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“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Eating my lunch,” you replied succinctly, your eyes maintaining its riveted gaze on red tresses and sapphire eyes that seem to accurately depict what you have with her; warm as the balmy days of summer, yet cold as the spell of Seattle weather.
Cristina Yang rolled her eyes, she could see through your bullshit as plain as day. It’s not like you were trying to hide your bullshit anyway. She snapped her fingers in front of you, eliciting a groan of protest as you attempted to slap her hand away, but you got a slap instead—in your face, no less. Okay, it was a light smack, but still you turned to her albeit begrudgingly with a frown. “I want to disown you, but I’m not gonna do that ‘cause we all have our bad moments, but this, what you’re doing, is self-destruction at its finest. We are not martyrs of love, Meredith.”
You allow yourself to saturate your best friend’s words of wisdom, and it’d be probably wise of you to follow through, but you couldn’t even bring yourself to care anymore. You were already at a dead end. You’re gone to the point of no return; your heart has been hopelessly and irrevocably claimed by Addison Montgomery and perhaps it really was martyrdom or even masochism if you’re being honest. “You’re not, but maybe I am.” You confessed, stealing a glance at her again.
“Oh, bullshit, Meredith!” Cristina hissed in a hushed tone, this time slotting your chin in between her forefinger and thumb as both her hands slide up the sides of your head, cradling it to keep it in place. “I kid you not, I will admit you to the psych ward myself if you don’t stop this.”
You took note of her stern threat, you knew she was strong arming you into putting an end to the lost cause that is your affair—no, relationship with the woman whose husband you once screwed, and now you wound up in the same exact position, except this time, you’re her mistress. You are screwing her and you idly wonder how this began for a second time, was cheating a genetic trait you could inherit? Perhaps, it’s not only your mother’s prowess in the surgical realm that you’ve acquired, perhaps it was the cheating part, too. A legacy cheater is what you are, and no matter how right it had felt to be with her, it was still so wrong, at least under your circumstances. How could the world be so cruel as to make the right person wrong for you? What kind of twisted fuck is that?
There you go again, blaming the world for every shit that you’ve gone through, for every failed relationship, every failure and disappointment you’ve bore the brunt of when in fact, you’ve brought it upon yourself because even at the absence of a shrink, you’ve psychoanalyzed yourself enough to tell that you share an awful correlation with Mark Sloan; you’re self-destructive and self-loathing to an almost pathological degree. You just can’t help but ruin your life, taint your reputation anew, can’t help but let someone take morsels of something from what makes you you to a horrible extent that you’ve become so out of touch with yourself you can’t even recognize the reflection in your mirror.
Cristina seemed to notice the contemplative and somber look you donned so well and her firm visage softened ever-so slightly. “I know this can’t be easy, Meredith.” When did it become easy for you? “But you can’t keep punishing yourself like this.”
Was that what loving Addison is? A punishment? A mockery? Something that would drive you to insanity? Maybe it already did. “I’m in love with her.” You said as if that would suddenly, magically, paint Cristina the whole picture as to why you’re settling for less when someone out there could give you something more.
But you think there will never be a rational underpinning behind your innately complex nature. You’re far too… intricate for anyone’s reach. Too dark and too twisty.
Sometimes you think your intricacy was what tethered Addison into you because what could you possibly offer a woman like… that. What was the saying again? Opposites attract? That should probably be it, right? It should be, because you are but a mere intern with nothing but issues to provide and problems to pile while she was herself, the epitome of grace and beauty, intelligence and excellence morphed into one otherworldly creature to ever grace the earth with her presence. The presence you sorely missed, yearned, and craved.
You hear your person sigh and you know right away that you fell short as a friend, as a human being who should have possessed a sense of logicality, and as someone who should have known your worth.
She placed a hand atop yours and that’s the closest to a hug you’ll ever get from Cristina Yang, so you relish it still; the consolatory thumb skimming across your pale skin, the faint smile from her lips—she doesn’t understand you, but she tries. And that was enough. “It’s gonna be okay, Mer.”
Will it?
