𝙇𝙑𝙄𝙄𝙄.
I COULD NEVER GIVE YOU PEACE
──────
FLYING FROM LA to Seattle was a lot easier than Addison would've thought.
It was short. Too short.
***
Mark didn't particularly like it when his flings stayed the night.
He had half a mind to leave a little notice on his bedroom door; it'd be compromised of three steps, a three-step plan of how their night was going to go. He could imagine himself maybe printing leaflets (like Andrew's helpful assortment of little foldouts) and leaving them on the nightstand.
Maybe he'd print it on a business card, leave an info-graphic on the bathroom mirror. It'd say three things:
1. This is a one-time thing.
Mark didn't want reoccurring flings, to be honest, he'd gotten pretty sick of them. He'd tried his hand at dating and it hadn't worked out well. He didn't want anything that was going last longer than a night. He really didn't want anything that wasn't physical. He didn't have time to be concerned or attached. He didn't want to be concerned or attached either. He wanted things to be easy, to be simple.
2. Take your shit with you when you leave.
Mark didn't want reoccurring conversations either. He didn't want a reason to even make eye contact with you again (He hadn't had time to unpack that yet, he couldn't tell whether it was exhaustion or shame but he was running with it for the time being). He didn't want to have to mail someone's panties across Seattle. He was busy. He had better things to do.
And finally;
3. Don't stay the whole night.
The final one was something that Mark had to enforce many times.
Twenty years ago he'd done it with so little regard for the other person: Oh, I'm done now, want me to call you a cab? or Bye, don't forget your bra! He'd managed to do it with such indifference that he'd become numb to the raised eyebrow, the dirty look of a woman who'd barely even gathered her wits— now, he had a little less enthusiasm.
It was more of an exhausted gesture towards the door and a grimace that wouldn't dwindle until the front door to his apartment slammed shut (the sound bouncing around his apartment and causing his muscles to clench).
He didn't like feeling like an asshole.
A few times, he was stuck with one of them going straight to sleep. He'd been lost at that point, not quite at his peak jackass power to have the heart to shake someone from their sleep. In that situation, he'd devised his own plan of action; he'd leave them to his bed and rough it on his couch. It wasn't ideal, but Mark didn't really find the idea of someone staying the night ideal.
No, he wanted them out of the door, far away as soon as he closed his eyes to sleep.
He really didn't want to wake up with someone next to him.
He didn't want it to feel domestic. He didn't like feeling as though he had a girlfriend who was just so happy to wake up next too him. It was the exact sort of thing he was trying to escape— one morning he'd woken up with this beautiful blonde girl flipping pancakes in his kitchen. It'd been enough for him to break out of hives.
He'd watched the realisation dawn on her face as he started speaking. It was a pretty shit realisation to have; the shift in her eyes, the purse of her lips and the way she'd scowl and start gathering her things from across his apartment. Mark would have to stand there, like a lighthouse in the middle of a tumbling sea, consumed by the fierceness of a woman scorned.
Just before they slammed the door, they'd look back at him with malice in their eyes.
"Asshole," They'd scoff and then the walls would tremble with the force of their rage.
Mark tended to ignore it. Just like everything else that was buzzing around his mind.
During his escapades in Seattle, he'd gotten smart.
After a nurse-coupe years ago when he'd been making his way through the female staff, he'd finally realised that maybe sleeping with your colleagues was not the way to go. Teddy, in a way, had been the final nail in the coffin— she wasn't speaking to him now and seemed to reserve all conversation into sharp looks that told him she really wasn't over the whole-stabbing-Beth-in-the-chest-thing (which in all honesty, he wasn't entirely over either).
So he'd started looking elsewhere. He was now a regular in Joe's, entering the bar with the intention of not leaving alone; it made him feel like an asshole, but after a while he'd figured that the shoe fit.
Looks like an asshole, walks like an asshole, quacks like an asshole, right?
During the day, he was busy. He was back in surgery, busy as patients started to look past what had happened. Things felt normal. He was working on all of his cases, steaming through days with reckless abandon and keeping just busy enough for him to avoid tricky little thoughts. In fact, Mark was sure that this was the hardest he'd worked since his residency back in New York.
"I'm impressed," Andrew had said during his last session.
The psychiatrist had sat at Katherine Wyatt's old desk and given him an earnest smile. Mark had leant heavily in his chair but knew that Andrew had good reason to be impressed. He'd worked hard to get back into surgery.
"You've really made good progress," The shrink said with a nod, "Good job, Mark."
Things were normal. It felt like how it had been when he'd first arrived in Seattle, past Addison and past the whole divorce, before Beth had arrived and before he'd loved Lexie a little bit too much. Mark was counting his blessings— things were back to normal!
Sure, his coping methods were unconventional at best, but they were working. He almost didn't think about--
Beth.
Mark thought he was hallucinating.
A ghost was stood in the next room over.
He'd never really believed in ghosts. He'd never been particularly spiritual or religious, never been particularly sold on the whole supernatural thing either— but he could've sworn that he was having some sort of experience.
He could've sworn that his mind was playing tricks on him, or maybe he'd accidentally taken something and was now staring at something his mind had just picked out of the back of his brain.
Beth.
Beth was stood in the next room over.
He blinked, thinking that maybe it was just the shift sinking into him— maybe he'd been up for too long and his brain wasn't adjusting well? Maybe it was the lack of sleep he'd been having lately? Maybe he was projecting— either way, he could have sworn that she was stood there.
Right there. In the middle of a busy room, hair in a bun and lips in a precarious frown as she looked down at the receptionist. It was a brief glimpse, a flash through a window that he would've never thought to look through if it wasn't for his wandering attention.
He'd only been passing, but now, he halted completely in his steps. He ignored his pager, the device that screaming at him, telling him to go check on one of his post-ops. Instead, Mark stared through the window and absently drifted in through the door.
For a moment, he felt as though he was having some sort of out-of-body experience, one in which he didn't even remember making the decision to approach her.
It was her. When he blinked, she didn't go away.
Beth was standing there, looking just as she when she'd sat one step down from him on Meredith's deck. He didn't know what he was doing, but he was walking towards her, weaving through a crowd of outgoing patients as Beth pushed her hair behind her ear and signed whatever papers the nurses gave to her.
Ah shit. Mark thought when he was stood right beside her. What now—
"Hey, stranger."
It was as if Mark had forgotten all laws of social interaction.
That wasn't very normal. He didn't know what to say, what to do— she was suddenly talking to him and he couldn't find the words to reply with. Beth sounded the same too. She didn't look up from what she was doing; it was as if she could just tell it was him.
Mark shifted from one foot to another, staring at the side of her face as she continued to just scribble her initials aimlessly.
"Beth."
There was so much weight on her name. It felt more like a gasp than a word. More of an exhale than a voice. A very slow smile played on her lips as she continued her paperwork, occasionally exchanging sheets with the receptionist on the other side of the desk.
The office worker looked in between the two of them as if he could tell that there was a very important moment playing out in front of him. His quiet almost whisper made Beth chuckle.
"Can I help you, Doctor Sloan?"
Doctor Sloan. It'd always been odd for Beth to call him that when they'd always just been Beth and Mark.
He could remember the feeling it'd evoked when they'd had to pretend to be strangers at ManWest all those years ago. They'd constantly teetered on the edge of something deep and very real (the sort of thing he was now actively avoiding whenever he had the opportunity) and hidden their inside joke between brief smiles.
For him, the title Doctor Sloan always felt so different coming from her. It felt like an inside joke in itself as if Beth knew something that the rest of the world didn't-- maybe it was the fact that sometimes, the asshole doctor actually allowed himself to feel.
