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It was the sounds. Those were what kept Cristina up at night – what still keeps her up at night. The only difference now is that the sounds are simply memories. She isn’t wrestling with wolves over Lexie’s corpse anymore. Though she feels similarly dead inside. The nights were cold. So cold. And so dark. It wasn’t like anything she’d ever experienced in her life. Sure, she’d gone camping before, but out in those woods... after around 6pm the sun would begin to set, the temperature easily dropping 20 degrees in what felt like no time at all. They’d run out of matches the first night. After that there wasn’t much else they could do aside from huddle together in the tangled mess of jackets and blankets strewn over their laps, hoping, praying to any fucking gods Cristina never believed in that please, no one else die, please, just find us.
She lays in her bed – their bed, her and Owen’s? She isn’t sure anymore. She doesn’t quite know what they are, but it doesn’t really matter. She stares at the ceiling, watching the stucco go in and out of focus; the patterns beginning to swirl as static washes over her ears. She wants a glass of wine, turning her focus to the kitchen. Just out of reach. She doesn’t have it in her to get up. Or to move at all really, anything past turning her gaze to one side or the other. She’s tired of hearing everyone tell her it’s okay. It's really not. And sure, she knows no one really thinks that, but they keep waiting anyways. And she’s paralyzed.
When she hears the familiar jingle of keys downstairs and the steps as he approaches their loft, she isn’t sure how long it’s been since he left. If it’s been all day and he was at work, or if it’s been 20 minutes and he was just out grabbing some lo mein. This should scare her, but it doesn’t. She doesn’t have it in her to care anymore. All she can hear is those fucking wolves and she snaps her eyes shut as Owen takes off his coat, gently padding towards her as if he is literally walking on eggshells. Is she really so fragile? She doesn’t know. Her eyes stay closed as he sits at the edge of the bed, his hand coming to rub her back gently.
“Hey... I... I missed you today.” So, it must have been work. He leans down to press a kiss to the top of her unwashed mass of curls. She opens her eyes, Owen meeting them with a concerned expression on his face, brows furrowed as his lips move as if there’s something he’s trying to say but he can’t get the words to leave his mouth.
A tear falls down her cheek, though her own expression betrays nothing.
“Let’s get you something to eat.”
The sound of Lexie’s flesh tearing seared her mind as she desperately tried to fend off the wolves with one arm and a long stick, she knew it was a hopeless fight, but she was going to fucking try! One of them grabbed a hold of Lexie’s hand, tugging hard as Cristina did her best to poke and push at the mutt, but it only seemed to make him angrier as he reared back and she heard a loud crunch of bone snapping, followed by the squelching as the skin released from muscle and fat, ligaments stretching as the white metal of the plane was painted red. With nothing left to lose, she screamed, as loud as she could, her vocal cords ripped raw as the pack scattered, Lexie’s detached hand in tow, dripping blood down one of the wolf’s mouths as they ran into the safety of the trees. Cristina sobbed silently as she fell to her knees. Please, God, don’t let me die like this. Don’t let me die.
Cristina looks up to Owen.
“I’m not hungry.”
He seems surprised to hear her voice, though it’s quickly followed by his usual disappointed sigh.
“Cristina... it’s been 2 days. You need to eat something.”
She looks away.
“I’m not hungry.”
He sighs again. It’s their usual song and dance. He stands, slipping off his shoes and unbuttoning his shirt, folding it up before setting it down on the chair. He looks back with those furrowed brows before stepping into the bathroom. She hears the shower begin to run, letting out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding once the door closes.
She is hungry. But she can’t stomach the thought of her teeth ripping into anything right now. Not that Owen would be able to understand. She knows he wants to try. He tells her every day. But he can’t. He just can’t.
It feels like mere seconds have passed when the bathroom door opens again, Owen walking out with a towel wrapped around his waist, eyeing Cristina the moment he walks back into their room.
She rolls over, hoping at least this way she won’t have to close her eyes. She doesn’t want to risk falling asleep.