Turns out, nothing is okay. Because as you begin to ask her what was truly her intent with you, with this, she abruptly silences you with a searing kiss that fed, yet never tamed the beast raving within you. A kiss that transcends you to a sheer state of enlightenment in a trip to your own version of Nirvana where ephemerality is forever and you both lived happily ever after, but as you come down from the post-coital bliss, from the high, the intoxication of your favourite liquor that took a solidified shape as Addison Montgomery, you painfully and regretfully relapse to the reality of the world where you are in no happy ending and it gives you the worst kind of hungover where putting a gun to your head seems much, much more preferable.
As you hold her slumbering form in your arms, you can’t help but feel a little more empty and a little less yourself. She took something away again. It’s a piece of your morals, no doubt. And you’re letting her steal it to complete missing pieces of her own self without warranting any type of conviction nor protests from you, and that’s on you for treating this liaison as though it was a blessing in disguise when you know you would ruin yourself for her and that doesn’t necessarily signify a healthy… well, a healthy anything. You love her so you were more than willing to put your heart in her hands even if it meant getting crushed, dropped, or stomped upon. How did you end up in this predicament? How did you become the person who laughed at people like these to becoming one of them? Actually, you might even be the President of the fucking club. The joke you made was made for you now. God, you’re such a fucking hypocrite—a ridiculous one, too—it’s really sad and it’s a whole nother level of patheticness you didn’t ever think you’d stumble on.
You imagine your mother having a field day with this in whatever ebbing states of lucidity she’s currently in doing either of the two L’s she always did; laughing at your idiocy or lashing out at your idiocy, or on a really good day, doing both.
Whatever. Fuck her, fuck everyone who neglected and abandoned you. You’re the fucking sun and they can go suck it… well, maybe you’d vocalize that in a few years when you finally have something to brag about. When you’re not as stupid. Not as naïve. As gullible. Maybe in a few years when you’re stronger, braver—enough to resist her.
“I love you, Addie.” You whisper amongst the stillness of the room, attaching your quivering lips on her forehead as you cry silent tears.
When she stirs a bit, you haphazardly wipe any residuals of your anguish. Addison’s eyes flutter open and she beams, her perfect set of teeth in a wondrous array that blinds you so damn much you can’t even see past the end of your nose and you found yourself in the downward spiral once again. “Hi.” She mumbles in her raspy, morning voice.
“Hi.” You answer, mirroring her expression. You want to tell her how you feel, how this isn’t good for you anymore; you want to provide an ultimatum, but you know you can’t win. You always lose, so you stand against it because you will never be half the person her husband is. He was perfect—perfect for the woman who was so perfectly imperfect for you. “Did you sleep well?”
“The best. It always is when you’re with me, baby.” Fuck. Yeah, you might as well commit suicide now. In a rapid motion, she straddles you, her cobalt globes boring through your soul that kindles a digestive sea of flames in you that you might just combust into a puddle of goo. “You’re so beautiful, Mer.” She breathes out, her cadence fond and genuine you almost believed it.
You reach up a hand to cup her cheek as she lovingly leans into your touch. “That’s you.” You palmed the juncture where her neck meets her shoulder and you pull her down for a kiss. Before it can even escalate further to your liking, she retracts from you, letting out a soft giggle.
“Mer, I have to go. He might get suspicious, I told him I’d only go out for a run.” She explained.
Ah, of course. Borrowed time needs to be returned. You ignore the persisting ache in your chest and you forced a smug smirk to shroud the vulnerability that threatens to leak through your walls of resistance. “What do you mean a run? Sweetie, you went on a freaking marathon. Five times.” You fake a gasp.
She laughed, smacking you with a pillow as you prop yourself on your elbows. You watched her get dressed and you smiled a smile that never quite reaches your eyes. You knew eventually the anesthetic drug would only work a handful of times, and that soon enough you’ll get immune to the drug… but not the pain. Never the pain.
“I’ll make sure nobody sees you leave and distract George and Izzie.” You announced and she shot you a grateful look.
