The Fight for Chief

Chapter 9

Clearing the air

The following morning, Meredith walked into the attending's lounge with a heavy sigh. She was tired. Whilst staying until 2am to talk things through with Wilson was the most important thing she could do, her 4 hours of sleep was already biting at her and she'd only just arrived to work.

As she made her way to her cubby, she noticed a steaming up of coffee by her scrubs. She frowned as she looked around, noticing Derek standing in the small kitchen area, leaning against the countertop. "Hey," he said quietly, sensing by her frustrated expression that she wasn't a morning person.

"Hi" she smiled small, focusing on trying her hair up. "I made you some coffee, and there are some bagels over there" he pointed nonchalantly as he stepped towards her. She began changing into her scrubs, not caring about his presence because the quicker she got this done with, the quicker she would be out of there.

"Derek-" she sighed as she pulled her scrub top over her head. His frown of worry didn't go unnoticed. "Is everything okay?" he asked nervously. She grabbed his hand and brought him to the sofa. "I just want you to listen to me, okay?" Meredith said. Derek nodded carefully.

"Are you okay? Like, okay okay?" Meredith asked slowly, still holding his hands. He pulled an unrecognisable expression. "What do you mean?" he asked quietly as other attendings came into the room. Meredith sighed.

"I got a visit in the early hours of this morning from Dr Wilson, the intern you were teaching in your surgery last night," she said slowly. Derek gulped. "You know what I'm about to say, right?" Meredith asked. He didn't say anything, he just looked like he wanted to cry. "She said you were fine, good, teaching her, and then she said you got a page..."

Derek sighed as he looked at his hands, almost as if he was ashamed of what was coming next. "She said after that, you were unfocused, strict-" she paused "aggressive..." Derek looked up at Meredith quickly. "I know that the residents say you can be a hard-ass, but you frighted Jo yesterday. Apparently, you threatened to have her fired, even when she was just simply observing your technique. Now I know Neuro is your department but I know that isn't your call to make, that's Richard's decision and you shouldn't have said it."

He didn't say anything, he couldn't. "From colleague to colleague, you need to apologise to Jo, and you need to have her on your service to boost her confidence because I know you can be nice and you can really teach these residents something. But if you can't do that, I have no choice but to go to Webber." she sighed. His head shot up and she raised her hands in defence. "I'm not saying I'm going to, but you need to make this up to Jo because she didn't know what she was doing wrong and you were just screaming at her."

"Okay," Derek said quietly. "I was going to apologise to her this morning anyway. I didn't mean- I-" he stopped himself as Meredith interrupted him. "And from a friend to a friend, what the hell is going on Derek?" She exclaimed quietly. He sighed, tugging on his raven hair. "Addison's in labour" Derek closed his eyes as he said it quickly.

Meredith sat back for a moment. "Oh" was all she could say. "And that's fine, it's not my kid. But then Ma-" he started to explain but the door swung open and this time Mark strolled in with a bounce in his step. Derek glanced at him for a moment before looking away.

"Hello, Meredith" he beamed happily. She frowned at him. "Morning, Dr Sloan". They both eyed him curiously and dangerously as he poured himself a coffee. "You might be wondering why I'm so happy" he grinned. Meredith just smiled awkwardly, already knowing why. "I'm a dad now" he beamed.