The Moment I knew

I was sitting on the couch while the children played in the next room over. It was four forty-five. I could start panicking in fifteen minutes. That was the deal I made. But I had already broken it. I was already panicking. All the signs of me panicking were there. My breath was coming a little faster and heavier than it normally would, my heart rate was accelerated, my stomach felt like it was twisted in a knot.

There wasn't really anything I could do. He was supposed to be in DC but he obviously wasn't. Instead, he was somewhere in roughly three thousand miles between the two places he was supposed to be. I had just gotten him back, he was gone and came back. I had told him that I can live without him but at this point, I'm starting to think that was a lie. My breath hitched then started to come even faster. Now I'm going to throw up.

I can't find him if I'm throwing up so that's not an option right now. Instead, I'm going to focus really hard on the wall in front of me. I set the alarm on my phone for five pm so I'll know when I'm allowed to let myself panic instead of being in denial about panicking. Where could he be? I feel like I just got finished playing this game. Except for the last time he had kissed someone else then came home to fix our marriage.

He could be with someone else. He could have decided it wasn't worth the trouble of giving up his job. But if he had decided that, he would have gone back to DC and they wouldn't have called me looking for him. Derek could have just left me and it could have had nothing to do with the job. Though I'm pretty sure that wasn't it. He- he loved me. I know that. I do.

He could just be having a bad day, missed his plane, lost his phone and wallet. Though if that happened he probably would have borrowed a phone and called someone for help or to let them know where he was. He could have gotten kidnapped. Do people kidnap forty-year-old white men? Is that a thing that people do? He probably wasn't kidnapped. He could be in another plane crash. When we had gotten in a plane crash, I'm pretty sure people were told before this point in time that the plane never landed.

Which basically left me with the option that he had gotten hurt. My breath stopped altogether. I tried to catch it but it wasn't working. I need to calm down. I closed my eyes and focused on listing the steps in an appendectomy. Open identify ligate irrigate close. Open identify ligate irrigate close. Open identify ligate irrigate close. Okay, I can breathe again.

I have experience with disasters. It could be a train wreck, but that would have been on the news. A deadly bike race, but that's in September, it's April. It could've been an explosion, but that also would have been in the news. He could've been electrocuted, where would he get electrocuted? He could've drowned. Fallen off a ferry boat or something. Though he already survived jumping into Elliot Bay in the freezing water. He's a good swimmer, he would've been okay if that happened. He could've been shot. That- is plausible. He could've been shot and needed long hard surgery. Oh god. He could survive that too, he already has.

Or he could have gotten into a car accident. George- he died, a bus hit him and he died. George pushed someone out of the way and he died. Derek drives like a maniac too. He's been arrested for it. He spent the night in jail for driving too fast. He said he would stop doing that but what if he didn't? What if he collided with another car and now he's dead in a ditch somewhere. That- no. I can't go down this path. He was okay. He wasn't dead.

Derek couldn't be dead. There were a thousand different things that could've happened to him, and he didn't die. He just didn't. Derek probably did something stupid and forgot to call me and that's why. I'll get to yell at him for that when I see him, probably tonight. Or- he could be injured. He could be long-term fine but right now he is just too injured to be able to call me. I'll have to take some time off to take care of him but that will be alright. We'll get through this. He isn't dead. That's an absurd thought. I'm just a panicky wife who is worried. I'll tell someone that for a few minutes I thought he could be dead and they will laugh and tell me I worry too much.

I've already had enough death in my life. My fair share for sure. My sister, my mother, my roommate, my husband's best friend, my dog, many colleagues, it would just be ridiculous to lose my husband in some freak accident on top of that. Completely ridiculous. Maybe I should go back to therapy. I could tell my therapist about how I imagined the many ways my husband could have died and they will tell me I'm crazy and then fix me.

Derek said that he would take care of me if I get Alzheimer's. We said that we would love each other when we were old and senile. He said he wanted to die at a hundred and ten in his arms. He promised me. He's only forty-nine. He still has sixty-one more years before he is a hundred and ten. That's a whole other lifetime. He's not finished yet. We're not done.

I took a deep breath then closed my eyes as the alarm on my phone started to ring out. I had to turn it off. I had to start looking for him, but honestly, I'm terrified about what I'll see when I find him. But I need to keep going. If there's a crisis, I don't freeze, I move forward. I get everyone else to move forward. Because I've seen worse. I've survived worse, I know he's alive. I'm dark and twisty and it's not a flaw it's a strength. I never told him that I use those words. That when I'm panicking, I recite the words he told me when he proposed to me. At some point in our long life together, I'll tell him that.

I moved my hand to grab the ringing out phone but when I turned my head, my eyes were blinded by the red and blue flashing light. I couldn't hear anything except my own heartbeat pounding in my head and an annoying ringing in my ears. I saw the police officers get out of the car and walk towards my front door and I saw them press the doorbell. I couldn't hear the noise that should've rung out. I was waiting for it but I soon realized that I had just missed it. I needed to get up and answer the door before Zola ran out and tried to answer it for me. I needed to get up.

I walked towards the door and saw the two police officers standing in front of me with grim faces. I needed the ringing in my head and the thundering heartbeat to go away so I could hear what they were about to tell me. I just- needed it all to stop. Then he was there, Derek, well not really Derek. It was the Derek I used when I needed him and he wasn't there. The Derek inside my head was telling me to calm down and that it was going to be okay. I took one last deep breath and looked up towards the police officer. "Is this the home of Derek Shepherd?" He asked. And that was the moment I knew. 

(Only mentally healthy people here. Let me know what you thought. This was a one-shot, so there wouldn't be any continuing things.)