these are just ghosts that broke my heart before i met you {owen/cristina}
Title: These Are Just Ghosts That Broke My Heart Before I Met You
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Characters/Pairings: Owen/Cristina
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 975
Author's Note: This was not on the agenda for today...and yet...
Summary: Spoilers for "Before And After". It’s those damn steps that got her in so much trouble in the first place - go figure that it’s where she chooses to sit, wait; something wicked comes this way.
It’s those damn steps that got her in so much trouble in the first place - go figure that it’s where she chooses to sit, wait; something wicked comes this way.
“Just wait.” His hand slides over her arm in much the same way that her tongue slides over her lips, cool air stinging them. “Just wait for me.”
‘I don’t wait for people’ she doesn’t say, and instead just shakes her head and walks away, with hands shoved in pockets and his eyes burning into her back.
Some love stories aren’t meant to be told, and maybe this is just her closing the book on the twelfth page.
Still, she waits while the sky turns gray and darker, cold concrete steps underneath her, damp from the latest downpour and she doesn’t care. You see, this is a test of sorts, designed at the last minute to keep her warm at night when nothing else will.
If he fails - well, then he just wasn’t good enough was he?
(She does these things to protect herself, simple as that, to protect herself from men who leave you and take your breath and your heart right along with them)
---
He parks his car a block away from here, walks the rest. Owen isn’t sure why; if he’s trying to cover his approach, catch her off-guard (that’s the only way to get in, to be let in, with her, now isn’t it?), or trying to avoid the increasing possibility that she takes some heavy object to his windshield.
There’s ink on his hands, charcoal-colored stains that he keeps trying to rub away, index finger against pad of thumb, but he doesn’t need to look down to know it’s still there. Will still be there. Some stains take time to fade. Instead he tries to focus on the way his shoes hit the ground, the soft thud with every step, loud as his heartbeat on the empty street.
He can see clear in front of her apartment, the sidewalk in front of it, the road beside it. There’s a wall that obscures her door, in front of those steps, and he has to get closer to see beyond it. Or maybe that’s just optimism speaking - maybe there’s no one there.
It’s not like he’d be completely surprised by that.
---
She hears him rather than sees him coming. Like a warning sign; get up and run while you still have the chance but she forces herself still and silent.
It might not even be him.
(Now wouldn’t that be easy? If it wasn’t him, she could just shake her head, resign herself, shut her door behind her and write it off as someone else’s problem)
But it is. Owen with his eyes on hers and his hands shoved so deep in his pockets that he looks like he’s trying to hide something. “I just signed his discharge papers.” They both know the ‘he’ in question. No point in saying names to fill up empty spaces and silences.
Cristina tries to find the answer to the ‘so what’ that nearly makes it past her lips - on her own.
---
“I’m not who I was when I met her.” He starts feeling the need for explanation and apology, things he used to be able to do without before her. Problem is, he’s stuck with the same few lines on repeat, like a broken record, hoping things like tone and eye contact will be the ones to save him. “And I don’t think I’ll ever be that person again.”
“I don’t know who that was,” she says, in lieu of the ‘I probably wouldn’t have even wanted that person’ (he likes to think he knows her better than she wants him too; but perhaps that’s another lie in a string of them). “And I don’t know who this person is either.”
At least, he thinks, looking for something to salvage in all of that, she didn’t say she didn’t want to. It’s dangerous, this line of thinking, a bad way to get your hopes up. It makes him go and say stupid things such as, “I’m not sure I do either.”
---
He keeps doing things like going and challenging her fundamental beliefs of things like, “People don’t just up and change. And that person doesn’t just die; it gets pushed back, away.”
“That person doesn’t exist anymore,” he insists, flirting with almost promises that look like lies.
“Right. Clearly.” She can’t for the life of her remember why she even bothered sitting out here. “It doesn’t work that way. There’s always people left behind.”
“Ghosts. Skeletons in the closet.”
“She’s not a ghost anymore than you are.”
“But she is gone.”
Cristina nods, slowly, and at least that’s something concrete, something fact, amid all of this. She can deal with facts.
---
“I don’t know who I am.” He repeats, a jumping off point. “But isn’t that half the fun? Finding out.”
She laughs, but it’s not in the kind of way he’d like. It’s the kind of laugh that has him bracing to see her stand and slam the door in his face. “This is about a lot of things; I don’t think any of them qualify as fun.”
“Then why did you wait?”
It has the desired effect, catches her off-guard, no answer at the ready, and he watches her play with her hands in her lap for a moment, waiting for the next bit of sarcasm to roll of her lips. He doesn’t quite get that either. “To see if this even was anything at all.”
He pauses, her words unexpected. “And is it?”
“Maybe.” It’s better than flat-out rejection. She stands, one long graceful movement, until she’s toe to toe with him, and then she says, “I think that’s part of the finding out thing.”
