Merder AU

Chapter 2

The auditorium was huge given the size and wealth of the school, and every single seat was full as Meredith looked around from her spot next to Cristina, George, Izzie, and Alex. They had luckily found seats in the back which meant if they talked to each other or fell asleep they would not be caught. At least, Meredith hadn't been yet. She could see the middle schoolers too, who often came in here too. But there weren't enough seats so they all sat on the floor. Meredith felt a sense of superiority given that was her last year.

As her eyes wandered the subconsciously wandered to Derek and Mark, who were sitting with their friends. She noticed someone she never had before, a tall redhead not clinging onto Derek's every word. Lots of girls fawned over him, his nickname was McDreamy, counterpart to Mark's McSteamy, but it seemed like he didn't even notice that she wasn't (which almost certainly meant she had a crush on him). Meredith shook her head and forced her eyes away and they locked eyes with Amelia, who was sitting with her friends, and who wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

What Meredith mouthed, to which Amelia just raised her eyebrows questioningly, looked at Derek quickly, grinned at her, and turned back to her friends. What did that mean? Did Amelia think Meredith... liked Derek? That was ridiculous. Sure he was nice and caring and dreamy and hot, but she had known him forever. Just because she noticed those things didn't mean she liked him. It just meant she wasn't blind. She huffed and turned away, and focused back on the conversation.

"No, Evilspawn," Cristina was saying, "you have to cross-clamp at the base to cut." They were arguing the steps of an appendectomy. Of course. Meredith knew it was cross clamp from her many hours in OR galleries and coloring with crayons on old surgical charts when she spent all her time in the hospital where her mother works.

"No, plain clamp."

"cross clamp."

"plain clamp!"

They both looked to her, and she sighed, always the go to for surgical fights. "Cross clamp," Meredith said, but Alex's protests were cut off by someone tapping the microphone and letting out a huge thumping noise throughout the room. It was the principal.

"Hello students. I hope your first day is great so far! How are you?"

"Good," everyone mumbled in a chorus.

"Great!" It wasn't that no one liked her, just that her enthusiasm was very unmatched, especially before 8 am. The principal, Ms. Ruiz, tried to start a slideshow but couldn't get the projector to connect, so she said, "Okay everyone, talk amongst yourself while we get these technical difficulties sorted out!" The room slowly escalated in noise as people became comfortable talking into a once-silent room. Soon it was a circus.

Meredith was laughing with her friends about the time George got his swim trunks stuck on the side of the pool and had to stay there until someone (Alex) came to his rescue. After taking a bunch of pictures of the pruny and stuck George. Everyone kept adding on something else that made everyone laugh even harder until Meredith couldn't speak or breathe and her stomach hurt and tears were coming out of her eyes. She felt a pair of eyes on her and looked around the room to see Derek staring at her. When she locked eyes with him her laughter faded but her smile did not, but he looked shocked and embarrassed, although it was hard to tell in the dim lighting.

He joined in on his friend's conversation so quickly and acted like nothing happened she wasn't sure anything had. Except she knew the blush on her cheeks had to be there for a reason. Why did he look away?

She didn't get much time with her thoughts because the projector connected and a slideshow entitled "How to be happy and stress-free in such stressful times" popped up on the board. Meredith internally groaned, and heard her thoughts echoed from Cristina, who leaned over the arm rest dividing them and whispered, "This is stupid. If a teacher comes wake me up," and proceeded to fall asleep with her head on her hand.