Chapter Text
It’s been a year since the plane crash.
A year since you, Arizona, Callie and Lexie moved to Portland and the four of you collectively opened up your own practice.
A year since you buried one of your best friends and his wife. A year since you and Lexie became Zola’s legal guardians.
A year since you proposed to Lexie Caroline Grey and decided not to waste any more time.
You mindlessly adjust the wedding band on your left hand when you walk into the double doors of Shepherd-Grey Memorial Hospital, a name you and your wife came up with together when you first made the move. You both decided that instead of grieving the people you loved, you'd put your efforts into something positive. Something good.
Lexie finished up her fifth year of residency at Shepherd-Grey as quickly as she could and was now in the middle of her fellowship in Neurology. Derek took the smaller Grey under his wing, so you have no doubts that you'll have to strongly suggest a different program for your head of Neuro soon enough.
You're proud of the work you've done, all that you've achieved since the plane went down. The unconventional family you've built.
You just wish Derek and Meredith were here to see it.
You sink into your chair, and adjust your nameplate that reads:
Mark Sloan, Chief of Surgery.
For years you had aspired to be Chief, but now you find yourself missing being behind a scalpel as often as you were.
Drowning in paperwork was a dull way to live.
You look out at the glimmering seaport - Lexie thought the chief’s office should have the best view in Grey-Shepherd Memorial - and watch as a tugboat passes underneath the bridge. For a moment, you think of Derek, how your best friend would make you tag along to his weekend fishing trips. You were never too keen on fishing, but you always wound up having a good time with him.
Besides, there wasn’t much you wouldn’t have done for that man.
If he was here, you wouldn't feel the way that you do either.
“Mark?”
You were so lost in your thoughts that you must’ve missed Callie knock. You stroke your beard with your fingertips out of habit and sit up straight in your chair. More chief like.
“Dr. Torres. I assume your arthroscopy went smoothly?”
The mother of your child walks further into the room and hands you a thick chart, turned to a specific page. “He’s in recovery, I just need you to sign off on these.”
You cross your t’s and dot your i’s quickly and hand the chart back to Callie. You expect her to leave, but she lingers behind. “Was there something else, Dr. Torres?”
The dark haired woman squishes the hefty paperwork beneath her arm and asks, “Is everything okay? You seem off and you haven’t left your office all day. It's not like you.”
“I’m fine,” you half lie. You are fine. Not good, but not bad either.
“Look, I’m going to be blunt here,” she says, sitting at the edge of your desk. Usually you’d berate one of your employees for doing so, but she co-owns the hospital that paid for your desk. “Arizona hasn’t been the same since the crash. Every time there’s a loud noise or a plane flying overhead, she freaks out. She’s still figuring out how to navigate her life with a prosthetic.”
“Where are you going with this, Torres?” I've got things to do.”
“All I’m saying is, I’m here. I wasn't there when it all happened, and I can only imagine what you all went through in those woods but you’re not the same either, Mark. You’ve closed yourself off. The man I used to know is not behind those eyes,” the woman accused, pointing at your face. “Have you even spoken to Lexie about the days you spent out there?”
“No,” you reveal dejectedly, getting up from your chair and facing out the window toward the seaport. It calms you, you realize. “Truthfully Callie? I don’t even know what I would say,” you sigh.
“Mark, you lost your best friend-”
“She lost everything,” you yell, and you don't mean to, but holding it all in obviously hasn't done you any good. You bang your fist on the glass of the window, shattering it to small pieces. You bring your fist to your line of vision and there’s blood dripping down the side of your hand. Callie grabs a few tissues quickly and applies pressure to your hand, but it doesn't seem to be helping all that much. “She lost her mother and now her sister? Her father was hardly around and now she's lost function in her leg. She's been walking around with a damn cane, Callie. She won't even look at me and I miss her I- I miss Lexie.”
You don't even realize you're crying until you feel a tear fall onto your bloodied hand.
