See Right Through Me

See Right Through Me
By Misha

Disclaimer- Not mine.
Author’s Notes- This fic literally popped into my head and demanded to be written. There are crossover elements (not a Choices crossover) but pretty subtle. When I was replaying Open Heart, I was so drawn to Aurora Emery and I suddenly had these strong headcanons for my MC, Meredith Pierce, and this came together. Thanks to Lizeboredom for helping me piece it together.
Rating- PG-13
Pairing- Slight Ethan/MC, slight Bryce/MC
Summary- Meredith finds herself drawn to Aurora Emery, despite both of their best efforts to keep a distance.

“Where did you learn to do that?” Aurora blurted yet, as I finished stitching up our patient. We were assigned to work together again, something that happened more and more often. I’d complained to Ines, but had been told I was the one that worked best with her, which was shocking given the constant disdain she showed me.

Or maybe it was because I refused to let her get to me. Or because I understood her in the ways the other didn’t, her attitude towards her aunt was an uncomfortable echo of the past for me and gave me a little extra patience when dealing with her.

“Where did I learn what?” I asked and then smiled at the patient, “all done.”

“The suture technique,” Aurora answered when we stepped into the hallway, “I’ve never seen it before.” She looked momentarily disgruntled over the idea smirked. “Picking up tips from your scalpel junkie boyfriend?”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said absently, assuming she meant Bryce. We’d fooled around a few times, but it was casual, just the way we both liked it. “And no. My grandfather taught me.”

She looked surprised. “Your grandfather was a doctor?”

“Yes,” I answered, “he wasn’t world famous, but he was a legend in Crabapple Cove.” He still was, the local hospital was named after him, and they still talked about how great he was, but how he could have been better, how he could have been world class if not for the war. “It was hard on my father.”

Or at least that was what my mother had told me, I had no first-hand knowledge of the man who had died before my third birthday. Just the stories and the never-ending blame that my mother and grandfather heaped on each other.

I wasn’t sure why I’d said that last part and I’d regretted it almost as soon as I said it. I never talked about my father and I wasn’t going to start opening up to Aurora Emery of all people, even if I did occasionally get the feeling she might relate more than most.  

“Was your father a doctor too?” Aurora asked, almost curious.

I turned so she couldn’t see me wince. It was a normal question I knew that and she couldn’t know how painful and complicated that question was…I hesitated, trying to find an answer that didn’t involve the complicated truth, the ones that had haunted me my entire life.

“Dr. Pierce!” I had never been so grateful to hear the sound of my name, saving me from answering or for coming up with a convincing lie and I hurried away, aware that Aurora was still watching me. As I ran, I silently cursed myself, why had I told her that? Why had I opened that can of worms at all? What was it about Aurora Emery that made me want to confide my darkest secrets in her? It certainly wasn’t her friendly demeanor. And even if I sensed she might understand… I couldn’t open myself up like that.

**

Once my shift was over, I joined the other at Donahue’s as usual. Ethan was there, finishing off his drink and we exchanged in some banter that just teased the edges of professional.  After a while, he stood up, though his eyes lingered on me for a moment as if there was something to say, but whatever it was, he decided against it and instead he said goodnight, leaving me along at the bar contemplating whatever secrets he kept and why they fascinated me so.

“Why do you drink if you don’t like it?”

I looked up in surprise as Aurora slid into the seat that Ethan had vacated.

I shot her a surprised look, the half-full glass of scotch still in my hands.

“Normally I would assume you were just trying to suck up to an attending,” she continued, “but you do it with your friends too, you hesitate before every shot.”

“I had no idea you watched me so closely,” I countered, evading the question.

“We’re doctors, it’s our job to be observant,” she said with a shrug, “and you are so annoyingly perky that it’s hard not to notice when you get broody.”

I wasn’t sure if she was insulting me or not but for Aurora, it was almost nice, so I shrugged it off. Besides, I was too busy being unnerved by how easily she’d read me.

To prove a point, though I was unsure whether it was to her or myself, I tossed back the rest of the scotch letting it slide down smoothly just like it had the times I’d drank in my grandfather’s study.

“I got a taste for scotch during the war,” he’d tell me, pouring us both a glass, uncaring that it would be years before I was legal drinking age. But Grandpa had never been one for rules.

“You were drinking scotch during the war?” I asked in surprise as I took the glass in my hand, peering down at the amber liquid.

Grandpa laughed, the warmth of it filling the room. “No, mostly, I drank bathtub hooch during the war but I had a tent mate with expensive taste and sometimes I could charm him out of a bottle.” His eyes got that far away look they always did whenever Korea came up. “I swore I’d never drink homemade booze again, but the scotch… That I drink to remember.”

“You mean to forget,” I corrected because people drank to forget, didn’t they.

Grandpa smiled, his eyes sad. “No, I drink other things to forget, but sometimes you need to remember kiddo. Because if you let yourself forget, then you lose a part of yourself, the key is to remember on your own terms and only as much as you can handle.”

I could handle the memories of my grandfather, of how he got melancholy when he drank scotch and talked about the war that had changed his life. It was the other memories… The ones where he and my mother said horrible things to each other, each holding the other responsible for the past… Hating each other because neither one of them could bring themselves to hate a dead man… Those I would choose not to remember.

Aurora was still watching me when I put down the empty glass. “Trying to prove something to me or yourself?”

Both, maybe, I thought but didn’t say. “I was just finding my drink,” I told her, getting to my feet, “I think there are some darts with my name on it.”

I didn’t give her a chance to respond, instead, I quickly crossed the bar to where Bryce and his friends were playing darts. “Come to get your ass kicked again?” Bryce teased, slinging a familiar arm around my waist and nuzzling my neck affectionately as his friends hooted and hollered over the display of affection.

“You mean kick your ass?” I teased, but I couldn’t resist glancing back at the bar and saw that Aurora was still watching me, an unreadable expression on her beautiful face. I looked away quickly, focusing on Bryce instead.

It unnerved me how easily she had read me, how much she had been able to see and what unnerved me, even more, was that she had seen fit to comment on it. Why? We weren’t friends. My habits should be nothing to her. Just like she should be nothing to me and yet I knew that wasn’t true.

There was a reason I worked better with Aurora than anyone else because deep down we were more alike than I would ever be comfortable admitting. And that was a luxury I had that Aurora didn’t. She couldn’t hide who she was or what it meant, while I could and I was going to keep doing so as long as I could and that meant I had to give Aurora a taste of her own medicine and keep her at a distance because I couldn’t afford to let down my walls.

It was the same reason I started out every night exchanging quips with Ethan but ended up in Bryce’s arms. Because I couldn’t afford complications. I couldn’t afford to let anyone in, to see the truth behind the perky exterior, and all the ghosts that laid there.

Not Ethan, not Aurora, not anyone.

• End