Arizona was finishing gathering her stuff to leave the hospital for the day. There has been a long time since she needed to stay in there for more than 24 hours straight. That's the downside of fetal medicine: labors are unpredictable.
Meredith entered the attending's lounge and spotted the blonde having some difficulties in stocking a few scans into her briefcase, she looked tired.
"Do you need some help in there?" – Meredith joked, trying to pull out a smile from her colleague.
"Gosh, I'm so tired I can't even think" – Arizona confessed.
"Bailey told me you're in here for over 24 hours. Are you sure you're good to drive home? I can give you a ride" – Meredith offered.
"Thank you, Meredith, I already called a cab, I definitely can't drive now" – Arizona said, smiling.
"Ah, and good news, right? Callie told me she'll be in town later this week with Sofia, you will get to see the little one for a while" – Meredith said, smiling. Bringing up Sofia's name was just enough to get Arizona shining.
"Yes, I'm counting the days already. She'll arrive on Thursday night" – Arizona told her, happily.
"I can imagine you must want to spend every little second with her, but if you two find a spare time, let's schedule a playdate with Zola? She misses Sofia so much" – Meredith asked.
"Definitely. Sofia misses her too. As soon as Callie shares her schedule in Seattle with me, I'll let you now so we can arrange that. Oh, I gotta go, my cab arrived. Good night, Meredith" – Arizona said, placing her arm on Meredith's shoulder.
"Good night, Arizona" – Meredith said, smiling.
Two days later and Sofia was finally in town with Callie. The ortho doctor was invited to speak at a conference and give a special consult for her mentor during med school in Florida, who now works in a research center in Washington. Since she would need to stay in the State for at least a week, she decided to bring Sofia to be with Arizona. She knew Penny wouldn't handle a whole week by herself taking care of a seven-year-old.
Arizona came to the airport to wait for them, she couldn't even explain how bad she was missing Sofia these past days. Once they arrived, the little girl was excited to see her Mommy and ran towards her.
"Mommy, I've missed you so much" – Sofia exclaimed, holding Arizona really tight.
"Oh, honey, Mommy missed you, too! I'm so glad you're here!" – Arizona said, kissing the girl's cheek and forehead – "Hi, Callie, how are you?"
"Good, and you? Sofia was highly excited on the plane, she didn't sleep for a minute" – Callie told and they started to walk towards the airport's parking lot.
When Arizona opened the car, Callie commented:
"Oh, new car? This is nice. Grey-Sloan must pay you really well" – Callie quipped.
"Well, you used to work there. You made a lot of money yourself, too" – Arizona answered, knowing that Callie now is making not even half of her previous annual salary in NY.
"So, the conference put me in a hotel in downtown, can you give me a ride? I know it's a little out of hand to your place, I'm sorry" – Callie said.
"Not a problem at all. Sof, are you ready to go?" – Arizona asked, looking at her daughter through the rear view mirror.
"Yes!" – the little girl squealed.
Arizona was off the next day so she could be with Sofia. The little girl was all over her Mommy, telling every story from her school and even complaining about how much she missed her home in Seattle. Every time the little girl said those words, Arizona felt a sadness taking over her. She knew the girl was too altruist to speak her heart out about where she would like to live, and she often did things she thought would make Callie or Arizona happier.
At night, when Callie called Arizona so she could say good night to Sofia, the women talked a little about the conference and Callie's schedule for the next few days.
"How was the speech?" – Arizona asked.
"Great, there were some of the best orthopedists of US in there. I felt good." – Callie exclaimed.
"I'm glad you're over your stage-fear now" – Arizona quipped.
"Well, I need to be, anyway. Every conference like this pays me well. Moving to NY ended most of my savings and Penny doesn't make much" – Callie confessed.
"I'm sorry Callie. But you're adjusting in there, soon enough Penny will finish her grant and she'll make more. And, I know it must sound weird, but if you need help, I hope you know you can count on me. For real" – Arizona share her good intentions, but apparently, Callie understood it differently.
"You don't need to glow about how better you are in the money universe, Arizona. That's not cool" – Callie answered, slightly angry.
"Glow? I'm not glowing, Callie. You just told me you're going through a rough time, I'm offering to help, but you know what? Forget it. I won't get into a fight over this. I actually just wanted to know about your schedule so we can arrange things for Sofia" – Arizona said, now angry too.
"Well, I'm leaving on Sunday to Kent and will be back on Wednesday night. Maybe we could share Sofia tomorrow?" – Callie suggested.
