it was a great love (one for the ages) / DISCONTINUED

Candlelit Dinner

A week has flown by and a lot has already changed. After a lot of talking, Meredith decided she needed to go to therapy. She visits the hospital's psychiatrist once a week after her shift is over, and Addison waits until she's done to pick her up and go back home.

Addison, George, and Izzie have been getting really close, and when Meredith gets home after them, she sometimes eavesdrops from another room to listen to the three of them interact and laugh together. Not that she'd admit it.

    Addison and Meredith have been getting really close, too. They go on dates whenever they can, or they go to the park to talk and enjoy the view. Sometimes, Meredith sneaks into Addison's room at night because she doesn't want to feel lonely. Addison was content with it. They are still keeping their relationship a secret, with the exception of Izzie, George, and Dr. Bailey. They had their suspicions that Derek knew, but if he did, he certainly wasn't making it obvious. Meredith and Derek mended things over for the sake of their work dynamic, and Addison is still friends with him.

    Long story short, everything was going really well. There was this one incident where Meredith flushed her mother's ashes down the sink in a scrub room and freaked Addison out, but other than that, life felt really good.

  

    One quiet night, Addison and Meredith are cuddled on the couch, watching a romantic movie. Of course, it being Meredith and Addison, they made fun of the cheesy romantic tropes throughout the entire movie.

    "Come on, with the cliches! Where's the originality?" Addison whined at the TV. Meredith laughs and throws popcorn at Addison's head. Addison chuckles and lightly taps Meredith's nose.

    "I have to admit... the candlelit dinner was really sweet," Meredith gushed.

Addison hums and smiles. She had a plan.

  

    After the movie ended, Meredith went straight to bed. "I have a surgery tomorrow," she said. Addison let her go, but not before giving her a goodnight kiss. That night, Addison stayed up to plan out a candlelit dinner for Meredith. She had an off-day the next day, so it was the perfect time to set up before Meredith got home. She knew that George was staying over at Callie's, and Izzie was staying at the hospital to keep an eye on a patient.

    Meredith leaves the next morning after breakfast and Addison gets to work. She cleaned up the house and pushed the furniture to the sides in the living room, then set up a small round table in the middle. She rummaged through the storage closet and pulled out a white tablecloth, perfect size for the table. She settles on spaghetti carbonara, red wine, and sourdough bread and makes a trip to the grocery store.

It was nearing the end of Meredith's shift when Addison finished cooking and setting up the table. She had on light makeup and got dressed up in a tight black dress and pulled her hair into a low ponytail. Of course, that's when she realized she didn't have candles set up. For a candlelit dinner.

"Oh... crap."

Addison runs around the house, into every storage closet, every cupboard, every room. After a hasty search of the house, Addison finds a pack of once used birthday candles and an obviously electric tea light-- that's missing its batteries.

In defeat, she takes the pack of birthday candles into the kitchen and pulls out a rectangular plate. She melts off some of the wax on the bottom of the candles to stick it onto the plate before lighting them up. Addison grumbles and puts the plate on the side of the table. Addison looks over at the door when she hears it open.

    "Hey, I'm home. Where ar-" Meredith stops.

    Addison smiles warmly. "Hi."

    Meredith is... she doesn't know what she's feeling. She hears Addison chuckle and pull on her wrist.

    "Surprise," Addison presses a kiss to Meredith's cheek. Meredith smiles affectionately.

    "Wow, you... you did all this for me?"

    "Of course I did. You said you liked the candlelit dinner from the movie yesterday, and I wanted to surprise you. I also heard that your surgery went well, so we also have something to celebrate."

    Meredith stares lovingly into Addison's eyes. "How did you hear that?"

    Addison shrugs. "I have my sources."

    Meredith sets her bag down and pulls Addison into a kiss.

    "Thank you so much."

    Addison gave her another peck and led her to the table. Meredith sits down and something catches her eye.

    "Are those... birthday candles?"

    Addison laughs nervously. "I uh, I couldn't find any tea lights. And by the time I remembered, it was too late to go out and buy some."

    Meredith's laughs made Addison's heart jump in her chest.

    "It's perfect. You're perfect."

    "No, you are."

Their dinner goes very well. They talked about the surgery Meredith got to scrub in on, how the interns had a hotdog eating contest during lunch. Addison shared about how she nearly set the kitchen on fire while baking the bread and ended up buying a pre-made loaf of it from a bakery. Sometimes, they just sat quietly and stared into each other's eyes.

Meredith sat at the table sipping her wine while watching Addison clear the table, "because you had a long surgery and you deserve a break," she had said.

Once Addison was done, Meredith links her hand with Addison's and heads for her room.

"Come on, let's go to bed."

Addison smiles. "Are you tired?"

Meredith turns around and smiles playfully. "I never said anything about sleeping."

Addison raises her eyebrows and picks up Meredith over her shoulder, Meredith laughing the whole time.