Who Would Have Thought

Chapter 16

"Are you following me now?"

"What?" Meredith frowned as Derek smirked at her, causing her to stop in her tracks.

"You're following me," Derek smirked more.

"I'm not."

"You're not?" he raised an eyebrow.

"I'm...definitely not," she shook her head fervently. Or she had been. She had seen him and she had...she had wanted to talk to him. Or watch his surgery. Or something. But she wasn't following him. Or she was following him but not in a creepy stalker way. Just in a...following people closely kind of way.

"Okay, I was joking but now I think I might have been right," he laughed.

"I wasn't following you," she sighed. "I'm definitely...not following you. Just...walking behind you towards the same place you are...but that doesn't mean I'm following you."

"Is that definition of following found in the same dictionary as the word Dereky?"

"You're an ass."

"Ass, you were staring at my ass?"

"What?" she stared at him. Okay, he was a freak. He was a complete and total..."Why would I...I said you were an ass. Not that I was staring at...I'm not staring at your ass."

"Of course you wouldn't admit to it," he shrugged.

"Did you hit your head or something today?"

"No."

"I think you did."

"Why?" he laughed.

"Because you're being...Markish," she frowned.

"I'm not being Markish," Derek frowned.

"You're definitely being Markish," she giggled.

"How am I being Markish?"

"I called you an ass and you turned it into a sexual innuendo."

"Okay, that's just guyish."

"No, it's Markish."

"Guyish."

"Definitely Markish."

"And you're being....stalkerish."

"I am not stalking you."

"Where are you headed?"

"I um...down the hall," she stammered.

"Where down the hall?" he asked, his smirk returning.

"Just...down the hall to a...room..."

"A room?"

"A room. Walls, a floor, ceiling...room."

"Hmmm..."

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You did the hmmm thing. Which means you're thinking. Or you don't believe me...or...something."

"It means hmmm, Mer."

"No, it doesn't. It means things. It means you're thinking things."

"I'm thinking you were following me."

"I was not..."

"It's okay if you were."

"I wasn't."

"Fine," he rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say."

"I was just...walking closely behind you," she sighed.

"Oh," he smiled. "Why?"

"I...don't know," she admitted quietly as a blush crept over her features.

"You don't know?"

"I just...I don't know."

"Hmm..." he nodded. "For what it's worth, I'm happy you were walking closely behind me."

"Oh," Meredith breathed, rocking slightly on her heels as she bit her lip. "Okay."

"Have you talked to Mark or Addie today?" he suddenly asked.

"No," she frowned. "Why?"

"He was supposed to tell her last night."

"Did he?" she smiled slightly.

"I don't know if he did, but it was the plan."

"Why don't you know if he did?" she asked. "You're his best friend. Shouldn't you know those things?"

"I'm sorry, Mer. I've been busy saving lives."

"Saving lives," she rolled her eyes.

"You're good at following people. Go follow him."

"I am not following Mark."

"Oh so it's just me you follow."

"Ye----I wasn't following you," she groaned.

"You're so fun to annoy."

"Don't you have lives to be saving?"

"Actually, I do," he nodded.

"Which is why you're standing outside the scrub room annoying me?"

"It is," he smirked.

"You should probably go save a life, Der," she rolled her eyes.

"Probably," he nodded. "We on for that supper I owe you tonight?"

"If you're not an ass."

"Good," he grinned.

"Saving lives, Derek."

"Going," he rolled his eyes.

"I'll see you later," she smiled.

"See you, Mer."

"Good luck on your surgery," she murmured, her hand brushing his wrist.

"Thanks," he whispered.

"Bye, Der," she sighed.

"Bye Mer."

She sighed as he gave her one more smile and then walked away, looking back at her once more before going into the scrub room. He was being..him. Derek was definitely being very Dereky and she wanted to be angry at him. Or annoyed with him. And instead her heart was pounding in her ears and she was pretty sure her hands couldn't stop shaking.

She liked it. She liked it far more than she was ready to admit but she liked him being Derek. She probably shouldn't. She had every reason to not want him being Dereky because he had promised her that he wasn't going to push and she didn't want him to. They were supposed to be figuring this out. But they couldn't figure this out if he was being Dereky.

When he was Dereky, her head went all cloudy and things just...things just didn't work right. When he was Dereky, she wanted to kiss him. Which was bad. Not that kissing would be bad, if she could remember correctly, Derek was a great kisser. But kissing him...kissing him would be terrible. Her brain would get even more fuzzy and she didn't need fuzzy right now.

She was thinking. She was thinking a lot. It seemed like recently all she did was think, at least when Derek wasn't making her brain fuzzy. She thought constantly. About him, it was always about him. About them. She couldn't stop thinking about them and that stupid house they were planning together. Which was insane. They definitely shouldn't be building a house together.

They weren't together. They weren't anywhere close to being together, and she definitely didn't even think she wanted to be with him. Or she did, she just...it wasn't a good idea. Them being together, them building a house together and being whatever they would could be...it would be a disaster. He would make promises again. And he'd swear to be there. And then things would fall apart again.

It had happened before. And maybe a lot had changed since then, actually everything had changed since then but still, he was still Derek and she was still Meredith. And they were still the same people who had been so frighteningly in love to only have it blow up in their faces twelve years before. And she couldn't do that again. She couldn't go through what he had done again.