“Let’s get you cleaned up, Mark. I’ll page maintenance about the window.”
You didn’t have any fight left in you to argue with her.
//
You make your way to Peds as quickly as you can after receiving Arizona’s page. You wonder if Nathaniel, the little boy you operated on last week was rejecting the skin graft you made.
You never let it show how hard Peds cases get to you, but they always do.
“Robbins, you paged?” You ask, greeting a few of the nurses at their station. If this was a different time in a different hospital, you'd be leaning over the counter, charming your way into an on-call room.
But now? You hardly notice whether they're attractive or not - only if they're efficient at their job or not.
“Chief, let’s talk in private,” the blonde says, directing you to a supply closet on that particular floor.
“Robbins, if this is about Nathaniel Adeleke, I can schedule an OR for this afternoon for another approach. Maybe a free flap would keep the graft more secure.”
“No, no Nathaniel is fine. It's about Dr. Grey,” she reveals, crossing her arms. “You know I wouldn't betray her confidence unless it were serious but- she had a tough time with her microdiscectomy this morning.”
“Is she okay?” It's pathetic, but it's all you can offer. “Is the patient all right?”
“I'm not sure. I think you should talk to her, Mark.”
Easier said than done, you think, but as Chief of Surgery you have a duty to your patients and a reputation to uphold. “I’ll speak to her. Thank you Arizona.” You struggle to get the words out, “I’m grateful that Lexie has you as a friend.”
You disappear before the blonde could say anything more. You take the elevator to the large chart hanging on the wall of the surgical floor to see which OR Dr. Grey was located in.
You scrub into OR three and you find your wife inside of someone’s brain. You’re in awe of her - how delicate she manages to be with a scalpel in her hands. How far she’s come as a surgeon since you met her all those years ago during her intern year.
You bridge the gap between you and stand adjacent to her, admiring her work.
“I heard you had a hard day today,” you say, watching her careful hands move through brain matter.
“You heard or Robbins told you?”
Her voice is even, still completely focused on the task at hand. Her mannerisms remind you of another Neurosurgeon you used to know. He was her teacher after all. “I just wanted to make sure everything was okay.”
“The patient is fine Chief Sloan,” Lexie says thickly, mocking your title. Even if your wife didn't intend to sound that way, it stung a little where you felt it shouldn't. “You won't have to worry about a lawsuit.”
You look her dead in the face, even if she's still laser sharp focused on nerves and tissue.
“The patient isn't the only reason I came here, Lex,” you huff, continuing to stare at the dark eyes above her surgical mask. “You're my wife. Although sometimes I think you forget that.”
You remove your own mask and throw it into the trash aggressively. Before you leave, you stop in front of the double doors momentarily as she mirrors words you've said once - a different time.
“Yeah, walk away. You're good at that.”
And you do, leaving your wife worse off than she was when you scrubbed in with her.
//
You purposely get home late that night. It's Friday - and you're not in the mood to wait for Lexie to get home from, well, wherever it is she goes with Callie and Arizona. So you finish up the last of your paperwork and oversee one of your residents’ first solo surgeries.
Callie told you that Lexie doesn't confide in her and you wonder if she's lent an ear to Arizona, but you don't ask. If your wife wanted you to know how she felt, she'd come to you herself.
You grab a beer from the fridge and throw some leftovers in the oven. In the meantime, you check on your daughters who you put to bed after the sitter left. They're both beautiful girls who've been through so much.
You silently vow to make sure the rest of their lives are as normal as possible.
You're halfway done with your food and flipping through the channels when you hear a crash outside your front door. And giggling. A lot of giggling.
You go to check the source of the noise, but you're sure you know what you'll find on the other side of the door.
“Oh hey Mark,” your wife slurs and then laughs at Callie who's holding her up and chuckling herself.
Arizona beeps from the car and throws a wave your way. Clearly she was the designated driver tonight while you were watching the kids.
“Thanks for taking care of her Torres, but I've got this,” you say, picking up the potted plant Lexie seemed to have knocked over and guide her into the house.
