"someone asked me
to describe home
and I started talking about your
hair color
and the sound of your voice
and the taste of your lips
and how your skin feels like
until I realized
they had expected to hear a place."

-Daria M. (insp. by unknown)

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The knocking on Arizona's door comes late at night, and she almost doesn't get up to answer it. Sofia is in New York with Callie, and she knows Andrew is staying over with Maggie - having made his amends weeks ago and resumed their relationship. She isn't seeing anyone - hasn't been on a date in months - and there's no good reason why she should get up from the comfortable nest she'd made on the couch to answer what is probably someone with the wrong house.

But the knocking persists, and feeling a tug of curiosity, she makes her way to the door to glance out through the window.

And the person she sees is someone she never expected to see on her doorstep. Not tonight, not for months. Not ever, really.

She turns the lock quickly and pulls the heavy wooden door open only to come face to face with her ex-wife, her eyes darting up nervously to Arizona's face before she immediately starts talking, no explanation or even a greeting proceeding her words.

"So I was having lunch with one of the scrub nurses a couple weeks ago - and she knew I was from Seattle, I'd mentioned it before - but we're talking, and out of nowhere she just asks me to tell her about home."

Callie pauses, taking a quick breath, but she continues speaking before Arizona can even process that she's really standing there in front of her. That she's here, in Seattle, and she's standing in front of Arizona for the first time in two months.

"She asked me to describe home and when I started talking, all I could think about, all I could talk about was you. I talked about our bench at the park and how nobody ever goes up there because you have to climb that hill. But even when you couldn't...when you were -" she bites her lip a little, eyes softening, "it was one of the first places you asked me to walk to. And about that trail by the beach where we used to go on Sunday afternoons, with the tree that you always thought looked like it had a face. And the little bakery - Pink's - that's tucked away downtown that you love more than any restaurant in the city."

Memories flood Arizona's mind and she blinks a bit, willing the tears not to form as she listens to her ex-wife ramble on. She's not sure what's taking her more by surprise - Callie's words, or her presence here at all.

"I talked about how rainy it was, and all I could think was how much I loved the rain because it made your hair curly and that was always my favourite. It never mattered that it was grey and miserable outside because you were so, so beautiful. You were my light."

The blonde wants to say something but the words catch in the back of her throat, and all she can do is stand silently in the doorway, her mind and her heart battling the emotions coursing through her body.

"And I started to realize, as I was describing all this to her, that the only things that mattered in Seattle were things that related to you. And when I think of home, all I can think about is the way your hair reflects in the sun, a hundred different shades of blonde, and how it always smells like coconut and vanilla. About how blue your eyes are when you open them first thing in the morning, like the bluest part of the sky - the most beautiful colour I've ever seen. About how the freckles on your shoulders are barely visible, but how the ones on your left collarbone look kinda like Sagittarius when you look at them sideways."

Callie's voice softens, her head tilting just a bit as she gazes at the other woman.

"I love those freckles. I loved touching you so much, do you remember that? The little dip below your collarbone, that impossibly, impossibly soft spot under your ear. That little scar, just above your left thumb...it's raised just a little, but still so smooth you hardly know it's there."

Arizona swallows the lump in her throat, nodding slightly.

"You were obsessed with it."

"And just..." Callie sighs heavily, as if she knows she's gone too far, but there's no turning back now, not after what she's said, "the sound of your voice. The way you say my name. I miss the sound of your voice so much, Arizona. Every time you call to talk to Sofia, I just...I want to keep you on the phone. I want to talk to you. I just want to listen to you. And it's stupid because I had three years to realize all of this and I didn't but..."

She shakes her head a little, casting her eyes up toward the sky to avoid the smaller woman's gaze. Or maybe to stop the tears from falling and try to save face; she's not really sure.

"But I think I always knew. I knew. When I think of home...it's not Seattle, or Miami, or New York...it's not a place," she lets out a half laugh, sad and hollow in the night air, "and it's not Penny."

She risks a look into blue eyes again and can see them filling with tears. Arizona isn't even trying to hold it back anymore, her stoic front long dissolved by Callie's words, and the look on her face is enough to push the brunette's emotions over the edge.

"It's you, Arizona. Home is you."

She reaches up to wipe at her own eyes, her voice catching slightly.

"And I know I ran away from us, and we're damaged, and...and I'm telling you all of this too late but...you're all I want."

The silence stretches between them as her words disappear, and Callie can't take it - she needs something, anything from the other woman.

