Author Note:

I asked my friend what she wanted for her birthday, and she requested something with an Arizona/Nicole pairing. As I'm currently not too impressed with Callie, I decided to give it a shot and ended up liking it more than I expected to. If you're looking for a story where Calzona eventually reconcile, this is not it. This story is a AU in several respects, in order to help me tell the story I'm wanting tell.

Just a quick note, I know there has to be a decent sized age gap between the two - but since it has never actually been specified, I'm going with my gut instinct before I googled how old Geena Davis was in real life, because I think it's easily plausible for her to pass as being in her mid-40s.

For Cass.

I hope this was something like you had in mind and that you had a beautiful birthday! Thank you for your friendship.

X

Thanks to Amber for embracing this ship and being my sounding board. And to Sar, who doesn't ship them (yet), but who humoured me by proof-reading it anyway ;) Love you girls! X

I'd love to promise frequent updates but my college schedule is insane right now and my muse dictates what I write and when I write it so that probably won't happen. What I do promise is that however long I leave a story, I will always return to it.

Constructive criticism is welcomed :)

Leigh

Disclaimer:

Any characters/storylines that you recognize are the intellectual property of Shonda Rhimes. I am not Shonda, therefore these aren't mine. I just have a penchant for playing with other people's toys so please don't sue me xD

Something To Live For

Chapter One

She doesn't know how it happened.

One moment they were at opposite ends of the couch as they discussed the complexities of their current case, all the while completely ignoring the proverbial elephant in the room. This is the last one. If Amelia Shepherd's gamble doesn't pay off this will be her last case.

It's as if Arizona knows what she's thinking, because the next thing Nicole knows, her voice is interrupting her innermost thoughts. To be fair, she probably does - they've spent that much time together over the past five months that they've become pretty attuned to the ways in which the other think. She barely has time to respond because then Arizona's mouth is on hers. Nicole is somewhere between being torn pushing her away and kissing her fiercely back when the perky blonde surgeon makes the decision for her. She tears her mouth away and reaches to pick up the contents of the manila folder now scattered on the floor.

"What did you do that for?" Nicole sounds aghast but her hand has flown to her mouth and she's now unconsciously tracing the place where Arizona's lips just touched hers. The erratic thud of her heart against her ribcage sounds so loud in the empty room and she wouldn't be surprised if the other woman could hear it.

"Amelia is the best hope that you have. She's your only hope at beating this thing and having a remotely normal life afterwards. You may have a tumor, but you're still an intelligent woman and the sooner you accept that this is how it is, the better."

Her pleas fall on deaf ears, and she has clearly touched a nerve. The set of her jaw lets Arizona know that she's pissed, even before she opens her mouth to begin ranting. "I don't even think this is about me anymore. It's about you, Robbins and as usual you can't even see it." She snaps, irritably. "I had accepted it. I'd made my peace with what was going to happen and then you just had to -" She stops speaking, running out of steam before continuing in a similar vein. "Don't you get it yet? You may have made the decision for me, when you decided to poke into my medical records and invade my privacy but last time I checked my mental faculties were all still functioning normally, so you do not get to tell me what to think or how I'm feeling."

Arizona's eyes gloss over with tears, but she continues, undeterred. "Nicole, I know that before you met me you'd given up and I still don't think you really believe you can beat this. But now you need to find that belief from somewhere because sometimes it's the patient's mentality which makes the difference between life and death in surgeries like this -" Arizona's takes a deep breath, willing herself not to cry. Her issues with authority certainly choose their moments to make themselves apparent. "Actually screw everything I just said. I don't care if you believe it or not because I believe that and I - I -" Another breath.

"Don't start bloody crying on me again." There's distinctly less bite to her tone than usual however, to the point where she sounds almost human. Bizarrely, Arizona is able to draw strength from this; the corners of her mouth twist upwards, keeping her tears at bay. "Are you going to explain why you kissed me? Hell, I thought I was supposed to be the one with a deficient impulse control."

