(no subject)
Title: Four Ways This Wasn't Supposed To Turn Out
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Characters/Pairings: Ensemble. Meredith/Derek, Meredith/Mark, Alex/Izzie, slight George/Callie, and George/Lexie.
Word Count: 2,271
Rating: R
Author's Note: For
miss_reiko
Summary: The house that sits on a cliff, perfect view of Seattle down below, looks like something out of an idealistic storybook. On the surface. In reality it's as one dimensional as this relationship. Lyrics from "Fairytale" by Sara Bareilles.
cinderella’s on her bedroom floor, she’s got a crush on the guy at the liquor store, cause mr. charming don’t come home anymore
The house that sits on a cliff, perfect view of Seattle down below, looks like something out of an idealistic storybook. On the surface. In reality it’s as one dimensional as this relationship.
And Meredith has always been so much more complex than that.
She likes to spend as little time as possible in it. Prefers Joe’s, with the dim lights and subdued chatter. With the alcohol. With the good looking man in the leather jacket who has no problem with giving her a taste of what life used to be like before all of this.
He’s at her side not two minutes after she’s taken a seat on the stool right at the bar. Before she’s even got her drink in front of her. “Thought you said you were spending a quiet night at home?”
“I say a lot of things.” Joe sets her drink down with a small thud against the wood of the bar. She smiles; he goes about his business.
“You hate that place don’t you?” Mark’s gotten good at reading her, even better than Derek. No surprise there; she sees Mark double what she sees Derek nowadays.
“With a passion.” The same passion that allows her to empty her shot without an ounce of hesitation.
He waves down Joe for her, no words necessary. “Remind me again why you agreed to move in there?”
She moves her hand just right, so the lights hit the diamond ring on her left ring finger. This, plus a raised eyebrow, serves as her answer.
“Didn’t mean you had to move into that house; could’ve just stayed in your own.”
Her own house, the one she gave to Izzie. “It’s not the house.” He gives her a raised eyebrow of his own. “Okay, it is the house, but it’s not just the house.”
“It’s Derek and the house?” He offers.
“It’s Derek and the house.” She confirms with a nod and the tap of her fingers against the shot glass.
“You sound like Addison.”
“I am Addison.” Four years ago and that comparison would’ve done nothing but piss her off. Today she more than gets it. “And I’m starting to think she had the right idea.”
That piques his curiosity. “Meaning?”
Perhaps that was more direct than she’d meant. “I am bored and lonely and before now I didn’t understand why she would cheat on Derek. He’s McDreamy, your own personal real-life Prince Charming.” She frowns, feels like throwing something; settles for tossing her balled up napkin. “Turns out he’s Prince Charming gone rotten.”
“I should really be defending him, shouldn’t I?” He asks but it’s more rhetorical than anything else. “You know, as the supposed best friend.”
“Did you defend him to Addison?”
“No.”
That’s what she thought. “Why start now?”
“You could always divorce him.” He’s far too drunk to be serious.
So is she. “And then what?”
“Then you move out of that house you despise.”
“After I spent two years fighting to get to where I am?” He shrugs. “Yeah, I think not.”
“And you like this option better?” He asks, because he’s not exactly blind to her unhappiness. Very few people are these days.
“I don’t like either.” She sighs; she thinks she’s had this conversation before. “But what else is there?”
---
sleeping beauty’s in a foul mood for shame, she says none for you dear prince, I’m tired today
Izzie’s laying on her side, back to the door, to him, for a reason. A reason that, no surprise here, doesn’t exactly occur to him.
“What?” Alex asks, perturbed, after she’s shrugged out of his grasp, hugging the edge of the bed.
“I just want to sleep.” She tells him, eyes wide open even still.
She can feel him collapse onto the bed, on his back, all but giving up on that idea. He isn’t getting anything from her tonight; now he just has to work out why. “And yet two hours ago you were running around the hospital like you could stand to do it for another ten hours.”
“Maybe I’m a good liar.” She shoots back at him.
He snickers. “No. Want to try again?”
“Why don’t you stop trying to be such an ass?” She gives the pillows on her side a good yank and she’s fairly sure she disturbs his in the process. Good. “Or is there no trying involved at this point.”
And just like that he sits back up again, except this time he’s pissed. “What the hell Iz?”
“Just go to sleep.” She doesn’t want to do this tonight.
“No.”
“Well then go sleep on the couch.”
The next thing she knows he rips the covers off of her, and that causes her turn to him, with an icy glare, which very well may have been his intentions. “What are you, five?”