"Arizona...please say someth-"

"Calliope."

She's cut off by the soft, almost melodic cadence of the smaller woman's voice, and the way Arizona is looking at her...her heart leaps at the possibility that maybe - by some miracle - she's not too late after all.

"I've learned to live without a home."

Arizona shifts a bit, leaning on the frame of the doorway, and reaches up to wipe her tears with a slight shake of the head.

"When I was a kid, I never felt like any place was home. When people would ask where 'home' was, I didn't have an answer, because it wasn't really anywhere. I'd have one for awhile, and then we'd move, and then everything started over again. But I was used to it."

Callie watches as blonde hair falls from behind her ear, and she desperately wants to reach out and tuck it into place.

"I never truly had a home until I met you."

She lets out a soft breath, blue eyes meeting brown and holding their gaze.

"And then...it was gone. It was like a tornado swept through and home was just...it was in pieces. And then the pieces got swept away too."

Her eyes are swimming with emotion, but she looks at Callie imploringly - almost as if she's willing her to leave it be. To walk away. And Callie can feel her heart sinking - the naive hopes she'd been harboring as she worked up the courage to come here slowing slipping away.

"And so I got used to it again. And now home is wherever Sofia is; she's it."

"But what if..." Callie speaks up, taking a step closer, leaving only inches between them, "what if home could be...all of us. It could be all of us again."

Arizona can feel her resolve slipping, the faint scent of the other woman invading her senses; her eyes bright and pleading as they meet hers, her skin begging to be touched. She shakes her head a little, trying to clear her mind, but her words still come out as a strangled whisper.

"Callie...it's been almost three years..."

"Then tell me you don't love me anymore."

The brunette lets out a shaky breath, her hand reaching up to tuck that loose hair behind her ex-wife's ear. She lingers only a moment before pulling back, but she remains standing where she is, the space between them still barely there.

"Or tell me that you couldn't. That you could never love me again. Because you let me go, Arizona – Sofia was yours, you won, but you brought her to me and you told me to go because you knew I would never leave without her. You set me free even though it meant breaking your own heart because you still loved me. I know you did – I know that now."

And when the ultimatum is spoken - when the words are out there, hanging in the tense air between them - Arizona knows she can't keep her walls up. She can't deny them this opportunity, not if it's truly there in front of them, waiting to be taken. She's never been much of a gambling woman but she knows she would gamble on this - she would do it a million times over.

"Tell me...and I'll go. And we'll just be friends, and Sofia's mothers. But if you don't tell me to go then I'm going to stand here and I'm going to tell you that I love you too, and that I never got over you, and that I never want to get over you because I want to be with you. I want to come home, Arizona - and you're the only place that's ever going to feel like home to me."

So Arizona makes a decision, closing the space between them as her hands come up to caress the face she's longed to touch for years. She cradles Callie gently between her palms, her eyes fluttering shut as she kisses her, and the immediate reciprocation is the only sign she needs that this is the right decision. Because nothing has ever felt like this, nothing has ever felt as right as kissing Callie Torres. She moved on but she never forgot, and she knows that they deserve another chance. They deserve all the chances.

"You're an idiot, Callie Torres."

"So are you," Callie smiles softly, her hands threading into blonde hair as she leans their foreheads together, "but you're perfect."

At that Arizona can only laugh, the light feeling in her chest bubbling up suddenly, almost against her own volition.

"I'm not perfect."

"You're perfect for me."

She leans in, nuzzling her nose just below Arizona's ear, and she can't help but inhale deeply as she presses a kiss to the softest of skin.

It feels right. It feels like love, and happiness, and it feels exactly like everything that's been missing from her life. The ferocity with which it hits her is almost overwhelming, and she wraps her arms around the smaller body, pulling her close. Her tears fall against silky blonde hair and she closes her eyes to let the sensation of being here, of being with Arizona, wash over her completely. She's never going to let her go again.

And Arizona understands, as she speaks softly in Callie's ear, because she's never letting this feeling go either. She's not going to lose her home again - she's going to cherish it. There is nowhere she would rather be.

"Calliope, we're home."

Callie leans back just enough to press a kiss to the softest of lips, and she smiles through her tears, eyes lighting up with pure joy.

"Where we belong."

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Thanks to magicgirlwrites on tumblr for suggesting the quote that inspired this. I hope it's everything you imagined. :)

Accompanying soundtrack - Feels Like Home, by Chantal Kreviazuk

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