(Shattered...) Dreams Fulfilled

Revelations

Kathleen listened, absorbing all he was revealing.

"She kept pushing me, to find out more about me," he paused, and smiled thinking back to the moment she was following him on the bridge, and continued, "she told me she wouldn't sleep with me until she learned more about me, and then I actually got mad at her for continuing to push it."

"You got mad at her, for wanting to learn more about you?"

"Don't use that censorial tone with me, I'm being honest and trying to tell you this as objectively as I can."

"It's just hard Derek, to understand why you were not honest with her from the beginning."

"If I could change that, I would. But, I can't."

"Go on, it sounds like that was just a small part of ...what is it over eighteen months of your life?"

"I realized, I wasn't being fair to her...and though I did not tell her about Addie, I allowed myself to start opening u and shared my new life with her, no one had been out there, she was the first one...the land...the trailer...and told her just a little bit about me," he repeated part of the evening, and conversation, "and she trusted me Kathleen, she took it all on faith, as I asked, and just took my hand...and I did not have the decency or courage to tell her I was married."

"How long before she found out?"

"Not long at all," he laughed sarcastically, "before Addie flew in on her broomstick."

"Derek."

"She was the bitch from hell."

"She was your wife."

"She was the woman who cheated on me with my best friend, my brother," he spat out, "on our bed."

"I'm sorry, I should not be defending Addison."

"No, you should not," he snapped, and sat in silence.

"Derek, I'm only going to be here a couple days, tell me the rest."

"That single action, taking my hand and trusting me, began to restore my own faith, in life and love. She saved me Kathleen, and I betrayed that trust with my silence."

"What happened after that night?"

"She told me about her mother, trusted me, I always accuse her of not trusting people, but she did, and I had decided, that night, we were going out to dinner to tell her the truth, about my marriage, what had happened, but before I had a chance Addie showed up."

"And you told her?"

"Oh no, didn't have a chance to do that. We were getting ready to go out, leaving the hospital, when she walked up."

"She just walked up? Unannounced?"

"Basically. She'd tried calling me all day, and I had ignored her calls. Apparently, Richard saw Meredith and I together, and called her in for a consult, the interfering meddling busybody."

"I thought you like Richard? He's living on your land."

"I do, and believe me, with him, it's a hell of a lot more complex that meets the eye, we'll get to that."

"So, Addie walks up to you and Meredith..."

"That's what she did...and introduced herself in her own inimitable fashion, "I'm Addison Shepherd, and you must be the woman who is screwing my husband."

"For the love of God, Derek...how do you get past that?"

"You don't."

"Obviously, you did, since you and Addie divorced and you are with Meredith."

"She was furious with me, at first, threatened to run me down in the parking lot."

"I don't blame her."

"You'd have no brother."

"I'd have probably done you bodily harm myself on her behalf."

"Good to know."

"Addie didn't need protecting Derek, she could stand on her own. Meredith, there's...this vulnerability behind this wall of ...I don't know how to explain it, but there's this look...a sense of her trying to be self sufficient...to do it all by herself...as though it's a bad thing to have to lean on someone."

"She's had to it on her own Kathleen...since she was a kid, and I know...sometimes, I can see this look in her eyes, where she retreats to this place where I can't reach her...and I know there's so much more she hasn't said, but she's done it all...by herself," he said, and told her about Ellis and Richard and Thatcher abandoning Meredith.

"My failure to be honest, put her through hell, when the hospital gossip mill nailed her for being involved with me, for sleeping with me to get ahead, you name it, I put her through that, I could have avoided it and didn't. Even the patient on he consult heard about it, and refused to have her on the case. I have to say one thing for Addison, she set the patient straight, and told her she'd been the one cheating on me. Meredith came out here and confronted me, and I told her what had happened, but she said it wasn't enough, and left."

"There's deep strength within her, but Derek, she's fragile, and she carries a sadness within her."

"You can tell?"

"Yes and Mark, surprising as it is, was right. I do want to protect her."

He reached his hand out to his sister, "thank you," he said, emotion deeply rooted in his voice, "she's never had people to count on, or to care for her, and I've let her down almost from the day I met her."

"She loves you Derek, you have not always let her down," Kathleen said, gently squeezing his hand in support before releasing it.