He stared at her long and hard as if he was convinced that at any second, she'd drop dead. But she didn't— there wasn't a scratch on her, she looked squeaky clean, as if he hadn't spent an hour scrubbing her blood off of his skin in the shower.
She didn't drop dead, in fact, she looked more alive than he'd ever seen her.
When she looked up, the overhead lighting illuminated the exhausted bruises under her eyes (a tell-tale sign of a woman who was just about okay). Despite this, her gaze sparkled and Mark found himself uncomfortable under the brief second of attention.
As quick as it came, it was gone.
"I..."
He didn't know what words to use. They felt like misshapen shapes trying to get through the holes of a kids game. He was currently trying to pummel cylinders into cube indents, inwardly panicking over why they wouldn't fit. She raised an eyebrow and then looked away, returning back to her paperwork.
His mouth was dry as he spoke:
"I haven't seen you in a while..."
"Yeah," Beth chuckled to herself. "I've been a little preoccupied." When Mark didn't immediately speak again, she raised a wary eye and cocked her head to the side. "Mark?"
Mark's pager had stopped screaming, the world seemed to slow and quieten as he watched every single one of Beth's movements— he wasn't sure what he was looking for... a sign maybe? Some sort of telltale giveaway to tell him that he wasn't hallucinating this or even the shit that had happened two months ago.
He wanted to see some sort of scar, some sort of wear and tear that would show that he wasn't just going insane slightly. But, to the eye, Beth looked pristine.
"You look well," He said quietly.
"Yeah," She answered, nodding with a persistent grin. "I've had a lot of time to myself..." Then Beth paused, circled something on the form. Her eyes lingered a little longer on him. "You look well too... work treating you good?"
"Yeah," Mark stole her answer and her choppy nod, "It's been busy... but it's been... good."
Things had finally picked back up, it'd taken them two months to get back to some form of normal. Mark had finally gotten back into surgery, he'd finally made his way out of his funk and back into the swing of things— but seeing Beth, dressed in sweatpants and a Patriots sweatshirt was enough for him to dip in and out it all over again.
Admittedly, when he blinked, he thought about what it'd been like when they'd last looked at each other. He thought about all of the things he'd thought about in those moments and all of the things they'd said back and forth—
"Good," Beth repeated back to him lightly, clearly not sharing the same sentiment that Mark was experiencing. In fact, she seemed totally unbothered by anything. "I wish I could say the same."
She couldn't remember the last time she'd had so much time. Busy was Beth's baseline, it was her normal. She took after Addison in the way she only seemed to exist in a constant state of chaos and movement. The two of them weren't happy if they weren't immersed, constantly piling one thing after the other. It was both their friend and their flaw.
They both had an uncanny need to get involved with everything and anything— for Addison that had manifested into a tricky impulse to meddle and manipulate, for Beth, it had resulted in overwhelming unrest whenever she wasn't grinding herself to the bone at work.
"I didn't expect to see you here," Beth said, as she handed the pen back to the receptionist and leant against the countertop. She gave him her full undivided attention and Mark almost squinted; it was as if the sun was shining directly into his face, "I thought I'd get out of here undetected. I didn't expect to see any familiar faces in outpatients."
It was as if a switch had flipped in his brain. Mark noticed that Beth was right; they were currently stood in the middle of outpatients, watching the world drag by. He glanced down at the papers Beth had just signed and realised that they were discharge papers; specifically, the ones that went against the guidance of her doctors.
He raised an eyebrow, wondering whether she was doing what he thought she was.
"I was passing by," He couldn't describe the strain in his voice, it was as if he was holding his breath and speaking through the skin of his teeth. He pressed his lips together and swallowed. "I thought I'd say hi."
Beth smiled. "In that case... Hi."
Mark's lips twitched.
"Hi."
Hi?
Mark almost felt like slapping himself.
He didn't want to say Hi, he wanted to say other things, other things that he couldn't exactly shake off of the top of his tongue. Beth looked away from him again and continued on with what she was doing— Mark found it a little harder to move onwards.
He had questions he wanted to ask, things he wanted to apologise for, but Beth started talking and he couldn't interrupt her in the fear that she'd stop.
He'd never been so hung up over the sound of her voice before.
"It must be nice for things to get back to normal," She breezed along, leaving him a few steps behind in the conversation. He wished that she'd just slow down— she never slowed down. She spoke quickly and with enthusiasm as if she was trying to make up for being still for so long. "I heard that Derek is back."
"He is," Mark confirmed, talking so much slower than she was. He felt like dead weight. "I think he got sick of crosswords and NFL repeats. He seems to be doing good."
"Good," Beth said it with little conviction. There was a flicker of malice in her eye that came and went. Mark dropped his gaze, knowing exactly what she was thinking. She didn't think it was good at all. "I'm glad he made a very speedy recovery—"
"How are you doing?"
Mark couldn't stop staring at her.
It was a question that he'd been scared to ask people (How's Beth? How is she doing? Is she okay?), the iterations seemed to be on constant rotation through his brain. He'd been worried that, in response, they'd sigh and say 'Not good' or 'Actually, she died last night', and he'd have to be confronted by the reality of things.
He'd also been worried that he'd appeared worried— for Derek to shoot him that look, or Callie make that face, it would be a dangerous suspicion that Mark didn't think he'd cope with. There'd be the brief moment in which people would think, why is he is so desperate to know?
Mark didn't know how to answer that question.
Beth paused.
"I'm better," it was an honest answer that filled the gap in Mark's chest. She seemed to linger on her answer for a long beat. "I'm not as speedy as Derek, but at least I can breathe on my own now, right?"
This time, Mark didn't appreciate the humour. It wasn't said maliciously or bitterly— it was said with an indifferent laugh that Mark knew was the epitome of her humour.
It didn't settle right with him. He didn't laugh, just stared at her discharge papers rather blankly. Mark wondered whether he was a tough crowd to her or someone who was a little too empathetic. Beth didn't falter at all, just continued onwards.
Maybe this was her coping method. Maybe it was better than fucking a bunch of strangers.
Beth had always been a humour sort of person. Mark guessed that he was too, but lately, he hadn't really found himself cracking many jokes.
"I think Charlie's sick of me," Beth murmured with a dash of exhaustion. She rolled her eyes to herself and watched the receptionist as they filed the paperwork she had just signed. "I'm going stir-crazy. I think I'm three days away from cabin fever—"
"It's been weird," Mark said quietly, realising the truth of what he was saying as he said it. "It's been weird here without you."
It struck him at that moment, how the idea of Beth in Seattle wasn't as abstract as it had once been. He almost didn't even realise how long she'd been here. She'd become, just like he had when he'd moved to Seattle, a slow integration into the background scenery of Seattle and the hospital. Her absence had been odd, odder than Mark had even realised until she was suddenly here in front of him.
"I bet," She chuckled, "I bet not many people in Psych will put up with your shit, huh?"
He didn't reply.
"I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the Chief of Surgery got a fast pass," Beth said, face contorting slightly. "I don't even need to do a lot, right? I could literally sit down all day and do my job— and still, Andrew won't let me back into my office." She let out a miffed laugh. Her eyes flickered back over to him, the impassive statue beside her. "I mean— you know what I'm like..."
"I do," He agreed. Mark shifted from one foot to the other. He knew exactly what she was like. "Let me guess, you've got a little sick of watching movies on repeat and threatening people over the phone?"
