Trapped in my head

Chapter 9

The next day Meredith Grey woke up with a smile on her face. Yesterday had been a lot. It had been very overwhelming and scary but at the same time it had been absolutely amazing. She had had her first kiss. With Andrew DeLuca. Her resident. And now- were they together now? Was he her boyfriend? Was she his girlfriend?

No. No, she wasn't ready to have a boyfriend. She had autism, maybe she wasn't even supposed to have a boyfriend. What if he would soon get enough of her and decide that she wasn't loveable. What if she really wasn't loveable? She's never had a boyfriend before and had no idea how relationships worked.

Sighing she opened her eyes, sitting up and starting to take off her wrist- and ankle weights. They were little weighted devices that she could fix on her ankles and wrists and which helped her sleep. They were called sensory-processing-devices and just calmed her down a lot since they provided sensorial relief, which was why she had been wearing them for a really long time now, every single night for over ten years already.

She felt as if today wasn't going to be a really good day. Her mind was racing while she was just trying to focus on her daily routine, humming quietly as she walked down the stairs to make herself a cup of warm milk. She drank one cup of warm milk every morning. She liked the feeling of warmth in her stomach and since she didn't like the taste of coffee it was a good alternative. While still drinking the warm milk she started to prepare breakfast for her sisters and Alex who joined her after a few minutes as well.

"Morning." Alex said, shuffling into the room and starting to pure himself some coffee. Just the smell made Meredith nauseous but she had slowly started to get used to it so that she managed to stay in the same room without throwing up. "Morning." Meredith replied after placing three bowls on the table and getting a banana for herself. She usually didn't ate anything else but a banana for breakfast since she wasn't really hungry this early.

"Amelia is blocking the bath again. I swear this plan is not working. We agreed on 15 minutes each, me and Amelia before breakfast and Maggie afterwards. But if Amelia takes 30 minutes than I might as well go shower outside." Alex groaned, sitting down opposite Meredith and starting to eat his cereal.

As Meredith kept looking at him with big eyes, ignoring what Alex had just said. "What?" he asked as he noticed Meredith's stare. "I- need to ask you something." She said, taking a bite of her banana. "Sure." Alex said, shrugging.

"Uhm- I had a date yesterday. And I think something happened between us and-" but before she could continue she stopped as Alex started choking on his cereal. "You- you had a what?" he asked shocked, still coughing, his face slowly turning red. "I had a date." Meredith asked confused, not understanding why her going on a date would be a such a big deal.

"Okay." Alex said slowly. "I'm sorry go on." He added, placing his spoon on the table and focusing his whole attention on Meredith. She was like a sister to him and if she was dating someone, how bizarre that was, he needed to know who, when, where and how this man treated her. "We kissed and now I don't know what that means." Meredith finished. "Am I in a relationship now?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. As Alex didn't answer but just looked at her she continued. "I'm a surgeon Alex, I could tell you the Latin technical term for each of the veins in the human body in alphabetical order while doing a gallbladder removal but I have no idea what I means if two people kiss after a date. So, I am asking you to tell me. That's it, no big deal."

"Who is it?" Alex just asked, making Meredith frown. "That doesn't matter Alex I just need you to answer my question." Meredith said, her chest tightening slightly as she felt as if Alex didn't understand her problem. "Okay, okay. You have to talk to him Mer. You have to talk to him about the kiss in order to know whether the two of you want to be in a relationship or not but what is more important is that you tell me who it is Meredith because you- you are Meredith and- and if you kissed a guy then I need to know about that."

Meredith just sighed before standing up, finishing her banana and putting her cup into the dishwasher. "Mer- our conversation isn't over yet." She heard Alex yell after her but she just kept walking up the stairs, deep in thought. So, she had to talk to Andrew about it. As she was still wrapped up in her imagination as her mind kept playing different scenarios of their future conversation, she suddenly heard a knock at the door and not a second later all three Maggie, Amelia and Alex were standing in her room, looking at her. "You kissed him!" Maggie and Amelia said at the same time while Alex just looked confused. "What you know the guy?" he asked the two women.

"Why is suddenly everyone so interested in my- love-life?" Meredith asked confused. "Because you've never had a love-life before Mer." Amelia chuckled as the other two nodded. "But honestly, who is it? Why am I the only one not knowing who we're talking about?" Alex asked, getting more and more mad at the three girls. "It's Andrew." Meredith said, not being able to stop herself from smiling brightly while saying his name. "DeLuca? The resident DeLuca?" Alex asked surprised, starting to laugh as Meredith nodded. "Why are you laughing?" she asked confused, not understanding why that would be a funny information.

"He's just laughing- because he's really happy for you Mer." Maggie said quickly, giving Alex a warning look before walking over to Meredith and sitting down next to her on the bed. "I'm not stupid Maggie. And although I know that what you said is not the reason he's laughing I also couldn't imagine another reason why he would be laughing." Meredith said, looking down at her hand. "Ugh, just ignore him Mer, how was the date? And how was the kiss?" Maggie asked as Amelia quickly sat down at the other side of Meredith. "It was amazing. We ate pizza and talked a lot and then we walked through the park and- we kissed." Meredith said, smiling brightly at the memory. "And it felt really good." She added, nervously fidgeting with her hands.

"Aaaand- did you tell him that it was your first kiss?" Amelia asked, smiling at Maggie knowingly. "Uhm- he somehow knew." Meredith asked, looking up just to notice the look Maggie and Amelia exchanged. "What? Does that mean something?" she asked, scared that he had lied to her and she was actually a bad kisser. "What did he say?" Maggie asked interested as Alex was still standing at the door, mumbling 'DeLuca' over and over again. "He said that he liked it." Meredith answered, looking from Amelia to Maggie. "Oh." They both said as suddenly Meredith started to panic. "What? Did he lie?" Meredith asked, her breathing getting more and more laboured. "No, I don't think he would lie to you Mer." Amelia said, placing a hand on her sister's shoulder while looking at her other sister knowingly.

"Maybe I shouldn't go to work today. I should stay here and avoid him. That'd be the best." Meredith said, crawling over to the other end of the bed and laying down, covering herself with her blanket. "No Mer, you have to go to work. And you can't avoid him. Just talk to him. Talking always helps." Maggie said, smiling at Meredith encouragingly. "Talking always helps." Meredith repeated, sighing and getting up again. It was a phrase that Maggie used a lot. Pretty much every time Meredith would noticeably shut down her feelings or increase her unintentionally self-stimulating movements.

Meredith was really glad she had them because by making her talk about everything to them she usually felt better. "Okay, I will talk to him. I like him and he told me that he likes me so we can make this work I guess." She said, smiling slightly as she looked up at her sisters. "Thank you. And- you think Alex will be okay?" she added, giggling as she saw Alex still standing in the door, mumbling Andrew's name. "He'll live, come on now we gotta go."