139. Making a New Memory

Disclaimer: Grey's still isn't mine.

I know. I suck. Fic writing (like my life in general) has taken a backseat to school, which owns me right now. Thankfully, Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming up, which I hope means a little more free time to write. Thank you as always for your patience!

January 21st had been a dismal day for Derek for the past twenty-nine years. It was the day of his father's death, and while the shock had worn off, the loss hadn't. And since Lilly had come along, he felt it even more, which is why Meredith was determined to make it a good day for him.

She stood at the OR board and wrote her name and Derek's in the designated slot. So far, they had completed three successful neuro surgeries as part of Derek's Christmas gift. Until now, he'd been the one to arrange everything, from the surgery being done to the date and time. But today was different. Meredith managed to orchestrate this surgery all on her own, one that Derek hadn't done since his own residency, one that he'd been dreaming of doing again.

Meredith put the cap back on the marker and set it on the board ledge. As she turned around to head back to Derek's office, she bumped into the Chief, who was behind her.

"Oh. Sorry, Chief," Meredith apologized, blushing at her klutziness.

Richard waved it off with his hand. "No, it was my fault. I was busy reading the board. Oligodendroglioma, huh? That's quite the surgery," he said.

"Yeah. Derek's a tumor junkie. I knew he'd like this case," Meredith said.

"You found it for him?" Richard asked.

"Yeah. Kind of inadvertently, actually. I planned it all myself," she explained.

"But Derek doesn't know about it?" Richard asked.

"No. I was actually on my way up to his office to surprise him now," Meredith said, rolling her watch around her wrist out of habit. "It's just... today's the anniversary of Derek's father's death, and I wanted to take his mind off it by helping save someone's life."

"That's very kind of you, Meredith," Richard said.

"Oh. Well thank you, sir."

Richard bounced on his heels in excitement, looking like a kid on Christmas morning. "So, uh, you and Derek are still letting Adele and I watch Lilly for the day, right?" he asked.

Meredith laughed. "Yes, you are. I mean, unless you don't want to. I know you volunteered, but I don't want you to think it's an obligation," she added.

"No, not at all. We've been looking forward to it all week. All of our nieces and nephews are grown now. And Lilly is the closest we'll ever have to a granddaughter," Richard said, smiling warmly at her.

"Derek and I want you to feel that way. We want you to be a part of her life," Meredith said honestly.

Richard put his hand on her shoulder. "Thank you, Meredith."

"Of course."

"Okay, well I'll see you in an hour or so. Adele and I will meet you in my office, if that's okay," Richard suggested.

"Sounds good. Thank you, sir," Meredith agreed.

The two nodded politely at one another before Meredith continued down the hall toward the nurses' station to pick up the scans and patient chart to show Derek. After collecting both, she headed for the elevator. Derek and Lilly were taking a catnap together on the couch in his office when she snuck out to do her last minute preparations for this afternoon's surgery, and she knew they'd be waking up soon.

Meredith pressed the button for the fifth floor when she entered the elevator, and it ascended with its usual hum. Once the doors parted for her, she walked the few feet down the corridor of offices until she reached Derek's. She gently pushed the door open, smiling when she saw Derek and Lilly both stretching their limbs nearly in sync.

"Hey," Meredith said. She set the chart and scans on the coffee table and dropped down next to them on the couch. "You both looked so cute. I didn't wake you, did I?"

Derek shook his head. "Nah, we got up a few minutes ago. I wanted to have time to look over the scans before our aneurysm clipping today," he said, passing Lilly over to Meredith, then reaching for the large envelope on the table. "Is this them?"

"No, those are for a different surgery," Meredith said vaguely, kissing Lilly's cheek. "Hi, baby girl."

"New consult?" he assumed.

"Nope."

Derek looked over at her and cocked his head in confusion. "What are they for, then?"

"You," Meredith said, a coy smile on her face. When Derek didn't seem to put the pieces together on his own, she nudged her shoulder against his. "Open it."

"Okay," Derek obliged. He pulled one of the scans from the envelope and held it up to the light, his eyes widening with interest the second he realized what he was looking at on the CT film. "An oligodendroglioma tumor in the parietal lobe," he said in awe. "I haven't seen one of these in years."

"Well, today you will."

Derek removed the scan from in front of his face and blinked at her, as though he couldn't fully comprehend what she was saying. "You got me an oligodendroglioma?"

"I did," Meredith said.

