Ghosts That We Knew [6.1 of 6.2]
Title: Ghosts That We Knew
Author: greymcdreamysgh
Pairing: MerDer
Rating: PG-13
Summary: MERDER. Picks up after 9x11. A short multi-chapter fic that deals with being a family, preparing for a new baby, recovering from the plane crash, and dealing with survivors' guilt.
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
I will hold on with all of my might
Just promise me we'll be alright
The ghosts that we knew made us black and all blue
But we'll live a long life
One Saturday, when Caroline is three weeks old, Derek gets called into the hospital at five in the morning for an emergency follow-up surgery on his patient from the previous day. Meredith is already awake, feeding Caroline in bed, when he gets the page. Two minutes into the ensuing phone call, it is clear that he can’t just talk someone else through what the next steps should be from the comfort of their home. They actually need him. He won’t know how bad it'll is until he gets in, so he cannot promise when he will be home.
“You could always call somebody if you need a hand,” he says as he quickly dresses. “Callie and Arizona offered to take Zola anytime.”
Meredith shakes her head, and grimaces as she adjusts Caroline in her arms. Three weeks of near constant nursing is taking its toll on her body. Even though she is exhausted-they both are-she doesn’t want to outsource one kid as soon as the parent-child ratio is no longer in her favor. While she is sure that Zola would love to play with Sofia, she also does not want Zola to feel like she is not supposed to be home with them.
“We have to figure out handling both of them at once by ourselves at some point,” she says. “I’m sure we’ll be ok. Go save somebody’s life.”
“Ok,” he nods. He leans down and kisses her, and then kisses Caroline’s head. “Bye, Bee. Tell Zo I’ll see her later.”
“I will,” she says. She lifts Caroline’s tiny fist and waves. “Bye, Daddy.”
As soon as Derek leaves, Meredith realizes that she is very likely up for the day, but when Caroline finishes eating and Zola still isn’t awake, she gets back in bed and closes her eyes anyway. Sure enough, about a half hour after Caroline falls asleep in her bassinette, Zola lets herself into Meredith and Derek’s bedroom.
“Hi, Mama,” she says sleepily. Meredith opens one eye and watches Zola crawl into bed with her, bringing her favorite giraffe and two other stuffed animals with her.
Meredith wraps her arms around Zola, and she lies down with her. Maybe she can get Zola to snooze for a few more minutes, or at least play quietly in bed while she takes a light nap.
She groans a little at the pressure of Zola’s hand on her hip as Zola uses her for leverage and peeks over at Derek’s side of the bed. “Where’s Daddy?” she asks.
“He’s at the hospital,” Meredith says.
“Me too?”
Derek went back to work two weeks ago, and when he did, they decided to keep bringing Zola to daycare so as to disrupt her routine as little as possible and to allow Meredith to recover and devote all of her time to Caroline.
“Not today,” Meredith says. She opens her eyes-both of them-now, knowing that Zola is not going to go back to sleep. “It’s the weekend. So can you help me take care of Caroline today?”
Zola nods, and glances eagerly at Caroline’s bassinette in the corner of the room. “Right now?”
“Well, she’s sleeping right now, but later. Do you want some breakfast?”
They take the baby monitor downstairs and Meredith fixes Zola a small bowl of cereal, but Zola barely gets through her breakfast before Caroline’s cries crackle over the monitor.
“I can have more?” Zola asks as she finishes the last bite of her Cheerios and Meredith is already halfway up the steps.
“As soon as I come back down,” Meredith assures her.
Upstairs, Caroline has squirmed her way halfway out of her swaddle, and continues to fuss even when Meredith unwraps and cuddles her.
“Oh, Caroline, you stink,” Meredith says as she holds her up and sniffs. “No wonder you’re upset. Let’s get you changed.”
She covers the bed with a blanket, and undresses Caroline so she can take off her dirty diaper. As soon as the air hits Caroline’s bare legs and bottom, she starts to wail.
“You know,” Meredith says, pulling a few wipes out of the container so she can clean the poop off her, “For a little baby, you can make a pretty big mess.”
Even though Meredith goes as quickly as she can, Caroline still seems to think that she is taking too long. She screams as Meredith wipes her down, straps a new diaper on her, and snaps the legs of her onesie closed. She takes a second to try to settle Caroline down, and while the baby is happier now that she’s warm, she is still cranky. Meredith is tempted to let her nurse right now, even if only to soothe her, but then she remembers that Zola is downstairs and she actually is hungry.
“Let’s go see your sister,” Meredith coos at Caroline. “Want to go see Zo?” Caroline grunts and roots around for Meredith’s nipple, knowing that it’s close and that she can’t get to it. “I know. In a minute, Bee.”
Downstairs, Meredith sees Zola’s guilty face first, and the Cheerios all over the kitchen counter and the floor second.
Meredith stops in her tracks and sighs. “Did you try to pour yourself?”
“Sorry, Mama,” Zola says.
Caroline starts to cry again, wanting to be comforted, and Meredith resigns herself to leaving the mess on the floor for the foreseeable future. She walks into the kitchen, trying to avoid crushing the cereal on the floor, but can’t get close enough to the counter without stepping in at least some of it.
“You got some in your bowl though, right?” Meredith asks, peering over the counter to take a look. The bowl is, in fact, overflowing and Meredith wonders if Zola has emptied the entire box by accident.
There’s no other way than to step on the spilled Cheerios to get to Zola. Shifting a now screaming Caroline to one arm, she uses her free hand to scoop the extra cereal out of Zola’s bowl.
“You need more milk,” she sighs, and goes to the fridge to refill Zola’s bowl. If she can just Zola situated, then she can nurse Caroline, and then later she can figure out how to get the kitchen back in order.
“Sorry, Mama,” Zola says again. Her eyes fill with tears as Meredith pours the milk.
“Hey, it’s ok,” Meredith says, squeezing Zola’s shoulder with her free hand, and mustering up her energy to give Zola a reassuring smile. She has to remind herself that Zola is still just a little girl herself, and that she does not mean to do this. “Accidents happen. Eat your breakfast, ok?”
She sits down on the couch with Caroline, and tries to get her to nurse. Caroline takes the breast at first, but screams and hiccups so that milk dribbles out of her mouth. On her next attempt, Caroline gets a bad latch and it hurts so badly that Meredith has to stick her pinky in Caroline’s mouth to break it and try again. It takes a few minutes to get her to settle down enough to eat correctly, but once she finally does, the situation feels just a little bit easier to deal with.
“There you go,” Meredith murmurs, settling back onto the couch. “Oh, you just wanted your mama, didn’t you?”
Everything Meredith has read has told her that the constant nursing will let up after the first month. She hopes so, because if she does not focus entirely on getting Caroline to latch the right way, then the pain of trying to feed her is terrible, and she’s not sure what else to do.
She knows to count on sitting here for the next forty minutes or so, and therefore the mess in the kitchen will have to wait. She can hear her cell phone ringing upstairs, but she knows there’s no way she can get to it right now. When the house phone rings, Zola reaches over the kitchen counter and answers it. When did she learn to do that? Meredith wonders.
“Hi,” Zola says into the phone. The caller must be someone she knows, because she brightens and says “hi” again. “Yeah. My mama,” she says, and slides off her chair to bring the phone to Meredith.
“Who is it?” Meredith asks, adjusting Caroline so that she can take the phone with one hand.