"I thought I could give you a reason to believe. I wanted to give you something worth living for." Arizona's gaze doesn't falter as she tests the waters with a fraction of the truth.

"And you think that's you?" Nicole answers, not altogether dismissively, which is reassuring to her blonde protege. The words catch in her throat because Arizona has quite literally left her breathless.

Arizona considers the question for a minute, before deflecting it. "Do you want it to be me?" Nicole doesn't reply, and Arizona has probably already embarrassed herself once today so she might as well go all out and make it something worth living down. "Because I think I want it to be me."

"You think, or you know?" Herman finally speaks, her own cheeks slightly reddened, under the dimly lit lights. Her words are barely audible, but they're only stood about a foot apart so Arizona hears her clearly.

Arizona's lips curve up into a smile. "I know," she whispers, like it's still some kind of a secret.

After that encounter, things are strictly professional between them for about a week. Dr. Herman actually starts sending Arizona home, in defiance of the pattern of accidental office sleepovers they seem to have fallen into. They talk, only if it's related to their caseload - although Arizona attempts to bring up what happened on more than one occasion. Nicole quickly redirects those conversations because it's far easier to deal with the deterioration in her condition, if she can pretend that there hasn't been a shift in their relationship.

Pretending that she still has nothing to lose makes it hurt less.

She isn't as scared.

Arizona stops by the office to check in, as she normally does at the end of every day and when she breezes in, she finds her mentor curled up on the couch, tears dripping steadily down her cheeks. "Go away, Robbins." Nicole has been surprised at the lack of resistance her protege has put up over the past week, although the thought has lingered in the back of her mind that it was only ever a temporary measure. Avoidance was only ever going to work for so long because if there is anything that she's learned over that past few months, it's that Arizona has the persistence of a dog with a bone. If that persistence pays off, she swears she'll never say another word about it.

And it appears that her time is up, when the peds surgeon crosses the room and drops down onto the second couch they appropriated for her. "No can do. Alex practically kicked me out of the house. He has plans for Jo, which I have no desire to bear witness to." Her face scrunches up adorably and Nicole's lip twitches slightly, trying to ignore the subconscious whisper in the back of her mind, insisting that she's missed this.

"And I brought ice-cream." Arizona holds up the bag she's holding, like that will seal the deal.

"I don't want to talk about it, okay." She roughly runs a hand over her face, wiping away any remaining evidence of her breakdown. The almost imperceptible hint of a smile has formed on her face, but Nicole hides it well, relenting and moving on the couch to make room for Arizona.

"Okay," Arizona answers simply, accepting the small victory for what it is. "Red Velvet or Cherry Garcia?" She retrieves the dessert from the bag and Nicole considers it for a second. "I figured you prefer the red velvet, but it never hurts to try something new." There's an undertone to her words and the other woman isn't oblivious to the intensity of her stare. The beginnings of a smirk are playing on the corners of the blonde's lips and she's pretty sure that this is about more than just ice cream. She lets it go though, because calling Arizona out on it would mean having a conversation she isn't ready to have right now. "We could share," she suggests shrewdly.

"Sounds good to me." Arizona grins and it's infectious, and damn it, Nicole can't help it. Her resolve melts away in the face of those dimples and shining blue eyes. A proper smile appears on her own face, and suddenly the damn noble reasons she has for not wanting Arizona to get hurt, don't seem to carry half as much weight in the warmth of the peds surgeon's smile. The full force of her crush hits her again and despite numerous hours soul-searching since that day, she still has no idea how the hell she let this happen. "Are you alright?"

"I am now." Her guard is down and a even with that short affirmation, she unintentionally reveals more than she would have done had she been thinking clearly. Arizona hands her one of the cartons and a spoon, flashing her another megawatt grin - quite unaware of how captivating she is. This is bloody ridiculous. "Thank you."

Arizona has pushed the boundaries far enough for one evening and so she doesn't acknowledge everything she hears that Nicole isn't saying. "You're welcome." She reaches out and tentatively gives her knee an awkward squeeze, her heart literally skipping a beat when she doesn't shy away from her touch. She's about to break the contact, but before she can, the other woman's fingers wrap around her wrist, anchoring her there.

