Current mood:	contemplative
Current music:	Theme from "The Great Imposter" - Henry Mancini
Entry tags:	author: lavenderseaslug, shipper: burke/addison

This is what I like to call Baddison...
Title: Missing Pieces
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1,422
Pairing: Burke/Addison
Summary: A different take on the Burketina wedding. Perhaps not so Burketina after all. Spoilers through the season finale.
Author's Note: I guess I started thinking about this and I couldn't work on my research paper at all. So I wrote this instead. This is probably the only time I'm going to write this ship, but I make no promises.


"I think I speak for every woman here when I say... Dump her. Dump Yang and marry me."

As soon as the words had left her mouth, Preston Burke hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it. And he knew it was wrong to think about another woman on his wedding day. But it was all he could think about.

He was not this man. He was not a man who entertained thoughts about seducing his women friends while in a serious relationship with another woman. He was a dedicated man, a man who was sure and steady. He knew what he wanted and he never made rash decisions.

If he knew what he wanted, why was he thinking about Addison Montgomery instead of Cristina Yang?

It’s true that at certain points throughout his courtship with Cristina he wished for a more normal relationship. A relationship where both members put forth equal effort. A relationship where there was communication. A relationship where he did not feel like an adult dragging along an unwilling child.

But then Cristina would do something sweet, in her Cristina way, and Burke remembered why he loved her. She would try to reconcile their differences in a way that only an emotionally stunted woman would, but Burke always appreciated the effort and knew what it took for Cristina to make those admissions.

Standing at the altar with Derek, Burke had been tempted to ask how Derek had been so unappreciative of all that Addison had to offer. He knew the chapel was not the opportune time to have this discussion, so he had refrained, keeping his thoughts to himself. He wasn’t really the kind to have heart to hearts anyway.

His eyes found Addison in the crowd, her arm leaning on the side of the pew, her eyes scanning the crowd. He knew that it would have been easy for her to pull out one of her many designer dresses and outshine everybody in the church, but he appreciated that she had worn something simpler, less showy. Addison had class, that was for sure.

Burke couldn’t help but wonder about the wedding. He was never one to do anything unless he was absolutely sure that he wanted to do it. And he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something wrong. If he was thinking about Addison instead of Cristina, did that mean something? Burke wished that the wedding wasn’t in progress, that he had time to process these new thoughts.

---

"I'm the only woman here. Am I supposed to be the entertainment? Because I'm not stripping.” She had been completely joking. She knew that none of the men there were even interested in seeing her strip anyway.
"That's all right, we've all seen it before,” Derek had responded, equally jovial.
"True," was Mark’s characteristic answer, but it didn’t stop him from looking her up and down with his eyes.
"I haven't." That reply surprised her. And thoughts of stripping for Preston Burke invaded her brain.

Addison sat at the chapel, avoiding looking at Preston. She could barely look at him without her cheeks coloring. The idea of a relationship between the two of them was absolutely ludicrous. She did not want to have the record of having slept with all the attendings. That was most definitely not her goal in life.

And she didn’t want to be one of those flighty women that moved from man to man with ease, never settling down, never getting too emotionally attached. And her heart was bruised from Alex’s most recent response to her advances.

She couldn’t pretend that she didn’t find Preston attractive, or that she didn’t admire his mannerisms. But she could pretend that she didn’t think about what it would be like stripping for him. Or him for her. She had been grateful for the excuse of getting drinks and then the slightly awkward conversation with Mark. She felt even guiltily relieved when Nina had collapsed at Joe’s. Anything to keep her from sitting with Derek and Preston and Mark in a dimly lit bar with thoughts of her as ‘entertainment’ on all of their minds.

But then she was in surgery with him. And he had said his vows. And Addison had felt a flutter when he said, “I am not optimistic. I am not hopeful. I am sure. I am steady.” Sure, his vows leaned a little towards the sappy, but Addison embraced the sappy on occasion.

A wedding was not the time to be thinking about this. She was not going to ruin another relationship at Seattle Grace. That wasn’t going to be her ‘thing’. She was going to let Preston get married and she was going to not think about him in that way anymore.

But he did look good in a tux.

---

Burke saw Alex sit down next to Addison. He knew that there was something going on between the two of them. It was true that he didn’t gossip, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t know things.

Before Addison had proposed to him in surgery, the idea of Alex and Addison together had only given him a minor pause before he moved on to think of other things. And it wasn’t that he had been jealous of Alex. It was that he wasn’t sure how Addison ever became interested in the angry, sullen intern. Now, he felt a little twinge. He almost wished he could be sitting next to Addison, no doubt flirting with her as Alex was.

But whatever Addison said to Alex made him practically run out of the church. Burke glanced away from the double doors to make sure that he didn’t catch a glimpse of Cristina. He didn’t want to risk any bad luck, not on top of what he was already thinking.

But he was thinking. He was thinking about Cristina. And he was thinking about how this was not exactly what she wanted. And he knew that if he was not completely satisfied with something, he wouldn’t want it. And as today had progressed, Burke could see that he himself was not completely satisfied.

And the thought came to him that Cristina didn’t want any of this. And he was struck by her devotion to him. And it seemed unfair to him to allow her to feel and do all these things for him when he couldn’t even be sure that he wanted it.

---

It was with confusion that Addison watched Preston walk down the aisle. She rather enjoyed watching him move. He looked almost as if he was strutting. Pride was something that Preston wore almost as well as that tux.

But when the groom walked down the aisle, it almost never boded well. She could only think of two options. Either he had decided to elope with Cristina, leaving them all sitting in the chapel, or he had decided that he no longer wanted to marry her.

Addison knew it was wrong to hope for bad things for other people. She knew that these feelings were most likely superficial and that they were probably not even reciprocated. But she couldn’t help but hope that Preston would come out of those doors, take her by the hand and sweep her off somewhere.

Hearing romantic wedding vows could mess with your mind.

---

It wasn’t until Preston knocked on the door of Room 2214 that he fully realized what he was doing. He had two boxes full of his favorite possessions and a fresh change of clothes. He realized what it was that he was doing, but he was unsure of the why behind it. It was unlike him to do anything of this nature, but there was something drawing him to this woman.

She was strong and poised, not unlike himself. She behaved like an adult. She put others before herself. It would be a relief to spend time in the company of a woman who was mature and acted like an adult.

But it wasn’t because of her that he wasn’t marrying Cristina. It was because of her that he realized he didn’t want to marry Cristina. They both deserved something different, and Burke was trying to get what he deserved.

He wasn’t over Cristina, not by a long shot. But he didn’t want to wait too long. So he was here.

And so he knocked on the door and when she opened it, he gave her a small smile, and she let him in.

He didn’t know what to expect, but she had already proposed to him. Anything else that happened wasn’t going to exceed that.

Author's Note...again: So there it is. Mmhmmm. And I haven't jumped the Good Ship Vanilla Latte, I just need a break from Alex. Let me know what you think.