“Shane,” Zola replies, and goes back to her cereal.
Ross lets her know that Derek will likely be in surgery until after lunch. He says that he has been told to ask if she needs anything.
“Are you offering to come watch my kids, Ross?” Meredith snaps. Granted, there had been a few rough patches, but so far they are doing fine and she can’t help but be a little annoyed-however irrationally-with Derek for checking up on her.
“Uh,” Ross stammers. “I was just…. Do you want me to, Dr. Grey?”
“I don’t. Tell Dr. Shepherd that everything’s fine, and we’ll see him when he’s finished.”
She hangs up and leaves the cordless on the couch next to her. “We’re doing good, right, Zo?”
Zola nods with a mouthful of cereal. “Caroline’s hungry too, Mama?” she asks, watching them from the kitchen counter.
“She is, Lovebug,” Meredith replies, realizing that she hasn’t eaten herself yet. “How’s the cereal?”
“Yum,” Zola says as she takes another bite.
“Good. Smaller bites, ok?” Meredith says. The last thing she needs right now is for Zola to choke or puke.
When Zola finishes, she slides off her seat at the counter and carries her plastic bowl and spoon to the sink. Meredith cringes, and prays that she won’t spill the leftover milk. Zola stands on her tip toes and pushes the bowl into the sink without a problem, crunching spilled Cheerios underneath her.
“Thank you for putting your bowl away, Zo. You’re my big girl,” she says when Zola joins her on the couch.
Zola takes Caroline’s tiny foot in her hand and just holds it while Meredith continues to feed her. “What should we do today, Caroline?”
“How about a walk later?” Meredith offers.
“Caroline wants to do that too?” Zola asks.
Meredith smiles. “I think she would be ok with it.”
“Can you read, Mama?” Zola asks, reaching under the coffee table for one of her books. Meredith figures out how to feed her and read to Zola at the same time. She still needs both hands to hold Caroline, but if Zola holds the book, Meredith can still read the words to her.
After three books, Caroline pulls off the breast, finally content. Meredith adjusts her shirt and then sits Caroline up and pats her back gently to coax a burp out of her.
“Good job!” Zola says when Caroline finally burps.
Meredith laughs. “Want to hold her while I clean up a little?”
Zola nods excitedly and forms her arms into a perfect cradle, a stance that she has perfected over the past three weeks.
“Sit back a little,” Meredith says. “Put your back against the couch.”
Once Zola does, she settles Caroline into her arms for her. “See, Caroline? Your big sister wants to hold you.” She turns to Zola and reminds her, “I’ll be right in the kitchen. If you have to go the bathroom, or you don’t want to hold her anymore, just tell me and I’ll come get her, ok?”
But Zola sits with Caroline for as long as it takes for Meredith to clean the Cheerios off the kitchen floor and load the dishwasher. Zola chats away to Caroline while Meredith works, pretending that Caroline responds to every question and can keep up her end of the conversation just as well as Zola can.
“How’s she doing?” Meredith asks Zola once she’s finished cleaning up.
“Good. We are going to the zoo,” she announces.
“Oh, you are?” Meredith asks. “Ok. When are you going?”
“Right now.”
“Oh,” Meredith says. “Ok, well little girls should get dressed before they go to the zoo. Can we do that first?”
There isn’t really a problem with letting Zola wear her purple striped pajamas all day, especially because they’re not actually going to the zoo, but it would be nice to get her dressed while she has the chance.
“We’re not going to the zoo,” Zola says. “We work at the zoo. I’m in charge of it.”
“Oh, I see. Well should you get changed for work? Like how Daddy and I wear scrubs at work?”
“Oh!” Zola cries. “Yeah!”
“Ok, why don’t you go pick out what you want to wear to work, and bring it into Caroline’s room. We’ll get dressed and then I’ll take you to work.”
Meredith takes Caroline upstairs, where she changes her into a fresh long-sleeved onesie and puts a new pair of socks on her. Zola bounds into Caroline’s bedroom a few minutes later, holding a pair of mint green polka dot leggings, a pink t-shirt, and a white tutu skirt.
“I’m ready!”
“Did you get a fresh pair of underwear?” Meredith asks.
Zola drops her stuff on the floor and runs back down the hall, returning a moment later with a pair of panties in her hand.
“Ok, now you’re ready!” Meredith says. “Can you show me how you get dressed like a big girl?”
She doesn’t know how some other moms do it. It’s so much easier to have two kids when one can get almost all the way undressed, and then dressed again with minimal assistance. Zola needs only to lean on Meredith to step into her tutu, and to accept some help with putting her shirt on.
“Good job, Zo! Now let’s brush your teeth and you’ll be ready to go.”
Downstairs, a few minutes later, Meredith sits Caroline in her bouncy seat on the floor, and covers her legs with a receiving blanket. Zola brings down armload after armload of stuffed animals from her bedroom, dumping them in the center of the living room.
“Hey, Zo, before you start work, can I just do your hair?”
With Zola seated on the couch, Meredith gently combs her hair, and pulls it into two braided pigtails. As she works, Zola says, “I’m happy I’m home with you, Mama.”
Even though she hasn’t had a shower or gotten dressed herself yet, and even though it’s only mid-morning and this day already feels like a marathon-this builds her up.
With a handful of Zola’s hair in one hand, she kisses the top of her head. “I’m happy you are too, Lovebug.”
In the living room, Zola plays “with” Caroline by essentially just playing around her. She doesn’t even want Meredith to really play with her, but if Meredith looks like she’s not paying attention, Zola is quick to notice. She sets up all of her stuffed animals around the living room, and shows them to Caroline one by one. After showing Caroline her giraffe and her penguin, she squats down in front of Caroline’s bouncy seat with her lion.
“Oh, Caroline, this is a lion. It goes ‘ROAR!’ But don’t be scared; this one is nice.”
Caroline stares at her without reacting at all, but Zola is undeterred. She shows her a zebra and an elephant next. When she finally shows Caroline a dog, Meredith laughs and wonders why this is Zola’s only somewhat traditional stuffed animal. There isn’t a bear in sight.
“Oh no, Mama!” Zola suddenly cries.
“What is it?” Meredith asks.
“My giraffe is sick! Caroline says!”
Meredith smiles-what will it be like when Caroline has opinions of her own?-but quickly changes her expression when Zola looks at her disapprovingly. Amusement does not fit into the seriousness of the game.
“Oh no!” she says instead, “Should we take him to the vet?”
“No, I am the vet. I be right back.”
Zola dashes upstairs and returns with a scrub cap, a surgical mask, and a bag full of plastic physician instruments. She and Derek got her some scrub caps for Christmas, and, because Zola loves to play doctor so much, they occasionally sneak her a box of surgical masks from the supply closet since those aren’t as durable as her other medical equipment. Meredith makes a mental note not to tell Cristina that her youngest cardio protégé is currently thoroughly enjoying a stint in veterinary medicine.
“Can you tie?” Zola asks, holding out the mask in one hand and the cap in the other.
“Which one first?”
“Hat.”
Meredith ties Zola’s scrub cap on, making sure her pigtails are tucked neatly inside, then helps her tie the mask onto her face. Both are way too big for her, but they work well enough, and Zola doesn’t seem to mind.
Zola sets the giraffe on the coffee table, and then opens up her doctor’s kit. She sets the plastic reflex hammer on Caroline’s stomach.
