Perfect strangers

Chapter 38

Meredith was shopping and she hated shopping. But after multiple phone calls from Amelia insisting that they needed to spend some time together so here they were. Shopping.

"Meredith come on, let's go." Amelia groaned as she tried to pull Meredith through the shopping mall.

"Amelia please, can we just slow down, I mean what's the rush?" Meredith complained as she followed behind.

"Right, look I've been seeing someone and it's new but it's his birthday tomorrow and I may have forgot..." Amelia said with a guilty look on her face.

"You forgot?" Meredith had to stop herself from laughing.

"Stop Mer it's not funny." Amelia playfully pushed her lightly. "I need your help, please."

"Fine, but you're buying lunch." Meredith pointed at her as she walked off with Amelia quickly catching up to her.

"So does anyone else know about your new mystery man?" Meredith asked as they walked into the first shop.

"No, which means you can't tell Derek because he will go all protective older brother and I don't want him scaring him off because I actually really like Link and I see this going somewhere and..." Amelia turned and frowned at Meredith. "Why are you laughing at me?"

"Because we have definitely been spending way too much time together and you've just out rambled yourself." Meredith laughed shaking her head. "But don't worry, I won't tell Derek."

"Yeah right, you tell each other everything." Amelia shrugged and walked off to look at the shirts.

Meredith couldn't even deny what Amelia had said when she knew that when it came down to it, she would probably end up telling him tonight as they lay down together on their bed and talked about their days.

Her attention was grabbed when out of the corner of her eye, the baby stuff caught her attention and she slowly started walking over. She let her hands wander over the small pairs of socks, the soft blankets and adorable teddies.

Right then in that moment she felt the urge to pick up so many things and pay for them but she had to stop herself. However, she couldn't stop from picking up some of the socks as she held them in her hands and smiled down.

"Meredith." Amelia shouted causing Meredith to jump. "Sorry, was an opportunity I couldn't miss out on, anyways what are you doing..." she asked as she noticed Meredith in the baby section.

"What? Nothing." Meredith tried to hide the socks and look normal but Amelia saw straight through it.

"What, it's not like your pregnant is it..." Amelia laughed but quickly stopped when she saw Meredith's face. "Oh you are, Meredith that's great news!" Amelia exclaimed as she wrapped her arms around Meredith.

"Thanks, we wasn't planning on telling anyone yet but...I'm not doing to well at keeping it a secret so far." Meredith laughed.

"Come on, I want to buy something for my favourite niece and nephew." Amelia smiled before heading off to look at the baby stuff herself.

Meredith thought to herself, maybe they should start telling people, they could be happy about this. If it wasn't for her own fears stopping her.

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Later that day, Meredith walked through the door, her arms full of bags. She hated to admit it but she had really enjoyed her day out with Amelia, even if it was shopping.

Locking the door behind her, she headed upstairs and down to their room.

"Hey, you're home." Meredith cheered happily as she walked in and found Derek sitting on their bed, looking down intensely at some paper work.

"Yeah." He grumbled in response but failed to look up at her.

"So..." Meredith sighed as she placed the bags down on the end of the bed. "I have some news, well more like gossip..."

"Mer, I really don't have time for this right now." Derek interrupted her as he continued to scribble something down.

Meredith crossed her arms over her chest and frowned at him.

"Look, if you had a shitty day at work then it doesn't mean you get to come home and take it out on me. I mean, for the first time in days maybe this week I've had a really good day, I went shopping with Amelia and we brought stuff for the baby..."

"Wait." Derek finally looked up to face her. "You told Amelia about the baby? What happened to not telling anyone? I mean are you just going to go round telling my whole family?" He placed the paperwork down on the bed.

"It was an accident, I was looking at baby stuff, and then, she kind of guessed." Meredith smiled, thinking back to that moment and the items she had in the bag.

"Yeah, seems to be happening a lot lately." Derek rolled his eyes. "I mean just because you don't have your own family to tell doesn't mean you have to run around yelling my family!" Derek snapped and then his face dropped with guilt when he realised what he had said. "Mer, I'm sorry..."

Meredith flinched away from Derek's hand as he reached out to comfort her.

"Don't apologise...just don't." She shook her head, trying her hardest not to cry in front of him. "Here." She grabbed the bag of the bed and forced into his chest before turning and walking out of the room.

Derek watched as Meredith walked away before finally looking into the bag that Meredith had handed him. His eyes started to fill with tears as he looked down at the tiny baby socks and tiny vest that read "daddy is my hero". At reading this he collapsed down on his bed and wanted to just break down and sob.

He knew he had taken his bad day out on Meredith and he already felt awful for that and knew he needed to make it up to her. Placing the bag down, he headed downstairs in the desperate need to find Meredith.

It didn't take long as he walked downstairs and found her sitting in the kitchen, a cup of what he gathered was hot chocolate as she stared down blankly at the magazine in front of her.

"Meredith." Derek spoke up and watched as her body tensed slightly. "I've come to apologise, I know it doesn't come close to making it up to you but you was right, I took my bad day out on you..."

"It's not good enough Derek." Meredith finally looked up to meet his eyes, tears pooling in her eyes. "What you said...I was going to come home and give you the baby stuff and then tell you I think we should tell your family about the baby at the dinner on Sunday, but like you said, it's not my family..." Meredith pushed herself up and attempted to storm past Derek.

"Meredith, stop." He grabbed the top of her arms stopping her in her tracks.

"Let go of me." Meredith started repeatedly smacking her hands on his chest and arms.

Derek allowed her to take her anger out on him, knowing that he deserved this. She continued to do so until she finally collapsed into his arms and wrapped her arms around his waist.

"I'm sorry." He leaned down and kissed the top of her head and wrapped his own arms around her. "What I said...my family is your family, I shouldn't have said that. I'm pretty certain Ma loves you more than me."

"Oh she does." Meredith laughed as she pulled back and looked up at Derek. He reached down and wiped the tears off her face before leaning down to press his lips against hers. "I love you."

"I love you too." She smiled up at him. "Can we just go to bed?"

"Yeah, I'll grab us a drink and some food, we can watch a film. I'm going to take the day off work tomorrow so we can start looking at ideas for the nursery if you want?" He smiled as he saw the wide grin on Meredith's face.

"I'd like that." She leaned up and kissed him quick. "Also, you still aren't forgiven, you've got a lot of making up to do." Meredith tapped him on the chest, winking at him as she walked out of the room, swaying her hips slightly.

Derek smiled to himself, forever grateful that he had ended up with Meredith. She understood him, she knew him and more importantly she loved him. He would spend the rest of his life making sure that Meredith and their baby had everything they ever needed.

Derek was going to be the best husband and father he could ever be.