"Yeah, I'm on call until 5 pm, so maybe you can get her tomorrow morning and I'll pick her up when I leave the hospital, is that good?" – Arizona asked.
"Works for me. Can I talk to her now, please?" – Callie asked.
"Sure, I'll get her on the phone" – Arizona answered and handed the phone to Sofia.
On the next day, Arizona bumped into Meredith on the elevator and shared the news about Sofia's schedule.
"Oh, hey, uhm, Callie's back on Wednesday night, so she will only pick up Sofia on Thursday, since Wednesday it's a holiday and Zola won't have to go to school, maybe they can play together?" – Arizona suggested.
"Awesome, she'll be thrilled. It's a date" – Meredith answered and smiled, leaving the elevator.
The week passed by pretty quick and Arizona couldn't believe it was already her last day with Sofia in town. They had so much fun together and that always makes Arizona forget about how lonely she feels in the city now that she's single and without her daughter living with her. She almost felt like canceling the play date with Zola so she could spend more time with her little girl, but she knew Sofia was excited to see her best friend and she took the courage to just fulfill her promise.
She needed to drop Sofia at Meredith's before her shift started, and gladly Maggie was off so she could watch the kids. It was a pretty bad raining day and there wasn't much to do outside with 4 kids.
When she arrived, Meredith was pissed off screaming at someone on her cellphone, but Arizona was polite enough not to ask anything, except handing Sofia to the play date.
"Wait!" – Meredith mouthed while she was finishing her call – "Yeah, you're useless, whatever" – she said at the end, sounding really mad at whoever that was.
"Is everything ok?" – Arizona asked, a little unsure of what she should do.
"Well, my car just blacked out and the insurance company doesn't seem to know the meaning of urgency. Anyway, are you heading to the hospital? Can you give me a ride? Maggie is off and Amelia is still on her night-shift" – Meredith explained.
"Yeah, sure, let's go" – Arizona said and they both walked to the blonde's car.
That was one of the situations where Arizona felt really lonely. Although she knew Meredith for almost ten years, they still felt like acquaintances. They've gotten a little bit closer after the plane crash for obvious reasons, but not longer after that Arizona and Callie split, after the cheating episode. When Meredith was attacked, Arizona helped her but it didn't had so much effect and not longer after that, there was the custody trial and that made the two women even more distant from each other than ever. So, inside the car, there wasn't much of conversation other than small talk about nothing important.
Inside Meredith's head, she could feel the discomfort but not as hard as Arizona felt. She just assumed the two of them didn't have so much in common and that's why they weren't close. Meredith knew Arizona was a good person and a nice woman to be around, but she actually didn't know what to say to break the awkwardness that was loud and clear between them if they needed to be around each other for more than 10 minutes.
"Is Ellis feeling better? Alex told me she had a strep last week, I know it can be hard on babies" – Arizona said, trying to break the ice.
"She's better, but not 100% yet. I was really concerned about pneumonia but Alex assured me it wasn't the case" – Meredith told, sounding worried.
"Well, carry on the fluids and if she doesn't recover completely in two days, you should bring her over to have a full check up. It doesn't hurt to be really sure she's ok, right?" – Arizona suggested.
"Yeah, I'll do that. Alex is leaving tomorrow for his vacations, though." – Meredith said.
"Well, lucky for you I'm still a pediatrician. And a good one. I'll check her out" – Arizona said, smiling.
"Thank you, Arizona. It's hard, isn't it? To be a mom and a doctor at the same time? It's like you know all the things but when it comes to your child you just paralyze" – Meredith vented.
"Well, it gets better when they're older, I think. I mean, you're way more secure about Zola, for an example. Because she's older and can communicate, so it's easier for you to figure it out properly. I was a mess when Sofia was a baby, I was always assuming the worst, I couldn't even sleep" – Arizona confessed.
"Who was the rational one between the three of you back then?" – Meredith asked, laughing at Arizona's confession.
"Callie, without a doubt. Mark was even worse than me!" – Arizona laughed.
They arrived at the hospital and went to the attending's lounge to change into their scrubs.
"Ok, so I will probably leave around 7 and go straight to pick up Sofia. Let me know if you need a ride back home, ok?" – Arizona offered.
"Thank you, I'll let you know" – Meredith said, smiling at Arizona.
It didn't felt weird like the previous times, Meredith finally found a thing that they had in common: they were both lovingly and worried mothers.