“Is Caroline helping you in surgery today, Dr. Shepherd?” Meredith asks from her position on the couch.
“Yes, but she's a baby doctor,” Zola says.
“Ok, well let me know if you need me to help too,” Meredith says.
But Zola doesn’t need any help. After a surprisingly short surgery that involves a lot of listening to the giraffe’s heartbeat with her stethoscope and giving a lot of injections, Zola announces that the giraffe will survive.
“Oh, good,” Meredith sighs in relief. “How about a snack?”
“Yeah, I’m hungry,” Zola agrees.
“Well, saving lives is hard work.”
Zola resumes checking all of her other animals, rearranging them on the living room floor before the game evolves into a sort of school experience. Meredith hears something about circle time and criss-cross applesauce while she rummages in the fridge for some cheese for Zola.
She is cutting up strawberries when Caroline starts to fuss again.
“Caroline’s crying, Mama,” Zola calls from the living room.
“I know, I can hear her,” Meredith calls back. “I’ll be right there.”
By the time she gets to Caroline, however, Zola has calmed her down by herself. She has plucked Caroline’s pacifier from the coffee table, coaxed it into her mouth, and is now gently smoothing Caroline’s peach fuzz hair down on her head.
“Hi, Honeybee,” Meredith coos at the baby. Caroline stares up at her, contentedly sucking on her pacifier. “Did Zola take care of you?”
Zola looks up at Meredith and smiles proudly, but never leaves Caroline’s side. Meredith leans over and kisses the top of Zola’s head. “Good job, big sister.”
***
A few weeks later, Derek is about an hour away from leaving work when his pager beeps loudly against his hip. He finds a phone, and listens to Callie hurriedly explain that she is getting ready to scrub in on an emergency surgery-a compound femur fracture resulting from an MVC on I-90. He does not understand why she is paging him with this seemingly irrelevant information, so he asks if the patient needs a neuro consult too. She shakes him off.
“No, Sofia. Arizona is at a conference in San Francisco, and this surgery is going to take at least four hours. The girl who usually watches her on weeknights when we have to work late has a stomach virus, and daycare closes for the day at seven.”
“Oh,” Derek says. “Yeah, we can watch her.”
“Are you sure?” Callie says anxiously. “You guys just had a baby."
“Callie, it’s no problem. I’ll get Sofia in about an hour when I pick up Zola.”
Callie sighs. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. Ok, I have to go, but Edwards is on my service today. I’ll have her get Sofia’s car seat out of my car and get it to you.”
“Ok,” Derek replies. “We’ll feed her dinner and you can just pick her up whenever.”
When he goes up to daycare a little later that evening, and tells Zola and Sofia that they are both going to come home with him that day, Zola is absolutely thrilled. She has been itching to have Sofia come over, since she has spent so much time at Sofia’s house and Sofia hasn’t really come to them at all. But Sofia is not so sure.
“My mommy’s not coming?” she asks.
“She is,” Derek assures her. “But she just has a surgery to do first, so she asked if you could have dinner with Zola tonight and she would come get you at our house. Would that be ok?”
"I want my mommy," Sofia says helplessly.
"Sofia, you can come with my daddy," Zola says, tugging on her hand. She tries to comfort her but it comes out as more of a whine. Sofia starts to cry.
"Why is she crying?" Zola asks.
"She just wants her own mommy. Right, Sofia?"
"Uh huh," Sofia hiccups.
He wonders what he should do. If Sofia was his own kid, he would pick her up and comfort her without a second thought. But she’s not his kid, and maybe him trying to hold her will make her even more upset.
It’s strange that this has never happened before, that he and Meredith have never been asked to watch Sofia. But then he realizes that maybe they’ve never been asked because there used to be three of them, not two. Mark used to be here.
He remembers that awful day when they were sure they had lost Zola forever. Mark had offered to share Sofia with them. It kinda works, he had said. No one gets too exhausted. You’re not on every night. We can work you into the rotation.
But Sofia’s gulping sobs indicate to him very clearly that she does not want him and Meredith worked into the rotation.
“Sofia, we can play at my house,” Zola says. She seems a little indignant that Sofia is not excited, that she doesn’t want to come with them. “Why is she still crying?” she asks her father.
Derek sighs. There’s nothing else to do but pick up Sofia. They can’t very well stand in the middle of the daycare until Callie finishes her surgery, and he is pretty sure that Sofia won’t walk if he asks her to.
“It’s ok, Sofia,” he says, hoisting her up onto his hip and rubbing her back. “Your mommy is going to come get you in a little bit. But can you eat dinner with me and Zola while we’re waiting?”
Sofia takes a hiccupping breath and nods.
He hasn’t held Sofia since Mark’s funeral. He sees her almost every day because she’s Zola’s best friend, but it’s been over a year since he’s held her. That day, he and Callie passed her back and forth for hours, wanting desperately to hold on to a piece of Mark, but somehow, he hasn’t held her since then. She feels different now, bigger and more grown up. She’s a solid reminder of how much time has passed without Mark.
It’s not the same at all. Even though it feels kind of like deja vu as he carries her down the hall, with Zola holding his free hand, he keeps reminding himself that it’s not the same. Sofia doesn’t have absent parents, just parents who happen to be busy on this particular day.
Growing up, Derek loved having Mark practically live with them. With four very nosy, chatty sisters, he couldn’t see a downside to having Mark around all the time. But as he got older, he noticed that it was strange that Mark spent so little time at his own house. He remembers asking his mother once. She had just sighed and said, “It takes a village, Derek.”
When he thinks back, his own mother must have had a problem with the way Mark’s parents treated him. She worked, and there were five of them, and she was still so much more present in her children’s lives than Mark’s parents ever were in his. But she never said a word. She was always just quietly there. She always kept a place for Mark, always made enough food for eight instead of seven, always kept a fresh set of sheets on the trundle under Derek’s bed.
It’s not the same. If Mark had any say in the matter, he never would have left Sofia. Derek wishes that Mark was still in the rotation, that he could have come for his daughter at the end of the day himself. The sight of a Sloan sitting at the Shepherd family’s dinner table that night gives Derek equal amounts of heartache and hope. And he promises to fill in when he’s needed, to be part of Sofia’s village, and to pull up a chair for her at his table for the rest of her life.
***
Meredith has been waiting for this for six weeks. After a month and a half at home with a newborn, she is dying to feel a little bit more like herself again. Since she took twelve weeks of maternity leave, she won’t be operating for awhile longer, so this is the next best way she knows how.
They have a very impressive track record. She and Derek, that is. But never before has this required so much planning, or caused so much stress. By and large, for years, she and Derek made use of even the tiniest slivers of time and the most unconventional of places. But the first time after having a baby has required much more strategizing than she thought it would.
Now, she needs to time everything perfectly. He knows what tonight is, but unfortunately, he has already called to let her know that he’ll be home a little late. It’s just another in a series of complications that include getting both girls to sleep at the same time while still timing his arrival for just after she’s fed Caroline. She has identified a window of opportunity for them-the house will be quiet, she will not be exhausted, and her body will cooperate and not give him an unintentional mouthful of breastmilk if he touches her-and they are rapidly approaching the end of it.
She has plans to make it special, plans that are as much for her as they are for him. Ordinarily, she would want a glass of wine to relax, but she can’t drink, so she’s left a negligee in the bathroom to change into later and that will have to do. It can’t hurt to get into bed while she waits for him, but when she does, she is so exhausted that she doesn’t even realize that she is falling asleep.