She gave him a bright smile, one that told him that he'd successfully read her mind— he couldn't tell whether it was supernatural or whether they just knew each other that well. Either way, he enjoyed the glimmer in her eye.
"You don't want to know how many Patrick Swayze movies I've watched in the last few weeks," Beth said, a grimace appearing on her face. He chuckled. "Andrew just lets me go to voicemail now and he won't see me until I've done some soul searching."
"Andrew seems like he knows what he's doing," Mark said quietly, thinking about the sessions he'd had with the psychiatrist. "I say trust the process."
"Oh I know he knows what he's doing. Andrew's one of the best in the country, but I've spent the last year working with him," Beth said briskly, "I know the process, I've put people through the process— I trust it, I just need it to pick up a little bit. It's usually quicker than this and Andrew's taking his sweet time..."
Mark had come to terms with the fact that Beth didn't like being told what to years ago. Dating her had been something not far from trying to babysit a child. She wasn't the sort of woman who could be told 'No'. He'd loved the strong-mindedness of her, but it'd been both a blessing and a curse.
"I'm surprised you're not up in the OR saving lives," Beth was organising the papers now, making sure that everything was there. She spared him brief looks, ones that conveyed curiosity. "It must be nice having everything together—"
For a second Mark wanted to laugh. If only she knew what sort of time he'd been having.
"Calm before the storm," Mark dismissed it with a light smile. "I'm surprised you're here."
"Call it a prison escape," She joked, slapping a hand down at the papers. The two of them paused as the receptionist accepted them; Beth thanked them with a bright, blinding smile. "This was supposed to be an extremely covert operation— so, if you tell Derek I don't think he'll let me even dream of—"
Mark shrugged. "My lips are sealed."
She paused for a second, seeming caught off-guard by his soft words.
Then, very slowly, she grinned. It was one laced with gratitude that went deeper than just an 'I didn't see anything'.
Mark's face ached.
Their attentions both simultaneously moved towards Mark raised an eyebrow, realising what she was implying. His brow creased as she absently checked her phone as if to wait for a signal that her grand master plan had worked. Mark found himself amused— he was right, nothing could hold Elizabeth Montgomery down, not even a bullet.
"I'm hoping he'll pay attention to me if he sees that I'm running wild," She gave him a smile that made his toes curl. It was wicked and had the same sort of crude impact as the sight of her bloody and lifeless on the boardroom floor had been. "I need to get back to work. If I sit in that apartment for any longer I might start doing something dumb— like watch Top Gun and actually enjoy it."
His lip twitched.
If Mark hadn't known better, he would've thought that Beth had just been off with the flu, or something mediocre like a stomach bug or a migraine. She stood there in skinny jeans, sneakers and a Patriots shirt and acted as if she hadn't had a brush with death— it messed with his head far more than he would've admitted it.
Idly, he wondered whether, if Beth was to strip down to her underwear, did she scar? Was there any bruise or dip against her skin to giveaway the trauma she'd been through— or had she come through all of this unscathed?
He knew that if he was in Charlie's position he would've done everything within his power to stop Beth from getting back to work so quickly. The thought of it made his head spin. just weeks ago she'd been on a ventilator as her lungs struggled to recover, just weeks ago she'd bled so much that Mark's shower water had run red for fifteen minutes (He'd just stared at it while it washed off of his body, unable to really do anything but stare).
Mark stared at Beth in the same way, as if his brain couldn't quite compute what was happening.
For his days and nights to feel normal, he'd had to completely ignore her existence— Mark almost laughed at the thought of it. Good progress my ass.
"I wanted to thank you, by the way," Beth was talking again and Mark bristled at her words. She wasn't looking at him, but rather just tapping away at her phone. If she'd looked up she would've seen the fast contortion of his face as he realised where this conversation was going to go. "I've been thinking—"
"You don't have to," Mark interjected tightly.
"I do," Beth blinked at him, her brow furrowing as she noticed how uncomfortable Mark suddenly was. She watched as his jaw clenched slightly, a stormy sheen blustering through his evasive gaze. "You practically—" Then she paused, her brain joined the dots and, to Mark's surprise, she laughed. "Oh, you asshole."
It caught him completely off-guard.
As welcome as the sound of her laugh was, it wasn't something Mark had expected at all. But he stood there, watching as her face exploded into a look of amusement and she laughed loudly and with reckless abandon, head moving from side to side in a slow movement of disbelief. He opened his mouth to ask what was going on but Beth waved a hand at him dismissively, cutting him short.
When he envisioned himself seeing Beth after he'd quite literally killed her, Mark had not anticipated this. She was full of light banter, pristine looks and no sign at all that she'd even flatlined— when Beth realised that was what Mark was referring too, she seemed to just find it funny.
Funny?
Seattle Beth found it hilarious... New York Beth would've been pissed off. He'd expected something a bit more... angry?
Angry Beth, at one point, had been the normal Beth. A Beth fuelled by heartbreak over the countless mistakes they made during their relationship. Mark would've been lying if he hadn't been scared about whatever hell Beth had prepared for him.
She'd been so full of anger when she'd first come to Seattle, so ready to torch the whole city down if she even made eye contact with him. He expected something alike to Teddy's reaction, anger at his audacity to suddenly decide to perform a cardiac procedure that had lead to the collapsing of some very vital organs. Laughing wasn't very normal—
"I wasn't going to thank you for..." Another chuckle. "You know, I don't blame you honestly... if I'd put up with me with five years ago I would've wanted to stab me too—"
"I didn't mean—"
He hadn't. He hoped she knew that.
"Oh, I know," She smiled at him. "You may be an asshole but you're not a homicidal asshole."
Mark found himself unable to speak.
He was unable to digest the sheen of her eyes— was it appreciative?
Was Beth appreciative of him? That was not, in any way, normal.
The way she was looking at him made him feel weird. Her tone was light, airy, seemed to float on the air as she then, proceeded to check her phone as if she hadn't just so casually discussed dying. He opened his mouth to speak but he couldn't find the words to say— again, he was speechless.
He was feigning normality while his brain spluttered and came up with nothing but blanks. He just stared at her, watching as she just seemed to push everything aside.
He'd spent the last two months wondering whether this would put them directly back to square one--
She wasn't angry.
"I was going to thank you for finding my engagement ring," Beth continued. She almost lazily drawled it and Mark caught the flash of her ring as she put her cell phone back into her pocket. "But, on the topic of your whole saving my life thing, I guess there's a thanks in there somewhere..." Mark suddenly felt itchy all over. The back of his throat burned with the need to swallow, almost like stomach acid sizzling there, threatening to appear. "And again, you know me, I won't pass up on a chance to go against what people want from me..."
She paused.
"So... thanks, I guess." He saw her falter for the first time in a while. Beth seemed to briefly waver on the edge of something but she cleared her throat, forcing out a dry chuckle. "For actually keeping a promise and not letting me die."
Somehow, Mark didn't mind her thanks as much as he thought he would. Maybe it was the fact that he hadn't anticipated her to thank him at all. Maybe it was the fact that it'd been just him doing his job-- a job that he hadn't even done that well. But here it was, Beth looking away.
If she'd lingered longer she would've seen the change in his eyes as he felt the weight in his chest lessen a little bit.
"Thanks." She repeated.
Mark finally found it within himself to respond.
Her thanks was full of humour but something swirled in her eyes; yes, there it was, the telltale sign that Beth's brush with death hadn't left her unscarred. His response was ready on his lips, ready to tell her that no, she really didn't have to think him.