They're having a bad day. Arizona isn't naive enough to take it personally though. They lost a patient and her twins on the table during an emergency procedure, but even before that Nicole's temper had been on the verge of fraying. She's been refusing to admit as much but it doesn't take a specialist to see that this latest round of radiation has taken a lot of it out of her. Amelia and Owen have faced the brunt of her irritation over the past few days, and as a result she's refrained from taking it out on Arizona, but it was really only a matter of time.

She's been silent since they scrubbed out of the OR though and it had fallen to Arizona to inform the husband of his losses. "Are you okay?" the blonde breaks the silence eventually, managing to speak through the onslaught of her tears.

"Just peachy," Nicole growls, not looking at her and lengthening her strides as she walks through the corridors.

"Nicole!" There's a note of recrimination in Arizona's voice, and hearing it grates on the other woman's nerves.

"I said I'm fine."

"It's okay to admit that you're upset." Arizona presses. Usually she'd let the subject drop but something about today has left her fired up and unwilling to let it go. When her superior continues to ignore her, the peds surgeon reaches out, catching her around the wrist to prevent her from walking away. "It's okay, Nicole."

Her mentor pulls out of the hold Arizona has on her and the other woman thinks she's going to walk away but instead she rounds on her. "What do you want from me?" She finally snaps.

"I want you to be honest about how you're feeling." Arizona answers, her voice reverberating off the walls. It wasn't what she was intending to say, but now it's out there and she can't take it back and suddenly this is about everything they haven't had the courage to put a label on. " If not with me -"

"Damn it, Robbins!" Nicole's eyes are glittering and she's struggling to get the words out past the tightness in her chest. She grabs her by the hand, dragging her into the nearest on call room. "There is a time and a place for personal conversations." The hallways had been mercifully empty, but she'd never enjoyed people speculating about her private life. It's bad enough that her colleagues have ringside seats as this damn illness sends her life to shit, without her becoming the subject of more mindless gossip.

"It's not like I've not tried to have this conversation with you several times this week," Arizona counters evenly, standing her ground.

Nicole closes her eyes briefly, massaging away the beginnings of the headache brewing at her temples. When she opens them, she finds she's looking anywhere but at Arizona. "Why don't you just say what you've got to say so we can get this over with?"

"I wanted to say that I'm sorry," Arizona answers quietly. "I'm sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable, if I put you in an impossible position - "

"Okay, stop talking!" The other woman interjects.

"- I misread the signs -" Arizona takes no heed of her warning and instead finds herself incapable of speaking when Nicole's mouth slides over her own and her back hits the on call room door. A firm thigh slides between her legs, pinning her there and she rocks down onto it. A breathy groan falls out of Arizona's mouth when her mouth ghosts along her jawline.

"I thought I told you to stop talking," Nicole whispers against her, breathing the words into her skin, and punctuating each one with a sharp nip to the collarbone, before returning to her lips.

The air is filled with then with the sounds of their heavy breathing, interspersed with the occasional groan as hands slide beneath layers of clothing, mapping territory that is foreign but at the same time, familiar. When they eventually pull apart, their grip on each other doesn't loosen, and they settle into a comfortable silence; which neither want to be the one to break.

Arizona lets out a shaky breath, her heart rate steadily dropping back to normal. Now what? "I didn't know you were into women." She starts, almost conversationally.

"I'm not into women."

"You've got a funny way of showing it." Is she mocking her? There's a lightness to Arizona's tone that hasn't been there all week, and they're both grateful for the sudden levity it brings to the table.

"I'm not into women," Nicole repeats, contemplating the amount of truth to that all-encompassing statement. "I'm into you, Robbins."

Arizona's mouth opens to respond, but she's interrupted by her pager. "I've gotta take this," she murmurs regretfully. "But we're not done talking about this, you hear me?"

It isn't a question, Nicole knows, and after Arizona has slipped out of the room, she makes sure the door is locked and slides down to the floor, finally giving into her emotions.