“Meredith,” Derek whispers, shaking her awake.
She groans. Has she been asleep? She opens her eyes to find him still in the clothes he wore to work, leaning over her side of the bed.
“Hey,” he says. He smiles, but she wrinkles her nose in disappointment. This already is so not going the way she wanted it to go. She was hoping to be more ready, more put together, for him.
“Hi,” she says, propping herself up. “What time is it?”
“A little after nine. I’m sorry I’m so late,” he says. He leans in to kiss her. “How are the girls?”
“Everybody’s good,” she replies. “It’s after nine already?”
“Almost 9:30,” he admits. “I’m really sorry.”
She waves him off. “Caroline’s not awake?” she asks in disbelief.
“She’s not,” he says, peeking over at the bassinet in the corner of the room. “Where is she?”
“She’s in her crib.”
“Really?”
They’ve been talking about trying to get her used to her crib, if not at night, then maybe for a nap or two each day so that eventually she can sleep in her own room. They haven’t tried it yet but when Caroline fell asleep at seven, and Meredith thought that Derek would be home by 7:30, she decided to give it a shot.
“Well, she’s in her moses basket and the moses basket is in the crib,” Meredith admits. “But she’s asleep.”
“She is,” he says, taking a seat at the edge of the bed. “And we-” he kisses her, “-are alone in our bedroom for the first time in six weeks.”
“We are.” She smiles, and runs her hand through his hair until she cups the back of his head to bring him closer.
“Do you still want to?” he asks.
And even though she feels a long way from sexy at the moment, in her wrinkled pajamas and nursing bra, with sleep still in her eyes, she can’t stop herself from saying, “Oh, yes.”
He is so careful with her, the way he pulls the covers gently off of her, kicks off his shoes, and leans over her a little more. He lets her push his jacket off his shoulders and lift his shirt over his head before he finally climbs entirely on the bed next to her.
“Is this ok?” he asks as he kisses her, moving his mouth from her lips to her neck and his hands from her cheek to her arms. His hands aren’t where she needs them most, but his skin feels good on hers, and he has never had a problem getting her to say yes.
Her mind is struggling to stay in the moment though. It’s an issue she has never had before when he touches her, but right now, she keeps thinking that it’s already after nine o’clock. He is doing everything he can to relax her, everything that usually spirals her into absolute bliss, but she’s still holding on and can't let herself surrender. She knows that baby better than anyone, and instinct, along with her full breasts telling her that the baby is going to need to nurse soon, let her know that this is going to be interrupted very shortly.
Sure enough, he hasn’t even gotten her shirt off when Caroline starts to cry down the hall, making it abundantly clear that the window of opportunity she has so carefully carved out has passed.
Derek is still awake when she returns to their bedroom a little while later, but she feels so unlike herself that she doesn’t know how to pick up where they left off. Her body has been completely taken over, and while she does love that she is able to do this for their daughter, a tiny part of her resents that she does not feel sexy at all. She feels ridiculous for even taking the negligee out of the drawer in the first place when her nursing bras are pretty much a necessity at this point. But she wonders whether, if they keep going and push through it, she can shake off feeling frumpy and disjointed.
“She’s asleep again,” Meredith sighs, and crawls into bed with him.
“Want to get some sleep too?” he offers. “Maybe tonight is not the night.”
“We could,” she says. But she melts when he wraps his arms around her and kisses the top of her head, and, as good as sleep sounds, she still wants to try. More than that, she still wants them back, and she worries about what it might mean if they put this off. She sits up a little and says, “But we should be good for at least two uninterrupted hours.”
“We don’t have to,” he assures her. “We have all the time in the world.”
She shakes her head, and kisses him. “I want to.”
He’s cautious, asking her before he puts any weight on her or takes her clothes off or touches her breasts, and she moans “yes” over and over every time he asks if what he is doing is ok, if it feels good.
It does feels good, but the best thing is just having each other’s undivided attention for the first time in weeks. Their babies are asleep, his patients are taken care of, and right now, her husband is worshiping her. For the first time in weeks, she feels like she might be getting herself back. This all feels good.
He pulls her pants down around her ankles and off, and then dips his hand into her underwear and repeats the action. The combination of his lips on hers, and his hands on her hips as he pulls her closer, makes every nerve in her body thrum. She slips her hands into the waistband of his pants, undressing him too, and, once he’s naked, she wraps her hand around him. She grins when his breath catches in his throat.
“Are you ok?” he asks breathlessly. He is kneeling on the mattress, settled between her legs. He strokes the inside of her thigh and pets her, readying her, with his other hand as he leans forward and kisses her.
She nods, and arches up into him. Her other hand runs gently down his side, feeling the hard muscles of his obliques. “Derek,” she says, “Please.”
He slowly pushes into her, and suddenly, she gasps. It feels different than it did before, uncomfortable and unexpected and not like them at all. He stops immediately. “You’re not ok,” he says, looking kind of horrified and guilty. “We should stop.”
She shakes her head. Pain or no pain, she loves him, and wants to get back to normal, more than anything. If powering through is what it’s going to take, then power through they will.
“Are you sure?” he asks.
“Yes,” she says. “I want to. Let’s just take it slow,” she says.
He smiles reassuringly, though he still looks uncertain. “I can take it incredibly slow.”
They take their time, but she can’t hide the discomfort she feels, and it throws both of them off. They’ve done slow plenty of times. In fact, he enjoys drawing it out, getting to know every inch of her body and making her moan before he finally gets her off. But it’s always been a tortuously pleasurable option, never a physical necessity. Before tonight, she has only ever tried to speed him up, or at least to reciprocate, to give as good as she gets-but she can’t do any of that right now.
It’s a far cry from what they’re both used to: easy and natural and loud and ecstatic. It’s the first time that sex with Derek Shepherd hasn’t blown her mind and made her toes curl and her legs shake. And right now, it’s just one more thing that makes her feel like a part of her has been lost.
Afterward, she doesn’t know what to say. It’s not like the sex was awful, but the hesitation and the pain are completely disconcerting. She suspects he feels the same way. They lie together under the covers. She rests her head on his shoulder and her hand on his chest, and he keeps his arm wrapped tightly around her, stroking her skin gently with the tips of his fingers.
“I’m sorry,” he says softly after a few moments of silence.
“Why?” His apology almost makes her feel worse. They’ve never had to apologize after sex before.
“Maybe we should have waited a little longer,” he says.
“Maybe,” she replies. “But I wanted you.”
He kisses the top of her head. “I wanted you too. I love you.”
She presses her lips to his chest, and stares off into space for a few moments. Despite everything, the peace and safety and love she feels when she’s wrapped in his arms is still important. She tries not to let that go while she thinks of what more there is to say besides, “I love you too.”
Finally, he sighs. “Well,” he says matter-of-factly. “Look at it this way. To everyone else in the world, it must have seemed like some sort of cosmic injustice that this has never happened to us before, so now we’ve evened it out. We may have been the only ones who got mind-blowing every time. It wasn’t fair to the rest of the world. So this could technically be considered a public service.”
She snorts an appreciative laugh, and suddenly, she feels ok about the whole thing, like it might get better. “A public service?”
“I think so,” he says.
She nuzzles closer to him, and runs her hand lightly down his chest. “Mind-blowing or not,” she says, “I am happy you’re in my bed tonight. I’d still rather be with you than with anyone else.”
