As You Are

Stuck here

Meredith

I travelled across Europe for months. I did wild, crazy, unthinkable things. The woman I'd loved went with me, travelled across the entire continent with me and always told me I was still the prettiest thing she'd seen. The Eiffel Tower, the leaning tower of Pisa, the Greek statues, she said none of those even compared to how beautiful I was to her.

And then in Amsterdam I caught her sleeping with a man she'd met at our hotel.

When I'd finally come home, I moved back in with my former roommate and best friend, Cristina. And that was the start of my journey to become 'settled down'. My personality was never normal and stability was far from my strong suit, but I wanted to try and get my life together.

"How'd your first day at work go?" Cristina asks me, when I'd gotten back to our apartment after a boring day. I'd applied for a few jobs, mostly doing secretarial work, and I'd managed to get one as a personal assistant for a doctor in the city. He was nice, he payed fairly well, but the only thing was not only was it really fucking boring, but the hours were a little all over the place.

When I'd asked what the schedule would look like, he said 'Monday to Friday from eight until four, and then whenever I need you in between I'll call'. He was a doctor, it made sense he'd be on call often and need me to do some things for him after hours.

I groaned in response to Cristina's question and flopped down on the couch next to her. "He's a nice guy, but the work is so boring. It's just filling out paper work, sending emails, faxing letters, organizing files in alphabetical order, updating his schedule, scheduling appointments for patients" the day, while busy, was boring.

"At least you kept busy" Cristina shrugged, popping some dry cereal into her mouth. Cristina was currently in med school studying to be a surgeon. Another reason I needed to come home; I needed to go back to school.

"How were classes?" I ask, reaching over and stealing some of her cereal. Cristina liked school so far, but she had a major crush on one of her professors (not that she'd ever admit it).

She shrugs. "Same shit, different day"

"How's Doctor Altman" I tease, watching as she rolls her eyes, trying to hide the small smile on her face. Doctor Teddy Altman was one of Cristina's professors, and while Cristina would go to her grave saying she's straight, I knew better.

"I didn't see her today, her class was cancelled" Cristina tells me, acting nonchalant about it.

"So that's why it's same shit, different day. You didn't see the light of your life, the apple of your eye, the-" she cut me off by smacking me as hard as she could with a throw pillow.

"Why are you so extra." She asks me, irritated. It didn't take much to annoy Cristina, and as her best friend I happened to know all the tricks to make her tick real fast.

"Okay, okay. I'll stop" I put my hands up in surrender, and stand up to go get some water from the kitchen. "You should just admit it; liking a woman doesn't make you gay" I call over my shoulder, to which I was responded to with a short 'fuck off, Meredith'.

After getting a water bottle, I fished my phone out of my pockets and sat down next to Cristina again, seeing what notifications I had.

Meredith, it's Sadie. We should talk.

I nearly dropped my glass. Everything about this was so typical. I rolled my eyes, and showed Cristina my phone. I didn't even have to say a word, and she was rolling her eyes along with me.