AN: Hey guys, this chapter once again picks up where the last one stopped. I hope you enjoy it. Let me hear your thoughts?
"Because you just left..."
The Latina's words penetrated the blonde's brain over and over again before she could form words herself. She hadn't just left. Callie had ended the relationship, had crushed all her dreams about a future together because the brunette didn't want children and that is why she had felt the need to leave. It wasn't a lighthearted decision. If she would have seen a chance that they could make it work, she would have stayed. That is what Arizona kept telling herself every night before she went to bed and every morning when she woke up. If she would have seen at least a little chance, she would have fought until she wouldn't have any strength left to do so. "I didn't just leave, Calliope. I... you broke up with me. Was I supposed to stay in the apartment and live with you, pretend that I was fine with the breakup and that the past years of our life didn't mean anything to me? That our love didn't mean anything to me?" Callie still hadn't turned around and talking to the brunette's back made Arizona furious, so the next time she spoke, she raised her voice, too many not quite yelling, but noticeably louder than before, "Would you at least have the decency to turn around when I talk to you?!"
Giving herself a moment to compose herself so she wouldn't face her ex-lover with tears in her eyes, Callie took a couple of deep breaths and internally, counted to ten. Ten seconds would have to be enough for now, just to make the blonde believe that she was fine, that should make her leave her alone. "What do you want, Arizona?", the brunette asked when her gaze met the other woman's. "What do you want from me, Arizona. You left", she said anew. "Actually, you ran away without looking back and left me there to pick up the pieces. I've tried to stay at the firehouse, our firehouse, where we worked together, but I couldn't. Everything there reminded me of you! And without you there, I couldn't deal with the guys' immature behavior either. But being at the apartment was even worse. You literally left me alone to sort out the rest of our broken relationship."
"You ended it!", Arizona yelled this time, tears brimming her eyes as she tried to understand the frostiness Callie obviously used to shield her beautiful, big heart. It's by far the thing that drew her to the Latina in the first place, her big heart. The brunette was a kind, loving person, who wasn't scared to get hurt but instead wore her heart on her sleeve. She had never seen her building a wall of blocks made of ice around her heart for protection. Until now. Clutching the sides of her top in her fists, she held on for dear life, as she feared to fall apart all over again. "I may have left but I couldn't stay there and see you every day. It hurt too much. It still hurts too much." The last sentence came out as a quiet breath of a whisper.
"Then why are you here now?", Callie wanted to know. She understood and believed the blonde when she said that she hadn't known that they would be working at the same fire station again. What she couldn't grasp was how Arizona purposefully searched for her to have a conversation. Why did she have to make it so hard for the both of them? "This place isn't the biggest, but if we try to avoid each other, I'm sure we can work together, somehow", she offered, fighting with her own tears just from looking at the blonde. It pained her to see Arizona like this. All she ever wanted to do was make the other woman happy, make her smile every day so she could see her dimples and her bright blue eyes shine from sheer joy. Never had she envisioned a scenario like this.
Scoffing, the blonde now crossed her arms over her chest. Avoid each other? She still loved Callie. She didn't want to avoid the brunette like their relationship was one huge mistake of her past. She wanted to try and make things work this time. If she – their love – were given another chance, she would give up her dream of being a mother. If that meant she and Callie would have another shot, that they could grow old together, she would only want that. "I don't want to avoid you", the blonde quietly confessed and waited for the other woman's reaction, searching her face for a sign that Callie wanted the same. Yet, the Latina's face remained emotionless, of which Arizona was sure, was just a facade. But she also knew that if the brunette didn't want to talk, she didn't stand a chance to get through to her.
"Yo, Torres, Meredith and the kids are here, they are waiting for you by the fire trucks", Mark announced and closed the door just as quick as he had opened it. Whatever the two women were arguing about, he didn't want to get between them. So he had waited until there was a moment of silent to deliver the news.
Frantically wiping her eyes and cheeks to clean them from the tears she had shed, Callie put the stuffed ice-bear back in its place – on top of the small bedside table – and started to walk away. When she was almost at the door, she turned around, seeing that Arizona hadn't moved an inch, but that she had her head in her hands, sobbing. "I'm sorry, but... it's better this way", she said and left the room, desperately trying to make herself believe her own words. Clearing her head on her way to the fire trucks, the Latina forced herself to smile. Malia didn't need to know that she had a rough morning. "What are you doing here?", she asked when she found her niece climbing into the fire truck with Derek's help. "Shouldn't you be in school?"
