Easing The Pain

A/N First of all may I wish you all a very belated happy new year. Isn't it amazing to think that it is 2009 already? I must be getting old! Secondly, my apologies to those of you who are still waiting for the continuation of Just One Second, my everlasting uncompleted fic. It will be done. To be honest this is part of the process of getting back into the writing, breaking my teeth on something new and fresh before I run headlong, or rather, stumble over, the last few chapters of JOS, but it WILL happen. I don't abandon stories, not ever, and have no intention of starting now.

Anyway, I have to say that the one-shot plot bunny bit me after watching a download of Thursday's stunning episode of Grey's. Ellen Pompeo acted her little socks off in that scene after William's execution and this is my response. Strangely, I feel a need to give Derek a voice to explain what, at least in my mind, happens next, and I might even mention a certain ring. Please, read and review. You can even abuse me for writing this when I should be finishing Just One Second if you like.

Disclaimer: I don't own Grey's Anatomy but after Thursday's episode I wish I did. What a stunner.

Meredith was broken. I watched her walk through the gates of the Caldwell Correctional Facility, guards at her side, and I knew she was broken. As the guard let her out she walked through, almost like she didn't know where she was, unsteady, uncertain, but with an urgency to get out of there that was obvious even to me as I stood on the other side of the road waiting for her. Her eyes met mine across the road between us and she never looked away, not even for a second.

It's one of the many things that makes me realise how changed she is, how changed we both are, that she asked me to go with her when she went to William's execution. In the past she would have gone alone, would have insisted on it, told me she was fine and could manage by herself. Now she asks me to go with her and I can't help the feeling that it gives me. She needs me for this and I won't fail her, even though I know that while she goes inside and witnesses the execution by herself, I will be outside, waiting for her by the car.

Part of me wonders even now why I stayed outside and let her go in alone, but Meredith seems to get it. She seems to understand that as much as she needs to go, I need not to. I need to not show Meredith that I just don't see this the way she does, she already knows that. I need to not show her that while she feels some compassion for William, I feel that he's getting exactly what he deserves. He killed five women, damaged the lives of untold numbers of others, probably took mothers away from children. When murderers act they create so many victims, not only the people they kill, but their families, wives, husbands, lovers, children, friends. God knows, I still remember the time after my Dad was shot, the days when it was hard to understand that I would never see him again, not just because he had died, but because someone made a choice to take his life away, all for a watch he'd refused to give up, a watch my Mom had saved for. It still burns me up inside to think that whoever did that to my Dad was never caught, that somewhere there is someone walking around free who should have paid for what they did. I push down a thought that somehow William is paying for it, that somehow his execution will take away some of the anger that coils around inside me, that it will somehow fix the damage. I need to not show Meredith that for me William's death is my vengeance on my Dad's murderers. Somehow I know she knows that's how I feel, but I can't show her that, and going in there, if I had to sit and watch while William was executed, I know I wouldn't be able to hide it and somehow I know Meredith knows it too.

I watch as Meredith crosses the space between us, her eyes still on mine. She looks small and delicate in the darkness, the only light coming from the building behind her, but immediately I can see that she is barely holding herself together. I wait for her, my hands deep in my pockets, one of them closing instinctively around a box, a box that contains a ring, a ring that is a link to the past and, if she says yes, will be a bridge to our future. I don't know what made me leave it in my pocket when we came here. Maybe it was a link to my Dad, but as she steps closer I realise that it is also a symbol of the way I feel for Meredith. It is a symbol that no matter how we see things, even if I see the world in black and white and she sees all the shades of gray in the world, I will always be by her side. Mom was right, I need Meredith.

Meredith steps up to me and I watch her, waiting for something. I don't know what for. In the past she would have got back in the car, told me she was fine and she wanted to go. Now she stands there and without a pause, without any hesitation, she is opening herself up. It surprises me for a second. Meredith never used to be like this. She held back, bottled everything up, pushed it all down. Now she is an open wound. The horror in her eyes burns into me as she begins to fall apart. She is crying, tears fall down her face in streaks of pain. Her voice breaks.

"I know you don't understand me", she sobs as she speaks. "I don't understand me."

The way her voice shatters over the words breaks my heart. I want to stop her. It's as if she is trying to explain herself to me, to tell me why she needed to do this. I want to tell her to stop, that it doesn't matter, but the pain seeping out of her stills the words on my tongue.

"I wanted to show him compassion, that's why I went, that's the reason," the words continue to come, catching in her throat through her tears.

It sounds like she is apologising for going, trying to fix something. I want to stop her, but still she goes on.

'And it was horrible."

She breaks even more, shatters into a million pieces in front of me, and all of a sudden nothing matters except making it better for her. There have been so many times that I wished Meredith would let me help her, would let me comfort her, and now she does. I reach for her, my hands flying out of my pockets. For a moment nothing matters, not even the ring, the symbol of the past and the future I want with her. No, all that matters to me is that Meredith is hurt and I need to make it better, and what's more, she is letting me try. She comes into my arms, still sobbing. "It was horrible," she sobs again, and clings to me.