“I’m not the one who’s laying there pouting yet won’t tell anyone what’s wrong?”
“I am not pouting.” She picks on that before she processes the rest of his sentence. “I’m just not in the mood.”
“No but you’re sure in a mood.” Classic Alex; doesn’t know when to shut up. She wants to slap him but the fact that she doesn’t have a clue what he would do in the heat of the moment stops her. She doesn’t think he’ll retaliate; she just doesn’t want to be proved wrong. “Now for the last fucking time, what is the problem?”
“Because this is just another case of when it’s convenient for you.” She turns back because she isn’t looking him in the eye and losing her nerve while she does this. “Because I hate people with commitment issues - hate, hate, hate them - and yet I’m sleeping with you.”
“Oh great, this again.” He lets his head fall back against the wall more forcefully than absolutely necessary.
“Well what did you expect?”
He cuts in before she can even really get going. “Don’t even start with the Olivia thing.”
She wasn’t going to but it definitely proves a point, four years after the fact. “You’ve never taken me out on a date.”
“Well the last one ended so well…”
”I’m talking,” she tells him, loud and clear. “It’s been the same thing, over and over again, for the past two years and maybe it’s getting a little old.”
“I am not the type to settle down.” This time she doesn’t interrupt. “You and I both know this.”
“I’m not asking for a ring Alex, I’m just asking for some freaking confirmation that I’m not the only one in this relationship.”
He groans, “Last time all I heard was I was overcompensating - “
“You were overcompensating.” She rolls onto her back so she isn’t literally talking to a wall. “Find a middle ground.”
“That’s a little hard to do when I don’t have any clue what that looks like for you.”
“Something other than this.” He really is the kind of guy who truly needs an instruction manual. “You act like you’ve never been in a serious relationship before.”
He just stares at her, all raised eyebrows, looking at her like she’s completely missing something.
And then it clicks. “Seriously?”
“What about me makes you think I’m kidding?”
He’s never done this before. He sleeps with everything that moves - or he did - but she’d never seen him in an actual relationship. She doesn’t know why she didn’t think of that before.
She also doesn’t know if that makes her more or less angry with him.
It doesn’t matter really; they’ve both adjusted to each other, put too much work into this, that being with anyone else other than each other would be an exercise in counter-productivity.
They’re made for each other, in all the worst ways.
---
snow white is doing dishes again cause what else can you do with seven itty-bitty men, sends them to bed and calls up a friend, says can you meet me at midnight
She just doesn’t have the energy for this anymore.
Callie often wonders how Miranda does it, how she has time for the hospital and for Tuck. Is there some secret memo she didn’t get? Is there a method to this madness?
All she’s got right now is two screaming children, making a mess of things, and she’s the only one here to take care of them.
This was an accident. She’ll never tell them that, but it was an accident. Both times.
George left her, they filed for divorce, and she found out she was pregnant. So they got back together. Except that wasn’t working either. So they broke up a second time and three weeks later the stick turned pink.
At that point she figured why bother. They were a lost cause.
So she has the kids, and George sees them whenever he wants and he’s good with them, really good, but then again he doesn’t live with them full time.
It’s not that she doesn’t love her kids; she does. It’s just that sometimes she needs a break.
So she tucks them in, hollers into her roommate’s room that she’s leaving, and makes a phone call.
Ten minutes later and she’s at Joe’s with a drink in hand and Erica Hahn across from her, watching Sloan check out everything with boobs before he finally settles in his usual spot next to Meredith Grey. Like they didn’t already know.
“And you really think being out all night is the cure you’re looking for?” Hahn asks her, somehow interested and indifferent at the same time.
“It’s a cure.” She shrugs, momentarily distracted by George delivering drinks to Lexie and that whole group. “I figure if I don’t sleep I won’t have to wake up exhausted.”
“That’s fine until you accidentally leave a scalpel in someone’s body because you were hurrying to close so you could go sleep in the on-call room.” Callie frowns, the beginnings of a glare on her features. “Hey, I’m just saying you might want to rethink that philosophy.”
Callie’s been able to avoid leaving things in people’s bodies insofar; she doesn’t plan to start now. “Thanks for the tip.”
“Look, I never understood why you never made him take more responsibility. I mean there’s no custody agreement, no child support. He just does whatever the hell he wants and you get to suffer for it.”
“I don’t need his money.” She says, indirectly answering the question; mostly she’s trying to avoid it entirely.
