He had been the one they had called. He had to go identify the body. Identify the body of a woman he hadn't seen in nearly three years.

A shrill ring had interrupted the quietness of early morning in the Shepherd home. Derek blinked open his eyes, startled awake from his dreamless sleep. The phone lay on the table to next to him and he reached his hand out to pick it up. 'Seattle Grace? Why are they calling me at this hour?' he thought as he glared at the blinking caller ID.

"Shepherd." he answered as an automatic reflex to the infamous middle of the night calls from the hospital. 'Damn,' he though, 'I don't work there anymore!'

"Hello, this is Natasha Woods from Seattle Grace Hospital. Is this Derek Shepherd?"

"Er…yes," he replied. 'What in God's name could they possibly want at two o'clock in the morning?'

"There's been an accident involving a young woman. She's in a coma, but we found your number in her cell phone. It was listed as her ICE number."

Derek's mind flashed back to that day almost four years ago. An unidentified man had been airlifted in the hospital with severe internal injuries. He lay alone in a coma for three months. They never did find out who he was, and he had been pronounced brain-dead. They took him off life support, and his body was never claimed. It was as though he hadn't existed. She had squeezed his hand while they watched the man's body being taken from the morgue to be disposed of.

"Promise you won't leave me to die alone in a hospital?" she whispered that night while they lay basking in their after sex exhaustion. "Promise you'll come and identify my body?"

That morning she had changed his name in her cell phone from Derek to ICE. He had done the same, but his had long since been changed from her number to Addison's.

He knew who the woman was, but he couldn't believe it. He wouldn't believe it until he heard it come from the woman on the line's mouth.

"Who is it?" he asked, his voice sounding strangled in his own throat.

"Mr. Shepherd, the body hasn't been identified. That's why we called you. We need you to come and identify her."

He heard her voice echoing throughout his head. 'Do you promise Derek?'

"Can you be here in the morning? There's a 90 chance she may never wake up, but we need someone to come and identify her. Her injuries were pretty severe."

'Do you promise?'

"Mr. Shepherd, are you there?"

'Are you awake?'

"Mr. Shepherd?"

'Derek?'

"I'll be there as soon as I can." He hung up the phone and stared wordlessly at the ceiling. She couldn't be in a coma. He never had the chance to see her again. He never had the chance to go back and apologize. He never had the chance to say good-bye. He never had the chance to be forgiven.