"I was just doing my job," Mark responded numbly, mostly because he didn't know what else to say. At the end of the day, it was true, he'd just done what any other surgeon would've done to any other patient. "You don't need to thank me."
"Jeez," Beth mumbled to herself. She shot an exasperated look at the floor, but in a joking way that made laughter bubble at the back of his throat in the place of discomfort. "I'm being nice please just take my thanks..."
It was his turn to chuckle. He wondered whether it took an effort to be nice to him. If it did, he appreciated it.
"I don't want it, it was just any other day at work—"
Her eyes lifted and narrowed in his direction. "On second thought... I'm suing for negligence."
It's weird, Mark thought. This felt so not-normal but, for a second, it was... familiar.
Not familiar in the way he'd expect it to be, but there was something about the way she scoffed and rolled her eyes as he smart-mouthed his way through what would've been a vulnerable moment— if he let himself linger on it for too long he would've thought they were twenty years in the past, meeting eyes over a dinner table, before the whole of New York had gone to shit.
"Ah," Mark leant against the desk and shot her a perfectly crooked grin. "Always knew that you liked Petunia's way of handling things."
Beth didn't even dignify him with her gaze. She snorted to herself as the receptionist told her that she was officially discharged and free to leave. For a very brief window of time, Mark felt the need to tell her that this was a bad idea— but he didn't bother.
She wouldn't pay attention to him anyway. She never did.
"Asshole," Beth said to him. It was said differently to the women he was sleeping with— she said it almost fondly (with a hint of exhaustion), as if she'd never expected anything different.
Mark tried his best not to smile.
"You'd be disappointed otherwise," he commented, feeling the rapport as fondly as if nothing had ever changed. She rolled her eyes. He felt the need to correct himself. "Everyone would, don't pretend--"
"Oh, what would the world do without Mark Sloan?"
He supposed that conversation would have continued if it wasn't for an interruption. He hadn't realised it but this whole time, Beth had been counting something down. She'd been staring at her clock the whole time, watching the seconds tick by and for someone to realise what she'd just done.
She'd been counting it down slowly, wondering how long it would take someone to hunt her down. The psychiatry department was four floors above and that left... She tried to do the mental calculations in her head, figuring from experience how long it took for someone to sprint a couple of flights of stairs or shove their way into the elevator.
She'd calculated five minutes, maybe ten tops, which explained why, despite her covert operation, she hadn't been in a rush to get out of the door.
The interruption came with the sound of the door opening and a look of intense delight on Beth's face.
Bewildered, Mark could only see the chaotic look of excitement as it unfolded, he heard the door to outpatients open with a loud bang and someone huffing as they came sprinting in. When he turned, he was startled to see Charlie stood there, staring at the two of them with alarm in his eyes.
At first, Mark was wondering whether there was something going on— he fell into the old pattern, the instant assumption that he'd crossed a boundary. It was the same feeling that he'd had when Derek had stormed in on him and Addison—a fleeting moment of panic--
But then he watched Charlie catch his breath.
The psychiatrist looked in between them, pressed a hand to his hip and stared at his fiancée for a while. In response, Beth grinned widely, taking a few steps towards him and holding her arms up as if he was a police officer about to haul her into jail.
Mark, on the other hand, was just completely lost.
"Three minutes," Beth said. She sounded impressed. "I think that's a record."
Charlie just rolled his eyes.
"What are we going to do with you?" Charlie said.
He said it the same way that Beth had called Mark an asshole: equal parts fondness and equal parts exhaustion.
Beth didn't respond, she just tilted her head to the side and raised any eyebrow, as if to challenge him to finish his sentence. Charlie seemed to seriously consider it for a few moments, Mark watched the hesitation flicker through his eyes.
"Voluntary discharge," Charlie sighed out, "Really, B?"
"I thought it would catch Andrew's attention," Beth stated, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. The breath that Charlie let out was long and tired and made her grin widen. "I have to say, you turning up in his place is a very lovely and welcome surprise— how angry is he at me?"
Charlie paused, another roll of his eyes. "Mildly."
Beth's arms dropped to her sides and she sighed. It was a long sigh, one that was over the top and made Mark question, briefly, how old she was.
"That's a lie," Beth pointed out, gesturing to the fact that Charlie had just, very clearly, sprinted half of the hospital to stop her from leaving. "On our last phone call, he told me, very unprofessionally I may add, not to discharge myself."
In the background, Mark snorted, realising what had happened.
She'd done exactly what he'd expected her to do— she'd found a way to get back to work quicker.
"Beth-"
"I flagged the system," Beth said each word slowly. "He's got me on there as a priority and me discharging set off all of the hospital bells and whistles— he sent you down here to wrangle me into a straight jacket. Don't deny it." When Charlie didn't answer, she put her hands on her hips. "Babe, I know you're an athlete now but... but not even you would choose just to sprint across a hospital."
Again, Mark felt the impulse to laugh.
But, she was close to her fiancé now, looming in front of him and just staring into his eyes. He held her gaze and they seemed to have a very silent, non-verbal conversation.
There was another sigh from Charlie.
He shook his head but his silence confirmed that that was exactly what had happened.
"Great, it worked," A slow, victorious smile unfurled over her face. "Now, that he's listening I can do a session in an hour—"
"Beth," Charlie began, "You're not supposed to be here, remember? We talked about this—"
She cut him off, rolling her eyes. Mark stared at the back of her head, watching as her head wobbled and she crossed her arms over her chest— he didn't miss the subtle flinch as she pressed a little too hard on her rib cage.
Another one of those little hints, one of those breadcrumbs that Mark picked up and stored at the back of his brain. She wasn't fully healed. He could imagine the bruises under her shirt, the traces of trauma that not even her blase humour and smiles could hide.
Mark looked between the two of them-- he found Charlie's exasperation just a tiny bit amusing. Does he not know her? Does he not know she's never going to stop? That she just never stops at all?
"What am I? Some dirty little secret now, Doctor Perkins?" Beth cocked her head to the side, "Scared that me being around is going to cause some hospital gossip seeing that you're a hotshot employee now?"
She seemed to be trying to get under Charlie's skin but he just sighed, rolling his eyes for the first time in the last five minutes. He walked towards her, pushed some of her hair out of her face and tried his best to fight off the smile that was threatening to breakthrough.
Beth stared up at him defiantly, raising a single eyebrow.
Suddenly, Mark realised that maybe he should be working instead of standing around.
"We're trying to help you," He said quietly, pressing his thumb to the side of her face. He looked down at her with very soft eyes and a frown that begged Beth to take it easy. Slowly, she raised a hand and pressed it over his. "We agreed that you need to take it easy..."
"I know," She murmured back to him. "I warned you, remember? I'm selfish."
"Beth," Charlie breathed softly, "I need you to be okay."
"I'll be okay," She insisted, leaning her head into his palm. "I just need to get back to... back to normality. Back here, so I can work with you instead of... just decomposing slowly."
Charlie nodded very slowly.
In that time, his eyes wandered— he met Mark's gaze. The plastic surgeon was busying himself with his pager, head tilted away from the couple as Beth held onto Charlie's shoulders. Mark and Charlie blinked at each other for a split second in time.
It was a weird moment, one in which Mark didn't really know what to do with himself. He opted for looking away very quickly. He'd just received another page anyway, he needed to go.
"I'll talk to Andrew for you."
"Just what I wanted to hear," Beth grinned, victory shining in her eyes. The softness and intimacy of the past moment ended with the silent trumpets of the Montgomery girl getting her way. "Tell him I can do anytime until nine. I've got dinner plans for the evening."
