Jump Then Fall

10.

Meredith was tired and annoyed and more importantly she was busy. Her friend Cristina was ranting right next to her as she sipped on a beer and Meredith was grading papers. At a bar. It was weird but she needed a night out even though she was so busy. She needed to hang out with her friend and she needed to drink. She was multi-tasking.

"You should have seen it...I had to open the guy up right in his room...the Chief wasn't too happy." Cristina told Meredith about her day before taking another sip of her drink.

'Wow...that's really great." Meredith placed her pen in her mouth as Joe, the bartender stood right in front of them.

"Seriously?" Joe shook his head, tossing a bar rag over his shoulder.

"What?" Meredith removed the pen, looking up to find Cristina and Joe staring at her.

"You're doing homework. In a bar." Joe stared at her. "I'm in my bar."

"He's right, Mer. It's weird." Cristina nodded, slightly laughing as Joe slid her another beer.

"I just have a lot of stuff to grade and I'm busy and my students...or a few of them hate me or want to kill me so...I'm grading papers in a part."

"Shepherd's kid?" Cristina asked.

"He has been a little better and by little...I mean little but I think he's trying." Meredith replied before writing a note on a paper.

"Just fail them all."

"Because that would go oh so well." Meredith sipped at her beer.

"They're bratty kids. It's not like it'll show up when they apply to college." Cristina shrugged.

"Okay." Meredith rolled her eyes.

"I agree with Yang on this one." Joe chimed in before going to serve another customer.

"Failing sounds better than grading."

"Just do it. And when all the kids parents start calling you to ask you, change your phone number." Cristina laughed, turning slightly on her bar stool.

"Oh alright." Meredith said sarcastically, swallowing more of her beer before looking back down at Madison Crofts spelling test.

"You're boring."

"Unfortunately."

"Let me know when you start to be fun again." Cristina drained the rest of her beer and headed off to the other side of the bar.

"I'll be sure to do so." Meredith laughed tiredly, before dropping her head on the bar top. This was her life right now and she was starting to hate it. She wanted to have great students like the year before, not to be tired and to be able to go to the bar without working at the same time.

"Rough day?" A male voice interrupted Meredith's thoughts.

"Oh dear." She whispered to herself. She would lose the papers if she got drunk and slept with an inappropriate man. She was working. "You have no idea."

"Can I buy you a drink?" Derek laughed, taking a seat on the barstool that Cristina had just left.

"Oh...hi Dr. Shepherd."

"Derek...call me Derek."

"I...I am only calling you Derek because I am really tired." Meredith groaned.

"Why wouldn't you call me Derek? That's my name." He smiled, gesturing to Joe to refill his drink.

"You are the father of one of my students."