"I was as bad as her mother, when I went back to Addie, I broke her spirit all over again, and still she gave me a chance to be her friend, to confide in me, and I betrayed her trust again," he said thinking back to the day he'd called her a whore and threw George back at her face.

He told her about not signing the divorce papers, trying to make his marriage work, doing the honorable thing, and at Christmas, after a month of being back with her, told Addison he was in love with Meredith.

"You told Addie that?"

"I told her she had not been a fling, that I had fallen in love with her, and that my decision to stay with her, did not mean I stopped loving Meredith."

"Derek, if you felt that way, why did you stay with Addison, why not get a divorce?"

"I thought I was doing the right thing. Kathleen, how can you ask that, we were raised to believe in marriage and family and working through it all, I did what I thought was the honorable thing, and tried to make my marriage work, to make up for whatever fault I had in what it had become."

"Derek, sometimes...the honorable thing...is being true to yourself, to your heart."

"I found out too late."

"It's never too late."

"We tried to be friends," he said, "Kathleen, we are like moths to a flame, we could not stay away, and kidded ourselves, pretending to be friends, but we just needed to be with each other. Just breathing in her scent made me whole, and I couldn't be with her."

"Well, I for one, can tell you that was the most idiotic decision you've ever made, trying to make a marriage work for months, after you knew you were in love with Meredith, and even told Addison. Derek, why didn't you call me, why did you have to go through all of this alone? We are your family, we have always been there to support each other, and it pisses me off you went through this alone and did not reach out to us."

"I'd already failed Kathleen, in my marriage, I had not been enough for Addison, she had gone and looked elsewhere. I did not want to feel I had disappointed my family as well."

"Derek, Mom dotes on you, if you let her. She'd never...well, never mind, she'd give you hell first and lecture you, but she'd have supported you. She wants us to be happy, Derek."

"I wasn't ready to take that risk."

He went on to tell her about those months with Addie and the relationship with Meredith, sharing Doc, and in his opinion, his betrayal of the trust she'd placed in him, when she told him about George, and his reaction when she tried to move on with her life, and started to date Finn.

"I basically called her a whore Kathleen," he'd been brutally honest with her, "I'm sharing this with you, as my sister, but I expect you to maintain all of this in the confidentiality expected of you as a doctor, because it is what she deserves, and I'm telling you because I need help, I need help to deal with many things, and I want to make sure I never let her down again."

"You don't have to ask that. Derek, I already know this."

"She knows...I'm talking with you, that I'm not going to hold back, and she didn't even ask me not to...instead," he said, and she could hear him trying to compose himself, "instead, she's worried you'll hate her, and asked me to tell you she was sorry..."

"Sorry...for what?"

"For hurting me...for me, needing to call you as a result."

"Oh, Derek, I want to pull her in my arms and hug her."

He relayed the rest of the events, the bomb incident, his desperation when he did not see Meredith, going to her house just to see her, to see she was alive. He told her of Addison's accusations that she wasn't Meredith Grey in front of everyone, and without the obvious unnecessary details included Doc's death and what led to him and Meredith being together at the prom.

"Addison found Meredith's panties in your jacket, how stupid can you be, did you want her to find out?"

"No, and when I went to find her, to tell her the truth, tell her our marriage was over, I found Mark instead, coming out of the bathroom, with only a towel around his waist."

"Merciful heaven, Derek, this is a soap opera," she said, breaking the heaviness that had settled over their conversation.

"I think Meredith might found humor in that," he said.

"Not so sure about that, but you want to be delusional, go ahead."

"I'm not delusional, she'd see the humor in that statement."

"Ok."

"You're being condescending, Kathleen."

"I don't think, especially, the way her hormones are raging right now, that she'd find humor in it, but hey...I'm only a woman...who's been pregnant, several times...and a psychiatrist."

"You don't know Meredith."

"You are taunting me...how much do you want to bet?"

"I'm not betting on this?"

"Sure you are, we'll ask her... plain and simple...if she think it's funny?"

"I'm not going to do that."

"See...you're not sure."

"Fine, we'll ask her."

"Winner pays for dinner tonight."

"I thought you were planning on winning."

"I am."

"Shouldn't the loser pay for dinner?"

"Not tonight, my treat, either way."

He felt his phone vibrate, indicating an incoming text message.