"How did you... when did..." Derek sputtered.

Meredith laughed, satisfied that for once, she was the one who had him speechless. "The patient came into the pit a few weeks ago with persistent headaches and vomiting. His personal physician wrote it off as the flu, but his wife knew there had to be something else going on when he had a seizure, which is why they came into the ER that day. I did a CT and sure enough, there was a tumor in his parietal lobe. Nelson was supposed to do the surgery, but he got called to speak at a conference in Texas, so he passed it along to you, only I decided to keep it a secret to surprise you," she explained.

"You did?" he asked softly.

"Yeah. I know today is a tough, and I wanted to do something for you. Our patient is the father of two little boys. So even though you couldn't save your own dad, you're going to save theirs," Meredith said, rubbing her hand along his arm.

"Mer, this is... thank you," Derek said. When he couldn't think of something more adequate to say, he dropped the CT scan on his lap, put his hands on Meredith's cheeks, and kissed her.

"You're welcome," she murmured against his lips.

Lilly reached her hand toward their faces, watching as they kissed one another. When Derek felt her little fingertips on his chin, he regretfully pulled away. "Hmm, why is it that every time we kiss nowadays, we seem to have an audience?" he asked, tickling the bottom of Lilly's foot. She shrieked with laughter as she jerked her foot away.

"Because Lilly is attached at our hips," Meredith told him, smoothing her fingers through Lilly's dark ringlets of hair. "I guess it makes sense, though. Kissing led to Lilly, and now Lilly is around when we kiss. Full circle or whatever."

"That was poetic," Derek teased.

"My inner poet comes out when I'm deprived of caffeine," Meredith said.

"You're scrubbing in with me, right?" he asked.

"Hell yeah. I've never seen one of these. Plus, if I bailed, the Chief and Adele would probably never speak to us again," Meredith said jokingly. "I bumped into him on the way up here. I don't think I've seen him this excited since Lilly was born."

"He's smitten. Not that I can blame him. Lilly's been a heart breaker since she was in-utero," Derek said before pursing his lips. "Wait, just to clarify, there's no aneurysm surgery?"

"No, that was a decoy, just to throw you off. Obviously it worked," Meredith boasted. "We still have an hour. Want to go down and get food, so we can have an early lunch? I want to make sure I nurse her before we scrub in, and we can look over the scans."

Derek nodded, getting up off the couch. "Sure. What are you hungry for?"

"Surprise me."

"I don't think anything in the cafeteria can top an oligodendroglioma, but I'll try my best," Derek promised as he left the room with a slight spring in his step.

Meredith smiled in satisfaction, tapping her palm against Lilly's. "We got him good, peanut."

...

After eating lunch and subsequently relinquishing Lilly into the care of a very eager Richard and Adele, it was time to go meet their patient and his family in his room. Derek held the chart in one arm and pushed the door open with the other, letting Meredith walk through first.

"Thank you," she said softly. "Good afternoon, Fordhams. It's nice to see you again."

"Good afternoon, Dr. Grey," said David Fordham, their neuro patient. He reached out and shook Meredith's hand, then Derek's. "Dr. Shepherd, right?"

"Yes, it is. Hi. Good to meet you," Derek greeted, shaking his hand back, then smiling at the man's wife and children. "Mrs. Fordham," he nodded politely. "Are these your little ones?"

Mrs. Fordham nodded and wrapped an arm around each of her sons. "Yeah. Jeffrey and Max."

"Are you the superhero guy that's gonna save my Dad?" the older son, Jeffrey, asked seriously.

Derek smiled at the little boy. "That's the plan, buddy," he said, giving him a thumbs up.

"How does this work? Do you think you'll be able to get it all?" Mrs. Fordham asked nervously, wringing her hands together.

"We're going to try. See, with this type of tumor, there's a lot of fuzzy edges that make a clean resection difficult. But we're going to use a computer screen to help us map the tumor's location and avoid damage to the surrounding brain tissue," Derek explained.

"There's only so much that 2-D films can show us, so we'll have a much better idea once we're in the OR. We'll probably be able to remove about ninety percent easily. It's the other ten percent that could be challenging. But Dr. Shepherd is the best there is, and you're in excellent hands," Meredith said.

"You'll probably need radiation therapy to shrink and destroy the remaining cells left behind after surgery, but if we're able to remove that ninety percent of the tumor, you'll be in good shape. The likelihood is that you won't need more than a few rounds of radiation before you're fully tumor-free," Derek added.