Owen smiles.
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Characters/Pairings: Owen/Cristina
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 975
Author's Note: This was not on the agenda for today...and yet...
Summary: Spoilers for "Before And After". It’s those damn steps that got her in so much trouble in the first place - go figure that it’s where she chooses to sit, wait; something wicked comes this way.
It’s those damn steps that got her in so much trouble in the first place - go figure that it’s where she chooses to sit, wait; something wicked comes this way.
“Just wait.” His hand slides over her arm in much the same way that her tongue slides over her lips, cool air stinging them. “Just wait for me.”
‘I don’t wait for people’ she doesn’t say, and instead just shakes her head and walks away, with hands shoved in pockets and his eyes burning into her back.
Some love stories aren’t meant to be told, and maybe this is just her closing the book on the twelfth page.
Still, she waits while the sky turns gray and darker, cold concrete steps underneath her, damp from the latest downpour and she doesn’t care. You see, this is a test of sorts, designed at the last minute to keep her warm at night when nothing else will.
If he fails - well, then he just wasn’t good enough was he?
(She does these things to protect herself, simple as that, to protect herself from men who leave you and take your breath and your heart right along with them)
---
He parks his car a block away from here, walks the rest. Owen isn’t sure why; if he’s trying to cover his approach, catch her off-guard (that’s the only way to get in, to be let in, with her, now isn’t it?), or trying to avoid the increasing possibility that she takes some heavy object to his windshield.
There’s ink on his hands, charcoal-colored stains that he keeps trying to rub away, index finger against pad of thumb, but he doesn’t need to look down to know it’s still there. Will still be there. Some stains take time to fade. Instead he tries to focus on the way his shoes hit the ground, the soft thud with every step, loud as his heartbeat on the empty street.
He can see clear in front of her apartment, the sidewalk in front of it, the road beside it. There’s a wall that obscures her door, in front of those steps, and he has to get closer to see beyond it. Or maybe that’s just optimism speaking - maybe there’s no one there.
It’s not like he’d be completely surprised by that.
---
She hears him rather than sees him coming. Like a warning sign; get up and run while you still have the chance but she forces herself still and silent.
It might not even be him.
(Now wouldn’t that be easy? If it wasn’t him, she could just shake her head, resign herself, shut her door behind her and write it off as someone else’s problem)
But it is. Owen with his eyes on hers and his hands shoved so deep in his pockets that he looks like he’s trying to hide something. “I just signed his discharge papers.” They both know the ‘he’ in question. No point in saying names to fill up empty spaces and silences.
Cristina tries to find the answer to the ‘so what’ that nearly makes it past her lips - on her own.
---
“I’m not who I was when I met her.” He starts feeling the need for explanation and apology, things he used to be able to do without before her. Problem is, he’s stuck with the same few lines on repeat, like a broken record, hoping things like tone and eye contact will be the ones to save him. “And I don’t think I’ll ever be that person again.”
“I don’t know who that was,” she says, in lieu of the ‘I probably wouldn’t have even wanted that person’ (he likes to think he knows her better than she wants him too; but perhaps that’s another lie in a string of them). “And I don’t know who this person is either.”
At least, he thinks, looking for something to salvage in all of that, she didn’t say she didn’t want to. It’s dangerous, this line of thinking, a bad way to get your hopes up. It makes him go and say stupid things such as, “I’m not sure I do either.”
---
He keeps doing things like going and challenging her fundamental beliefs of things like, “People don’t just up and change. And that person doesn’t just die; it gets pushed back, away.”
“That person doesn’t exist anymore,” he insists, flirting with almost promises that look like lies.
“Right. Clearly.” She can’t for the life of her remember why she even bothered sitting out here. “It doesn’t work that way. There’s always people left behind.”
“Ghosts. Skeletons in the closet.”
“She’s not a ghost anymore than you are.”
“But she is gone.”
Cristina nods, slowly, and at least that’s something concrete, something fact, amid all of this. She can deal with facts.
---
“I don’t know who I am.” He repeats, a jumping off point. “But isn’t that half the fun? Finding out.”
She laughs, but it’s not in the kind of way he’d like. It’s the kind of laugh that has him bracing to see her stand and slam the door in his face. “This is about a lot of things; I don’t think any of them qualify as fun.”
“Then why did you wait?”
It has the desired effect, catches her off-guard, no answer at the ready, and he watches her play with her hands in her lap for a moment, waiting for the next bit of sarcasm to roll of her lips. He doesn’t quite get that either. “To see if this even was anything at all.”
He pauses, her words unexpected. “And is it?”
“Maybe.” It’s better than flat-out rejection. She stands, one long graceful movement, until she’s toe to toe with him, and then she says, “I think that’s part of the finding out thing.”
Owen smiles.