“Alright well what about passing them off to him a few days a week. See how much he likes it.” Hahn sounds like she’s planning the end of the world and it’s almost comical. Except for the point where Callie doesn’t feel much like laughing.
“Because.” She won’t say the reasons for it.
“Yeah, that only works if I’m one of your kids.” Hahn replies. “I don’t see why he shouldn’t have to take some responsibility.”
“Because.” And she knows Hahn is only going to push, has never been a fan of sidestepping questions or knowing when to stop. But she’s going to have to admit it sooner or later, to someone. Might as well be her. “Because they’ll like him better.”
There. It’s out. And oddly enough that only makes her feel worse. And yet words keep spilling out.
“Because he’s better with them than I am. Because he’d be a better parent and they’d like him better. He’s more patient, he’s kinder.” She shakes her head; thanks some higher power for the fact that the lights are dim enough that no one can see the tears in her eyes. “Because I can’t have my kids like him better than me.”
Because it would mean acknowledging that she can’t handle this. That she’s more or less failed, at least in her own mind, and that’s all that matters really.
She’s not ready for that.
---
the tall blonde lets out a cry of despair, says would’ve cut it myself if I knew men could climb hair, i have to find another tower somewhere and keep away from the windows
She vaguely hears Callie’s yell from the hall, informing Cristina that she’s leaving, but she doesn’t react. It’s not that Callie expects her to do something with her kids; she just expects her to be there in case the apartment happens to burn down.
The kids are asleep; they’ll probably stay that way until Callie gets home. She basically has the house to herself.
That’s the way she prefers it.
To hear Meredith talk about it she turns it into some tragic Lifetime movie. The girl who got left at the altar and now refuses to date. But Meredith does this only so her life doesn’t look so bad in comparison.
At least she’s married. At least she got past her dark and twisty parts, let Derek in.
A lot of good that did her.
It doesn’t matter. The way Cristina sees it this is just easier. This is her freedom. She doesn’t need someone trying to shape her, trying to conform her to their standards.
She put her heart and soul into her relationship with Burke only to have it blow up in her face. And it just wasn’t worth it. Not in the end.
So this is what she chooses. The life she chooses. She keeps her energy focused on her job first, her friends second. And it works.
Even if she looks around at the apartment every now and then and feels like someone’s missing.
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Characters/Pairings: Ensemble. Meredith/Derek, Meredith/Mark, Alex/Izzie, slight George/Callie, and George/Lexie.
Word Count: 2,271
Rating: R
Author's Note: For
miss_reiko
Summary: The house that sits on a cliff, perfect view of Seattle down below, looks like something out of an idealistic storybook. On the surface. In reality it's as one dimensional as this relationship. Lyrics from "Fairytale" by Sara Bareilles.
cinderella’s on her bedroom floor, she’s got a crush on the guy at the liquor store, cause mr. charming don’t come home anymore
The house that sits on a cliff, perfect view of Seattle down below, looks like something out of an idealistic storybook. On the surface. In reality it’s as one dimensional as this relationship.
And Meredith has always been so much more complex than that.
She likes to spend as little time as possible in it. Prefers Joe’s, with the dim lights and subdued chatter. With the alcohol. With the good looking man in the leather jacket who has no problem with giving her a taste of what life used to be like before all of this.
He’s at her side not two minutes after she’s taken a seat on the stool right at the bar. Before she’s even got her drink in front of her. “Thought you said you were spending a quiet night at home?”
“I say a lot of things.” Joe sets her drink down with a small thud against the wood of the bar. She smiles; he goes about his business.
“You hate that place don’t you?” Mark’s gotten good at reading her, even better than Derek. No surprise there; she sees Mark double what she sees Derek nowadays.
“With a passion.” The same passion that allows her to empty her shot without an ounce of hesitation.
He waves down Joe for her, no words necessary. “Remind me again why you agreed to move in there?”
She moves her hand just right, so the lights hit the diamond ring on her left ring finger. This, plus a raised eyebrow, serves as her answer.
“Didn’t mean you had to move into that house; could’ve just stayed in your own.”
Her own house, the one she gave to Izzie. “It’s not the house.” He gives her a raised eyebrow of his own. “Okay, it is the house, but it’s not just the house.”
“It’s Derek and the house?” He offers.
“It’s Derek and the house.” She confirms with a nod and the tap of her fingers against the shot glass.
“You sound like Addison.”
“I am Addison.” Four years ago and that comparison would’ve done nothing but piss her off. Today she more than gets it. “And I’m starting to think she had the right idea.”
