Fanfic: Memory Absolution
Ever since I saw the preview for the January 6 episode of Grey's Anatomy and read some speculation on other future episodes, I've had this vision. Mere posted a fanfic that had a similar scene. I loved that fic and tried to make it satisfy this vision of mine but my own personal muse just wouldn't shut up. Also, I'm not stealing any ideas from Mere, she even encouraged me to write this.
Warning: Possible Grey's Anatomy Spoilers, but nothing more than what was seen in the preview.
Title: Memory Absolution
Pairing: Mark & Lexie, of course
“Marry me!”
Mark stared in shock at the flushed woman before him, his eyes squinting as he tried to decipher if she was serious or not.
He had spent half the day holding her as she cried for the tragedy that hit Seattle that day that had sent so many wounded children and their teachers to the doors of Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital. He had spent the other half working non-stop on those patients, all the while worrying about her being able to deal with what another mad man had done to so many innocents.
As soon as his last skin graft had been placed on the badly burned arm of a substitute teacher who had had the misfortune of being employed that day by the Seattle Public School system, he had tried to track her down. He had been desperate to check on her.
His first stop was Derek who had been standing at the surgical board and to whom Lexie had been assigned that day. Derek told him that Lexie had been fine during surgery, quiet but fine. He had even let her drill the hole that released the pressure in their patient’s brain. Mark released the breath he had been holding and asked where she was at that moment.
“I told her she could leave after post-ops. She finished those about an hour ago.” Derek shrugged and nodded his head towards Meredith as she approached them. “Have you seen Lexie?”
She shook her head as she wrote in a patient’s chart but looked up at Mark’s softly uttered, “Damn!”
“Is something wrong?” She asked as she moved to the surgical station.
“No.” “Yes!” Derek and Mark answered at the same time. Mark frowned at Derek before explaining. “I’m just concerned about how she is handling today. She was pretty upset this morning.”
Meredith shrugged. “I’m sure she’s fine. She’s stronger than you think Mark. She’ll get through it”
“I know she’ll get through it,” he replied. “I just want to be there for her if she needs me. She doesn’t have to go through it alone.”
“I’m sure she knows that,” she said, going back to her chart.
“Knows what?” Callie asked as she came up next to Mark. She quickly forgot her question as she bragged about her skills in the OR. “I just saved the principal’s leg. They said it couldn’t be saved, but I saved it. Owen was trying to get me to just take the leg but I told him that I was going to save that leg. And I did. I saved it.” Her smile waned at the lack of interest from the crowd. “Did you hear I saved a leg?”
Derek snorted. “Everyone heard, Torres. Congratulations!”
“Well, at least someone appreciates my skills as a…”
“Have you seen Lexie?” Mark interrupted.
“No. Did you not hear me? I was busy…saving the…”
“Yeah, I heard. Way to go!” Mark said, turning to leave but found Arizona in his path. “Sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry. Everything okay?” she asked, even as her eyes slid to Callie who was suddenly very interested in a patient’s chart.
“I was just looking for Lexie,” Mark explained as he moved to the left to go around her.
“I just saw Lexie on the first floor.” Jackson said as he walked to the surgery station.
Mark looked over his shoulder at the newcomer. “Was she okay?”
“She looked like she was deep in thought. She was just standing there, looking down the hall.” He picked up a chart and began reading it. “I called to her a couple of times, but she never answered.” He shrugged. “She looked like she was trying to figure something out. So I left her alone.
Mark frowned as he thought about the young surgeon’s words. He knew exactly where she was and realized she was probably reliving that moment when a gun had been pointed at her. He had to get to her. He swung around fast to the stairs and suddenly she was in front of him, flushed and breathing hard but a smile graced her beautiful face.
“Marry me!” The words, blurted out in an excited tone, had everyone turning towards the woman who had just been the topic of conversation. Callie put her hand over her mouth to hold in her cry of shock at Lexie’s words. Her eyes darted to Mark to see his reaction.