You see that Callie gets back to the car all right and watch her give Arizona a sloppy kiss on the lips and grab her hand. As they pull away from the driveway, you're happy for them, you are, but it makes you incredibly sad to be excluded.
Lexie is sprawled out on the couch and eating the rest of your lo mein with her fingers when you get back. “Did you want a fork? Maybe some chopsticks?”
“No,” she spits out, like your request offended her. Maybe you meant to. “I'm good, thanks.”
She continues scarfing down your food for a while until she freezes. “Mark. I think I'm going to be sick.”
You run and grab the trash can from the kitchen and put it underneath the brunettes mouth. Luckily you had just taken the garbage out.
You hold her hair and run her back as the contents of her stomach spill out into the bin. “It's okay,” you whisper. “You're okay.”
After a few minutes, you think she's done so you grab her a bottle of water. You open it for her and make her drink at least half of the bottle - she's probably dehydrated.
“I'm sorry,” Lexie says, leaning back into the couch. “I'm so sorry.”
And she passes out.
//
A patient died on your table.
You did everything you could, but still, a patient died on your table during a simple procedure. Their heart stopped and Dr. Morgan, the head of Cardiothoracics, did everything he could to revive them. But there was a leak and he couldn't get it to stop bleeding.
You slam your fists into the sink after scrubbing out - you managed to get blood on your hands, the symbolism not lost on you- and you realize you aren't alone. Your wife is standing at the doorframe, saying nothing, just watching your doctors prepare the deceased for the morgue through the glass.
“Did you need something?” You ask her, and you try not to sound like a dick, you really do, but a patient just died on your table and you don't have it in you for pleasantries with someone who hardly looks in your direction most days.
Everyone is gone by this point, so when you turn off the sink, it's dead silent. “No, but it looks like you do.”
You know what she's implying, but you don't have the desire to fuck in an on-call room right now. “I'm not in the mood, Lexie. Just- just go.”
Despite your demand, she knows you. She knows you and you hate that she does right now, because she's shaking her head and walking closer to you. Her eyes are darker than you've seen them in a while and you're fully aware of what it means. You’ve been busy lately trying to keep your numbers up and you haven’t had the time to spend that kind of time with Lexie.
Or at least that’s what you tell yourself.
The brunette takes her right hand and wraps it around your neck, pulling you closer and the small contact of her fingertips makes you shudder beneath her touch. Her lips are inches from yours and you can feel everything you've been missing since the last time the two of you did this - only it's been heightened because of the events of your day.
Lexie leans in closer, but you stop her. “Not here,” you say, and you guide her out of the OR by her arm.
You wind up in your office - it has a couch, you reason with yourself, but the truth is, you just don't want to feel dirtier than you already do. There's nothing clean about not being able to save a patient.
You close the door and bless the architect who designed your office because though the large windows are made of glass, no one on the outside can see what's going on.
You try not to remember that you had the place modeled after Chief Webber’s office.
You're hardly in the room when Lexie starts kissing your lips and pulling off your clothes in the process. She hardly disconnects from you when she pulls off her lab coat and scrubs, leaving herself in only her bra and her matching thong.
You wonder if she had planned to fuck you in your office today, but you don't dwell on it too much. Instead, you shove her against your desk and plant kisses down Lexie's neck while she presses her hand to your bulge over your briefs - the only article of clothing you still have on.
The brunette’s breaths grow deeper and shorter as you hit her pulse points and you're so fucking turned on by her touch. You run your hands along her body - you dig your fingernails into her back and a resonating moan escapes her throat. In turn, she grabs your dick harder and faster and yeah, you've long forgotten about the dead patient that was lying open on your table just an hour ago.
You unclasp Lexie's bra with your thumb and middle finger in one swift motion and immediately draw your hands to her breasts, kneading them and rubbing soft circles on her nipples with your fingertips. You're using more tongue in your kisses and she pulls you closer to her so she can rip your briefs off.