I hold her close, feeling that somehow I seem to have become a lifeline for her. She gets that we see some things differently, that our view of the world is different, but she comes to me anyway. Maybe it is possible that as much as I need her, she needs me too. In this moment, in a lot of moments lately, it feels like she does. In this moment I love her more than I've ever loved her.

We stand by the car for what seems like hours. Meredith continues to sob and it breaks my heart. I try to comfort her, try to soothe the tears away with soft words and reassurances that it was all right, and although the sobs quieten, the tears don't stop. She trembles in my arms and though I know that the night is cold, I realise that most of her shivering is because of the horror she feels at what she has witnessed. I want to get her away from this place, away from the hurt. A measure of the pain she is in is the way she doesn't even resist when I steer her towards the car and guide her inside. I open the door on her side and help her up into her seat before I run round to my side. I really want to get her out of this place.

I start the car and my first thought is to head for home, the home that used to be Meredith's, the home where I live with her now, where her friends will be, or maybe to take her to the trailer, the place I used to live in the middle of nowhere. The place she uses now when she needs some space or some time with Cristina, the friend she trusts implicitly, the friend she needs. The friend who isn't speaking to her. I know exactly where I'm taking her now. She continues to cry softly.

We arrive at Cristina's apartment block and I turn off the car's engine, telling Meredith that I won't be a second. She nods in understanding, reassuring me that she is hearing me, that she hasn't gone too far in to herself, but still the tears are falling, as if she doesn't have the will, or maybe the energy, to stop them, or maybe she continues to cry because she knows she can't express everything she feels to me. Maybe she knows that there are some things I just won't understand. In the past I would have hated that. I would have been jealous of anyone being able to help Meredith, especially anyone that wasn't me, especially Cristina Yang. Now I don't care. All that matters now is that Meredith is still crying and I have the solution to it in my grasp.

I run up to Cristina's apartment and knock on her door. It opens and she stares at me in confusion. Cristina and I have never been close. I know she still thinks that I'm going to let Meredith down again, that I'm going to hurt her, and I've been jealous of the closeness she shares with Meredith, a closeness that for so long I had no part of.

When the door opens and Cristina stares at me I jump straight to the point. "She's in the car, she's in the car and she won't stop crying." I'm sounding short of breath, partly due to running to the apartment, but mainly because of the urgency I feel. I need Cristina's help right now. Meredith needs Cristina.

"Did you propose?" Cristina asks the question, her voice and features full of sarcasm. It doesn't occur to me to ask why me proposing to the woman I love would reduce her to tears, at least in Cristina's eyes. I already know. Cristina thinks that Meredith spending the rest of her life with me would be a disaster.

"No she went to William's execution" I respond, focusing not on disabusing Cristina of her obvious low opinion of me, but on Meredith, who for all I know is still crying in the car.

For a split second Cristina stands still. I think for a moment that she's going to tell me to deal with it, to fix Meredith on my own, but then something changes in her eyes. Something falls into place for her. Within a second I am following her out to my car, back to Meredith.

I sit on the steps of the apartment block to give Meredith a chance to talk to Cristina alone. I don't have to wait too long. Within about twenty minutes Cristina opens the door on her side of the car and jumps out. I stand up, pushing my hands into my pockets, feeling the ring box again. I grip it firmly, the hard edges of the box digging into my palm. It comforts me.

Cristina walks up the steps. 'Take her home McDreamy" She uses the nickname she gave me at the beginning of her internship, before she knew there was anything between me and Meredith, before we knew there was anything between me and Meredith, before Meredith knew I had a wife.

"Is she all right?" I ask the question softly.

"She's all right" Cristina confirms. Somehow I half expected her to tell me that Meredith was 'fine'. The way she tells me that Meredith is 'all right' tells me that it is true. She really is all right. Right now I think I love Cristina Yang, but as I turn my eyes to the car I know I love Meredith more. She really is all right.

I begin to walk towards the car. As I reach the bottom step I turn back to Cristina, as she is about to go through the doors to the apartment block. "Cristina?" She turns to me, her expression typically void of any emotion. The only thing that gives her away is a vague shining in her eyes. "Just…..Thanks." She shrugs noncommittally and waves over her shoulder as she turns back and goes inside.

I get back in the car and start up the engine. I turn to Meredith, just too see for myself that she really is all right. I see her leaning back into her seat, her eyes closed. She looks like she is sleeping so I don't say anything. I pull out onto the road and as we begin to move Meredith's hand suddenly reaches out to the free hand of mine, the one that is not steering us home. I look at her and see that her eyes are still closed, though she seems to be awake. I feel her long thin fingers within mine. I realise that though Cristina can comfort Meredith in ways I just can't, there are things that I can give her that her best friend can't. In this moment she seems to need to know I'm still there, that I'm not angry that I couldn't get her to stop crying and Cristina could. I grip her hand within mine, our fingers locking together, as if they belong that way. Meredith sighs softly. She is all right, and so am I.