"Yes ma'am," Charlie conceded lightly, agreeing to try and negotiate with his older brother.
Beth looked fully satisfied, taking a few steps back as Charlie's pager screamed in his pocket. Mark didn't miss the look of longing on her face as she looked at the device as it appeared— Mark kept his head down but watched out of the corner of his eye as Charlie backed away, reading the message.
"Just promise me you're not going to come here again— you know it's not good—"
"Fine," Beth cut him off. She said it as if it was nothing but a menace, but Mark saw the way her shoulders bunched in discomfort. "I'll stay home like a good little housewife."
Mark looked away as the two of them kissed.
Yeah, he was really thinking that being anywhere else was a good idea—
"Oh!" Charlie said, just before he left. He turned on his heel, waving a thoughtful finger in their direction. "Archer called. He's going be landing in Seattle this evening—" The hesitation in his sentence made both Mark and Beth pause. Charlie rubbed the back of his neck. "He's bringing Addison to dinner."
Again, Mark found himself staring at the back of Beth's head.
Sometimes, if he tried hard enough, he could hear the sheer speed of thoughts running around Beth's head. It must've been a busy place. He wondered whether it was ever quiet— back in New York he'd often caught her talking in her sleep, so he figured it was unlikely. She was always thinking, constantly feeling and moving and never slowing down.
Now, he could hear the spiralling of her mind, the churning of the cogs and the clambering of whatever train of thought was in the process of pulling into the station. He couldn't see the progression of emotions on her face, but he could feel the change in her mood.
Maybe he did have a sixth sense after all.
"Ah," Beth said after a pregnant pause. Charlie gave her a look that conveyed the fact that he understood exactly what was going on. "That's not convenient."
Once Charlie had left for his consultation, Beth seemed to remember that Mark was there.
Softly, he walked towards her, face twisting as he tried to figure out what was running through her mind. Years ago he'd joked that maybe he should start setting up bets for Beth's thoughts— put a twenty on being able to anticipate what she was about to say, about to feel.
When he looked at her face, he found something he would've been able to predict. There was no trace of the tongue-in-cheek dialogue they'd just had, no evidence of her light and nonchalant mood— when Beth met his eye she was full of anger.
Just looking at her made his skin blister.
"Have you heard—"
"No," Beth replied, her voice a little too deep for it to appear unbothered. "I haven't heard a word from her. She didn't..." A pause, "She didn't even send a card or... anything."
He'd never pretended to understand the relationship between the two sisters, but he knew it was deeply strained. Something about the slight sag in Beth's shoulders as she
"You okay?"
Mark didn't know why he felt the need to ask. It was very clear that she wasn't— maybe he was just holding onto the idea that she'd prove him wrong.
He was right about that; her shoulders rose (a slight flinch as her muscles in her chest made her relive the pain of the last two months.) He didn't sound as scrambled as he felt. He sounded cool and collected, the opposition to the fire that burned in Beth's body.
She let out a breath, one that could've been mistaken for steam. She didn't meet his eye, just moved her body in a way that suggested she really didn't feel like being here anymore.
Beth scratched behind her ear, stared after the door where Charlie had left and, very gradually, shrugged.
"Do you have plans tonight?"
When Beth spoke, her voice sounded strange.
Mark couldn't quite put his finger on it. He just watched her, watched as she chewed her cheek and averted her eyes to something over his shoulder. She was in deep thought, possibly thinking back over everything that had happened over the past six months, the apologies, the arguments, the ignored phone calls— just the thought of thinking about everything, personally, exhausted him.
But it seemed to have the opposite effect on Beth. Instead, she seemed to get brighter and brighter with every misfortune she lingered on for too long.
"Nothing on, why?" Mark lied, even though he already had a companion in line for this evening. They'd understand.
Beth let out a breath.
"How does dinner and a show sound?"
***
Addison thought that the whole of Seattle was just off.
The city felt poisoned to her. It felt like marked ground, as if, from the moment she stepped off of the plane in Seattle, something terrible was bound to happen. Each step she took through the airport terminal, each look that Archer shot her (which she caught exclusively in her peripheral) felt like a death sentence.
Maybe it was dramatic but Addison felt like coming to Seattle was one of the worst decisions she could've made.
She'd never liked the city in the first place; somehow, finding out that it was the place where your ex-husband had rebuilt his life and found happiness really put a damper on a vacation destination.
Addison wondered how many more cities they were going to ruin for each other, the deadlock they had on New York made it pretty hard to enjoy the Big Apple. Was LA going to be next? Addison couldn't keep up with it all.
As soon as they stepped through the doors of the airport, Addison realised that not only was this Derek's city, this was also Mark and Beth's. This was the city of Beth's happiness too, Mark's new world of relationships and having a kid and a grandkid--
How she regretted sleeping with Mark when he came to LA.
(Addison didn't have a very good reason for that. She really hoped that Beth wouldn't ask.)
How foolish she was to think that Mark wouldn't tell Beth either-- was it bad to say she was surprised?
She'd assumed that maybe the whole cheating thing had done extremely irreparable damage. Of course, she'd wanted Beth to feel better, to find closure in Mark's apologies but this-- yeah, no, Addison didn't like Seattle.
"Beth's asking us to come to dinner," Archer said nonchalantly from beside her in the back of the taxi cab.
He was scrolling down his phone, not a hair out of place despite the flight they'd just endured. The conversation had been practically nonexistent, Addison had almost forgotten the sound of her brother's voice. Her head turned, her eyebrows raised and she blinked at him.
"Dinner?" She repeated. "Where?"
"Her apartment," Archer replied. He said it in a way that showed that he was as surprised as she was.
Addison hadn't expected dinner. She'd expected brunch maybe, but not dinner. Beth didn't do dinner. Dinner had always been Addison's thing. It'd always been her thing to organise and invite people to. She'd always been the one making the social plans, she'd always been the one booking the restaurants and organising the tables. For Beth to invite them to dinner like this, it felt wrong. It felt off.
Why did an invitation feel like a death warrant?
"Dinner?" Addison repeated. "Are you sure she said dinner?"
"Yes," Archer said as the taxi got closer and closer to Beth's apartment. Addison was able to recognise parts of Seattle. That turning there, that was the turning to Derek's trailer. That coffee shop there, that was a coffee shop she'd been too with Callie. Fuck Seattle. Fuck this city— "Beth said she sent you a text message about it."
Addison hadn't seen a text message. She checked her phone as they approached downtown.
dinner 2nite. - B
"Did she sound angry?" Addison asked rather quietly as the traffic got thinner and time seemed to speed up. Her brother shrugged, she watched the choppy movement out of the corner of her eye as she scrolled through her phone.
"It's Beth," Archer said, as if he wasn't sure what Addison had expected him to say. He looked at her with a furrowed brow, in the middle of answering a business email as his sister very visibly quaked in the seat beside him. "She's like our mother, there's always some anger going on in there but you can't tell half the time... I guess the only difference is that Beth didn't get a botched facelift in the 80s so she can actually use the lower half of her face—"
"I feel like she's angry with me..."
"Well," he sighed, his temper locked behind his temperament. Archer hadn't said anything since their argument yesterday. It was always as if nothing had even happened. Addison didn't like that, it felt as though she was constantly toeing some sort of unsaid line. "You didn't even send a get well soon card..."
"She hates cards—"
"The sentiment would've been nice... you know... kind gestures and everything"
Addison opened her mouth to reply, but was caught short as she realised that Beth had sent her two other messages.
it's your sister, by the way.
i didn't die.