She leaps off the desk, still holding onto your cock by her hand and gets on her knees. You don't normally ask her to do this, but she takes you into her mouth without hesitation - and you weren't strong enough to protest anyway.
You run your fingers through her hair, pushing it away from her face so you can see it while she sucks. She's beautiful and turned on and you try not to think about anything else but being with her right now.
“You’re so bea-”
“Shut up,” she says, detaching her mouth from you and standing back up. She takes the last of her own clothes off and hops back on your desk, pupils blown. Lexie was seemingly set out for only one thing. “Just- Just fuck me.”
You nod and pull her closer to you by her hips and kiss her neck, her collarbone, her stomach, everywhere you possibly can while teasing her clit with your fingers. She's grabbing at your dick again, growing harder from the combination of the brunette’s touches and her moaning underneath you.
You make the decision to knock the few items off of your desk with your arm, including some important documents, but you couldn't give a fuck right now if you tried. She situates herself better and you place both your legs on either side of her body, climbing further down so you can reach her center.
You kiss down her bikini line while continuing to tease her clit with your fingers. She's really wet, so you stick two fingers into her folds and take her clit into your mouth.
This wasn't necessarily what she'd asked you to do, but when it comes to sex, you were nothing if not thorough. “Mark,” she pants, grabbing at your chest, but not quite being able to reach anywhere further. “Fuck.”
Her back is arched off the desk and it's so fucking hot that you stroke your cock a few times before slipping your tongue inside her.
It's her favorite move of yours by a landslide.
“Mark, fuck,” Lexie moans, pulling your hair with one hand and shoving your face further into her with the other. “Please.”
It's all you need to pull yourself up and slip yourself inside of her. You have your hand wrapped around Lexie's throat, like she likes it when you're on top, and she feels so fucking good around your cock.
Making love to your wife never gets old, especially now. It's the only connection you've been able to maintain in all of this, but you're not sure she sees it the same way that you do.
Lexie pushes you slightly so she can dismantle herself from you, and climbs on top, riding you instead. You don't allow her to do much of the work, instead you grab her hips and make the movements for her.
Watching her on top of you almost sends you over the edge, but you try to hold it in so she can come first. That alone would instantly make you come yourself.
You free one hand from her hip so you can wrap your hand around her throat again and apply just the right amount of pressure. Lexie's still riding your cock and an increasingly fast rate. Her breaths growing more ragged, moaning your name.
You don't hold back your own grunts anymore and go back to moving her hips with your hands. You're on the verge of coming before she releases another slew of swear words and “I'm gonna come.” You're both hitting climax, you can sense it, and it feels way too good physically and emotionally to pull out.
And as she comes on your dick as the same time you finish she doesn't let you.
You stay inside of her for a moment while everything slows down - your breathing and your heart rates - but she eventually climbs off of you and lays on your chest.
“I love you,” your wife, your world whispers in your ear. Lexie climbs off of you quickly and throws her scrubs back on, like she said something embarrassing, like she'd never said those words to you before.
She's out the door in record time and you utter a soft, “I love you too” to the closed door.
//
“Dr. Sloan?”
You've been sitting in the hospital psychiatrist’s office for twenty minutes now, staring into your lap. What a waste of time.
“Chief Sloan, you scheduled this session yourself. While I know it isn't mandatory to talk, I think you have something you need to get off of your chest,” Dr. Porter hypothesized. She was a nice enough woman - you hired her yourself, but right now you wanted to be doing anything but this.
“I um. I-” You attempted to talk about how you and your wife have been estranged for months. How after your wedding and your move out here something shifted.
How she often initiates sex every so often, but you never speak. How it's rough and desperate, but far from loving because you don't see the woman you love anymore when you look at her.
How she's still the most beautiful woman you think you've ever known in your life, but you can't find her.
So you talk about something safer. “I hate paperwork.”
It's a start.
//
It’s Zola’s third birthday and the four of you decide that it needed to be really special this year.