***
Click here for part 2
Author: greymcdreamysgh
Pairing: MerDer
Rating: PG-13
Summary: MERDER. Picks up after 9x11. A short multi-chapter fic that deals with being a family, preparing for a new baby, recovering from the plane crash, and dealing with survivors' guilt.
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
I will hold on with all of my might
Just promise me we'll be alright
The ghosts that we knew made us black and all blue
But we'll live a long life
One Saturday, when Caroline is three weeks old, Derek gets called into the hospital at five in the morning for an emergency follow-up surgery on his patient from the previous day. Meredith is already awake, feeding Caroline in bed, when he gets the page. Two minutes into the ensuing phone call, it is clear that he can’t just talk someone else through what the next steps should be from the comfort of their home. They actually need him. He won’t know how bad it'll is until he gets in, so he cannot promise when he will be home.
“You could always call somebody if you need a hand,” he says as he quickly dresses. “Callie and Arizona offered to take Zola anytime.”
Meredith shakes her head, and grimaces as she adjusts Caroline in her arms. Three weeks of near constant nursing is taking its toll on her body. Even though she is exhausted-they both are-she doesn’t want to outsource one kid as soon as the parent-child ratio is no longer in her favor. While she is sure that Zola would love to play with Sofia, she also does not want Zola to feel like she is not supposed to be home with them.
“We have to figure out handling both of them at once by ourselves at some point,” she says. “I’m sure we’ll be ok. Go save somebody’s life.”
“Ok,” he nods. He leans down and kisses her, and then kisses Caroline’s head. “Bye, Bee. Tell Zo I’ll see her later.”
“I will,” she says. She lifts Caroline’s tiny fist and waves. “Bye, Daddy.”
As soon as Derek leaves, Meredith realizes that she is very likely up for the day, but when Caroline finishes eating and Zola still isn’t awake, she gets back in bed and closes her eyes anyway. Sure enough, about a half hour after Caroline falls asleep in her bassinette, Zola lets herself into Meredith and Derek’s bedroom.
“Hi, Mama,” she says sleepily. Meredith opens one eye and watches Zola crawl into bed with her, bringing her favorite giraffe and two other stuffed animals with her.
Meredith wraps her arms around Zola, and she lies down with her. Maybe she can get Zola to snooze for a few more minutes, or at least play quietly in bed while she takes a light nap.
She groans a little at the pressure of Zola’s hand on her hip as Zola uses her for leverage and peeks over at Derek’s side of the bed. “Where’s Daddy?” she asks.
“He’s at the hospital,” Meredith says.
“Me too?”
Derek went back to work two weeks ago, and when he did, they decided to keep bringing Zola to daycare so as to disrupt her routine as little as possible and to allow Meredith to recover and devote all of her time to Caroline.
“Not today,” Meredith says. She opens her eyes-both of them-now, knowing that Zola is not going to go back to sleep. “It’s the weekend. So can you help me take care of Caroline today?”
Zola nods, and glances eagerly at Caroline’s bassinette in the corner of the room. “Right now?”
“Well, she’s sleeping right now, but later. Do you want some breakfast?”
They take the baby monitor downstairs and Meredith fixes Zola a small bowl of cereal, but Zola barely gets through her breakfast before Caroline’s cries crackle over the monitor.
“I can have more?” Zola asks as she finishes the last bite of her Cheerios and Meredith is already halfway up the steps.
“As soon as I come back down,” Meredith assures her.
Upstairs, Caroline has squirmed her way halfway out of her swaddle, and continues to fuss even when Meredith unwraps and cuddles her.
“Oh, Caroline, you stink,” Meredith says as she holds her up and sniffs. “No wonder you’re upset. Let’s get you changed.”
She covers the bed with a blanket, and undresses Caroline so she can take off her dirty diaper. As soon as the air hits Caroline’s bare legs and bottom, she starts to wail.
“You know,” Meredith says, pulling a few wipes out of the container so she can clean the poop off her, “For a little baby, you can make a pretty big mess.”
Even though Meredith goes as quickly as she can, Caroline still seems to think that she is taking too long. She screams as Meredith wipes her down, straps a new diaper on her, and snaps the legs of her onesie closed. She takes a second to try to settle Caroline down, and while the baby is happier now that she’s warm, she is still cranky. Meredith is tempted to let her nurse right now, even if only to soothe her, but then she remembers that Zola is downstairs and she actually is hungry.
“Let’s go see your sister,” Meredith coos at Caroline. “Want to go see Zo?” Caroline grunts and roots around for Meredith’s nipple, knowing that it’s close and that she can’t get to it. “I know. In a minute, Bee.”
Downstairs, Meredith sees Zola’s guilty face first, and the Cheerios all over the kitchen counter and the floor second.
Meredith stops in her tracks and sighs. “Did you try to pour yourself?”
“Sorry, Mama,” Zola says.
Caroline starts to cry again, wanting to be comforted, and Meredith resigns herself to leaving the mess on the floor for the foreseeable future. She walks into the kitchen, trying to avoid crushing the cereal on the floor, but can’t get close enough to the counter without stepping in at least some of it.
“You got some in your bowl though, right?” Meredith asks, peering over the counter to take a look. The bowl is, in fact, overflowing and Meredith wonders if Zola has emptied the entire box by accident.
There’s no other way than to step on the spilled Cheerios to get to Zola. Shifting a now screaming Caroline to one arm, she uses her free hand to scoop the extra cereal out of Zola’s bowl.
“You need more milk,” she sighs, and goes to the fridge to refill Zola’s bowl. If she can just Zola situated, then she can nurse Caroline, and then later she can figure out how to get the kitchen back in order.
“Sorry, Mama,” Zola says again. Her eyes fill with tears as Meredith pours the milk.
“Hey, it’s ok,” Meredith says, squeezing Zola’s shoulder with her free hand, and mustering up her energy to give Zola a reassuring smile. She has to remind herself that Zola is still just a little girl herself, and that she does not mean to do this. “Accidents happen. Eat your breakfast, ok?”
She sits down on the couch with Caroline, and tries to get her to nurse. Caroline takes the breast at first, but screams and hiccups so that milk dribbles out of her mouth. On her next attempt, Caroline gets a bad latch and it hurts so badly that Meredith has to stick her pinky in Caroline’s mouth to break it and try again. It takes a few minutes to get her to settle down enough to eat correctly, but once she finally does, the situation feels just a little bit easier to deal with.
“There you go,” Meredith murmurs, settling back onto the couch. “Oh, you just wanted your mama, didn’t you?”
Everything Meredith has read has told her that the constant nursing will let up after the first month. She hopes so, because if she does not focus entirely on getting Caroline to latch the right way, then the pain of trying to feed her is terrible, and she’s not sure what else to do.
She knows to count on sitting here for the next forty minutes or so, and therefore the mess in the kitchen will have to wait. She can hear her cell phone ringing upstairs, but she knows there’s no way she can get to it right now. When the house phone rings, Zola reaches over the kitchen counter and answers it. When did she learn to do that? Meredith wonders.
“Hi,” Zola says into the phone. The caller must be someone she knows, because she brightens and says “hi” again. “Yeah. My mama,” she says, and slides off her chair to bring the phone to Meredith.
“Who is it?” Meredith asks, adjusting Caroline so that she can take the phone with one hand.
“Shane,” Zola replies, and goes back to her cereal.