"She's angry." Archer raised an eyebrow. As if to prove her point, Addison showed him the message, dragging in a long breath. She slapped a hand to her forehead, her mind running over everything that Derek had said to her over the past twenty-four hours. "Oh god. She's furious- I don't want to go to dinner--"
"Addie," Archer said, his mouth curving into a frown. "You can't not go to dinner."
"Archer you don't—"
"I do," He said. "You can't avoid our little sister for forever."
He was right, Addison knew that.
She knew that avoiding Beth was cowardly. Addison had never considered herself cowardly, she'd actually been very proud of the fact that she, alongside the rest of the Montgomery household, persisted no matter what was thrown in their way.
As a family, they were, arguably, the exact opposite of cowards. They'd always had too much pride, pride in the excess. Addison's pity party was not the sort of soiree she'd been raised to throw. In fact, Beth was far more in line with the family to throw a dinner party-- maybe it'd become a two in one. A dual dinner party and pity party. A dinner party and loving reunion. A dinner party and public execution.
Her moment of momentary panic and crisis was completely interjected by a light chuckle. Addison's head snapped to the side; Archer was laughing into his hand, face directed out of the window as if to hide his smile.
Her eyes narrowed-- she couldn't believe him.
"What?" Addison asked, nostrils flaring as her temper simmered. Here she was, barely holding herself together and Archer had the audacity to... laugh?
He bit down on his lip, trying his best to stifle the sound as he watched the buildings past.
Ever so often, Archer would glance back over at her, seeing the familiar way she squirmed at the thought of attending a little social event like this. He didn't peg Beth at much of an organiser or a socialite. Watching Addison get all uncomfortable... well....
"What's so funny?"
"You're funny," Archer replied, barely fazed by Addison's sharp, grilling tone. He grinned openly now, deciding that he didn't particularly feel like being nice today. "This whole thing... you're acting exactly like Beth. The whole reluctant thing... It's exactly what she used to be do whenever you'd have one of your parties." He trailed off, "I think that's what call karma."
Addison didn't know how to respond to that.
What she did know, however, was that Seattle felt a lot like a rule reversal. She wasn't thinking about karma, she was thinking about Derek's phone call and how her ex-husband had recruited her into some sort of top-secret project about Beth's medical history.
She didn't think she'd ever voice those thoughts to Archer, Addison couldn't bear to think what he'd say about it. He'd probably pull the disappointed card and then just make her feel bad about it.
She was doing a good thing. She was helping her ex-husband (the same ex-husband who she definitely didn't owe anything too). Addison couldn't exactly see why that was wrong-- especially when it involved Beth doing something that was possibly very illegal.
"I don't know about you," Archer breathed out, appearing completely at ease as the taxi turned onto the street of the apartment. He didn't miss how Addison stiffened out of the corner of his eye. "But I'm starving."
When Addison didn't relax, he sighed.
"I think you're overthinking this."
"You think?" Addison asked.
"I've been here for a while now," Archer said. "I spoke to Beth before I left LA. I think she genuinely just wants to have a sit-down family dinner. Honestly, I think you're getting a bit too worked up over it. Just... just let her have this, okay? We haven't all done something together since... since I almost died."
Neither of them understood how their had become the type that only got together at funerals, but they were working with what they'd been given. Luckily, both near-death experiences had been just that, near and fleeting and very close shaves. It was just a shame that Addison hadn't made the same effort for Beth that she had made for Archer.
"Okay," Addison said eventually, despite the fact that her head still swum with the echo of Derek's voice. A choppy nod and she could feel the world steadying. She let out an even breath, trying to calm down her racing, anxious chest. "Okay— you're right... she's probably not angry—"
"Oh no, she's definitely angry" Archer corrected. There was humour still lingering in his eyes. His lips twitched as Addison's face cracked once again, splintering like a mirror he'd just kicked dead in the centre. "I'd say she's furious, actually."
***
A last-minute dinner party invite was quite possibly the most Addison thing Beth had ever done.
Mark couldn't understand why he was stood outside of her apartment. He couldn't understand why he'd said that he had no plans. He had had plans, he'd had beautiful plans, a stunning Latina woman he'd met in the grocery store a week ago who'd been texting him non-stop.
He'd been looking forwards to his evening but he'd dumped it all-- and for what?
For an evening of tension, reclaiming the same awkward space he'd lingered it at Charlie's dinner a few months ago? For the feeling of an argument that he wasn't sure Beth was even going to let break the surface? Neither sounded fun.
Maybe he was just nostalgic for watching people fight over a meal?
Nothing said home like a good domestic dispute over dinner.
In his mind, he felt as though he was recovering from whiplash.
How quickly things had changed; one moment, Beth's this dying person on the floor of a boardroom and the next, she's trying to set the hospital ablaze and drag her sister down with her?
Mark should've taken a Tylenol. He couldn't keep up with how resiliently Beth seemed to bounce back.
The longer he stared at her apartment door, the more he figured that maybe it wasn't a good idea for him to be here. He felt the same inclination he'd felt third-wheeling Beth and Charlie. The thought of sitting in their apartment, surrounded by their things and their life... it didn't sound healthy.
He didn't know how or why, but over the past few months, he'd felt less and less motivation to pretend to like Charles Perkins anyway.
Was he going to try anyway? Of course... but only for B--
"Hey."
Mark had realised that he'd been pacing; he'd worked a back and forth groove in the flooring out of his indecision. His footfalls had been light and riddled with the inner conflict that was currently playing itself in his head-- but then he was interrupted.
His head raised and he stared at someone he hadn't expected to see.
From the greeting, Mark knew that Derek was as surprised to see him too.
The Chief of Surgery was walking down the hall of the apartment building, frowning at his best friend as he tried to figure out what Mark was doing here-- that makes two of us, Mark thought to himself. This evening was panning out to be full of surprises.
"You here for the..."
Mark jerked his head towards the door, not exactly able to say 'Beth's dinner party' because then they'd both realise how weird that sounded. He didn't want things to feel weird. He wanted normal, the same sort of normal that he'd been chasing like a fix over the last few weeks.
"Yeah," Derek said, "I didn't realise you--"
"Yeah," Mark answered. "I didn't want to be the..."
He gestured towards the door, unable to admit that he hadn't had the balls to be the first person to arrive. He was pretty sure he was on time but if he knew anything about Addison it was that she liked to be fashionably late, even to what was sure to be her own funeral.
Maybe that's why she'd turned up two months late to Beth's death?
"Addison not here?" Derek asked.
"You're still speaking to Addison?"
Mark was caught off-guard, seeing as not even Beth had known Addison was coming until recently. He frowned at the neurosurgeon but Derek just shrugged; he seemed to look around, avoiding Mark's eye until he'd answered his own question.
They were the only people here, the first people to show-- when Derek had established that, he met Mark's raised eyebrows and frowned back.
"I didn't realise you're still speaking to her," Derek let out a sigh as Mark's eyebrows raised higher and higher. "I thought you were done with her after you got all... marriage and commitment with your new wife."
"We're friends," Derek said tightly, hoping that the topic would just go away completely.
His statement didn't seem to help; the plastic surgeon let out a miffed chuckle. It wasn't a big deal, Derek didn't think it warranted the look of surprise that was on Mark's face.
"You're friends... with Addison?" Mark repeated.
It seemed as though he'd completely forgotten about the mental breakdown he'd been having and instead fixated on the way Derek rolled his eyes at his surprise and suspicion. They were talking about the same Addison, right?
"Addison... our Addison?" Mark echoed, "The ex-wife Addison?"
