Neptune
Arizona entered the operating room and immediately started working, she made the first cut and from there everything went subsides. Amelia was there only to monitor since the 32 weeks pregnant mom had suffered a blow to the head during a car accident a few hours ago, which was ironic because the woman was indeed a patient of Arizona who was coming on the way to hospital when the accident occurred.
Arizona was focused on her work and yet at some point in the middle of her concentration she looked up and found the gallery full of people. She had already used to that. Interns and residents generally stop by through her surgeries to take notes or just doing some paperwork in a quiet place.
But the blonde noticed something else this time.
Her blue eyes met with warm brown eyes that looked at her directly. She frowned slightly, after all, Callie had never been on any of her surgeries before.
But her frown soon became a small smile and her eyes shone with joy. She smiled even bigger through the mask when Callie smiled back.
Somehow, the brunette could read her expression at any time. She always could.
"Helen, can you turn on the intercom, please?" The fetal surgeon asked one of her nurses. A few seconds later the red light was on. "Hey, what are you doing here?" She asked giving a last look at the brunette sitting in the gallery before returning to her task.
"Nothing, I just realized I've never been on any of your fetal surgeries." Callie said. Other people who were in the gallery looked strange to the two women starting a conversation this way. "And I think I needed to calm down a bit." She added.
"Calm down? Why?" Arizona's asked without stopping her hands.
"I just put a printed sternum in the chest of a 15 year old girl ... a totally genius girl." Callie almost jumped with joy remembering her previous risky surgery.
"I'm assuming it was great." Arizona chuckled upon hearing the excitement in the woman's voice.
"You know it." Callie said arrogantly. "Alex wasn't happy with the idea, though."
"Alex will get over it." Callie chuckled at the words of the blonde.
They were silent for a few minutes as Arizona continued working on trying to remove the large tumor that covered the back of the little unborn child in which she was operating. It was a risky surgery, but she had no doubt it would be successful.
"Are you happy?" Arizona broke the silence. Her words came out calm and peaceful. She just wanted to know.
She looked up when she didn't receive an answer and saw the confusion and uncertainty in Callie's eyes, she smiled under her mask at the expression of the woman. "Callie?" She pressed.
"I don't understand what your question is." Callie replied immediately. She looked at the other interns and residents as if expecting someone to tell her what was happening, but all of them shrugged.
Except for a shy redhead who was leaning on the doorframe.
"The concept of happiness is very ambiguous, you know?" Arizona continued. "I am happy now because I know I'm going to save the life of this baby that hasn't even been born yet, that cause me happiness." She added, her eyes never leaving her job.
"Oh! Okay, in that case then, yes I'm very happy right now." Callie grinned.
"You know what else makes me happy?" The blonde asked again. Behind her Amelia was giving her a strange look, but never said anything.
"Hmmm"
"Your smile." And that smile on Callie's face faded completely. Her body tensed at the thought. "When you smile, you can light up a whole dark room." Arizona keep going. She wasn't nervous, she wasn't going crazy, she didn't hesitate. Her words felt naturally under her tongue and she just wanted to get them out. "I miss your smile every morning when I wake up. It used to be the first thing I saw, so I miss it."
Callie shifted uncomfortably. "Arizona, what are you doing?" She laughed nervously and glancing at the woman still standing in the doorframe.
"What's funny is that ..." She kept talking. "When I come to the hospital and I see you and see your smile, still illuminates my day, even when it's not directed towards me." Arizona easily added. "Even when I'm not the first person who sees your smile in the morning." She sighed heavily, but not with sadness ... just solemnity.
"Why are you saying these things now, Arizona?" Callie swallowed hard.
"Why do I have to shut them up?" She replied.
"Because!" The orthopedic surgeon made a tone of obviousness making chuckling the others, including nurses and Amelia in the operating room and Arizona itself.
"I've been silent stuff for too long." She said softly. "Amelia?" She called out, receiving a murmur from the neurosurgeon who remained silent. "You know that feeling like you're drowning in your own words and that however much you want to let it out, you just can't?" She asked suspiciously.
"Yeah, I know. I'm a blurt out type of a girl but yeah I know the feeling." That gave another laugh among people who listened attentively.
Arizona asked her scrub nurse for another tool before speaking again. "That's what happens when you love in silent." She said confidently.
Callie's breath caught in her throat, her eyes wide openly with fear.
"Loving you and not being able to say anything, it's choking me." Arizona give a small glance at the woman in the gallery who was still shocked. "I promised myself never do anything to get you back because my ego and my pride was bruised and because you would never choose me back." She added without any bitterness in her words. "You left me and went ahead with your life away from me. I feel so far from you even when we working in the same hospital and we have a daughter together."
"Arizona, why…?" Callie tried to say something, but the blonde was on a roll.
"You left me and yet I still love you as the first day and every day I have to see you with that resident ..." Callie turned her eyes to the redhead still leaning against the doorframe, listening to everything, before looking back at the blonde. "Or every time I go out to one of those trivial nights with Richard, don't get me wrong, it's fun to meet other women and talk about something more than just hospital stuff, but do you know what I prefer?" She asked rhetorically. "I'd rather be at home with you and Sofia." She smiled at the thought. "Those are things that make me happy and happiness is not something aspirational but instead something that you live at the moment. And I would give anything to live it with you again." She said with conviction. "I love you, I've always done it despite my mistakes and I know how much I've hurt you but I love you and don't think that will ever change."
Everyone was silent listening to the heartfelt words of the surgeon.
Callie was speechless. She was literally paralyzed, sitting there with her eyes on the ex-wife's butterfly's scrubs cap.