Ross lets her know that Derek will likely be in surgery until after lunch. He says that he has been told to ask if she needs anything.
“Are you offering to come watch my kids, Ross?” Meredith snaps. Granted, there had been a few rough patches, but so far they are doing fine and she can’t help but be a little annoyed-however irrationally-with Derek for checking up on her.
“Uh,” Ross stammers. “I was just…. Do you want me to, Dr. Grey?”
“I don’t. Tell Dr. Shepherd that everything’s fine, and we’ll see him when he’s finished.”
She hangs up and leaves the cordless on the couch next to her. “We’re doing good, right, Zo?”
Zola nods with a mouthful of cereal. “Caroline’s hungry too, Mama?” she asks, watching them from the kitchen counter.
“She is, Lovebug,” Meredith replies, realizing that she hasn’t eaten herself yet. “How’s the cereal?”
“Yum,” Zola says as she takes another bite.
“Good. Smaller bites, ok?” Meredith says. The last thing she needs right now is for Zola to choke or puke.
When Zola finishes, she slides off her seat at the counter and carries her plastic bowl and spoon to the sink. Meredith cringes, and prays that she won’t spill the leftover milk. Zola stands on her tip toes and pushes the bowl into the sink without a problem, crunching spilled Cheerios underneath her.
“Thank you for putting your bowl away, Zo. You’re my big girl,” she says when Zola joins her on the couch.
Zola takes Caroline’s tiny foot in her hand and just holds it while Meredith continues to feed her. “What should we do today, Caroline?”
“How about a walk later?” Meredith offers.
“Caroline wants to do that too?” Zola asks.
Meredith smiles. “I think she would be ok with it.”
“Can you read, Mama?” Zola asks, reaching under the coffee table for one of her books. Meredith figures out how to feed her and read to Zola at the same time. She still needs both hands to hold Caroline, but if Zola holds the book, Meredith can still read the words to her.
After three books, Caroline pulls off the breast, finally content. Meredith adjusts her shirt and then sits Caroline up and pats her back gently to coax a burp out of her.
“Good job!” Zola says when Caroline finally burps.
Meredith laughs. “Want to hold her while I clean up a little?”
Zola nods excitedly and forms her arms into a perfect cradle, a stance that she has perfected over the past three weeks.
“Sit back a little,” Meredith says. “Put your back against the couch.”
Once Zola does, she settles Caroline into her arms for her. “See, Caroline? Your big sister wants to hold you.” She turns to Zola and reminds her, “I’ll be right in the kitchen. If you have to go the bathroom, or you don’t want to hold her anymore, just tell me and I’ll come get her, ok?”
But Zola sits with Caroline for as long as it takes for Meredith to clean the Cheerios off the kitchen floor and load the dishwasher. Zola chats away to Caroline while Meredith works, pretending that Caroline responds to every question and can keep up her end of the conversation just as well as Zola can.
“How’s she doing?” Meredith asks Zola once she’s finished cleaning up.
“Good. We are going to the zoo,” she announces.
“Oh, you are?” Meredith asks. “Ok. When are you going?”
“Right now.”
“Oh,” Meredith says. “Ok, well little girls should get dressed before they go to the zoo. Can we do that first?”
There isn’t really a problem with letting Zola wear her purple striped pajamas all day, especially because they’re not actually going to the zoo, but it would be nice to get her dressed while she has the chance.
“We’re not going to the zoo,” Zola says. “We work at the zoo. I’m in charge of it.”
“Oh, I see. Well should you get changed for work? Like how Daddy and I wear scrubs at work?”
“Oh!” Zola cries. “Yeah!”
“Ok, why don’t you go pick out what you want to wear to work, and bring it into Caroline’s room. We’ll get dressed and then I’ll take you to work.”
Meredith takes Caroline upstairs, where she changes her into a fresh long-sleeved onesie and puts a new pair of socks on her. Zola bounds into Caroline’s bedroom a few minutes later, holding a pair of mint green polka dot leggings, a pink t-shirt, and a white tutu skirt.
“I’m ready!”
“Did you get a fresh pair of underwear?” Meredith asks.
Zola drops her stuff on the floor and runs back down the hall, returning a moment later with a pair of panties in her hand.
“Ok, now you’re ready!” Meredith says. “Can you show me how you get dressed like a big girl?”
She doesn’t know how some other moms do it. It’s so much easier to have two kids when one can get almost all the way undressed, and then dressed again with minimal assistance. Zola needs only to lean on Meredith to step into her tutu, and to accept some help with putting her shirt on.
“Good job, Zo! Now let’s brush your teeth and you’ll be ready to go.”
Downstairs, a few minutes later, Meredith sits Caroline in her bouncy seat on the floor, and covers her legs with a receiving blanket. Zola brings down armload after armload of stuffed animals from her bedroom, dumping them in the center of the living room.
“Hey, Zo, before you start work, can I just do your hair?”
With Zola seated on the couch, Meredith gently combs her hair, and pulls it into two braided pigtails. As she works, Zola says, “I’m happy I’m home with you, Mama.”
Even though she hasn’t had a shower or gotten dressed herself yet, and even though it’s only mid-morning and this day already feels like a marathon-this builds her up.
With a handful of Zola’s hair in one hand, she kisses the top of her head. “I’m happy you are too, Lovebug.”
In the living room, Zola plays “with” Caroline by essentially just playing around her. She doesn’t even want Meredith to really play with her, but if Meredith looks like she’s not paying attention, Zola is quick to notice. She sets up all of her stuffed animals around the living room, and shows them to Caroline one by one. After showing Caroline her giraffe and her penguin, she squats down in front of Caroline’s bouncy seat with her lion.
“Oh, Caroline, this is a lion. It goes ‘ROAR!’ But don’t be scared; this one is nice.”
Caroline stares at her without reacting at all, but Zola is undeterred. She shows her a zebra and an elephant next. When she finally shows Caroline a dog, Meredith laughs and wonders why this is Zola’s only somewhat traditional stuffed animal. There isn’t a bear in sight.
“Oh no, Mama!” Zola suddenly cries.
“What is it?” Meredith asks.
“My giraffe is sick! Caroline says!”
Meredith smiles-what will it be like when Caroline has opinions of her own?-but quickly changes her expression when Zola looks at her disapprovingly. Amusement does not fit into the seriousness of the game.
“Oh no!” she says instead, “Should we take him to the vet?”
“No, I am the vet. I be right back.”
Zola dashes upstairs and returns with a scrub cap, a surgical mask, and a bag full of plastic physician instruments. She and Derek got her some scrub caps for Christmas, and, because Zola loves to play doctor so much, they occasionally sneak her a box of surgical masks from the supply closet since those aren’t as durable as her other medical equipment. Meredith makes a mental note not to tell Cristina that her youngest cardio protégé is currently thoroughly enjoying a stint in veterinary medicine.
“Can you tie?” Zola asks, holding out the mask in one hand and the cap in the other.
“Which one first?”
“Hat.”
Meredith ties Zola’s scrub cap on, making sure her pigtails are tucked neatly inside, then helps her tie the mask onto her face. Both are way too big for her, but they work well enough, and Zola doesn’t seem to mind.
Zola sets the giraffe on the coffee table, and then opens up her doctor’s kit. She sets the plastic reflex hammer on Caroline’s stomach.
“Is Caroline helping you in surgery today, Dr. Shepherd?” Meredith asks from her position on the couch.