"Yes, Mark," Derek sighed, "I'm friends with my ex-wife."
Mark couldn't quite wrap his head around it. "How?" He stared at Derek in pure bewilderment. Friends with Addie? He couldn't imagine anything worse now. "Or... most importantly... why?"
"You seem to be great friends with Beth," Derek pointed out, causing Mark to pause in mid-sentence. Ah yes, that caught him out. "Or... whatever that is. What's so different if you're friends with your ex and I'm--"
"Maybe that's because Beth isn't Satan."
"Well, you thought she was when you left her for my wife," There was a bit too much heat in his words and Mark visibly was caught aback. He opened his mouth and then closed it, clearly unable to respond. Derek just sighed and shook his head. "Sorry... I'm friends with you, aren't I? It's not like I'm picking or choosing... What's so weird about me being friends with Addie?"
"It's just... weird."
Mark couldn't explain it, but something was setting him on edge. He couldn't tell whether it was the fact that he was completely convinced that this dinner was going to go south very quickly or the fact that Derek seemed to already be stressed and they hadn't even entered the apartment yet.
"I thought we were all done with her when she left Seattle," Mark admitted with a shrug, "I thought she was out of our lives for good--"
"Didn't you have sex with her when you went to LA?"
It wasn't said maliciously, it was said with the same miffed tone that Mark had used throughout the whole conversation. Derek quirked an eyebrow over at him and chuckled when he watched the blood drain very slowly out of Mark's face.
He hadn't realised that Derek knew-- the neurosurgeon chuckled, finding the expression on Mark's face extremely entertaining. Turning up to this apartment building might just be worth it for the crushing look of mortification mixed with a sheer physical full-body flinch.
"Who told you?"
Mark had been very adamant on not letting the information get back to Derek in any way. He'd practically begged Addison (it'd taken a lot of pride that he didn't really have in bulk supply at the moment, being at rock bottom and everything) not to tell anyone that he (yes, he, Mark Sloan) had decided to just fuck himself over like that.
He avoided Derek's eye, staring at his cell phone as the date he'd cancelled on tried to reschedule.
Suddenly, going to Joe's with a leggy Latina really sounded like a better idea.
He also had a sneaky suspicion of who it was that--
"Beth," Derek said, confirming Mark's suspicions. He grinned at his friend as Mark swore to himself, rolling his eyes. "Would you expect anyone else?"
No. Mark wanted to answer; he hadn't doubted for a minute that Beth was the one who'd dramatised his tales of woe and shame in LA.
Honestly, he'd regretted it the moment he'd told her. Really, he shouldn't have even been surprised that it made it to Derek eventually. She'd always been a vindictive little thing, that Montgomery girl. She'd always been so much spunkier than her sister. Addison had promised to not say a word.
"Remember a minute ago when I said that she isn't Satan?" Mark's words made Derek chuckle lightly, the two of them thinking about their hostess for the night. "I take it back— Beth's hellfire incarnate. God knows what else she's done to screw me over. I think I should stop being surprised."
Thinking about the conversation he'd had with Addison just the evening before, Derek's grin slowly faded into a look of bitter thoughtfulness.
"Yeah," Derek said, clearing his throat after a pause, "Probably."
"I mean..." Mark couldn't stop talking. For some reason, his brain couldn't get his mouth to stop moving. He gestured back towards the apartment door. "A dinner party, that's a surprise, right? It's not very Beth at all. I could've seen this coming from Addie but not her."
Both of them knew that Beth didn't have a hostess gene in her body at all; Addison must've taken every single one of them that Bizzy had had to offer.
Archer didn't have any niche dreams of hosting a celebrity casino-themed charity fundraiser and Beth didn't know her way around a cheese board. In Addison terms, they'd been deemed completely useless and written off as socialites that would never happen-- Mark could vividly remember how relieved Beth had been about it.
She'd once said that she would've gone mad if she was expected to spend her whole life sitting pretty and smiling passively at people who she couldn't care less about her and vice versa.
"I wouldn't say surprise," Derek's face twisted slightly. He was still distracted, his eyes fixed on the apartment door and he thought about his phone conversation. "Out of character, maybe."
"It's an Addie thing," Mark pointed out. He sounded a bit too unsettled for it to just be casual. "She's doing Addison-level crisis control."
"Crisis control?" He repeated, confused, "What crisis—"
"I saw her today."
"Who?"
"Beth."
"You saw Beth?"
"Yeah," Mark said, still staring holes into the door.
"She seems good."
"Good, are we going to go inside?" Derek checked his watch, already a bit too weirded out by the way that Mark's crisis seemed to just resume from when he'd interrupted. "We're actually kind of late--"
"She thanked me."
He hadn't been able to process it fully.
It'd been buzzing around his mind like an angry wasp that was trying its best to fight out of his skull. It'd been a heavy thought to carry too, one that had distracted him through his day's work. He didn't doubt that it would've plagued him through his date too, that when he'd finally gotten into bed and set his lips upon that date, it would've struck him (for just the tiniest moment) how floored and mixed he felt about it.
Just him saying the words out loud filled him with an unsettled feeling-- Mark couldn't pinpoint what it was. He was pretty sure that it wasn't far from vulnerability.
Stood beside him, Derek was completely blindsided by the sudden turn in tone.
He noticed how Mark's voice caught at the back of his throat and his body seemed to still from the nervous moving he'd been doing throughout the last ten minutes. Derek just stared, blinking over at Mark as a brief silence played out between them. He took the initiative to speak--
"She thanked you?" He spoke very slowly, cautiously, the expression on Mark's face completely overtaking the volume of his Addison-centric thoughts. Suddenly, Derek felt the need to say more, do more-- "Beth thanked you?"
"Yeah," Mark replied with an almost terrifying lack of emotion in his voice.
Derek could only stand there and watch warily as his best friend rubbed his hands together and lamented at length over the under-ten-minute conversation he'd had with Beth previously that day.
"She thanked me for killing her," Mark said, "that's not very Beth at all, right?"
"Uh," Derek squinted at him. "I guess not— not really— but you didn't—"
"She just... thanked me..."
"Well, I mean, people do that. But Mark you didn't really kill her when she was already--"
"And then she thanked me for stealing her engagement ring," Mark continued to ramble, completely unaware of the fact that Derek was completely lost and bewildered. "I was expecting... you know... like anger or something— and she found it funny. She found this whole thing fucking hilarious and— when you look at her you wouldn't even think she died. She looks fine. Fine. Not dead at all. She was all smiley and happy-- there's not a single scratch on her. She found it funny that I wanted to apologise for fucking stabbing her? I would've accepted mad or sad or angry or something but-- It's funny? She died. I literally stabbed her in the chest and her lungs collapsed and then she flatlined for 40 seconds and—"
He was tiring himself out. His rant was in a muted voice as he was extremely conscious about the fact that Beth was quite possibly half a metre away (SHE WAS ALWAYS SO CLOSE, IT MADE MARK'S THROAT CLOSE JUST THINKING ABOUT HOW CLOSE THEY WERE TO EACH OTHER AT ALL TIMES). He'd spoken with his hands, in a quick rush of air and words that he wasn't even sure made sense.
His tone was inflicted with disbelief and incredulous. He was trying so desperately to make someone else agree with him, to see how outrageous this whole situation was. How could he make his thoughts make sense to Derek when he couldn't even understand what was happening?