That piques his curiosity. “Meaning?”
Perhaps that was more direct than she’d meant. “I am bored and lonely and before now I didn’t understand why she would cheat on Derek. He’s McDreamy, your own personal real-life Prince Charming.” She frowns, feels like throwing something; settles for tossing her balled up napkin. “Turns out he’s Prince Charming gone rotten.”
“I should really be defending him, shouldn’t I?” He asks but it’s more rhetorical than anything else. “You know, as the supposed best friend.”
“Did you defend him to Addison?”
“No.”
That’s what she thought. “Why start now?”
“You could always divorce him.” He’s far too drunk to be serious.
So is she. “And then what?”
“Then you move out of that house you despise.”
“After I spent two years fighting to get to where I am?” He shrugs. “Yeah, I think not.”
“And you like this option better?” He asks, because he’s not exactly blind to her unhappiness. Very few people are these days.
“I don’t like either.” She sighs; she thinks she’s had this conversation before. “But what else is there?”
---
sleeping beauty’s in a foul mood for shame, she says none for you dear prince, I’m tired today
Izzie’s laying on her side, back to the door, to him, for a reason. A reason that, no surprise here, doesn’t exactly occur to him.
“What?” Alex asks, perturbed, after she’s shrugged out of his grasp, hugging the edge of the bed.
“I just want to sleep.” She tells him, eyes wide open even still.
She can feel him collapse onto the bed, on his back, all but giving up on that idea. He isn’t getting anything from her tonight; now he just has to work out why. “And yet two hours ago you were running around the hospital like you could stand to do it for another ten hours.”
“Maybe I’m a good liar.” She shoots back at him.
He snickers. “No. Want to try again?”
“Why don’t you stop trying to be such an ass?” She gives the pillows on her side a good yank and she’s fairly sure she disturbs his in the process. Good. “Or is there no trying involved at this point.”
And just like that he sits back up again, except this time he’s pissed. “What the hell Iz?”
“Just go to sleep.” She doesn’t want to do this tonight.
“No.”
“Well then go sleep on the couch.”
The next thing she knows he rips the covers off of her, and that causes her turn to him, with an icy glare, which very well may have been his intentions. “What are you, five?”
“I’m not the one who’s laying there pouting yet won’t tell anyone what’s wrong?”
“I am not pouting.” She picks on that before she processes the rest of his sentence. “I’m just not in the mood.”
“No but you’re sure in a mood.” Classic Alex; doesn’t know when to shut up. She wants to slap him but the fact that she doesn’t have a clue what he would do in the heat of the moment stops her. She doesn’t think he’ll retaliate; she just doesn’t want to be proved wrong. “Now for the last fucking time, what is the problem?”
“Because this is just another case of when it’s convenient for you.” She turns back because she isn’t looking him in the eye and losing her nerve while she does this. “Because I hate people with commitment issues - hate, hate, hate them - and yet I’m sleeping with you.”
“Oh great, this again.” He lets his head fall back against the wall more forcefully than absolutely necessary.
“Well what did you expect?”
He cuts in before she can even really get going. “Don’t even start with the Olivia thing.”
She wasn’t going to but it definitely proves a point, four years after the fact. “You’ve never taken me out on a date.”
“Well the last one ended so well…”
”I’m talking,” she tells him, loud and clear. “It’s been the same thing, over and over again, for the past two years and maybe it’s getting a little old.”
“I am not the type to settle down.” This time she doesn’t interrupt. “You and I both know this.”
“I’m not asking for a ring Alex, I’m just asking for some freaking confirmation that I’m not the only one in this relationship.”
He groans, “Last time all I heard was I was overcompensating - “
“You were overcompensating.” She rolls onto her back so she isn’t literally talking to a wall. “Find a middle ground.”
“That’s a little hard to do when I don’t have any clue what that looks like for you.”
“Something other than this.” He really is the kind of guy who truly needs an instruction manual. “You act like you’ve never been in a serious relationship before.”
He just stares at her, all raised eyebrows, looking at her like she’s completely missing something.
And then it clicks. “Seriously?”
“What about me makes you think I’m kidding?”
He’s never done this before. He sleeps with everything that moves - or he did - but she’d never seen him in an actual relationship. She doesn’t know why she didn’t think of that before.
She also doesn’t know if that makes her more or less angry with him.
It doesn’t matter really; they’ve both adjusted to each other, put too much work into this, that being with anyone else other than each other would be an exercise in counter-productivity.