-hey, in between surgeries, all good?
-yes, you?
-just tired
-take a break
-did already
-you did? are you feeling ok?
-yes, don't worry
-of course I worry
-we're ok, being tired is normal
-don't over do it
-kathleen doesn't hate me?
-no, she does not
-did you tell her I was sorry
-yes
-thank you
-she's treating us to dinner tonight
-oh
-what's wrong
-long story but sort of invited lexie
-you mean the two of you for dinner only
-no for her to join us wanted her to meet Kathleen,you know she's my sister
-I know that
-she's my only family here
-it's fine, that will be very nice
-you're sure?
-yes
-have to go
-I love you
-me too

"She's ok?"

"She is. She invited her sister to join us for dinner tonight."

"Lexie, right?"

"Yes, they just met you know?

"What do you mean?"

"Let me go on...it will explain things."

"So, you walked in on Mark and Addie, again..."

"Yes, but this time it was liberating. Knowing I could move on without any guilt."

"I can understand that."

Derek told her about his decision to end the marriage, knowing after he had been with Meredith, he could no longer pretend. He loved her, had loved her forever, and finally told her, after being forced to stay in quarantine at the hospital, he realized he could lose her, she could move on to someone else, because he had never told her. What he had not counted on, he told her was Meredith choosing to date both him and Finn.

"Good for her."

"What? How can you say that? I'd just told her I loved her, and she decides to date him?"

"Derek, you chose to go back to your wife, granted, you told her you'd chosen wrong, whatever, but you spent months with your wife, leaving her to fend for herself, and then after one I've loved you forever, you expect her to give everything up and believe you, I wouldn't have. I would not trust you."

"What do you mean you wouldn't trust me. I just told you the truth."

"Actions, Derek, always speak louder than words, and you have said nothing to me so far, about your actions, that would make her trust you."

"What's this, you're totally on her side, and not even giving any thought to what I'm saying, just blindly accept it's all my fault. Is that what you do to your patients, no wonder I never believed in therapists, you all take sides."

"Stop whining. This is what sisters who happen to be a psychiatrist do. Try to be objective, and I would love to hear her perspective on all of this, but you know what...bottom line, I want to make sure my brother and the woman he loves find the way to be happy...and I want to be there to celebrate with them every step of the way...your baby... a wedding...more kids...baptisms...birthdays, first communions...graduations... silver anniversaries...all those milestones that love brings to our lives."

"You're a good sister, Kathleen, I just don't take kindly to criticism."

"We all know that, your perfection illusion, and yes , I'm the best...even if I'm not your favorite."

"I do not think I'm perfect. Hey, even Jenna is your favorite," he joked, speaking of their youngest sibling, "but you are my confidante...and my conscience, always have been."

"Always will be Derek."

"Kathleen, by default...the one I trust...the one I'm trusting to help with my life and hers...is really my favorite."

"Your secret is safe with me," she joked, "I won't breathe a word to Jenna."

"I love all of you, you know."

"Even Nancy?" she laughed.

"Even Nancy, though I wanted to clobber her...when she visited."

"Tell me about that, and how did the dating two men work out?"

"It didn't," he said, and filled in as many details for her to get the whole picture, without regard to how foolish he himself would look.

"Derek, sometimes, I swear you are so completely brainless."

"What now?"

"Why in the world, did you walk away? You just found out she was possibly pregnant, with your child, she's the woman you love, and you walk away, what in the hell was going through your brain?"

"I thought I was doing the right thing, that she deserved someone better."

"What is it with you and this sense of not being good enough, we're re really going to have to work on that."

"That is not the reason I'm talking to you."

"It might not be, but you need to deal with it. Meredith's made her choice, she believes you are, and is not looking for someone better. I'm going to look for and recommend the best therapist out here because you need to deal with your issues, it's not just Meredith."

"That's bull, Kathleen."

"No it's not. She's taking the fist step, you need to do the same, but we will deal with that later. I mean it Derek, if you expect to both be healthy in this relationship, you have to work on your issues as well."

He was silent for a while, before he turned to her, "You don't know what you're talking about. I wasn't enough for Addison, and I keep failing Meredith. There's reason for me to think that I'm not good enough, especially Meredith...when...she ... she chose to give up in the water, because I was not enough to fight for...the idea of our life together was not enough to live for, and she gave up and drowned."