Arizona and Lexie went to the shops and bought streamers, party hats, and a pinata, which you’re positive the adults will wind up destroying anyway. You provide the drinks and snacks along with the meat and bee themed napkins and plates (bees are her favorite, it was the least you could do).
“The Castillos should be over by 4 with Julio and Janet said she and Zoe would be here at 3:30,” Lexie tells Arizona and Callie.
You throw your kiss the chef apron on and ask your wife if she needs anything before you check on your meat that’s been marinating all night in the refrigerator.
“I think we’re set, Mark,” she replies, the distance in her eyes something you’re familiar with. Since the crash, Lexie has spent more time with Arizona - Callie informed you that they bonded after working on a particularly heartbreaking Peds case. The blonde’s amputation of her leg and Lexie’s loss of function in hers paved the way for a long overdue friendship. They would go out for drinks at a small dive bar not far from Grey-Shepherd a few times a week, food tastings, even the grocery store when it was impossible for you to get there yourself.
You wanted your current best friend’s wife and your wife to get along, you’re just not sure that Lexie favoring time with Arizona over you was was what you had in mind.
“I didn’t realize how much big Sloan loved cooking,” you overhear Arizona tell Lexie over a glass of wine.
“Mark’s a great cook,” your wife says loud enough for you to hear, and your head snaps to her. She's beautiful, you think, but so very broken. You smile at her and you know it reaches your eyes, because she manages to nod in your direction before turning back to Arizona and changing the conversation.
You long for the way things used to be. Derek was your brother and Callie was your best friend for sure. But before the crash, if anyone had asked you who your best friend was, you’d say Lexie Grey.
But now?
The woman playing with your adopted daughter you hardly recognize.
Lexie is looking at Zola like she’s her world - everything she loves and everything she’s lost in the tips of her fingers - and then she looks at you, and you know something is different about her. You just can't figure out what.
You go outside and begin throwing veggie burgers on the grill before you could find out.
You're flipping chicken and steak when you hear the screen door open and shut behind you.
“Smells good out here,” Lexie says cautiously, nursing a beer this time. “Do you need anything?”
“I- No, I'm okay. Thank you,” you nod. Mrs. Shepherd always taught you never to play with your food, but you're pushing eggplant and squash up and down the grill for sport.
You expect your wife to leave, but she lingers, coming up next to you as you shut the grill so the rest of the food can cook for your guests.
“Zola looks so happy with Sofia and her friends here,” she half smiles. “I'm happy we could do that for her despite-”
Lexie stops herself, because if she continued saying what she was saying it'd mean you'd have to talk. The very thing you've been avoiding since you tied the knot tied up to your respective IVs.
“Kids are adaptable,” you manage, reflecting on what Addison would say in between silences way back when. “My girls are fighters.”
“You have two very strong children Mark. You're a lucky man.”
“I know. And I wasn't just talking about Zola and Sofia,” you explain, lifting the cover to the grill and resuming your grilling duties.
//
“So Chief Sloan. We talked all about how you miss performing as many surgeries for the last few sessions. And we...touched on the trauma you experienced last year,” Dr. Porter says, adjusting her glasses with her pointer finger. She has about ten years on you, which doesn't quite make her old enough to be your mother, but she sure has the air of one.
You really need to call Mrs. Shepherd.
You have the decency to look guilty for what Dr. Porter is saying. You have been dancing around the heart of your issues, because you're terrified that she's going to tell you that you aren't fixable. That your marriage isn't either.
“Okay. Well what about surgery? Have you figured out a way to make yourself happier at work?”
Again, you just sit there and look guilty.
“Dr. Porter, I don't even know how to talk about my issues, how am I supposed to fix my life? My marriage?”
You stare out the window at a bird perched on the frame of the glass. You wish you could take flight like she could - the endless possibilities you could have if you just let yourself.
“Well now we're getting somewhere,” the older woman smiles.