Mark didn’t know how he was supposed to respond. His first inclination was to yell “Hell yes!” But he knew that now was not the time to accept something he dreamed of and was being offered. He was scared, shocked, concerned and cautious. Yes, he had to be cautious here. She didn’t mean it. She was just reacting to what had happened today. He couldn’t accept something that she would regret in the morning. He couldn’t do that to her. He couldn’t do that to himself. She didn’t mean it. She couldn’t mean it.
“Lexie, you don’t mean this,” Mark began but stopped at her emphatic shake of her head.
“Marry me!” She said again on a rushed breath.
“Lex…it’s been a rough day; a really bad day.” He put his hands on her arms trying to draw her close but she held her ground as she put her hands on his arms drawing his hands to hold them gently in front of her. His eyes begged her not to make him answer. “You will regret this in the morning.”
“No I won’t. Uh uh…” She stopped his words with a quick finger over his lips and another shake of her head. “Yes, it’s been a really bad day. Yes, it made me relive that really bad day that happened here. Yes, that was hard, it was rough.” She pushed her finger against his lips again as he tried to speak. He kissed the finger and nodded for her to continue. She smiled softly at him as she looked deeply in his eyes, willing him to understand. “I survived. It was ugly and scary and hateful, but I survived. We survived.”
He nodded again, urging her to continue.
“I’ve tried so hard to forget that day, which is pretty impossible for someone with a photographic memory. And when I couldn’t forget it, I tried to ignore it. I’ve gotten pretty good at ignoring it. Today, I couldn’t ignore it, I definitely couldn’t forget it. So I had to…to…”
“Lex…it’s okay.” He spoke in a quiet and soothing tone.
She smiled again and nodded her agreement. “Exactly, it’s okay. Because…I survived. You survived. Alex survived.” Mark frowned at the mention of his nemesis but she squeezed his hand in understanding and continued. “All these months, it was about moving on…forgetting and moving on.” Mark nodded not really understanding. “Don’t you see? Instead of trying the impossible of forgetting that day, I should have been embracing the fact that we survived. Because that was part of the memory of that day too, Mark. We survived. We lived.”
He tilted his head, a glint of relief starting to shine in his eyes at her words.
“So here we are, months later. We made it through all of that and the fallout from that. We made it back together. We have talked and talked…”
“And made love and made love,” Mark teasingly interjected, his lips curled up on one-side in that cock-eyed grin he tends to get around her for some reason.
She laughed her agreement. “Yes, we have definitely done that.” She blushed furiously, even as her eyes twinkled at him. “Then today happened and all these feelings of fear and panic rush back in. And I just got tired of running from it. God…it’s exhausting!” She threw up her hands in frustration with herself. “I got to drill someone’s head today and instead of reveling in that I was still trying to run away from what happened that day. So I went back to that room where we were and made myself remember every horrible moment. And you know what kept running through my mind as I stood in that door reliving it all?”
He shook his head, the pain from that day still fresh in his memory. She grabbed his hands again and brought them up to her lips and gently kissed them as she looked into his eyes. “That man really loves me. What I put you through that day, no one should have to go through it. You had every right to give up on me, but instead, you just loved me.”
“I do,” he whispered softly.
“I know you do,” she said as she fought back tears. “I went to that hallway, that awful hallway where I knew I was going to die. And you know what I was thinking the entire time?”
He shook his head at her, his voice refusing to work for him.
“I was thinking I love Mark Sloan. It’s that simple. I wasn’t thinking about that horrible day or the gun going off or the horrible weeks that followed. I didn’t think about almost dying or going insane or fighting for my place here. I just kept thinking about how much I love you. I love you with all my heart. I want to spend the rest of my life showing you how much I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life letting you love me.” She swallowed hard and released a joyful smile that he couldn’t help but return. “And when you figure out you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want that life to start as soon as possible.”