"What's your success rate with this surgery?" Mrs. Fordham asked.

"One hundred percent survival. Ninety-five percent full recovery," Derek answered.

Mr. Fordham nodded slowly. "And the other five percent?"

"They had some minor loss of speech or motor control," Derek said. "But every patient is different. Every tumor is different. Luckily, we caught yours while it was still a grade II, which means it's growing very slowly. It's localized to your brain, and hasn't metastasized anywhere else. You're young, you're healthy. All of these factors work in your favor," Derek said encouragingly.

"I'll come out to the waiting room every hour to update you on our progress," Meredith said to David's wife.

"Do you have any more questions for us?" Derek asked.

Mr. Fordham glanced at his wife, and they both shook their heads. "No, I don't think so. Just take good care of me. Those little guys need their dad," he said, looking at his children.

Derek nodded. He understood more than anyone in the room just how much a child needed his father. Even after twenty-nine years, he missed his dad every day, which is why he was determined to keep Mr. Fordham alive.

"I know. Dr. Grey and I are going to return you safe and sound," Derek said, always reassuring and calm. "We'll meet you in the OR in a few minutes."

Once he and Meredith left Mr. Fordham's room and headed to the OR for his surgery, she took his hand and squeezed. "Are you okay? I know this case hits close to home."

"You know, actually I am, yeah," Derek said, squeezing back. "Ready to go save a life?"

Meredith smiled. "I am."

...

If there was one thing Meredith had learned over the past five years, it was that neuro surgeries were long, slow, and laboriously complex. But she loved every second of it, especially when she got to stand at the head of the table with Derek. She'd just finished scrubbing back in after leaving to give the Fordhams an update, and the OR doors opened with a swish.

Derek turned his head toward her briefly before returning his focus to Mr. Fordham's open brain. "I was beginning to think you abandoned me," he joked.

"Sorry. After I updated them, I called the Chief to see how Lilly was doing," Meredith said, rejoining him at the OR table. "Right now, they're out to lunch with her, then they're hitting the toy store."

"Hmm, she wears her Princess title well," Derek said, smiling under his mask.

"Right? I'm jealous," Meredith giggled. "How's he doing?"

"Still stable. The scans didn't show just how much the tumor infiltrated the surrounding tissue. If I leave it behind, there's a chance it'll grow back. But if I remove it, I could accidentally hit some major brain centers. I'm trying to decide which is the lesser of two evils," Derek said.

Meredith studied Mr. Fordham's brain, getting a close look at the remaining tumor that Derek had yet to remove. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion when she noticed a bulging artery that was almost concealed under part of the tumor remnant. "I... Derek, is that an aneurysm?"

"What?" Derek asked, using the retractor to temporarily push some of the tumor out of the way. "I'll be damned. This didn't show up on the scans."

"Because it's hiding under the tumor," Meredith said. "The only way to clip it is to take the rest of the tumor out."

"I guess that made the decision easy, then. Excellent catch, Dr. Grey," Derek credited.

"Thank you."

"Penfield 4 and a ten blade, please," he requested of the scrub nurse on his other side. She handed him the instruments and he accepted one in each hand. "Thank you," he said.

"Should I scrub out and tell Mrs. Fordham about the aneurysm? I know I just scrubbed back in, but I told her I'd keep her in the loop throughout his surgery," Meredith said.

"Tell her after you clip it," Derek replied as he began resecting the more delicate portions of the oligodendroglioma.

Meredith turned her head toward him. "You want me to clip the aneurysm?" she asked.

"You found it. You should be the one to clip it."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah. You've done it before. You probably knew the steps for clipping an aneurysm when you were in fifth grade," he said, checking the monitor to make sure Mr. Fordham's vitals were staying strong.

"Third," Meredith corrected.

Derek smirked. "Show off."

And when the time came for Meredith to show off those skills, she delivered without any complications. Derek watched as she worked, exposing the aneurysm, getting control of the blood flow, then applying the clip to the aneurysm neck. Once she was sure it was in place, she released it, cutting off the blood supply from the main artery. After doing the matador move, both she and Derek breathed a sigh of relief when the field was clear of any residual bleeding.

"Any better than that, and the Chief would have to replace me with you as head of neuro," Derek complimented.

Meredith rolled her eyes playfully. "Mhm."

