He was a neurosurgeon, one of the the best. She was just starting off. He had been married with children before his wife left him before one day he received divorce papers in the mail. They had been alone ever since.
Meredith stood outside of Cristina's apartment, waiting for her to come out. Meredith had offered to take her to Canada because abortion was legal there.
Cristina was devastated when she found out she was pregnant so Meredith did everything she could to find a way for Cristina to make an appointment to have an abortion.
"How long does it take for you to get ready? you're getting ready to have tools shoved up your vagina, you don't need to dress nice for that!" she yelled threw the door.
she awkwardly smiled at the people walking in the hallway giving her weird looks.
"Can you just hurry up? your neighbors are starting to hate me!" she yelled again.
"Can you stop yelling and scaring my neighbors. you're starting to scare me," Cristina said annoyed as she walked out the front door.
"How am I scaring you? I'm the one driving you to another country to get an abortion," she pushed herself off the wall and started walking down the hallway.
"You're dating a man who has three kids, one of which despises your existence, he's a surgeon. he's in love with you, wants to marry you, and have kids with you... I mean seriously Mer, what the hell are you doing?" she had never expected Meredith to have the life she had now. when they met they were both career driven, Meredith still was but she was also interested in other things, like her boyfriend.
"I'm living my life. the life I never thought I'd be able to have. if five year old me saw the life I have now she'd be thrilled," she smiled.
"Yeah but are you sure you want kids, and three of them? I mean.. they're not even yours, and then yours on top, that's a lot of kids Mer," she said as they made their way into the elevator.
"Yes, Cristina. if I didn't want kids of my own I will still have three, well they're not mine but I'll live with them and I'll have to like them. Derek said we don't have to if I don't want to but he's willing to have kids with me If I want to. I'm not with him for the kids, I'm with him because you don't always come across guys like him... he's good looking, he actually cares about me and he's good with kids which is always a turn on," she went on.
"who gets turned on by a guy being good with kids?"
"Me, who wants a guy who treats kids like crap?" the elevator came to a stop and they were now on the first floor and made their way out of the apartment building.
"Me, I want a boyfriend who I can bully your step-kids with when they treat you like crap," they got into Meredith's car as Meredith and Meredith got into the drivers seat.
"I like the life I have and I love Derek, he's a great guy and there's almost nothing wrong with him. he's everything I've always wanted but I was just too scared to admit it and now I have it and yeah, maybe I wasn't expecting him to have three kids but two out of three of them are fine with me dating their Dad so it's fine," she started the car and pulled out of the parking lot.
"I don't know how you do it. if Burke told me he had three kids and an ex-wife that left him and never took the kids not even on the weekend I would have fled the scene immediately,"
"it's not that bad. Madeleine ran away last night and he was driving around the neighborhood for three hours and only found her because his gas tank was empty," she said as she started driving down the road on their way to Canada.
"And then you stayed the night? isn't that a literal cry for help. that's what should make every women in the right state of mind run away, when his nine year old daughter runs away at the thought of being around you again,"
"she's cute okay, it makes her some what tolerable," she rolled her eyes.
"Anyways. what part of Canada are we going to anyways?" she changed the subject.
"I don't know. whatever part we arrive in when we cross the boarder and we'll go to the nearest abortion clinic,"
Meredith and Cristina were very similar in many ways. most people would say they were the same person. but their dream future looked a little different then the others.
Meredith planned to be married one day to Derek and would help him raise his three children. Cristina didn't understand how or why Meredith would want to live the rest of her life that way. to her it sounded like misery, to Meredith it sounded like she would be able to finally actually be able to live her life the way she had always wanted.
in high school she never admitted it to herself but she wanted someone she could spend the rest of her life with, someone that would love her no matter what, someone that would stand by her side even at the hardest times. she imagined everyone wanted that deep down but were either too scared to admit it or were too scared they would want it and not have it.
she also figured life would be easier without having to rely on someone else. her mother was someone she was supposed to be able to rely on, someone she should have been able to trust.. but that was the complete opposite of what she got.
her mother did the bare minimum when it came to being a parent. the only thing she did for Meredith was keep her alive long enough for her to move out for college and get a job to take care of herself, which wasn't as hard as everyone made it out to be because she had been doing it since she was three.
all she had ever wanted was someone that would love her, and actually love her. not feel compelled to love her because they were related or because they felt sorry for her and the way she grew up.
that's why she never told Derek about her childhood. she didn't want him to feel sorry for her. she wanted him to know only one version of herself and that was the version she was now.
she loved Derek and felt like she could trust him. but in the months that had been together she still hadn't let her guard down completely.
she knew Derek would never hurt her intentionally but she didn't want him to accidently throw her trauma in her face during an argument.
but that's how she had always been. she could only give people sixty percent of her. the last time she gave anyone more than that they turned their back on her the day after, she promised herself she would never make that mistake again.
she knew the only person she could one hundred percent trust was herself. she knew that if she didn't make sure she didn't get hurt again then no one else would.
she was all she had. usually she only gave friends sixty percent, she would only give guys fifty, and if it was a somewhat serious relationship she would give seventy.
she had given Cristina ninety because she knew she could trust her and Cristina had also told her about her traumatic childhood so if she ever did decide to turn her back on Meredith she had something to use against her.
Meredith knew she would never be able to do that to Cristina no matter what she did or said but they were even, they both knew very deep things about each other.
she had given Derek eighty percent and he had given her one hundred percent. she has happy that she was able to let Derek trust her so much but she was scared to tell him more than he already knew.
there were things that she would never be able to share with other people. they were just too personal and it would take Derek a lot for her to give him all one hundred percent of her. and she wasn't even sure if he would want all of her.
most of the time her guard would be down. she knew she could trust Derek and that comforted her. but she was still scared to tell him somethings about her.