“Yes, but she's a baby doctor,” Zola says.
“Ok, well let me know if you need me to help too,” Meredith says.
But Zola doesn’t need any help. After a surprisingly short surgery that involves a lot of listening to the giraffe’s heartbeat with her stethoscope and giving a lot of injections, Zola announces that the giraffe will survive.
“Oh, good,” Meredith sighs in relief. “How about a snack?”
“Yeah, I’m hungry,” Zola agrees.
“Well, saving lives is hard work.”
Zola resumes checking all of her other animals, rearranging them on the living room floor before the game evolves into a sort of school experience. Meredith hears something about circle time and criss-cross applesauce while she rummages in the fridge for some cheese for Zola.
She is cutting up strawberries when Caroline starts to fuss again.
“Caroline’s crying, Mama,” Zola calls from the living room.
“I know, I can hear her,” Meredith calls back. “I’ll be right there.”
By the time she gets to Caroline, however, Zola has calmed her down by herself. She has plucked Caroline’s pacifier from the coffee table, coaxed it into her mouth, and is now gently smoothing Caroline’s peach fuzz hair down on her head.
“Hi, Honeybee,” Meredith coos at the baby. Caroline stares up at her, contentedly sucking on her pacifier. “Did Zola take care of you?”
Zola looks up at Meredith and smiles proudly, but never leaves Caroline’s side. Meredith leans over and kisses the top of Zola’s head. “Good job, big sister.”
***
A few weeks later, Derek is about an hour away from leaving work when his pager beeps loudly against his hip. He finds a phone, and listens to Callie hurriedly explain that she is getting ready to scrub in on an emergency surgery-a compound femur fracture resulting from an MVC on I-90. He does not understand why she is paging him with this seemingly irrelevant information, so he asks if the patient needs a neuro consult too. She shakes him off.
“No, Sofia. Arizona is at a conference in San Francisco, and this surgery is going to take at least four hours. The girl who usually watches her on weeknights when we have to work late has a stomach virus, and daycare closes for the day at seven.”
“Oh,” Derek says. “Yeah, we can watch her.”
“Are you sure?” Callie says anxiously. “You guys just had a baby."
“Callie, it’s no problem. I’ll get Sofia in about an hour when I pick up Zola.”
Callie sighs. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. Ok, I have to go, but Edwards is on my service today. I’ll have her get Sofia’s car seat out of my car and get it to you.”
“Ok,” Derek replies. “We’ll feed her dinner and you can just pick her up whenever.”
When he goes up to daycare a little later that evening, and tells Zola and Sofia that they are both going to come home with him that day, Zola is absolutely thrilled. She has been itching to have Sofia come over, since she has spent so much time at Sofia’s house and Sofia hasn’t really come to them at all. But Sofia is not so sure.
“My mommy’s not coming?” she asks.
“She is,” Derek assures her. “But she just has a surgery to do first, so she asked if you could have dinner with Zola tonight and she would come get you at our house. Would that be ok?”
"I want my mommy," Sofia says helplessly.
"Sofia, you can come with my daddy," Zola says, tugging on her hand. She tries to comfort her but it comes out as more of a whine. Sofia starts to cry.
"Why is she crying?" Zola asks.
"She just wants her own mommy. Right, Sofia?"
"Uh huh," Sofia hiccups.
He wonders what he should do. If Sofia was his own kid, he would pick her up and comfort her without a second thought. But she’s not his kid, and maybe him trying to hold her will make her even more upset.
It’s strange that this has never happened before, that he and Meredith have never been asked to watch Sofia. But then he realizes that maybe they’ve never been asked because there used to be three of them, not two. Mark used to be here.
He remembers that awful day when they were sure they had lost Zola forever. Mark had offered to share Sofia with them. It kinda works, he had said. No one gets too exhausted. You’re not on every night. We can work you into the rotation.
But Sofia’s gulping sobs indicate to him very clearly that she does not want him and Meredith worked into the rotation.
“Sofia, we can play at my house,” Zola says. She seems a little indignant that Sofia is not excited, that she doesn’t want to come with them. “Why is she still crying?” she asks her father.
Derek sighs. There’s nothing else to do but pick up Sofia. They can’t very well stand in the middle of the daycare until Callie finishes her surgery, and he is pretty sure that Sofia won’t walk if he asks her to.
“It’s ok, Sofia,” he says, hoisting her up onto his hip and rubbing her back. “Your mommy is going to come get you in a little bit. But can you eat dinner with me and Zola while we’re waiting?”
Sofia takes a hiccupping breath and nods.
He hasn’t held Sofia since Mark’s funeral. He sees her almost every day because she’s Zola’s best friend, but it’s been over a year since he’s held her. That day, he and Callie passed her back and forth for hours, wanting desperately to hold on to a piece of Mark, but somehow, he hasn’t held her since then. She feels different now, bigger and more grown up. She’s a solid reminder of how much time has passed without Mark.
It’s not the same at all. Even though it feels kind of like deja vu as he carries her down the hall, with Zola holding his free hand, he keeps reminding himself that it’s not the same. Sofia doesn’t have absent parents, just parents who happen to be busy on this particular day.
Growing up, Derek loved having Mark practically live with them. With four very nosy, chatty sisters, he couldn’t see a downside to having Mark around all the time. But as he got older, he noticed that it was strange that Mark spent so little time at his own house. He remembers asking his mother once. She had just sighed and said, “It takes a village, Derek.”
When he thinks back, his own mother must have had a problem with the way Mark’s parents treated him. She worked, and there were five of them, and she was still so much more present in her children’s lives than Mark’s parents ever were in his. But she never said a word. She was always just quietly there. She always kept a place for Mark, always made enough food for eight instead of seven, always kept a fresh set of sheets on the trundle under Derek’s bed.
It’s not the same. If Mark had any say in the matter, he never would have left Sofia. Derek wishes that Mark was still in the rotation, that he could have come for his daughter at the end of the day himself. The sight of a Sloan sitting at the Shepherd family’s dinner table that night gives Derek equal amounts of heartache and hope. And he promises to fill in when he’s needed, to be part of Sofia’s village, and to pull up a chair for her at his table for the rest of her life.
***
Meredith has been waiting for this for six weeks. After a month and a half at home with a newborn, she is dying to feel a little bit more like herself again. Since she took twelve weeks of maternity leave, she won’t be operating for awhile longer, so this is the next best way she knows how.
They have a very impressive track record. She and Derek, that is. But never before has this required so much planning, or caused so much stress. By and large, for years, she and Derek made use of even the tiniest slivers of time and the most unconventional of places. But the first time after having a baby has required much more strategizing than she thought it would.
Now, she needs to time everything perfectly. He knows what tonight is, but unfortunately, he has already called to let her know that he’ll be home a little late. It’s just another in a series of complications that include getting both girls to sleep at the same time while still timing his arrival for just after she’s fed Caroline. She has identified a window of opportunity for them-the house will be quiet, she will not be exhausted, and her body will cooperate and not give him an unintentional mouthful of breastmilk if he touches her-and they are rapidly approaching the end of it.
She has plans to make it special, plans that are as much for her as they are for him. Ordinarily, she would want a glass of wine to relax, but she can’t drink, so she’s left a negligee in the bathroom to change into later and that will have to do. It can’t hurt to get into bed while she waits for him, but when she does, she is so exhausted that she doesn’t even realize that she is falling asleep.
