Breathe

Surprise!

Chapter One | Surprise!

Meredith couldn't decipher if the baby lodged deep in her uterus was causing the nausea uproar or if her nerves had finally taken the reigns. Either way, she felt inexplicably ill. The worst part of this might have been that she was alone. Painfully on her own through this journey of horrific morning sickness. She wanted to snort. Morning Sickness was a cutesy term some imbecile, probably a stupid man, came up with. Her nausea was not limited to dawn. At first there had been a schedule. Yes, it still wasn't a morning schedule but a designated time nonetheless. Since Gary Clark showed up and decided shooting the hospital was a grand notion, her body's internal puking clock was way off. Now she spewed at any time of any day, making it that much harder to keep baby Shepherd-Grey a secret.

It was seven in the evening and Meredith Grey was dry heaving over porcelain. A far cry from early hours. Derek thankfully wasn't home. Trying to empty her stomach with him around was proving to be more difficult than she bargained for. In the beginning, it was easy. He was immobile in their bed and drugged on pain pills. That man couldn't move his arm the first couple weeks much less rush to her aid when she was vomiting. There was no way in hell she would let him know either, at least not yet.

Meredith had been dying to lick her lips but the taste of bile remained present on cavern. Toothbrush and toothpaste were definitely heavy on her mind but in the moment she could not revoke from the cozy spot on the bathroom floor. When she first found out the news, Meredith wanted nothing more than to tell her husband she was carrying their first chatty child. They were going to eat takeout and have dirty sex. That was the plan.

Of course plans changed and a gunman erupted from thin air.

No time seemed like the right time. At first, Derek had been so sick. The bullet to his chest and the emergency surgery took nearly everything from him. Admitting she was pregnant in that time felt wrong. She allotted too much time to pass and now no time felt right.

Just recently Meredith hit the ten week mark and she was long overdue for an ultrasound. A part of her couldn't bring herself to make the appointment without Derek there. The doctor in her was practically kicking herself for waiting this long but the wife inside was trembling with fear. She imagined Derek might be roiling in anger if she went to the first ultrasound without him.

Her belly grumbled akin to a lions roar and she desired to scowl. How was it that a woman could barf her guts out and still be raging with hunger? Meredith pulled herself from the floor. Once she scrubbed the taste from her mouth she could extinguish her hunger with a hot pocket or maybe some of those double fudge brownies she bought from the grocery store a couple days before. She could hear Derek's disapproval of her bad eating habits in her head. But Meredith was far too cranky and hungry to care.

She spread a thick layer of Crest across her tooth brush and shucked the device into her mouth. Bristles met teeth and tongue. She sighed with satisfaction as taste of bile was replaced with minty goodness. Absently her right hand found a cozy spot just down below against her navel. Meredith caught herself doing this a few times in recent weeks. She was no where near showing a pudge or bump but she was cognizant a tiny baby was floating inside her. It was like a motherly instinct or something. She just had to caress her child.

Another loud rumble boomed from her stomach. She snickered. "You have the same appetite mommy does huh?" Commenting on her own eating habits. Derek tended to compare her to a bottomless garbage disposal at times and it seemed baby Shepherd-Grey was following in her footsteps.

Spitting, rinsing, and placing her toothbrush back in its holder, Meredith finally exited the master bathroom. The bed was rumpled and unmade from when she and Derek were napping earlier. I'll get it later Meredith though and shuffled from the bedroom. House was quiet. No Alex or Lexie or Derek. She was alone for the first time in a long time.