"What? It's the truth," he upheld. "Smithson, would you like to close?"

"Sure, thank you," the neuro fellow nodded with enthusiasm as the scrub nurse began setting up the titanium plates and screws needed to replace the removed portion of the skull.

"Good work, everyone. Thank you," Derek said, taking off the loupes and headlight. He set them on the tray, then followed Meredith into the scrub room where she was pulling off her gloves.

Meredith tossed the used gloves in the trash and untied her mask. "That was amazing," she said.

"It's all in the teamwork," Derek winked, taking off his own gloves and mask. "The only thing that would've made it better is if Lilly were here."

"I miss her," Meredith frowned. She took a fresh bar of soap from the box and handed it to him before getting one for herself. "Richard and Adele haven't called, which I'm taking as a good sign."

"I'm sure she's having a blast, perusing the aisles of the toy store," Derek said as he stepped on the sink pedal, so he could wash his hands.

Meredith followed suit, scrubbing off her hands, too. "She's spoiled. Let's face it."

"Well, as long as we're not the ones doing the spoiling, I think it's okay," Derek said.

"That's a bit of a rationalization, but I'll go along with it," Meredith laughed.

Derek handed her a paper towel after she turned off the sink. "Ready to give the Fordhams some good news?"

"Yeah." Meredith quickly dried her hands off, then tossed the towel in the trash.

Derek smiled, opening the door that led into the hallway. "Okay."

They made the short walk down the hall and into the waiting area, where Mrs. Fordham and her two children were seated. Mrs. Fordham straightened in her chair when she saw them, her foot shaking with nervous energy.

"How did it go? Is he going to be okay?" Mrs. Fordham asked immediately, bracing herself for their response.

Meredith and Derek sat down in the chairs across from the family, both of them smiling to alleviate the woman's fears. "It went well. Better than well, actually. During the resection, Dr. Grey spotted an aneurysm that had developed on the underside of your husband's tumor. The only way to clip it was to take the risk and remove it all. If not, we would have had no way to get to the aneurysm."

"Oh my God," Mrs. Fordham said, dropping her head into her hands.

"But the good news is Dr. Grey was able to clip it successfully," Derek said.

"That tumor may have saved your husband's life. The aneurysm never showed up on any scans, so without this surgery, we may not have known about it until it was too late," Meredith added.

Mrs. Fordham wiped the tears from her face with the sleeve of her sweater. "So, he's going to be okay? The whole tumor is out?" she asked in disbelief.

"The whole thing. He won't even need radiation therapy now," Derek said, shaking his head.

"You made my Daddy all better?" Max, the younger child asked shyly.

"Yes, we did. Your Dad's as good as new," Meredith said.

"Dr. Grey and I scrubbed out to come tell you how it went, and the neuro fellow is just closing now. After an hour being monitored in recovery, you'll be able to meet him back up in his room," Derek said.

"Thank you. Thank you both so much," Mrs. Fordham said, standing up from her chair. "I need to hug you."

"Oh. Sure," Derek agreed, not able to get another word in before he and Meredith were squeezed tightly in the woman's arms. He smiled at Meredith over Mrs. Fordham's shoulder, and she laughed softly.

It was days like this that made Meredith remember why she loved her job, because as hard as it was to be away from Lilly, it was time well spent getting to hand a father back to his children.

"Say thank you to the nice doctors for saving Daddy," Mrs. Fordham said after she eventually let go.

"Thank you," the little boys said in unison.

"You're very welcome," Derek said, giving each of them a high five. "Dr. Smithson will be the on-call doctor for your husband overnight, and Dr. Grey and I will be back tomorrow to check on him. If you have any questions, feel free to tell the nurses to give us a call," Derek said.

"Okay, I will," she replied. "Thank you. Really, we couldn't be more grateful."

Meredith smiled. "It was our pleasure."

She and Derek politely excused themselves from the family, and Meredith took his hand, pulling him down the hall in the opposite direction of the elevators. Derek went along with whatever she was doing, despite his confusion.

"What are we doing?" he asked.

"Celebrating."

Derek smirked as he put the pieces together. Celebrating with Meredith at the hospital had a singular definition, and he was happy to oblige. "Hmm, why are we going to an on-call room when we have my office upstairs?"

"Because we're not going to an on-call room," Meredith replied, looking stealthily up and down the deserted hall before turning the knob that opened the linen closet door. Once they both entered, she quickly locked it from the inside.

