slybrunette | (no subject)

Title: You Found The Words You Need (I Found Nothing)
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Characters/Pairings: Meredith, Alex | Definite undertones of Alex/Izzie
Word Count: 910
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Up to 5x03 - Here Comes The Flood
Summary: There are times when Meredith knows exactly why she still needs Alex and Izzie around.

There are times when she knows exactly why she still needs Izzie and Alex around. Times that don’t involve baking and fixing things. They help each other; they keep each other sane.

Like, for example, when she can’t sleep (Derek can sleep like a baby, every single night, on the other hand) and she comes downstairs expecting silence and instead finding the television on low and Alex on the couch.

He doesn’t even look up when she comes to sit down next to him, just scoots to the far end. Meredith does the same, leaning back against the armrest, legs bent at the knees, feet resting against the denim-clad thigh. They don’t need to talk (even if they inevitably will), they just…are.

Twenty minutes later whatever was jumping around in her mind, whatever was keeping her up, has calmed and whatever tension was in Alex seems to have bled out as well, the change in his posture, his expression, obvious. He’s like that a lot lately, this rigid, self-involved…she’s stopping herself there, really, because she kind of gets exactly what’s going on – she has for awhile – and the only thing that’s been stopping her from saying anything is the fact that anyone that guarded is only going to deny and make excuses. That would be a waste of time.

He’s not guarded now.

“So I heard Izzie asked you to move in with her.” Her voice sounds too loud against the low volume of the television, the silence throughout the rest of the house. This is a test, a way of determining just how receptive he is tonight. She wouldn’t really be surprised if all of this weird behavior amounts to something to do with Izzie.

“She asked everyone.” Alex replies, voice neutral. Everyone she could anyways, Meredith thinks, which quite literally amounts to Alex and Cristina.

“She has no one.” Meredith responds, and when she looks up she knows she has his full attention, just from the way he’s blatantly not looking at her, more looking down at his hands in his lap. That’s called regret, she wants to tell him, that thing that he’s feeling, but she doesn’t. “That’s what she thinks anyways. I’m with Derek, Cristina lives with Callie, she can’t live with George, you turned her down. She thinks she has no one.”

“If she hadn’t – “ He starts, and she can just tell whatever comes next isn’t going to be pleasant so she stops him.

“Alex.” It keeps him quiet; that’s all that matters. “I don’t know why you’re mad at her. I don’t think you even know anymore.”

He’s quick to disagree with that. “Oh yeah I do.”

“Whatever.” She cuts in again. “You’ve both pissed each other off enough. Call it even.”

“Why do you care anyways?” He’s a tad more irate this time.

Meredith takes a long hard look at the wall, trying to figure out a good way to put this. If there was such a thing. Some way that didn’t sound like some sappy greeting card. “I told Derek I wouldn’t make you two move out because you’re my family. That’s why I care.”

He doesn’t roll his eyes. That’s new. He also doesn’t say anything or even look at her.

“She really didn’t tell me anything, Alex. If that’s the problem.” Because it was right after she had that conversation with him that everything seemed to change and if she had to pinpoint the problem, if she was betting on it, that would have to be it. “She just said you were a good man.”

Maybe this time he believes her. His body has got that strange rigid posture thing going on again but his face kind of looks like someone who’s given up. She hates that she takes that as a good sign. He’s quieter when he says, “She’s wrong.”

Rather than tell him the prerequisite ‘no she’s not’ that he expects her to say, that comforting ‘I believe in you’ kind of look on her face, she tells him what she would want to hear. Something that doesn’t feel scripted. “Maybe,” his eyes finally meet hers. “Maybe she is wrong. But it’s what she believes and isn’t that all that matters?”

Here’s the beauty of this, the irony of it all. She’s giving relationship advice. She can give relationship advice because she’s finally not the one asking for it. They’re not just family to her, they’re people with their own problems, problems that sometimes they need help fixing and it makes her feel like she’s not the only messed up one here. Alex, especially, makes her feel that way.

“We’re alone enough as is because of what we do and who we are – we don’t need to feel like it too.” When she moves to rise, she puts a hand on his arm both to steady herself and for the gesture’s sake. “I’m going to bed. Goodnight.”

“Yeah,” he murmurs, low, and the dancing images reflecting off the screen only serve to make him look tired, older somehow. They’re all getting older, now if they could just all get out of this damn holding pattern they’ve been in for the past two years, going everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

On the fifth step up the stairs he sighs something heavy and if she listens closely she swears she can hear “Iz” as the undertone of it all. Like she said, she isn’t surprised. Or wrong.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

liljan98.livejournal.com

That's a wonderful little story. I'm a huge fan of the Mer/Alex friendship, because they are alike in so many ways and I'm so happy that Meredith can share some of her new found wisdom with him. I loved the part about giving out relationship advice :-)

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