His lips twitched. “Why does that line sound familiar” He croaked out, his heart ready to burst out of his chest as the smile grew so wide he felt his face would surely crack. How many times had she made him sit through that movie? It was the ultimate chick flick.
“Shut up!” She laughed. “Billy Crystal is a very wise man. Besides, just because it is a line from a movie doesn’t mean it doesn’t apply here. In fact, I totally get it now. I mean, I got it before, I’m not an idiot. But you don’t really get it until you finally get it. You know?”
He grinned and nodded at her logic but said nothing as he wrapped his arms around her even though she still held herself away from him slightly. “So, I’m here to ask you…”
“Wait…you mean you were asking? I thought you were demanding.” His brow wrinkled as he appeared to be thinking about the way she had presented her proposal. “Yeah…yep…” His head nodded as he came to a conclusion. “It was definitely a demand.”
She laughed and finally wrapped her arms around him, her head tilted back to look at him. “You love it when I’m bossy.”
He leaned down and kissed her nose. “Do not!”
“Do too!”
“Do not!”
“Marry me!”
“Ask me nicely!”
“I’ll wear the jeans that you love so much if you just say yes.”
“It’s tempting because I do love you in those jeans.”
“Marry me!”
“Ask me ni….”
“Oh for God’s sake! YES!! He’ll marry you! ” Callie’s bellow rang through the hall making Mark and Lexie turn to her and the rest of the crew standing there as they watched the entire scene.
“How long have they been there?” Lexie asked.
“Since before you arrived and demanded I marry you,” he answered.
“I didn’t….”
“No…No…not again!” Callie interrupted. “You two don’t get a say in this anymore. Mark…Lexie…you two ARE getting married. It is no longer your decision. There. It’s done. What I say goes! Mark, give her a ring. Lexie, buy a dress. I’ll throw you both an engagement party. End of discussion, end of this disgusting cuteness. Now can we all just get back to our lives!” She exclaimed as she turned and headed down the hall.
Lexie turned to look at Mark with a quizzical look on her face. He smirked and answered simply. “Drama queen.”
“I’m so happy for you both,” Arizona said, tears pooling in her eyes as she quickly hugged them both and left before they could fall.
Derek slapped Mark on his back in congratulations as Meredith and Jackson hugged Lexie.
****************************************************************
“What are you doing?” Lexie asked later that night. He had lit every candle in the room, turned the lights off, turned soft music on and had disappeared into their bedroom as she collapsed on the couch, her head falling back with her eyes closed. She felt the air move around her and she opened her eyes to see him kneeling before her. In his hand was a little blue box that held the most beautiful ring she had ever seen.
“Lexie Grey, I love you more than anything in this world. I want you to be my family. I want to build a life with you and for you. I want to spend the rest of my life making you happy. Because making you happy makes me happy. Will you marry me?” His voice cracked with emotion, but the words were strong and true.
A smile slowly spread across her face, lighting the room with its brightness and she nodded and softly whispered, “Yes, I’ll marry you.”
He let out the breath he hadn’t been aware he had been holding and laughed slightly as she held out her hand. He took the ring from the box and slid it on to her hand, kissing it gently. He looked up at her with shy approval seeking eyes. “It’s perfect!” She assured him and cupped his face to kiss him sweetly, then pulled him up next to her on the couch wrapping his arms around her as she stared at the ring.
He laughed again and teased. “Now that is how you are supposed to propose to someone!”
“Shut up!” She laughed and elbowed him. “Admit it, you liked my proposal.”
“No. I loved your proposal,” he admitted, leaning down to plant a kiss on her lips. “It was perfect!” He kissed her again.
She smiled into his kiss. “You’re not really going to let Callie throw us an engagement party are you?”
“Hell no!” He exclaimed as he suddenly stood up and lifted her into his arms, carrying her into their bedroom. “Callie can’t throw a party to save her life. But she can pay for the booze.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“I am a man with a plan.”
“I love a man with a plan.”
“Then I am your man!”
“Yes, yes you are!” She wholeheartedly agreed as he lowered her to the bed.