"Seriously? We haven't had linen closet sex in years," Derek said, the end of his sentence coming out in a murmur when she pressed her lips against his.

"I know. That's why I want to, for old time's sake." Meredith kicked off her shoes and shimmied out of her scrub pants. "Want to give me sex hair?"

A grin spread over Derek's face as she pulled her shirt over her head. "God, yes," he groaned, the pressure in his groin intensifying as more and more of her clothes came off.

Meredith smiled in satisfaction. "That's what I thought."

...

Lilly sat snuggled in Derek's lap, happy after a long day of being pampered by Richard and Adele, who sent her home with more toys to add to her collection, and clothes to add to her wardrobe. She looked with interest at the pictures in the album that Derek was flipping through in front of them.

"This is Dada, Lilly, when I was your age," Derek told her, pointing to a page full of his infant pictures.

Lilly babbled up at him, drool running down her chin. Derek wiped it off with his hand, then wiped that hand on his pants. "You're the only baby whose spit I don't mind," he chuckled.

The bathroom door opened and Meredith walked out, her hair pulled up in a messy bun after her shower. "I'm pretty sure my A-S-S still has shelf marks on it," she said.

Derek smiled smugly. "I guess that means I did my job right."

"Well, you did give me sex hair, so yes, you did," Meredith said, dropping down onto the bed. "That was fun. We need to do that more often."

"Agreed."

"What are we doing in here?" she asked.

Derek smiled. "Showing Lilly pictures of her grandpa."

Meredith wrapped her arm around his shoulders and hugged him. "I'm sorry this day always sucks for you."

"Today it didn't," he said, turning toward her. "Today was actually a really great day. You made it a great day."

"I swear I didn't plan it that way," she said.

"Still, because of you, we got to save Mr. Fordham's life today. Twice. Even though I didn't get to keep my dad, those two little boys got to keep theirs. That's worth more to me than any surgery," Derek said. He kissed the top of Lilly's head. "And you gave me Lilly. Whenever I'm sad, all I have to do is look at her, and I feel better."

"Me, too," Meredith said as her eyes were drawn to a picture of Derek's father holding Amy in his arm shortly after she was born. "Wow. That looks like you holding Lilly."

Derek grinned. "Shepherd DNA is a powerful thing."

"Clearly," Meredith said in amusement, gesturing to Derek and Lilly with their matching dark hair and blue eyes. "It's like playing 'which of these things is not like the other?' and the answer is me. I would care, except you're both really cute."

"You wanna see cute? Lilly is this close to saying Dada. We've been practicing," Derek said, turning Lilly around to face him.

Meredith rolled her eyes playfully. "She's seven months old, Derek."

"She can do it. Look at her. She's got her game face on," he upheld, bouncing Lilly on his lap. "I'm serious. Be on stand-by with your camera."

Meredith took her phone off her nightstand and turned on the video mode, mostly just to humor him. "Okay, we're recording."

"Okay. Come on, Lilly! Say Dada!" he shouted softly in encouragement. "Dada!"

Lilly blew bubbles and babbled back at him, then stuck her thumb in her mouth. Derek smirked as he gently nudged it back out. "We're trying to prove Mommy wrong. You can have your thumb back in a minute."

"I hope you do prove me wrong, because now I really want to see it," Meredith laughed. "Lilly, Dada!"

"Dadadadada!" Lilly repeated easily.

Meredith froze, nearly dropping her phone in shock. "Oh my God, you really said it!" she gasped.

"I told you she could do it!" Derek practically cheered, pressing kisses to Lilly's cheek.

Meredith finally remembered to press stop on the video, and quickly saved it so she could send it to everyone. "I can't believe she actually said it. You made me cry again, peanut," she said, wiping under her eyes.

"One week you get a tooth, and the next, you're talking. What's next, huh? Are you gonna start crawling tomorrow?" Derek asked.

"Come here, baby girl," Meredith said, taking Lilly from Derek to hug her. "I'm so proud of you."

"That just made this day a thousand times better," he said.

"She replaced a sad memory with a happy one," Meredith said in understanding as she leaned into him.

January 21st held a place in Derek's heart as the day he lost his father, but hearing Lilly call him Dada would forever make the day something to celebrate. Derek looked at his daughter, who finally succeeded in putting her thumb in her mouth after a job well done.

"Yeah," Derek smiled. "Yeah, she really did."