"Beth isn't mad at me," He felt the need to make someone realise how weird that was. After everything that had happened, Beth wasn't angry. She should've been furious. "I really expected her to throw something— or yell and she didn't! She didn't even raise her voice— she laughed. And then she invited me to dinner. Who does that? Who looks at me and goes, yes, I'd love to invite my cheating asshole ex-boyfriend to dinner— that's not Beth. I feel like I'm going insane because that's not what she'd..."
Mark ground to a halt.
He needed to catch his own breath.
He'd been talking and talking and talking, and he hadn't even bothered to realise that he'd left Derek in the dust. The Chief of Surgery just blinked at him, a very stupefied, blank expression on his face as he struggled to process all of the information that Mark had thrown at him at a very high speed. Mark took a breath, swore at himself inwardly and waited for Derek's reply.
Eventually, Derek just tilted his head to the side, eyes blazing slightly.
"You stole her engagement ring?"
Mark let out a long breath.
"Of course that's the only thing you'd take from this—"
"You took her—"
"I found it on the floor," Mark was deeply agitated. He hadn't meant to tell anyone that. His skin prickled as Derek appeared to get very angry over (what was, arguably a very minor detail in all of the thoughts Mark had just shared). "Honestly, I can't believe that's the only thing you're paying attention to..."
"Well, excuse me for thinking that theft is a bit of a pressing issue—"
"Stolen was the wrong word. Charlie was looking for it so I told him I found it—"
"Oh, a modern hero," Derek remarked.
He felt the need to continue this vein of conversation but halted when he noticed how antsy Mark appeared to be. In all honesty, it caught him off-guard, he'd never seen Mark so bothered. He shot a glance between his watch and the door; he got the feeling that they weren't going to be joining the dinner party for a while.
"So, Beth's not mad?"
"She's not!" Mark sounded relieved that Derek had finally caught on.
"And that's... weird?"
"It is," He said stiffly.
"Why?"
"Because it's Beth," Mark pointed out, as if it was completely obvious. "Don't you remember what it was like in New York? She was always mad at me. I mean, most of the time I gave her good reason to be but... sometimes I'd just breathe and she'd want to murder me for it—"
"But that was when Beth was using," Derek's words made Mark pause. "She wasn't always angry all the time. That's not who she is. That was the drugs and the alcohol..."
The lack of answer made the corridor feel stagnant and empty as if the conversation had run its course and just left something insufferably awkward in its path. Derek gazed over at his best friend, watching how Mark processed what Derek had just said— he seemed to be able to pinpoint the moment realisation hit home.
They had a foot in the past, both of them did, it was something that always seemed to be stuck there. The very brief mention of New York seemed to do them both more bad than good; Derek felt chills down the back of his arms and he looked away.
"She should be angry at me," Mark said, appearing almost resigned. A glance at his face and Derek could see the trauma of the past few months completely raw and unbridled on the plastic surgeon's face. "I don't deserve her thanks... or her forgiveness or anything."
For a moment, Derek wondered whether Mark was just talking about the shooting.
"Women do dumb things like that," Derek said softly. Mark's head turned and his piercing eyes stared at him, slightly distracted and unfocused. "Forgive us when we don't really deserve it."
A very short silence played out between the two of them.
It was familiar, comforting, a reminder of the friendship that they'd had for as long as they could remember. Despite his slight maniac discomfort, Mark grinned, shaking his head. It was times like these that Mark was glad that, no matter all of the shit they'd been through, they could still rely on each other.
"I still have no idea how the hell you convinced Grey to marry you."
Derek laughed, rolling his eyes and letting out a very long, miffed breath.
"Honestly, I ask myself the same thing every day."
He was leaning against the wall opposite Beth and Charlie's apartment; Mark joined him, the two close friends just leaning against the wallpaper (honestly, Mark wasn't a fan of it so he took great glee in pressing his foot against the border). Derek watched the side of his head, the warmth dipping for a moment of concern.
"You good?"
"Mhmm," Mark hummed slightly. "It's just been a long day."
A long couple of months, Derek felt like correcting him.
"My shrink said I'm great."
"Doctor Perkin isn't a shrink," A brief smile played on Derek's lips, "He's a certified crisis counsellor."
"Well," Mark drawled, "Whatever he is, thanks for covering the bill, Chief."
"It's actually a legal obligation—"
"I know," He waved a hand, "Just don't ruin the moment."
Their very short moment of peace in this fast universe of fuckery (one in which Mark seemed to actually be able to breathe, imagine that?) was interrupted by the sound of the guest of honour.
The elevator at the end of the hallway opened, spilling two very familiar people on the floor-- the two of them looked over in virtual unison, watching as Addison and Archer intently made their way through the building and towards Beth's apartment.
Immediately, both Mark and Derek leant forwards, straightening upwards and pretending as if they just happened to be about to enter into Beth's apartment--
It was Archer who spoke first, he said their names as if he hadn't expected them to be there. They were in the middle of a completely faked conversation, Mark and Derek pretending to discuss some sort of faux surgical case with an overwhelming intensity.
They halted completely as Archer called down the corridor; they extended warm smiles, completely aware of the fact that 1) Archer hated them both with unbridled passion and 2) he was lugging a ticking time bomb in his path.
"Hi," Archer seemed to falter for a second, trying to decide whether or not to say anything else. He looked back and forth again, then over at his sister as she finally caught up to them. The look of bewilderment and brief annoyance on her face made him eventually just opt for a sigh, "Okay, I can't be bothered to be pissed off so I'm just going to remind you both that I don't like either of you. It's been a long day. I'm very tired—"
"Would expect nothing more," Mark nodded.
"Works with me," Derek agreed.
"What are you guys doing here?" Addison asked, finally gathering her wits enough for her to question what was going on.
She wasn't dressed as smartly as she usually opted for, it was a giveaway sign that both of them had literally just gotten off of their flight. Both Archer and Addison looked very exhausted and slightly dishevelled as if their flight hadn't been very relaxing at all.
"We're here for..." Mark felt very uncomfortable as the reality of this hit him— Fuck, he knew what was going to happen. Why hadn't he realised this before? He exchanged a very brief look with Derek. "For dinner."
He could see the thoughts tick over behind Addison's eyes. She wasn't happy, it was clear as day. She had this twisted look to her face— they definitely hadn't anticipated Derek and Mark joining the family dinner.
It was as if they were back in New York, table-hopping every week across fancy restaurants in Manhattan and pretending to care about each other's problems.
But this was different, Addison wasn't particularly welcome at anyone's table. She wasn't in control anymore, she wasn't calling the shots—
How nice it must've been for her to receive her summons.
"Right," Addison said, then she cleared her throat. "Well— we're late so— do you want to..." She gestured towards the door as if she wanted someone to knock on it. Mark was closest, he was the one who should've knocked, but he didn't.
Instead of moving, he met Archer's eye. The eldest Montgomery sibling didn't seem to be excited to move either. He was looking over at Mark with a look in his eye that was almost knowing. While Addison and Derek decided to take matters into their own hands (bewildered by Mark's sudden decision to become useless), they shared a long moment of dread.
Mark was almost startled by the way that Archer seemed to be so convinced that this was some sort of death sentence-- he let out a breath and just shook his head lightly, breaking the tight seal of Archer's seriousness.
This wasn't going to go well.
Beth didn't do dinner. And, if Mark's suspicions were right and this evening was going to go how he thought it was, she didn't do confrontations either.
It would've been so much easier for him to have just stayed home. That was the only thought that floated around his mind as Beth opened the door to her apartment and the evening began. Maybe three steps for a coping method wasn't enough.
Maybe he needed a four and a five and a six--
Whatever number it was, it needed to say this:
Don't play with Beth's fire, not matter how tempting it was to get burned.