**********************************************
I hope you enjoyed this fic which my muse would not shut up about until I wrote it. Now that I have, I can go back to sleeping and reading other people's fanfics.
Warning: Possible Grey's Anatomy Spoilers, but nothing more than what was seen in the preview.
Title: Memory Absolution
Pairing: Mark & Lexie, of course
“Marry me!”
Mark stared in shock at the flushed woman before him, his eyes squinting as he tried to decipher if she was serious or not.
He had spent half the day holding her as she cried for the tragedy that hit Seattle that day that had sent so many wounded children and their teachers to the doors of Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital. He had spent the other half working non-stop on those patients, all the while worrying about her being able to deal with what another mad man had done to so many innocents.
As soon as his last skin graft had been placed on the badly burned arm of a substitute teacher who had had the misfortune of being employed that day by the Seattle Public School system, he had tried to track her down. He had been desperate to check on her.
His first stop was Derek who had been standing at the surgical board and to whom Lexie had been assigned that day. Derek told him that Lexie had been fine during surgery, quiet but fine. He had even let her drill the hole that released the pressure in their patient’s brain. Mark released the breath he had been holding and asked where she was at that moment.
“I told her she could leave after post-ops. She finished those about an hour ago.” Derek shrugged and nodded his head towards Meredith as she approached them. “Have you seen Lexie?”
She shook her head as she wrote in a patient’s chart but looked up at Mark’s softly uttered, “Damn!”
“Is something wrong?” She asked as she moved to the surgical station.
“No.” “Yes!” Derek and Mark answered at the same time. Mark frowned at Derek before explaining. “I’m just concerned about how she is handling today. She was pretty upset this morning.”
Meredith shrugged. “I’m sure she’s fine. She’s stronger than you think Mark. She’ll get through it”
“I know she’ll get through it,” he replied. “I just want to be there for her if she needs me. She doesn’t have to go through it alone.”
“I’m sure she knows that,” she said, going back to her chart.
“Knows what?” Callie asked as she came up next to Mark. She quickly forgot her question as she bragged about her skills in the OR. “I just saved the principal’s leg. They said it couldn’t be saved, but I saved it. Owen was trying to get me to just take the leg but I told him that I was going to save that leg. And I did. I saved it.” Her smile waned at the lack of interest from the crowd. “Did you hear I saved a leg?”
Derek snorted. “Everyone heard, Torres. Congratulations!”
“Well, at least someone appreciates my skills as a…”
“Have you seen Lexie?” Mark interrupted.
“No. Did you not hear me? I was busy…saving the…”
“Yeah, I heard. Way to go!” Mark said, turning to leave but found Arizona in his path. “Sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry. Everything okay?” she asked, even as her eyes slid to Callie who was suddenly very interested in a patient’s chart.
“I was just looking for Lexie,” Mark explained as he moved to the left to go around her.
“I just saw Lexie on the first floor.” Jackson said as he walked to the surgery station.
Mark looked over his shoulder at the newcomer. “Was she okay?”
“She looked like she was deep in thought. She was just standing there, looking down the hall.” He picked up a chart and began reading it. “I called to her a couple of times, but she never answered.” He shrugged. “She looked like she was trying to figure something out. So I left her alone.
Mark frowned as he thought about the young surgeon’s words. He knew exactly where she was and realized she was probably reliving that moment when a gun had been pointed at her. He had to get to her. He swung around fast to the stairs and suddenly she was in front of him, flushed and breathing hard but a smile graced her beautiful face.
“Marry me!” The words, blurted out in an excited tone, had everyone turning towards the woman who had just been the topic of conversation. Callie put her hand over her mouth to hold in her cry of shock at Lexie’s words. Her eyes darted to Mark to see his reaction.