“Meredith,” Derek whispers, shaking her awake.
She groans. Has she been asleep? She opens her eyes to find him still in the clothes he wore to work, leaning over her side of the bed.
“Hey,” he says. He smiles, but she wrinkles her nose in disappointment. This already is so not going the way she wanted it to go. She was hoping to be more ready, more put together, for him.
“Hi,” she says, propping herself up. “What time is it?”
“A little after nine. I’m sorry I’m so late,” he says. He leans in to kiss her. “How are the girls?”
“Everybody’s good,” she replies. “It’s after nine already?”
“Almost 9:30,” he admits. “I’m really sorry.”
She waves him off. “Caroline’s not awake?” she asks in disbelief.
“She’s not,” he says, peeking over at the bassinet in the corner of the room. “Where is she?”
“She’s in her crib.”
“Really?”
They’ve been talking about trying to get her used to her crib, if not at night, then maybe for a nap or two each day so that eventually she can sleep in her own room. They haven’t tried it yet but when Caroline fell asleep at seven, and Meredith thought that Derek would be home by 7:30, she decided to give it a shot.
“Well, she’s in her moses basket and the moses basket is in the crib,” Meredith admits. “But she’s asleep.”
“She is,” he says, taking a seat at the edge of the bed. “And we-” he kisses her, “-are alone in our bedroom for the first time in six weeks.”
“We are.” She smiles, and runs her hand through his hair until she cups the back of his head to bring him closer.
“Do you still want to?” he asks.
And even though she feels a long way from sexy at the moment, in her wrinkled pajamas and nursing bra, with sleep still in her eyes, she can’t stop herself from saying, “Oh, yes.”
He is so careful with her, the way he pulls the covers gently off of her, kicks off his shoes, and leans over her a little more. He lets her push his jacket off his shoulders and lift his shirt over his head before he finally climbs entirely on the bed next to her.
“Is this ok?” he asks as he kisses her, moving his mouth from her lips to her neck and his hands from her cheek to her arms. His hands aren’t where she needs them most, but his skin feels good on hers, and he has never had a problem getting her to say yes.
Her mind is struggling to stay in the moment though. It’s an issue she has never had before when he touches her, but right now, she keeps thinking that it’s already after nine o’clock. He is doing everything he can to relax her, everything that usually spirals her into absolute bliss, but she’s still holding on and can't let herself surrender. She knows that baby better than anyone, and instinct, along with her full breasts telling her that the baby is going to need to nurse soon, let her know that this is going to be interrupted very shortly.
Sure enough, he hasn’t even gotten her shirt off when Caroline starts to cry down the hall, making it abundantly clear that the window of opportunity she has so carefully carved out has passed.
Derek is still awake when she returns to their bedroom a little while later, but she feels so unlike herself that she doesn’t know how to pick up where they left off. Her body has been completely taken over, and while she does love that she is able to do this for their daughter, a tiny part of her resents that she does not feel sexy at all. She feels ridiculous for even taking the negligee out of the drawer in the first place when her nursing bras are pretty much a necessity at this point. But she wonders whether, if they keep going and push through it, she can shake off feeling frumpy and disjointed.
“She’s asleep again,” Meredith sighs, and crawls into bed with him.
“Want to get some sleep too?” he offers. “Maybe tonight is not the night.”
“We could,” she says. But she melts when he wraps his arms around her and kisses the top of her head, and, as good as sleep sounds, she still wants to try. More than that, she still wants them back, and she worries about what it might mean if they put this off. She sits up a little and says, “But we should be good for at least two uninterrupted hours.”
“We don’t have to,” he assures her. “We have all the time in the world.”
She shakes her head, and kisses him. “I want to.”
He’s cautious, asking her before he puts any weight on her or takes her clothes off or touches her breasts, and she moans “yes” over and over every time he asks if what he is doing is ok, if it feels good.
It does feels good, but the best thing is just having each other’s undivided attention for the first time in weeks. Their babies are asleep, his patients are taken care of, and right now, her husband is worshiping her. For the first time in weeks, she feels like she might be getting herself back. This all feels good.
He pulls her pants down around her ankles and off, and then dips his hand into her underwear and repeats the action. The combination of his lips on hers, and his hands on her hips as he pulls her closer, makes every nerve in her body thrum. She slips her hands into the waistband of his pants, undressing him too, and, once he’s naked, she wraps her hand around him. She grins when his breath catches in his throat.
“Are you ok?” he asks breathlessly. He is kneeling on the mattress, settled between her legs. He strokes the inside of her thigh and pets her, readying her, with his other hand as he leans forward and kisses her.
She nods, and arches up into him. Her other hand runs gently down his side, feeling the hard muscles of his obliques. “Derek,” she says, “Please.”
He slowly pushes into her, and suddenly, she gasps. It feels different than it did before, uncomfortable and unexpected and not like them at all. He stops immediately. “You’re not ok,” he says, looking kind of horrified and guilty. “We should stop.”
She shakes her head. Pain or no pain, she loves him, and wants to get back to normal, more than anything. If powering through is what it’s going to take, then power through they will.
“Are you sure?” he asks.
“Yes,” she says. “I want to. Let’s just take it slow,” she says.
He smiles reassuringly, though he still looks uncertain. “I can take it incredibly slow.”
They take their time, but she can’t hide the discomfort she feels, and it throws both of them off. They’ve done slow plenty of times. In fact, he enjoys drawing it out, getting to know every inch of her body and making her moan before he finally gets her off. But it’s always been a tortuously pleasurable option, never a physical necessity. Before tonight, she has only ever tried to speed him up, or at least to reciprocate, to give as good as she gets-but she can’t do any of that right now.
It’s a far cry from what they’re both used to: easy and natural and loud and ecstatic. It’s the first time that sex with Derek Shepherd hasn’t blown her mind and made her toes curl and her legs shake. And right now, it’s just one more thing that makes her feel like a part of her has been lost.
Afterward, she doesn’t know what to say. It’s not like the sex was awful, but the hesitation and the pain are completely disconcerting. She suspects he feels the same way. They lie together under the covers. She rests her head on his shoulder and her hand on his chest, and he keeps his arm wrapped tightly around her, stroking her skin gently with the tips of his fingers.
“I’m sorry,” he says softly after a few moments of silence.
“Why?” His apology almost makes her feel worse. They’ve never had to apologize after sex before.
“Maybe we should have waited a little longer,” he says.
“Maybe,” she replies. “But I wanted you.”
He kisses the top of her head. “I wanted you too. I love you.”
She presses her lips to his chest, and stares off into space for a few moments. Despite everything, the peace and safety and love she feels when she’s wrapped in his arms is still important. She tries not to let that go while she thinks of what more there is to say besides, “I love you too.”
Finally, he sighs. “Well,” he says matter-of-factly. “Look at it this way. To everyone else in the world, it must have seemed like some sort of cosmic injustice that this has never happened to us before, so now we’ve evened it out. We may have been the only ones who got mind-blowing every time. It wasn’t fair to the rest of the world. So this could technically be considered a public service.”
She snorts an appreciative laugh, and suddenly, she feels ok about the whole thing, like it might get better. “A public service?”
“I think so,” he says.
She nuzzles closer to him, and runs her hand lightly down his chest. “Mind-blowing or not,” she says, “I am happy you’re in my bed tonight. I’d still rather be with you than with anyone else.”
***
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