Chapter 1: Prologue

Author's note: This is my first fic ever, so I'm a little nervous about it. I've read hundreds of MerDer fics before( seriously, I'm not exaggerating!) and I'm a diehard fan. So, I finally mustered the courage to write a fic of my own. This is a completely AU fic , but several Grey's characters will show up later on. Be warned, this is going to be a really angsty fic.

Disclaimer: I don't own Grey's Anatomy or any of its characters. Shonda Rhimes does and I'm just borrowing the characters from her.

Meredith looked in the mirror one last time, and exhaled loudly. Then she grabbed her bag from the desk and plodded down the stairs into the living room. "Morning, Mom", she said to her mother, who was sitting on the couch and reading the newspaper. Her mother greeted her back and then glanced at the clock, before saying "He's late. " Meredith huffed as she plopped down on the couch beside her mother. "Mom, you know that he's the most meticulous man on Earth. He must be stuck in the traffic or something."

As if on cue, a car honked outside and Meredith leapt to her feet, grabbing her bag and flinging it on her shoulder. "Bye, Mom. See you later." And with that, she rushed out of the house, leaving Ellis in her wake. Ellis shook her head a little, hoping that Meredith knew what she was getting into.

Meredith almost ran across the yard, barely able to catch her breath when her green eyes clashed with the pair of mesmerizing blue ones. He was leaning against the car casually, his arms folded across his chest, which caused the material of his indigo shirt to stretch tightly across his chest and arms, accentuating the definition of his chiselled chest and robust biceps. Her heart fluttered in her chest as he threw her a dazzling smile, almost making her swoon right then and there. She smiled back at him as she approached the car. "You are late", she said as he leaned in to place a soft kiss on her cheek that sent a delicious tingle down her spine.

"Sorry. Mom was trying to surfeit me to death today. You know how she can be."

Meredith chuckled, knowing completely well how much Carolyn loved her only son. "Well, at least you have someone to surfeit you to death. My mother doesn't even care."

"Believe me when I say that you are very fortunate in that respect", he said light-heartedly. Then his voice softened as he added, "You know, you underestimate Dr. Grey's love for you. She does care about you Meredith, even though she does not show her affection overtly by trying to feed you to death."

Meredith nodded, then moved to the passenger side of the car. "Come on now. We're ten minutes late. Mom was already pissed off at you for being late. You don't want to bear her wrath by delaying further." She seated herself in the passenger seat as he got behind the wheel.

"Ready?",he asked.

This made Meredith roll her eyes at her best friend of fifteen years. He could be so daft sometimes. But his tomfoolery was damn adorable too.

"Of course I am, Derek. If I wasn't ready, then why would I be sitting in the car next to you, telling you to get going so that we won't be late?"

"Any more late, you mean. And don't give me that look, I was just asking. It was a rhetorical question,Mer. You weren't supposed to answer."

Meredith giggled as Derek started the car and the engine roared to life. As Derek turned the car away from her house, Meredith looked at him once, her love for him augmenting a little before turning away to look out the window. Yes, Derek Shepherd was her best friend and she was in love with him.

As soon as the bell rang, Meredith hurried out of class and made her way to the locker. As she was depositing her books in her bag, Cristina Yang came and stood beside her. "Collins really bored the pants off me with his lecture", Cristina said in her usual wry tone. Meredith just smiled at her, shaking her head in a non-committal way. Cristina had been her friend for three years now, since the inception of the freshman year of college. She and Cristina had clicked instantly, and after Derek, Cristina was her closest friend. Cristina was also the only one who was privy to her secret feelings for Derek.

"So, how was your date with Mike?" Meredith asked.

"What do ya think? I told you he is a complete moron. I'm never going out with that twit again."

"Strange. He looks kinda smart. Didn't think that he'd turn out to be an idiot."Meredith shrugged nonchalantly, knowing how difficult it was to meet her friend's standards.

"How is your boyfriend Shepherd?" Meredith glared at Cristina, and then quickly looked around to see if anybody was hearing. Everyone seemed to be pretty busy with their own stuff. She turned back to Cristina, giving her an exasperated look before saying," Cristina, how many times have I told you that he is not my boyfriend? You can't go around saying stuff like that out loud. I can't risk anyone knowing about it. If I had wanted everyone to know, then I'd have shouted it from the rooftops."

Cristina shrugged, not expressing any qualms about it. "Well, it's about time he knew anyway. Only if you could stop being a wuss and muster the pluck to tell him about your feelings."

"I am going to tell him soonish. I just want to be sure that he feels the same about me too, before taking any hasty steps. Because above all, he is my best friend and I can't risk losing our friendship over this."

"Whatever. Just don't wait forever or some hot chick will snatch your boy away."

Meredith rolled her eyes, assuring herself that Derek was not like that. But Cristina's words left an uneasy feeling in her stomach and she made up her mind that she would tell him soon.

Outside the college building, a gaggle had assembled around a tall, leggy blonde on a bike. The guys were outright drooling over her and the girls looked on with envy. Derek and his friend Mark Sloan were exiting the building, when Mark's eyes alighted on the hot blonde. "Hey man, look at that chick on the bike", he said to Derek. Derek followed Mark's gaze and noticed a gorgeous young girl, wearing dark blue shorts and a red baby tee, sitting atop a bike and laughing at something a guy was saying to her.

"Wow, she's so sexy. I'm gonna go chat her up", Mark said in a sturdy voice, determined to win the girl with his charms.

But before he could take more than a few steps, Derek caught him by the arm and pulled him backwards. Derek's own eyes were glued to the blonde; there was no denying the fact that she was indeed an extremely attractive girl.