Mark didn’t know how he was supposed to respond. His first inclination was to yell “Hell yes!” But he knew that now was not the time to accept something he dreamed of and was being offered. He was scared, shocked, concerned and cautious. Yes, he had to be cautious here. She didn’t mean it. She was just reacting to what had happened today. He couldn’t accept something that she would regret in the morning. He couldn’t do that to her. He couldn’t do that to himself. She didn’t mean it. She couldn’t mean it.
“Lexie, you don’t mean this,” Mark began but stopped at her emphatic shake of her head.
“Marry me!” She said again on a rushed breath.
“Lex…it’s been a rough day; a really bad day.” He put his hands on her arms trying to draw her close but she held her ground as she put her hands on his arms drawing his hands to hold them gently in front of her. His eyes begged her not to make him answer. “You will regret this in the morning.”
“No I won’t. Uh uh…” She stopped his words with a quick finger over his lips and another shake of her head. “Yes, it’s been a really bad day. Yes, it made me relive that really bad day that happened here. Yes, that was hard, it was rough.” She pushed her finger against his lips again as he tried to speak. He kissed the finger and nodded for her to continue. She smiled softly at him as she looked deeply in his eyes, willing him to understand. “I survived. It was ugly and scary and hateful, but I survived. We survived.”
He nodded again, urging her to continue.
“I’ve tried so hard to forget that day, which is pretty impossible for someone with a photographic memory. And when I couldn’t forget it, I tried to ignore it. I’ve gotten pretty good at ignoring it. Today, I couldn’t ignore it, I definitely couldn’t forget it. So I had to…to…”
“Lex…it’s okay.” He spoke in a quiet and soothing tone.
She smiled again and nodded her agreement. “Exactly, it’s okay. Because…I survived. You survived. Alex survived.” Mark frowned at the mention of his nemesis but she squeezed his hand in understanding and continued. “All these months, it was about moving on…forgetting and moving on.” Mark nodded not really understanding. “Don’t you see? Instead of trying the impossible of forgetting that day, I should have been embracing the fact that we survived. Because that was part of the memory of that day too, Mark. We survived. We lived.”
He tilted his head, a glint of relief starting to shine in his eyes at her words.
“So here we are, months later. We made it through all of that and the fallout from that. We made it back together. We have talked and talked…”
“And made love and made love,” Mark teasingly interjected, his lips curled up on one-side in that cock-eyed grin he tends to get around her for some reason.
She laughed her agreement. “Yes, we have definitely done that.” She blushed furiously, even as her eyes twinkled at him. “Then today happened and all these feelings of fear and panic rush back in. And I just got tired of running from it. God…it’s exhausting!” She threw up her hands in frustration with herself. “I got to drill someone’s head today and instead of reveling in that I was still trying to run away from what happened that day. So I went back to that room where we were and made myself remember every horrible moment. And you know what kept running through my mind as I stood in that door reliving it all?”
He shook his head, the pain from that day still fresh in his memory. She grabbed his hands again and brought them up to her lips and gently kissed them as she looked into his eyes. “That man really loves me. What I put you through that day, no one should have to go through it. You had every right to give up on me, but instead, you just loved me.”
“I do,” he whispered softly.
“I know you do,” she said as she fought back tears. “I went to that hallway, that awful hallway where I knew I was going to die. And you know what I was thinking the entire time?”
He shook his head at her, his voice refusing to work for him.
“I was thinking I love Mark Sloan. It’s that simple. I wasn’t thinking about that horrible day or the gun going off or the horrible weeks that followed. I didn’t think about almost dying or going insane or fighting for my place here. I just kept thinking about how much I love you. I love you with all my heart. I want to spend the rest of my life showing you how much I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life letting you love me.” She swallowed hard and released a joyful smile that he couldn’t help but return. “And when you figure out you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want that life to start as soon as possible.”
His lips twitched. “Why does that line sound familiar” He croaked out, his heart ready to burst out of his chest as the smile grew so wide he felt his face would surely crack. How many times had she made him sit through that movie? It was the ultimate chick flick.
