MerAdd Oneshots

I know

TW: mentions of suicide

It was cold outside, that's all I remember. The freezing cold, biting into my exposed skin, chilling me to the bone despite my warm winter attire. It was cold.

She came up to me, hands stuffed in her pockets and face burrowed down into her coat. I hadn't seen her in years, three of them to be exact. Three years since the love of my life up and disappeared, leaving me with our daughter. For three years, I didn't know if she was dead or alive.

"Addison" she greeted me, her voice sounding so hollow and empty "I'm sorry" she said nothing else, she just stood there waiting for my reply.

"I know" was all I said, before turning around to get back into my car.

I know.

~

Meredith had gotten into the plane crash just six months after we adopted our daughter, an orphaned newborn baby who'd come into my NICU after a car accident, the accident that killed her parents.

Of course, I understood when she didn't want to come home right away. I understood that she needed time to grieve when her sister died, when she went through perhaps the biggest tragedy of her life with her best friend.

But unbeknownst to her, it was also my biggest tragedy.

She'd left one day, and didn't call me back. That was all I knew. That was three years ago.

She didn't call, didn't write, didn't email. She was a ghost; her presence was always constantly surrounding me, wether it was her side of the bed, her picture on the wall, her clothes in my closet. It were as if she'd suddenly died, as if Meredith Grey had ceased to exist.

She was gone.

I did the best I could to raise our daughter alone. I harboured anger and guilt, anger towards her and guilt towards myself, for always feeling like I could've done more. And hatred, a small bit, for looking at the door constantly, for checking my phone and hoping there was an unknown caller, for still sleeping on one side of the bed.

All this time, and she shows up unannounced, in a parking lot in the middle of January. And all she does is apologize; all she says is she's sorry. I don't know what I was expecting, maybe a request for a divorce since we were still legally married. I had planned what I'd say for years, I stayed up at night thinking of what I'd say if the time ever came.

But when it did, nothing seemed important enough. It didn't seem worth my time to say anything else to her, because the pain in my heart swallowed me whole and left me less than before.

Again, she shows up randomly the next night, knocking at the door late at night. I'm praying she doesn't wake my daughter, while opening the door anyway.

"Can we talk?" She asks me, after a silence hung in the air, stale and unmoving. I just nod, closing the door behind me as I step out onto the porch. I had the baby monitor in my pocket, and I didn't want to risk waking her up if we went inside.

"I would invite you in, but Ivy's asleep. I don't want to wake her up, she only just started sleeping in her own bed again" I don't know why I'm telling her this, why I think it matters that she knows Ivy is still safely with me, despite her absence.

Meredith nods understandingly. "She's three now, I marked her birthday off on my calendar" she muses, looking up at me with sad eyes.

I just nod. Ivy turned three, her third party with only one Mom, her third birthday that Meredith missed.

"I don't know how many ways I can tell you I'm sorry" Meredith sighs, running a hand through her hair "but I am. I, sorry for hurting you and for missing our daughters life. But I also want you to know, that I made the best decision for us and for her. Staying away was protecting you, I wasn't in any state of mind to be with other people, let alone ones who loved me"