"What the hell, man? Why are you deterring me?", Mark said with an indignant look in Derek's direction.

"You don't wanna get involved with her, believe me. She is trouble."

"Oh really? You seem to know a lot about her. I don't care if she is trouble. It's not like I am going to marry her or anything. I just wanna get her in my bed."

Derek's blood boiled at the way Mark was talking about the girl. He had a strong urge to slug Mark, but he controlled his urge by giving Mark a deathly glare. "She is not one of those slutty chicks that you can just screw and leave. Don't even think about it."

"Whoa, what is your problem? You never had a problem when I screwed almost every chick in this college. What is so special about her?"

Then, realization dawned on Mark and having an epiphany, he said,"Oh my god, you are interested in her, aren't you?"

Derek quickly refuted Mark's claim and said, "It's not that. You don't know who she is. If you knew, you wouldn't dare to go near her."

"Why, who is she? Obama's daughter?" Mark said, his voice laced with sarcasm.

"Worse. She is Isobel Stevens, the daughter of Dr. Ellis Grey and Dr. Paxton Stevens", Derek declared, stunning Mark into silence.

Derek Shepherd was a pretty level-headed guy. He had everything planned out in his life. He knew from the age of six that he could ill afford to make mistakes. So, he was always prepared for everything. Whether it was a surprise class test or an impromptu debate competition or a baseball match, he was always poised to face it. He was meticulous, fastidious- all the time. Well, at least till now. But he wasn't prepared for this. Not at all. He hadn't seen this coming. This had turned his life topsy-turvy. In no way was he prepared for this curveball. Well, how can you prepare for falling in love?

Yes, Derek Shepherd was in love. How? When? Why? He himself didn't know the answer to these questions. He just knew that he was completely, irrevocably, head over heels in love. But with whom?

A certain petite blonde had managed to purloin his heart. The one with the tyrant of a mother. He knew that if Ellis Grey knew that he was in love with her daughter, he would be dead. D-E-A-D. End of story.

But, all of a sudden, he didn't care. It didn't matter that Ellis would be poised to lynch him once she found out. He didn't care that he was in deep shit, very deep shit.

Nothing mattered anymore, except for her. She, who made his heart thud against his ribcage. She, who made his world stop spinning. She, who he so desperately wanted to love him back.

Derek sat at the bar all by himself, sipping his Scotch. He couldn't help but feel melancholy, and couldn't, for the life of him, understand why he had agreed to this in the first place. A double date with Isobel Stevens and her boyfriend. Him, Meredith, Isobel and Carl- what a wonderful foursome. And now, he was sitting alone at the bar because Meredith was tardy and Isobel was too busy with that douchebag in a corner booth of the bar.

But he couldn't bring himself to say no to Meredith when she had asked him to come with her to this double date thingy, not as her boyfriend, but only as her friend. How could he have said no to that adorable puppy dog look that she was giving him at that time, the one she knew was foolproof, and the one she had been using on him for years?

So here he sat, nursing his glass of Scotch, drowning in solitude while douchebag Carl over there was licking Isobel's hand as she fed him a fry. Seriously, was that man her boyfriend or her pet dog?

He never really understood Isobel's choice of men. Take Carl for example. A complete nincompoop who could only embarrass her in the public. What did she possibly see in him?

Isobel and Meredith were so different. Meredith was down-to-earth, simple, upfront and witty. Isobel was starry-eyed, complicated, double-faced and ditzy. Meredith was focussed, poised, spunky. Isobel was scatterbrained, desultory, curt and very high maintenance.

It was abstruse that Isobel and Meredith were sisters. Step-sisters, to be precise. But really, it was almost impossible to say that they were related by blood, that they had been born from the same mother. It was hard to tell if Isobel resembled her father. Dr. Paxton Stevens was a world-renowned cardiothoracic surgeon. He was obviously not scatterbrained like Isobel. He had married Ellis a few years after Thatcher left her. Meredith was only four years old at the time of their marriage. She had immediately accepted Paxton as her father. And when Isobel was born, she had been ecstatic. She had shown off her new sister to everyone who had visited. Meredith had never treated Isobel as her step-sister; it was like she was her own sister. The same couldn't be said about Isobel though.

Derek couldn't help the building rage as he watched Carl lean over and whisper something in Isobel's ear. Isobel laughed at whatever he said, throwing her head back in a way that suggested that it was the most hilarious thing she had ever heard. Derek couldn't help but feel jealous as he watched the couple interact and get cosy. Where the heck was Mer?

As if she had heard him, Meredith appeared at the entrance of the bar. She opened her jacket and made a beeline to where Derek was sitting, downing probably his ninth or tenth glass of Scotch.

"Hey, sorry I'm late. Cristina was having an emergency and I kinda had to go."

Derek looked at her, no, he glared at her as he slurred,"Oh really, so Yang had an emergency and you thought that it would be best to leave poor Derek alone with your sister and her boyfriend. What an awesome idea! Kudos to you Mer."

"Derek, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that to you. I am really sorry."

"Right. Of course you are." He downed another shot.

"Could you stop with that tone? I apologised already. What else do you want me to do? And how many shots have you had?"

"I dunno. A couple hundred probably, to get through the show going on in that booth." He was having difficulty in forming the sentences in his fuzzy, fuddled brain.

"Okay, I think you've had enough already. I'll drive you home. Come on."

Derek turned to look at Meredith, but his eyes alighted on Isobel and Carl kissing. And on an impulse, he leant forward and kissed Meredith full on the mouth, stealing her breath away.

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