Her mind was screaming at her to get up and leave the place and then pretend that none of this was happening, meaning this is Arizona, the woman who never want to say anything aloud about her personal life was just now saying she loves her in front of the highly gossipy staff of the hospital.
She certainly never saw that coming.
Above all, she never waited for Penny to stay there and listen too.
This Arizona, talking so freely and openly in front of others, saying what her real feelings for her were after so long, this Arizona certainly wasn't the same as Callie remembers and that surprised her… in a good way.
She was curious about this apparently new but well-known person.
She wanted to know more.
So her body betrayed her - or helped? - To stay there and hear what the blonde has to say.
"You know, the other day I was listening to this song and I couldn't stop thinking about you and about what a coward I have been all this time to remain silent." Arizona took the baby out of the womb to have better visualization of the tumor. "I am happy. As happy as I am to have this unborn baby in my hands is how happy I am for loving you, even if you don't love me back. It is a privilege." She quoted her mentor. "Loving you and you loving back is a privilege that not everyone get to experienced. When you love back, God, that's like the version of heaven, at least it is for me." She said quietly looking up at the woman still sitting on the gallery.
Her blue eyes glistened with unshed tears, but they weren't tears of sadness, they were tears of recognition. Was she doing this for real? Was she saying these things out loud? Yes, she is and there was no doubt in her voice. Only Assertiveness.
"Bokee, get the song on." Arizona told her nurse. Bokee was usually in neuro but today was her rotation for fetal surgery. "It's my favorite song and you know it. You know me better than anyone." Arizona looked at the brunette when the song started playing and she smiled when Callie's eyes widened in recognition as well.
"It's that Neptune?" Callie finally said something at recognize the song and then she gasped when Arizona suddenly began to sing along with it.
Pitch black, pale blue,
It was a stained glass
Variation of the truth
And I felt empty handed.
You let me set sail
With cheap wood.
So I patched up
Every leak that I could,
'Til the blame grew too heavy....
And if her words weren't enough to the Latina, listen to this woman singing was definitely a huge moment in life.
Stitch by stitch I tear apart.
If brokenness is a form of art,
I must be a poster child prodigy.
Thread by thread I come apart.
If brokenness is a work of art,
Surely this must be my masterpiece...
And with every note she understood where Arizona came from with this and the deepness of her words and what they meant.
I'm only honest when it rains.
If I time it right, the thunder breaks
When I open my mouth.
I want to tell you but I don't know how.
I'm only honest when it rains,
An open book with a torn out page,
And my ink's run out.
I want to love you but I don't know how.
I don't know how,
No I don't know how.
I don't know how.
I want to love you but I don't know how.
I want to love you......
For the choir all the personnel in the operating room was accompanying the blonde in what looked like an epic declaration of love. Even Amelia was bleary with tears, because even if the letter is a little sad, everyone in that room now understood the feelings that radiate from the fetal surgeon and despite the distance she made Callie shiver who was still sitting there peacefully with silent tears running down her face now.
But Callie couldn't take it anymore.
Pitch black, pale blue,
These wild oceans
Shake what's left of me loose
Just to hear me cry mercy.
A strong wind at my back,
So I lift up the only sail that I have,
This tired white flag.
I'm only honest when it rains.
If I time it right, the thunder breaks
When I open my mouth.
I want to tell you but I don't know how.
I'm only honest when it rains,
An open book with a torn out page,
And my ink's run out.
I want to love you but I don't know how.
I don't know how, know how, know how,
I want to love you but I don't know how.
I want to love you......
By the time the song ended Arizona looked up just in time to see her ex-wife standing up and walk out passing right next to Penny.
She looked back at the stitches she was giving to close the mother and put the little baby back inside his safe temporary home for another few weeks.
"That was beautiful." Amelia finally said when all the commotion passed on. "But she left. You don't want to go after her? I can finish for you." She suggested.
Arizona shook her head and continued to work. "I said what I had to say and she heard it, which was all I wanted." The blonde looked to her side to the other surgeon and smiled softly to say she was being sincere. "I'm fine, Amy. She listened to me and I was finally able to speak up, so I'm fine." She finished her work and finally removed her gloves. "Thanks people, you were great as always." She praised before leaving the place feeling light and calm.
The rest of the day passed quietly. She was telling the truth when she said that all she wanted was for Callie to hear what she had to say - and sing? - That was unexpected, but she couldn't help it. She just got carried away by the feeling and she didn't regret.
On the contrary, she now feels better than ever.
Suddenly she climbed the stairs due to crowded elevator and there is the woman who even today makes her heart race just with a glance.
They stopped in front of each other longing for one another, barely breathing, waiting for the other to make the first move. Desiring. Longing. Wanting.
"I miss you." The whispered statement made all her body shudder with excitement and before thinking about the implications of the words of the brunette, Arizona smiled just letting her dimples pop in joy before taking her arm around Callie's waist and effectively crashing their lips together.
Callie felt her back hit the wall as the blonde's tight body kept her in the same position. She smiled in the kiss and put a hand to the neck of the woman to push her closer.
They didn't want the kiss to end but the air was needed. When Callie opened her eyes a pair of bright beautiful blue eyes were staring at her with that old love that never dies and always prevails.
She smiled wider and pecked the swollen lips. "And I love you so much, you dork." She lightly said before kissing her again.
She never wanted to stop kissing her and touching her and love her. And she would make sure that would never happen again.
My favorite song ever: Neptune by Sleeping At Last
I was traveling the other day and I was listened this song and all I could think about was in that OR part. The stairs part was just a way to fix what the show's writers want us to like and no one it's liking it… at least I'm not.
All mistakes are mine