He had loved her then. He had really loved her then and he had still been...Dereky. He had still not shown up, still left her, still chose work over her. Work was always more important in the end. And that was...he was trying to build up his career still. That wouldn't change. None of it would change. And she couldn't do it again. She really couldn't go through all of that again.

So she should probably just ignore the Derekyness. And the tiny things like the way her heart kind of jumped when they talked about the house or how warm and shaky she got when they touched. That wasn't enough. Because the first time had been like that. The first time had probably even been better than that but it had still gone so wrong. She couldn't build a relationship built on tiny things again.

She moved her way towards the gallery, thankful it was a slow day. She could watch him. She could watch him do surgery and pretend that her hands weren't shaky, pretend her heart wasn't still pounding way too fast. She had to learn to ignore those things. Those things led to admitting things and wanting things like a house. And that house...god, she wanted it.

It sounded perfect. She couldn't believe how perfect it sounded. She probably could have forgotten about it if he hadn't taken her there, to see the view. Because waking up the view every morning, wrapped in his arms, it kind of all sounded perfect. Completely perfect. Except it wouldn't be. It couldn't be. She had to remember that. She had to ignore the perfection or something.

Because once she didn't think about the view, once she ignored the perfection, everything else came rushing back. The hurt. The tears. Wondering if he was going to come home. All of that came back. And none of that was worth a perfect house with a perfect view. Even if the house had everything she could ever want with Derek, she didn't think she could want it that badly.

This was supposed to be easier. The feelings were supposed to be gone. Or maybe they had been. Everything was such a mess in her head that she couldn't even figure out if this was the same feelings she had had twelve years ago or if it was a completely new set of feelings. But they were there. The feelings were definitely there and were too confusing to think about.

Watching him was easy. Watching him cut was completely easy. His fingers moved perfectly, his every movement purposeful...he was a great surgeon. A really great surgeon. But then she would watch him and her thoughts would go to the fact that there were feelings there. Really, really big feelings. Feelings that wouldn't go away, no matter how scared she was.

She wasn't in love with him. She couldn't be in love with him. The idea of being in love with him was insane, or at least it seemed insane if she ignored the way her body felt at the pure thought. It was just feelings, really amazing feelings that made her want to do stupid things like fall into his arms and beg for a second chance. There was no way she was going to beg.

Meredith Grey did not beg. She didn't beg, and she wouldn't. And there wasn't anything to beg for anyway. She wasn't going to fall in love with him again. She couldn't. He had left. Years ago, he had left. He had left and they had been done and...there wasn't anything to start again. They were just going to be...whatever they were. And he'd build the house for someone else.

She was just helping him plan it because...she couldn't actually figure out why she was helping. But he would come to her with a completely amazing idea and things would just pop into her head. Things she wanted. Which didn't mean he had to have them because she wasn't going to live in the house. Even though she kind of was already in love with it. It wasn't hers.

It was Derek's. Derek's and...whomever he decided to marry. That's it. It wasn't her house. Even if it had the wrap around porch and the wood floors and the sun room...it wasn't her house. And Derek wasn't her Derek. Not anymore, not ever again. She was just Meredith now. Not Meredith and Derek. He might want her. He might want this, but she wasn't his anymore. They were done.

And they couldn't restart. After everything they had been through that would be...stupid. It would be stupid. He had changed. She knew that. He wasn't at all like the man she had dated years before, with the hiking and the fishing but he was still Derek. And she was terrified. She was terrified that history would repeat itself and there was no reason to do that again.

So this had to be it. They had to be coworkers and some weird strange hybrid of friends and...whatever they were. But they had to just let this go. The feelings would go away and they'd go back to normal. Or whatever normal was going to be now that they had figured everything out. They had talked, she had gotten closure, everything was fixed now.

Except the house that she still wanted so damn much it kind of scared her. She wanted it. She wanted it with Derek. She wanted it more than she had twelves years ago when they had talked about it. The house they were building in their minds was so much more them than the one in Cambridge. Their house. For their family. Her heart squeezed at how much she wanted it.

He looked up briefly, his eyes meeting hers and she could swear he winked. Ass. He was such an ass. A Dereky ass, but an ass all the same. But her heart was squeezing and tears rushed to her eyes as she thought about everything. About the house, about her shaking hands, about the way he smiled at her, or the way his breath tickled her skin when he got to close. And then came all the other thoughts. Bad thoughts.

About how many nights she had spent in his bed alone because he had promised to come home and never showed up. Or how sometimes he would choose to drink with his intern buddies instead of coming home to her. And how he'd rush off in the middle of a date to get to the hospital early the next morning. And that was all before he had finally really walked away.

It wouldn't work. None of it would work. Falling in love with him again, being witih him again, it would just lead to the same things. And she couldn't do it. No matter how amazing the house was, no matter how she couldn't bare to be without him for a few days. They had been done for a long time, there wasn't a point to bringing it all back for some stupid feelings that would probably go away.

But right now she would just watch him. Because it was safe, it was easy. For a stolen second of time she could just try to breathe and watch him be...him. She could do that. She could pretend for maybe just a few minutes that it was easy. That she could just sit and enjoy the confident steady way he moved around the OR and that all the mixed up feelings would disappear.