“Shut up!” She laughed. “Billy Crystal is a very wise man. Besides, just because it is a line from a movie doesn’t mean it doesn’t apply here. In fact, I totally get it now. I mean, I got it before, I’m not an idiot. But you don’t really get it until you finally get it. You know?”
He grinned and nodded at her logic but said nothing as he wrapped his arms around her even though she still held herself away from him slightly. “So, I’m here to ask you…”
“Wait…you mean you were asking? I thought you were demanding.” His brow wrinkled as he appeared to be thinking about the way she had presented her proposal. “Yeah…yep…” His head nodded as he came to a conclusion. “It was definitely a demand.”
She laughed and finally wrapped her arms around him, her head tilted back to look at him. “You love it when I’m bossy.”
He leaned down and kissed her nose. “Do not!”
“Do too!”
“Do not!”
“Marry me!”
“Ask me nicely!”
“I’ll wear the jeans that you love so much if you just say yes.”
“It’s tempting because I do love you in those jeans.”
“Marry me!”
“Ask me ni….”
“Oh for God’s sake! YES!! He’ll marry you! ” Callie’s bellow rang through the hall making Mark and Lexie turn to her and the rest of the crew standing there as they watched the entire scene.
“How long have they been there?” Lexie asked.
“Since before you arrived and demanded I marry you,” he answered.
“I didn’t….”
“No…No…not again!” Callie interrupted. “You two don’t get a say in this anymore. Mark…Lexie…you two ARE getting married. It is no longer your decision. There. It’s done. What I say goes! Mark, give her a ring. Lexie, buy a dress. I’ll throw you both an engagement party. End of discussion, end of this disgusting cuteness. Now can we all just get back to our lives!” She exclaimed as she turned and headed down the hall.
Lexie turned to look at Mark with a quizzical look on her face. He smirked and answered simply. “Drama queen.”
“I’m so happy for you both,” Arizona said, tears pooling in her eyes as she quickly hugged them both and left before they could fall.
Derek slapped Mark on his back in congratulations as Meredith and Jackson hugged Lexie.
****************************************************************
“What are you doing?” Lexie asked later that night. He had lit every candle in the room, turned the lights off, turned soft music on and had disappeared into their bedroom as she collapsed on the couch, her head falling back with her eyes closed. She felt the air move around her and she opened her eyes to see him kneeling before her. In his hand was a little blue box that held the most beautiful ring she had ever seen.
“Lexie Grey, I love you more than anything in this world. I want you to be my family. I want to build a life with you and for you. I want to spend the rest of my life making you happy. Because making you happy makes me happy. Will you marry me?” His voice cracked with emotion, but the words were strong and true.
A smile slowly spread across her face, lighting the room with its brightness and she nodded and softly whispered, “Yes, I’ll marry you.”
He let out the breath he hadn’t been aware he had been holding and laughed slightly as she held out her hand. He took the ring from the box and slid it on to her hand, kissing it gently. He looked up at her with shy approval seeking eyes. “It’s perfect!” She assured him and cupped his face to kiss him sweetly, then pulled him up next to her on the couch wrapping his arms around her as she stared at the ring.
He laughed again and teased. “Now that is how you are supposed to propose to someone!”
“Shut up!” She laughed and elbowed him. “Admit it, you liked my proposal.”
“No. I loved your proposal,” he admitted, leaning down to plant a kiss on her lips. “It was perfect!” He kissed her again.
She smiled into his kiss. “You’re not really going to let Callie throw us an engagement party are you?”
“Hell no!” He exclaimed as he suddenly stood up and lifted her into his arms, carrying her into their bedroom. “Callie can’t throw a party to save her life. But she can pay for the booze.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“I am a man with a plan.”
“I love a man with a plan.”
“Then I am your man!”
“Yes, yes you are!” She wholeheartedly agreed as he lowered her to the bed.
**********************************************
I hope you enjoyed this fic which my muse would not shut up about until I wrote it. Now that I have, I can go back to sleeping and reading other people's fanfics.