Everything is still a little muted when the ringing of her phone cuts through the ambient horror replaying in her mind. It’s on the kitchen counter, but the ringer is turned all the way up, and she wishes she could just disappear when she hears Mer’s ringtone blasting from the other room.
Owne walks over to it, looking back at Cristina once before picking it up.
“Hello. No, she’s not feeling up to it right now. I will tell her you called. Yes, I promise. I... don’t know...” The last three words are uttered quiet enough that Cristina knows he doesn’t want her to hear them. What he doesn’t know? Well, that could really be anything.
He hangs up, placing the phone back on the counter as he walks over towards Cristina again. He pulls on a t shirt and boxers from their wardrobe, climbing into bed beside her and reaching out to rub his hands down her shoulders and arms.
“You can talk to me. I know you don’t want to talk about it, but I’m here, Cristina. Let me be here.”
“I’m not though. Here. I...” Arizona’s screams echo in her ears as she desperately shakes Meredith, ‘Please, Mer, Wake up!’ Every breath hitches as her chest grows tighter, and tears start to flow down her cheeks.
“But you are. You’re right here, Cristina, with me. You’re not back there. You’re safe.”
“What about Lexie?”
Owen sighs again and Cristina knows he won’t push further.
*****
“Can I ask you something?” There’s a real sense of trepidation in his eyes as he looks down at her. Owen is making breakfast, scrambled eggs and bacon, while Cristina sits at the island, staring absentmindedly at the pan as the eggs start to brown.
“I can’t stop you, can I?”
“Do you remember the crash?”
Does she remember the fucking crash? Does she remember the way the turbulence began to get rougher than she could rationally brush off – the way Mer looked at her when the pilot made his announcement to ‘Please, fasten your seatbelts immediately and brace for impact.’ The amount of fear exchanged in one split second look back before the oxygen masks deployed – it was unfathomable. Derek grabbed Meredith tight, and Cristina watched them close their eyes as the back half of the plane seemed to disappear before her own, Lexie and Derek sucked along with it as they continued travelling forward, barreling toward the ground. It was all she could do to push out her arm in front of her face before she was thrust into the seat ahead her, feeling the crunch of her radius snapping against hard plastic backing – the abrupt halt flinging her into the back of the plane onto the cold metal, her head banging hard against the ground as her vision swam. There was screaming, and pain, and it was all so fast she almost wondered if she’d blacked out for a time.
She looks up at Owen.
“Yes. I remember it.”
He looks at her with a sad expression.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”
“I thought I was going to die. Again. After everything, it was going to be that stupid fucking plane crash. I didn’t think we were going to get out. And I couldn’t stop thinking about Zola. If Mer and Derek and me... with Lexie gone and Mark dying every other hour... who would she have left? Her whole family gone in an instant. I couldn’t -- I couldn’t let it happen, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t close my eyes. I can’t close them. I can’t. I close them and I’m there again. I’m always there. And everyone’s always dying.”
Owen stops his motions on the stove, his spatula almost falling from his right hand as his other goes to grip the counter, seemingly to steady himself.
“You can close your eyes Cristina. The world isn’t going to fall apart if you take a moment and take a breath. You’re going to be okay. This will pass.”
“Will it?”
He looks down to the pan, continuing to scramble the eggs, lowering the heat as the bacon is nearly finished.
“Yes.”
He doesn’t meet her eyes, and Cristina knows he’s lying. She still hears his screams sometimes at night. He hasn’t come home yet. How can she hope to?
He plates the bacon and eggs, popping some bread in the toaster and adding it to the spread with some butter and raspberry jelly before placing it before her. She pokes at the food with her fork; her stomach turns.
“What time is it?”
“It’s 11pm.”
“Why are we having breakfast?”
“Because you’re awake.”
She takes a bite of bacon. Her teeth rip through the chewy flesh, and she doesn’t allow herself to close her eyes. She finishes one piece before her eggs are wet from the tears she didn't realize were streaming down her face, and Owen pulls the plate away.