“How is any of what I said ‘getting somewhere?’”
“Not to get all psychologist on you, but if I can recall, the first step is admittance. You're admitting you don't know how to put yourself or your marriage back together. That's hell of a something, Dr. Sloan.”
You allow yourself to be proud for a moment, but you don't let the feeling linger for too long. You have a lot of work to do.
“Things have been bad, doc,” you sigh, not meeting Dr. Porter’s eyes. You tell the woman about your relationship with Lexie, how you have to hide what's going on from your kids. How Callie and Arizona have been saving your asses when they have their own shit to work through.
It feels good to get it off your chest.
“I think something's shifting though,” you nod. “I feel like things are getting better. I don't know how, but- I think they are.” You tell her about Zola's birthday and how your wife came to you first without picking a fight or initiating sex. Something she hasn't done for a year. “I think Lexie and I are going to be ok, I can feel it I- I love her so much and I- I think we're going to be okay.”
“I think you're right, Chief. You're getting there,” Dr. Porter smiles. “You're getting there.”
//
You decide to build a treehouse.
Whatever this rough patch is with Lexie, you feel like it's nearing some kind of head, even if you aren't talking about it. You're communicating, even if it's about trivial things. You're just glad you're able to be civil with the woman you're so hopelessly in love with, so you're building a treehouse.
Lexie's had to go in for an emergency Craniotomy, so you decide to work on this - you'd went to Lowe’s for wood, screws, sandpaper and other materials you needed and began working on it straight away. After a few hours of hard work, you had a solid foundation for the treehouse.
You’re working on the platform when you hear a voice from the ground.
“Hey,” the brunette calls up the ladder.
“You’re home early,” you yell down, wiping some sweat off of your brow. It’s dark outside and drastically colder, but the exertion of power drilling and hammering away all day has your body temperature at an accelerated rate.
“Yeah, well. Turns out there was a mix up with the Chief Resident and- it doesn’t matter, actually. Have you and Zola eaten dinner yet?”
You move a few wooden boards around until they’re lined up to their proper position. “Zola’s with Callie and Arizona, I hope that's okay,” you say, hammering away at a particularly temperamental nail.
“Of course it's okay,” Lexie says in between the loud noise. “Mark, not to sound daft but- what are you doing?”
You think about telling her, you do, but you're steps ahead of this place you're in with your wife. It's not really surprising - you've always jumped the gun in your relationship, but you don't want to scare her off this time.
You're ready to do things right, when you're both ready for it. The treehouse will take time, you just hope you'll be past this by the time it's finished.
“Can't tell you that Little Grey,” you mutter, taking a sip from the mug with a stethoscope on it. A gift from Sofia from Father's Day this year.
“You haven't called me that in a long time, Mark,” Lexie says, looking you in the face - hers lost in memories, you're sure. “Do you think- do you think we can get back there?”
The question is vague, but you know exactly what Lexie means. “No,” you answer truthfully, taking the seat across from her. “But we can move forward.”
“We've been doing this dance for so long that I'm not sure we can,” the brunette counters, tears welling up in her eyes.
At least you know she can still feel. You know now that Lexie has been dealing silently, while you were pushing every thought of the messes of your life of the past year from your mind completely.
Everything seems so clear now in the chill of a Portland evening.
“A treehouse.”
Lexie looks completely confused. “What?”
“It's a treehouse. I'm building a treehouse,” you nod off to the few hunks of wood in the biggest oak in your backyard. You exhale heavily into the night and brace yourself for what you're about to say next.
“There's a reason why we're here. There's a reason we survived, Lex. And I'm sorry it took me so long to realize why.
“What we have? It transcends life. It transcends death and I'm ready. I'm ready, but some things must fixed first. Something,” you amend. “We need to fix ourselves, us, so that we can continue our life together.”
Lexie looks like she wants to bolt and run as she takes in your words, but to your sheer luck she doesn't.
She just sits and lets what you've said sink in, so you let her for a little while and go back to hammering away at the treehouse.
