Where You Belong

97

ame time she knew Bailey would never have allowed any personal conversation, so she kept her stance solid and told herself it was the only way her intern would learn.

The elevator came to a stop and the moment the doors opened, Meredith stepped out, heading immediately for the Nurses' Station. She divvied out some charts to her interns, with strict orders to monitor and page her if anything was unusual.

Once free of her interns, Meredith ran a hand through her hair and sucked in a breath. She reached for her cell phone and sighed, debating about whether she should page Derek.

It was then that she felt eyes on her.

Turning away from the Nurses' Station, she faced the waiting area and immediately recognized the mother of the man who broke her best friend. As if her day couldn't get any worse.

"Mrs. Burke," she greeted, approaching the older woman. "What a surprise to see you here. Are you visiting someone?" She asked, knowing the most likely reason the woman was here, but needing to confirm it so she could warn her best friend.

"Miss Grey," Mama Burke greeted with a nod. "You're the maid of honour."

"Would have been," Meredith agreed.

After taking a moment to absorb Meredith's response, Mama Burke cleared her throat. "I'm here to see Dr. Yang. I was told she was with a patient."

"She's probably in surgery. Could be hours. I can have her call you or something if you don't want to wait..."

"I'll wait."

"Okay. Is there a...message you want me to get to her?"

"Just that I'm waiting for her."

Meredith took a breath.

"Is there something you want to say to me?" Mama Burke prompted, "About my son and his relationship with your friend?"

Meredith took another breath. "No, I think your son said more than enough for everyone."

"He never meant to hurt her."

Had Meredith not been so entirely on her best friend's side, she made have softened at Mrs. Burke's tone. Instead, she crossed her arms over her chest. "Well, he did. She never wanted that stupid wedding in the first place. But she was willing to do it. For him."

"Have you ever thought that maybe he needed her to want the wedding?"

"If he thought Cristina would ever want some big, flashy wedding, he never took the time to get to know her."

"You encouraged her."

"Excuse me?"

"You and your friends. You encouraged her to resist. A wedding is important, and you made it a joke."

"I'm not exactly an expert, but I'm pretty sure it's the marriage that's important. The wedding is one day. The marriage is the forever part."

Mama Burke paused.

Meredith smirked, knowing she had made a good point. "We love Cristina for who she is. And that's what she deserves."

"My son did what he did because he knew she deserved better. He's an honourable man."

Meredith scoffed. "He's not an honourable man. He's a-" She cut herself off as too many terms came to mind.

"I'm sorry he hurt your friend, Miss Grey, but he-"

"It's missus," Meredith cut her off, before stammering, "Well, okay, actually it's doctor. Doctor, or missus. Not miss." She glared, even though Mama Burke had no way of knowing. She was simply irritated that Burke had apparently sent his mother to smooth things over and make him look like the good guy.

"I wasn't aware you were married. I assume it's too the best man?"

Meredith nodded. "Yes. We had a wedding we both wanted. And now we have a marriage. Because my husband is an honourable man."

"So, is my son," Mama Burke insisted.

"Not in this hospital. Not anymore."

"You'll understand one day, why he did what he did."

Meredith took another deep breath. "And maybe you'll understand one day why I don't believe you." She exhaled. "I'll let Cristina know you're here."

Storming down the hallway, Meredith reached for her pager, hoping she had somehow missed a page. Nothing scrolled across the screen. She growled something incoherent to the, thankfully empty, hallway, and pulled out her cell phone. Reaching an equally empty corner, she paused, debating whether to send Cristina a warning text. If she wasn't already alerted to Mama Burke's presence, word would spread quickly in the hospital.

Mama Burke in surgical waiting room, she finally tapped out, steer clear.

She would explain more when Cristina responded.

Footsteps echoed from around the corner, and Meredith barely had a chance to look up when her former resident appeared. "Grey."

"Dr. Bailey," she greeted. "I have my interns monitoring post-ops. I was just about to-"

"Grey," Bailey said again.

"Yes."

"Grey."

"Yes," Meredith echoed her earlier words, dreading what Bailey was building to.

"Okay, I need you to work in the clinic today."

The clinic would not serve much of a distraction against any of the things she needing distracting for. "But-"

Bailey cut her off. "Before you open your mouth and tell me all the reasons why you can't, just let me say this; I need this. Because I have idiots – do you understand me, Grey? Idiot interns are in my clinic. A clinic dripping with my blood, sweat and tears. And I am not at all convinced that they won't burn it down with their ineptitude!"

Meredith felt a smile pulling at her lips as she realized this obviously meant she wasn't inept in Bailey's eyes anymore.

"I'm not telling," Bailey continued, "Because I understand that I do not have the authority to tell. Not anymore." She hesitated. "So, I'm asking. Nicely."

Meredith allowed the corners of her lips to be tugged upwards.

"I'm just saying; if I ever did anything for you... Like save your life-"

Meredith felt her smile disappear.

"-If you ever felt you owed me a debt of thanks; now is when I'd like to collect." She stared Meredith down for a long moment, before adding a, "Please," though they both knew it was superfluous. Meredith couldn't say no, and they both knew it.

"Fine," Meredith grumbled, taking a small stack of charts from Bailey. She took the stairs to delay her arrival in the clinic, but even with the added time, her brain never stopped to consider just which interns she would be supervising.

The moment she pushed open the door, Lexie approached her excitedly. "Oh no," she mumbled.

"Oh, are you working down here today?"

"Uh, I, uh," she stammered, trying to come up with some way out of supervising her exuberant half-sister for the remainder of her shift.

"Great," Lexie responded, seemingly ignorant of the fact that Meredith never actually confirmed anything. "We have no idea what we're doing. Plus, I was really hoping we'd get a chance to talk, so yay."

"Yay," Meredith forced herself to echo, with as much effort as she could muster, which unfortunately wasn't all that much. Great, she muttered silently to herself, Now my day is freaking perfect.

"What should we do first?"

"Have you assessed any patients?"

"No, not yet. Dr. Bailey said not to do anything unless we were supervised."

This was going to be a very long day. "Okay, well, grab a chart and get started on initial exams, but come to me before you give any advice or make any decisions."

"Great," Lexie said excitedly. "And maybe after we could talk? I know you didn't want to before, but it was a bad day and-"

"Let's just focus on the patients for now."