“What do you need from me? Please, Cristina, just tell me and I’ll do it. Anything.”
“I don’t know. Okay? I don’t know if there is anything you can do. It’s done.”
“Okay...”
“Could you get me a glass of wine?”
He looks at her for too long. She looks away.
“What?”
“You just woke up.”
“It’s 11pm.”
He turns around, pulling a cheap bottle of red from their top cupboard along with two glasses. One he pours taller than the other, handing it to Cristina, who downs it in hardly 3 gulps. Owen sips at his own, looking at her like she’s some scared stray dog.
‘Stop it.’ That’s what she wants to say. Nothing comes out. He refills her glass.
I don’t recognize us anymore. She takes a sip. He follows.
“How was work?” The silence that follows her question is nearly unbearable.
“I was home today. Yesterday was good though.”
“Oh.”
*****
Cristina locks the bathroom door, sobbing silently as she slowly slid down the wall, pulling her knees to her chest.
“Please, Cristina! Just let me know you’re okay. You don’t even need to say anything, just give me something! Please, I don’t wanna have to break this door down. Cristina!” Owen pounded on the door as Cristina dragged her nails across her scalp. All she could hear was screaming.
Arizona writhed under her one steady hand as she tried her best to pick out the bugs. After 3 days it was impossible to get them all, but she did her best, trying with all her might to tune out the screams and whimpers as she dug into the open wound, scraping ants and beetles and maggots out of bone and tissue while Derek and Meredith held her leg still. She couldn’t allow herself imagine the kind of agony Arizona must be feeling right now, doing her best to shut everything out as she forced a ripped-up piece of fabric into her mouth and scooped out at least a dozen wriggling larvae.
“Shut up, shut up, shut the fuck up! Shut up Arizona! Please, just stop crying!” She scrubbed her ears as it all went silent. Finally.
“Cristina?”
Owen? Why was he here? He wasn’t supposed to be here. It was her, and Meredith, and Derek, and Arizona, even Mark and fucking Jerry, but not Owen. He wasn’t supposed to be here.
“Cristina – please open the door. It’s Owen. You’re safe. You’re not there anymore. Arizona is okay. Please!”
She couldn’t move. She can’t move.
“I can’t move.”
Her voice is barely a whisper, shaky and soft as it seeps through the crack in the bottom of the door. She hears Owen’s loud breath of relief, and then the sound as he presses his back against the door, sliding down until he’s sitting similarly to herself on the other side of the wall.
“It’s okay. It’s gonna be okay, Cristina. Just take deep breaths. You’ll be able to move again soon, I promise. You’re okay. Everything’s gonna be okay.”
She does as he said, taking deep breaths while he counted on the other side of the door. After a long while the tightness in her chest began to fade. She moved her hands, wiggling her fingers which before had felt like they’d been weighted with lead.
“I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for.”
She doesn’t believe him but she doesn’t protest aloud. She has a lot to be sorry for. An image of a wolf gripping a pale hand with manicured fingertips flashes in her mind.
When she stands she catches a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror. She looks as alive as Lexie right now. Stop it. Just stop. She’s gone. You’re not. That needs to be enough.
Cristina unlocks the door, Owen seeming to have been listening as she hears him jump up, gently pulling it open.
“Hey. I’m sorry I yelled.”
“Don’t — just, let’s not talk about it right now.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
“Are you hungry.”
“Just… stop.”
She walks out of the bathroom, past Owen and to the bed where she collapses before breaking down into heaving, shaky sobs. She could hear the quiet footsteps as he started to slowly approach.
I’m not there anymore.
“Cristina…” he reaches out to her, but she’s not here anymore either. Her cries soften and her breaths begin to steady but theres a glaze that’s settling over her dull eyes and she isn’t sure if the absence — the pit that drags and tears at her chest, the shivers that run up her arms and down her spine no matter how tight Owen holds her — is any better than the usual cacophony inside her mind.
He doesn’t speak anymore. Neither does she. There’s nothing left to be said.