It had been a long day. But it was my own doing.

I'd worked as long as I could, operated as much as possible, and put off going home as long as doable. But the inevitable finally came.

It wasn't going home that was bothering me. It was my voicemail inbox holding one sole message from a number I recognized, and being home meant that there was only so much I could distract myself with to keep from listening to that message.

It was a number that I knew like the back of my hand, one I could shout off in my sleep.

But a number I hadn't seen light up my phone in eight months.

Yes, it'd been that long since Derek and I first split up. Carolyn still called me every Sunday as if nothing changed. And it was nice talking to her. But we were both careful not to breech the subject matter of how are you, what's new?

Nothing much is new.

I haven't dated, not even thought about it. If you want to count me going out with Jackson and laughing my ass off as he gets drunk and try to pick up on ugly women, then yeah, ok, I've dated. But the thought of a guy touching me with his hands, who isn't Derek...well it felt like someone was literally stepping on my nerves.

For the longest time Derek was the only guy for me.

We were college sweethearts. We'd met my senior year at Brown University. He was already a second year med student, making money as a tutor and teaching assistant for Bio Chemistry. I was struggling with the class....or so I made him believe. After two sessions of flirting he finally asked me out. We were inseparable, and got married the following summer at his family's vacation home on Nantucket Island.

We'd been together for what felt like forever. So yeah, it was hard to fathom having another man all over me that wasn't my husband....ex-husband. Yes, I was still having a hard time using that term, it just felt so foreign.

I got in my car, started the engine, and gripped the steering wheel.

I stared ahead as if I were concentrating on the road ahead of me, but there was no road ahead of me. It was just a concrete wall that surrounded the hospital. And that just felt like a metaphor for my life. I heard my phone calling to me, not literally, I was fully aware that it was all in my head.

I let out a loud huff of frustration and pulled it out of my purse. I called my voicemail and entered the password quickly, before I could talk myself out of it. Then pressed the phone to my ear and listened.

"Hey Meredith...I um. I'm sorry to call you after all these months. Um, I was looking for something in the closet this weekend and I noticed a few of your things still in the back of it. So I didn't know what you wanted to do with your items. I won't be home until the middle of the night probably, so you'll have plenty of time without me around... I mean, you know, so you won't feel uncomfortable. Again, sorry it's been so long. Bye."

I let out a breath of air that I wasn't aware I'd been holding and ended the call.

I blinked as I felt an excess amount of moisture built up in my eyelids. I pulled my car out of its spot and proceeded to exit the parking lot of Mercy West.

It was a longer drive than the one I'd accustomed myself to, but it was familiar.

I turned down the gravel-dirt driveway as the sun started to set across the horizon. I got out of the car and took my time to the wraparound porch of the log cabin. I gazed out across the lake, it sparkled in the setting sun, casting a shadow of light across it and lighting up the sky in shades of pink and purple.

I took a deep breath of fresh air. I missed this place.

The door was easy to unlock, the spare key was still where it always was, on the eve of the doorway. I walked in to a quiet house full of dust mites and cobwebs. It hardly looked lived in; it was sad, lonely, and lifeless.

It was made to be a happy family home, ready to be filled with love and memories. Somehow I felt like we cheated it out of that.

I shook it off as I climbed the pine staircase to the landing and then three doors down to the master bedroom. I knew the floor plan like an old memory; after all, I'd helped draw it out. I set my purse on the perfectly made and untouched bed; the room looked just as unlived in as the rest of the place.

I opened the door to the walk in closet and turned the light on. I gasped as Derek's sweet, musky-wood scent filled the air in the small space. It caught me off guard, it was a smell that I'd always cherished, but one I hadn't smelt in....eight months.

I made my way to the back of the closet and tried looking for what he was talking about. I moved a few of his jackets and suit blazers out of the way and saw a few dresses I'd even forgotten I'd had.

The first was bright red. It was a cocktail dress, the one I'd worn on our first formal date. He took me on my first ferry boat ride to long island, it was freezing that night. I remembered him taking his jacket off and placing it around my shoulders. It was then that I fell in love with ferry boats.

The next dress was black, very plain. It was the dress I'd worn to my mother's funeral. Derek and I had only been dating for eight weeks when her untimely passing happened. It was sudden and tragic. Though we hadn't had the best relationship, she was still my mother, she'd raised me, and she'd taught me to be the person I was. And I found myself aching more than I imagined I would that day. Derek was there though, by my side, he never left.

We'd made love for the first time that night...what? I needed some cheering up. Man was that some good cheering up!

The third dress took my breath away. It was long, white, and the dress I wore on the happiest day of my life. I remembered how much it took Derek's breath away when I walked down the aisle in it. How comfortable it was to dance in...and how easily he took it off later that night.

I traced my hand over the dress, through the plastic bag that kept it safe from dust and aging. I suddenly had the craving to put it on again... Oh what the hell, Derek wasn't here and it's not like I'd ever wear anything like it again.

I yanked it out of the closet and laid it out on the bed, unzipped the zipper on the bag and stripped.

I was surprised when I zipped it up that it fit like a glove still, if anything it could be taken in a few inches...I'd lost a little weight.

I fluffed out the skirt of the dress and turned to look at myself in the tall mirror hanging on the closet door. I was disappointed with the girl looking back at me. Her beauty didn't hold a candle to that of the dress she was in.

Her skin was dull, wrinkled, it was old. Her eyes were puffy and held dark circles underneath them, and her eyes lacked the light that used to shine in them. She wasn't the same girl that wore this dress the first time... not even close.

I sighed heavily as I stormed back in the closet to snag the rest of the dresses and leave. As I tugged their hangers off the pole, something came tumbling down on top of my head. I winced and rubbed my noggin before leaning over to see what it was that caused my bump on the head.

I picked up a small leather bound journal that I'd never seen before.

I frowned at the unfamiliarity of it and wondered if I should put it back or not. I shrugged, what's wrong with a little peek? I flipped open the front cover and judging by the sloppy scrawl written inside it was definitely Derek's.

Dear Journal,

Today is June 26, 1999. Today is the day that I marry the love of my life. It hasn't been a long one, but a meaningful one at that. This is the woman that I know deep inside my soul, the one I will spend the rest of my life with. It's been a fun journey to get to this point-many of your pages were filled with my thoughts along that journey.

But I became a different man, I became the man that I am now...all because I love her.

So, beware...it's filled with mushy romantic stuff. But this...this is the story of how I made Meredith Grey fall in love with me.

Sincerely Yours,

D.C.S

I closed the cover and held it firmly in my hands, pressing it against my satin covered chest. I inhaled deeply as I thought about what I was holding and the smell of dusty-damp leather and stale paper infiltrated my nostrils.

These were the most intimate, personal, thoughts of Derek. Reading them might be breeching his privacy. But they were obviously about me....so was I in right to reading them?

I turned and walked out of the closet, I sat, folding my legs underneath me, the skirt of the dress in a large pouf around my torso and held the journal gently in my lap as I turned to page one...

Are you with me on this?