They’re made for each other, in all the worst ways.
---
snow white is doing dishes again cause what else can you do with seven itty-bitty men, sends them to bed and calls up a friend, says can you meet me at midnight
She just doesn’t have the energy for this anymore.
Callie often wonders how Miranda does it, how she has time for the hospital and for Tuck. Is there some secret memo she didn’t get? Is there a method to this madness?
All she’s got right now is two screaming children, making a mess of things, and she’s the only one here to take care of them.
This was an accident. She’ll never tell them that, but it was an accident. Both times.
George left her, they filed for divorce, and she found out she was pregnant. So they got back together. Except that wasn’t working either. So they broke up a second time and three weeks later the stick turned pink.
At that point she figured why bother. They were a lost cause.
So she has the kids, and George sees them whenever he wants and he’s good with them, really good, but then again he doesn’t live with them full time.
It’s not that she doesn’t love her kids; she does. It’s just that sometimes she needs a break.
So she tucks them in, hollers into her roommate’s room that she’s leaving, and makes a phone call.
Ten minutes later and she’s at Joe’s with a drink in hand and Erica Hahn across from her, watching Sloan check out everything with boobs before he finally settles in his usual spot next to Meredith Grey. Like they didn’t already know.
“And you really think being out all night is the cure you’re looking for?” Hahn asks her, somehow interested and indifferent at the same time.
“It’s a cure.” She shrugs, momentarily distracted by George delivering drinks to Lexie and that whole group. “I figure if I don’t sleep I won’t have to wake up exhausted.”
“That’s fine until you accidentally leave a scalpel in someone’s body because you were hurrying to close so you could go sleep in the on-call room.” Callie frowns, the beginnings of a glare on her features. “Hey, I’m just saying you might want to rethink that philosophy.”
Callie’s been able to avoid leaving things in people’s bodies insofar; she doesn’t plan to start now. “Thanks for the tip.”
“Look, I never understood why you never made him take more responsibility. I mean there’s no custody agreement, no child support. He just does whatever the hell he wants and you get to suffer for it.”
“I don’t need his money.” She says, indirectly answering the question; mostly she’s trying to avoid it entirely.
“Alright well what about passing them off to him a few days a week. See how much he likes it.” Hahn sounds like she’s planning the end of the world and it’s almost comical. Except for the point where Callie doesn’t feel much like laughing.
“Because.” She won’t say the reasons for it.
“Yeah, that only works if I’m one of your kids.” Hahn replies. “I don’t see why he shouldn’t have to take some responsibility.”
“Because.” And she knows Hahn is only going to push, has never been a fan of sidestepping questions or knowing when to stop. But she’s going to have to admit it sooner or later, to someone. Might as well be her. “Because they’ll like him better.”
There. It’s out. And oddly enough that only makes her feel worse. And yet words keep spilling out.
“Because he’s better with them than I am. Because he’d be a better parent and they’d like him better. He’s more patient, he’s kinder.” She shakes her head; thanks some higher power for the fact that the lights are dim enough that no one can see the tears in her eyes. “Because I can’t have my kids like him better than me.”
Because it would mean acknowledging that she can’t handle this. That she’s more or less failed, at least in her own mind, and that’s all that matters really.
She’s not ready for that.
---
the tall blonde lets out a cry of despair, says would’ve cut it myself if I knew men could climb hair, i have to find another tower somewhere and keep away from the windows
She vaguely hears Callie’s yell from the hall, informing Cristina that she’s leaving, but she doesn’t react. It’s not that Callie expects her to do something with her kids; she just expects her to be there in case the apartment happens to burn down.
The kids are asleep; they’ll probably stay that way until Callie gets home. She basically has the house to herself.
That’s the way she prefers it.
To hear Meredith talk about it she turns it into some tragic Lifetime movie. The girl who got left at the altar and now refuses to date. But Meredith does this only so her life doesn’t look so bad in comparison.
At least she’s married. At least she got past her dark and twisty parts, let Derek in.
A lot of good that did her.
It doesn’t matter. The way Cristina sees it this is just easier. This is her freedom. She doesn’t need someone trying to shape her, trying to conform her to their standards.
She put her heart and soul into her relationship with Burke only to have it blow up in her face. And it just wasn’t worth it. Not in the end.
So this is what she chooses. The life she chooses. She keeps her energy focused on her job first, her friends second. And it works.
Even if she looks around at the apartment every now and then and feels like someone’s missing.