But before you do, you tell Lexie, “It’s for our kids. The treehouse. I know we’re already a family, you, me, Zola and Sofia, but- I love you and Ii want to have a baby with you. I want to look at my kid and see your eyes in him. That's what I'm doing.”
You leave her there, stunned.
//
Lexie brings you hot chocolate and a padded sweatshirt after a while.
The gesture shocks you, because like other little moments you've had recently, it seems genuine, not mechanical like things have been. She sets the mug down on the table on the deck and sits, sipping from her own steaming cup.
You slide the sweatshirt over your head and go retrieve the coco. When Lexie hands you the mug, you realize this - and her kindness toward you at Zola's party - you realize this is an olive branch.
Something is shifting, even now, and you think you've figured out why. She’s trying.
“Remember when I thought I was dying underneath that hunk of metal from the plane and I told you to tell Meredith that she was a good sister?” Truth is, you try to forget that moment as best you can, but you nod for Lexie’s sake. For her to keep opening up to you for the first time in a long time. “I lied. I didn’t want to die and leave her to think that she...that she could’ve done more. But Mark? She could’ve done more and I am so angry at her for that.”
You wipe the tears from her eyes as delicately as you can and interlace the fingers on your right hand with her left. “It’s okay to be angry, Lex.”
“It’s not,” she sniffles and more tears fall. “I feel so guilty for walking around with this feeling all day. When I’m charting, in surgery, on my walk home. I feel so angry and guilty and I try not to take any of it out on you. So it’s better to not talk about it. The same way I’m sure it’s easier for you to not talk about how a part of you died when you lost Derek.”
It’s hard to look at your wife when the truth falls from her mouth as it does. She’s right, and after bottling your feelings for so long, you figure it’s time to give the love of your life a break.
“I- I started seeing the counselor at the hospital,” you whisper. “To deal with things a little better. But I didn’t want to talk about Derek with him until I talked to you.”
Lexie shifts herself closer on the bench and runs her fingers through your hair as you speak. “You could’ve talked to him, Mark. I wouldn’t have been angry.”
“It seemed...wrong somehow. It’s just- he wasn’t just my best friend, Lexie. Derek was my brother. I’ve known him my entire life. His mother practically raised me.”
“I remember,” Lexie smirks, and you do too for a moment, remembering when Mrs. Shepherd came to town when he and Lexie began seeing each other.
But you remember that her only son is now dead, and your wife allows you to rest your head on her shoulder. She moves her fingers to your cheeks and plays with your beard hair, something she usually does when she thinks you’re asleep.
“I went to Seattle for Derek because I missed him too much, not because of Addison. And now I don’t know how to enjoy a life that doesn’t include my brother.”
“We both lost a lot that day, didn’t we,” Lexie says, wiping a stray tear from your face. You shift and turn your head so you can look at your wife properly, meeting her eyes for the first time in months.
“We did, but I’m so thankful I didn’t lose you in all of this, Lex,” you choke, cupping your wife’s cheek and she crashes her lips into yours hard. “I love you so much.”
You both feel yourselves letting go as you tangle your fingers into her dark hair and she wraps her arms around your neck. “I love you too,” she says through her tears.
Kissing Lexie feels like you were in limbo, and you’re finally coming home. It’s knowing that this conversation, and the many conversations that will probably occur after this one, was the solace you both needed.
Tangling yourself into your wife makes you feel like everything is going to be okay.
“So. Wanna bolt some screws?” You ask, revving the drill enthusiastically. You love drills. Lexie, seemingly had other plans.
“No, the saw oh my god that looks so fun,” she says, nearly knocking you over while running to the power tool. All you can do is smile widely at the woman you love, a smile that finally reaches your eyes for the first time since the plane crash.
She’s back, you think. And you’re getting there yourself, one day at a time.
“Oh and I probably should've mentioned before,” the brunette says, sliding your goggles onto her face, saw in hand, “I'm pregnant.”