Then she left… and took your heart with her. You can always stop; Addison will respect whatever decision you make because that’s just how good and reasonable of a person she is. But see, the thing is, it’s you who doesn’t have enough willpower to call a halt to this, it’s you who wouldn’t be able to recover from the heartbreak, it’s you who will suffer the most, it’s you who will have nothing left because it’s her that you want. She’s what you’ve always wanted even before you knew it. And this way, even if it’s through locked on-call rooms, murky parking lots, and tip-toes across your own house—this way you have her. And as the vestigial scent of vanilla perfume the only trace of her smooth, velvet skin, slender arms and longs legs, encapsulating you in a whimsical warmth that, truth be told, left you more bare than ever, colder than usual, emptier than before, you allow the lines between reality and fantasy cease to exist.
You lost a patient, and you’re in the scrub room on the brink of breaking down as you try to scrub out the last ounce of bacteria in your skin as though it would cleanse you in a spiritual sense, too. As though after this, you won’t feel disgusted with yourself anymore, as if you’ll be able to look at yourself in the mirror again. You half hoped it would, if it were that easy to take away the fact that you’re a dirty, adulterous whore; a homewrecker on a world-class degree, then you wouldn’t have to feed this unrelenting need to punish yourself every damn day.
Oh, the parity of despair that you’ll share with your patient’s family once you deliver them the godforsaken news. Everything’s slipping through the tips of your fingers and you can’t do anything about it; your mom thinks you’re her best friend as her disease gradually diminishes the capacity of her most prized possession and you’re under duress to watch it unravel. Your liver’s mourning for the non-tequila-soaked nights, and on top of that, you had to pretend to Cristina that you’re not with her anymore.
But you have a feeling she knows… she always does, and you’re taking advantage of the benefit of the doubt that she keeps on giving you.
You were too engrossed in the feeling-sorry-for-yourself rabbit hole that you failed to realize the hand stopping you from scrubbing too aggressively. You looked down and saw how red and irritated your own hands became and there’s a stream of bullet shaped tears dripping down your cheeks. You heaved, wiping your face with the fabric of your shirt.
“Grey, are you okay?” Your resident asked you, deep-seated concern coating every word that befell from her usually snarky mouth.
“I’m fine, Dr. Bailey. I’m sorry, I — I will inform the family now.” You deadpanned, making a quick work to escape the asphyxiating vicinity.
God, it’ll take an idiot to accept that lame ass excuse.
You thought you could do this; the entwined hands under the table, the stolen kisses, the lingering stares, the fire that ignites within you in a widespread destruction of your inhibitions as her hand trails up and down your thighs, her lips a remnant of your borrowed happiness, her tongue a gentle caress of the time you begged to have—she was the crux of your world, so you thought you could still endure the pain and get behind clandestine meetings… but as you watch her from across the bar, smiling and laughing with a sound your ears oh-so desired to hear in a berceuse that sings you to sleep, you smiled bitterly to yourself—that should be me—a sentiment that could never be as true as it was in your wildest dreams and it irks you how her husband doesn’t even seem to know how terribly fortunate he is that he gets to wake up beside the woman that you love, the woman you’d be on one knee for as he tracks your move with those two pools of dreamy eyes. Fucking hell, that should be you in his shoes.
Still, you don’t rule happiness out of your life. Maybe someday someone will come and patch up the tapestry that she shred, maybe someday someone would be able to take you out for dancing, and maybe someday, that someone won’t leave you standing, but until then, as you subject yourself to another plight of agonizing misery, you think about how lovely of a bride she would have made; what a shame you’re fucked in your head, though.
She raises a glass your way to showcase the budding friendship that you had in the name of civility (and for the sake of Derek and his neurotic overly moussed hair, seriously he can go fuck himself) So, in honour of that, you did the same. And as is every moment, you know, deep down, that you will never be the one that she’ll want to spend the rest of her life with. It’s the champagne problems, you think. The severe case of abandonment, the inability to fully commit, the issues most people pass over as nothing short of a walk in the park, not seeing it for what it really was—a terrified, ill-equipped little girl waiting for mommy to finish her surgery so that she could cash more fame and currency heedlessly forgetting the family she put in agony.
You’re simply too fucked up to be wanted. There’s too much water under the thing or whatever.
You, Meredith Grey, will never be her one.
And that’s the thing about illicit affairs.
“Keep ‘em coming, Joe.”