Title: How Far We've Come
Authors: Sara And Lizzie
Rating: T for language, mild sex
Disclaimer: Not ours, not ours, not ours.
Summary: Three years after the season three finale, Addison is fully entrenched in LA life. She has everything there: a boyfriend, best friends and a private practice. She's cut all ties to Seattle, until Meredith, terrified at her engagement to Derek, his flirtation with her sister and her attraction to a certain steamy surgeon, joins her practice. Can Addison help Meredith figure out what she really wants before it's too late?
Author's Note: We have two new fics coming out. This one and "Let The Angels Commit" which should be up next week, but we'll also be updating our other ones far more regularly. Promise.
REVIEW.
I'm waking up at the start of the end of the world.
It was a gorgeous day in Los Angeles. Blue, cloudless skies, a sun that beat down on the city, basking it in warmth. Addison practically woke up with a smile on her face. Her boyfriend was gone, but she didn't worry about him. Pete was always up before her, jogging by the water.
It was raining in Seattle. Meredith didn't wake up, because she had been awake all night, staring at the rain dripping down her window pane. Derek was on call, and by the time he got home, she would be gone. She was engaged to marry him, yet she still found him, teasing her little sister.
And now, there was this. This thing, this person in her stomach. She hadn't told him yet, and she wasn't going to before she went away. It was too much to process, to handle. She would destroy the child like her mother destroyed her, she was sure of it.
And the secret that had been plaguing her for a month. It was the last night she had gone out before she realized she was ten days late. Tequila was coursing through her bloodstream; Derek's fault. She had seen him leaning against the wall, talking to Lexie, who twirled a strand of hair around her fingers and giggled. And she had been so drunk she couldn't see straight, and when Mark drove her home, she kissed him. Hard and deep, it lacked the passion she kissed Derek with, but she had been tempted to drag him up to her room.
She supposed it was good that she hadn't, but the fear and the guilt and the endless waiting for Derek to come home and tell her he'd made a mistake by proposing had worn her down, completely.
She was leaving. She signed a three month contract with a private clinic in Los Angeles. She gathered her things, and left the letter for Derek by the door where he would see it on his way in.
The sound of a car honking outside showed her that Cristina was waiting to pick her up. She begged experience to the chief, but Mark knew why she was leaving, and he signed her transfer papers, promising not to tell Derek. Meredith knew she was being selfish, endangering the friendship that always hung by a thread, but she didn't care.
She boarded the plane like a corpse, showing no emotion at all as she took to the skies, and ran away from her problems.
"You were gone when I left this morning." Addison said to Pete in the elevator, swinging their hands back and forth lazily.
"Sam needed my help." He said. "Bringing in a new doctor this morning. Three month contract. Surgical background."
Addison turned to him and blinked. "No one told me that." She pouted. Pete grinned, leaning forward to kiss her.
"Happened quickly. She needed to get away or something."
"Where's she from?" Addison asked.
Pete shrugged. "Hell if I know. I hauled a chair into her office though." Addison smiled and leaned in to kiss him again.
"How very manly of you." She murmured.
The elevator doors dinged open, and Naomi raced over to them and grabbed Addison by the wrist. "It's Meredith." She whispered.
"What?" Addison asked. "I can't hear you…"
Naomi tried to pull her aside, but Addison was staring straight ahead, into the shell shocked eyes of Meredith Grey.