

"Experiencing and learning are different. C'mon." He switched his hand out for hers. He used one finger to find the right position, and she curled against him. "Mer? You need a break?"

"Nooo!" Again he thought of Zola, protesting bedtime.

"It's not too much?" He eased off, stroking her labia. The times she'd gotten overstimulated didn't have much in common, but her level of frustration, in all senses, seemed to play into it. Giving her a minute would be best, and she was not going to see it that way.

"Uh-uh. It's good."

"You're gonna tell me if it's not good?"

"Yes, just, go, okay?"

"I will. I promise, in just a second, we'll go until you say stop."

"I'm saying go," she protested, but a moment and a little bit of pressure took the irritation from her face.

This time he started slower, and still it took almost no time to get her to the edge. Even he was tempted to just rub it out for her. If she'd asked one more time, he would've, but the only words she was forming were yes, now, and more with moderate variations. When she started straining and rocking, he arranged two fingers over her clit tapping them together. Relief flashed over her face before it contorted back into desperation.

"Aw, yes! This's it, oh-yeah, oh-yeah gonna come, gonna—ah, ah, agh, fuck, Derek, 'm there, faster, faster. There, there, there, coming, so good, so, soooo—don't stop, not yet, not yet, still—never gonna stop—so strong—fuck, fuck, f-UNGH."

She collapsed against him. He kept tapping lightly until she batted at his hand. Mincina Meredith. He kissed her sated smile, and took her wrist, returning to his original task and putting lotion over that cut. When he moved back to her leg, he remembered examining the sutures. They'd been made with small bites, almost uniformly even. Another contradiction. She got worked up to the point of not being able to release any emotion, but the frenzy ended as soon as she gave into picking up a blade. It didn't seem fair that she could achieve that with pain that made her go numb, not the pleasure that led to her languidly indicating she wanted help rolling onto her side and putting her head in his lap.

He combed his fingers through the sweaty hair that'd fallen over her face. "The way you worry about becoming Ellis…. You go numb sometimes. Sometimes you want to. But it never lasts. And I'd much rather have a Meredith who has strong feelings."

"Even when I get all worked up and paranoid?"

"Especially then." He didn't know how to tell her how much harder it was to see misery locked in her eyes than to listen to the swerves her racing thoughts were taking.

She nodded, and she put a hand on her belly. "Little Boy Blue, huh?"

"Sheep's in the meadow. Cow's in the corn."

"Zola's such a busy bee, maybe he will be a little slacker. You'll have to take point on that. I'd be a hypocrite."

"You didn't slack off, you hid excellent time-management skills."

"Potato, tomato. He'll be a Shepherd. No hyphens."

"No hyphens."

"Do you wish I'd changed my name?"

"No. Are you still happy with not giving the kids Grey-Shepherd? If you're concerned about shadows, Shepherd casts a long one."

"That they might not be under. This one's gonna play handball."

"Not soccer?"

"That'd be predictable. Were you and Addison gonna have Montgomery-Shepherds?"

"Uh…I'm sure we discussed it, but…I don't remember. I didn't want her to hyphenate, only because I'd seen how it went for my sisters. No matter what the birth certificates said, the kids rarely ended up using 'Shepherd.' Their husbands never took it on, and the girls were always bit—complaining about not being addressed correctly. I wanted the cohesion. To be The Shepherds, like we were growing up.

"She hadn't published yet, unlike the other resident I married—" Meredith smacked the back of her hand against his side. "—but she had her diplomas, and her license, and 'Montgomery' meant something to a certain echelon. Still, if she'd asked me that…I'd have said yes.

"Now…. Cohesion, family is so much more than a last name. Zola's names give her parts of both of us regardless. Your name, being Dr. Grey, it's important to you. If you ever wanted to do it, even non-professionally like celebrities do, I'd be honored, but it'd be a paradigm shift to see you as anyone other than Meredith Grey. Besides, you're already a shepherd. You have a whole flock of doctors."

She scrunched her nose up at him. "A dose. A group of doctors is a dose. There're other words for specialties. There was a British Medical Journal article…. Remember how I read a lot of journals whenever I had to stay at Mom's?"

"I do," he said. She spiraled her hand in the air. There you go. He shook his head. "A dose of what, is the question."

Meredith laughed again. He thought of his mother, concerned about godparents and names. All he really hoped they'd passed to their son was her smile, her laugh, her resilience. Her brilliance, in all senses. The rest didn't matter. Their crappy babies would all be perfect.

And they were definitely having a shower.