"Tia Callie!", Malia hopped down the steps and ran to her aunt before jumping into her arms, hugging her tightly. "Our teachers are sick", she explained, "and Ms. Baxter said that every available parent should pick up their kids because they can't teach us today and maybe even tomorrow." Apparently, most of the teachers were hit by a wave of the flu and there simply wasn't enough staff to keep the classes going. The grin on the dark-haired girl's face was priceless. A day off in the middle of the week, that was spectacular news to her – even though she was usually pretty eager for knowledge and absorbed every word from her teachers.
Looking at her fellow firefighter's wife, the tall brunette asked, "Isn't that too much? To watch them both for more than twenty-four hours? Meredith, if you have other plans, I can ask the chief and-"
"Nonsense", the thin woman with dark blonde hair told the Latina. "It's fine. We'll go to the zoo and if it's okay with you, I'll take the girls to see a movie. We'll do some of the extra works for school and I'll just keep them busy until they pass out tonight", she laughed. It really didn't bother her that much. Sure, the house-cleaning and grocery shopping would have to wait for another day or two, but that wasn't exactly the end of the world. "Don't worry, okay?"
"Okay", Callie sighed in relief as she put her niece back on the ground – the girl simply getting to big for her to carry her around longer than a few minutes. Meredith was an angel sent to her when she needed one the most. "I can't thank you enough, Mer." She really didn't know what to do without the other woman. Being a housewife and mother only was not something she could picture for herself. She needed to do something good, something important. But if life would demand a change for her, if she needed to make a decision, she would always choose Malia over her job and she was one-hundred percent okay with it.
"Nonsense, again", the other woman laughed. "Just make sure to invite us to your next dinner party and let us have some of your awesome food", she winked at the Latina. "Oh, and maybe you could watch Zola one weekend next month It's our anniversary and Derek promised to take me to the Space Needle. Apparently, he made the reservations almost a year ago."
Feeling blue eyes watching her, the brunette needed a moment to find her words. Arizona's gaze was intense, staring a whole into the back of her head – at least, that's what it felt like. "No problem. Just give me a heads up so I can make a plan. Because, apparently, Meredith Shepherd is better at entertaining two girls than I am", she mocked, repeating her niece's comment from a few weeks ago.
Just when Malia was about to correct her – and Callie knew her niece well enough to know she would defend her own words, the siren blared through the truck hall, followed by the situation status through the speakers, "Firehouse 22, car accident on Fourth Avenue, Battery Street. Trapped and injured person, two more injured people on the scene. Truck 42, Squad 8, ambulance 72, battalion 11."
And then everything happened really fast. Derek helped his daughter out of the truck, gave Meredith a quick kiss before she left with the kids. Callie jumped into her uniform pants and boots before grabbing her jacket from the hook. The ambulance was already on its way out – with Kepner once again as the driver – when the brunette climbed into the truck. "We're good to go, lieutenant", she said when fire unit of Truck 42 was complete.
Upon arriving at the scene, Arizona was quick to exit the car and let her eyes scanthe surroundings, getting a general idea of the situation. Despite her own inner turmoil and the emotional state she was in, regardless of how badly she just wanted to crawl into her bed and cry for an hour or two, this was not the time to let her feelings control her. She had to toughen up and push everything that could possibly distract her to the back of her mind – for the second time today – and do her job. Which was harder than this morning. Her thoughts were racing a mile a minute in every possible direction, each ending up revolving around memories of Callie, Callie and her being in love, of her and Callie planning their future together. But she needed to focus. "We need three cervical collars and at least one spine board, maybe two", she muttered, more to herself than to her fellow paramedic. They most likely wouldn't be able to reach the victim in the crashed car yet, but they were able to help the other two people first. "Kepner, check on the man, I'll check the woman and when the firefighters freed the one in the car, we'll take over."
"Okay", April nodded and grabbed one of the collars and a paramedic's bag from the back of the ambulance. Fast steps alongside the new paramedic through the in charge drizzling rain led her to the middle-aged man. He had blood on the right side of his face, coming from the cut right above his eyebrow, but other than that, he seemed fine. "Sir, are you in pain?"
"Just my head", he answered, his words clear and strong. Relief settled on the two paramedics when the woman confirmed the same state, saying that she only had a pounding headache, probably the result from a concussion caused by the impact. Putting the cervical collars on the patients to stabilize them and prevent any future trauma during the transport to the hospital, they checked their eyes with a flashlight and the reaction of the pupils.
"Robbins!", Chief Webber's deep voice practically vibrated through the air and after the blonde made sure that April was good to handle the elder couple alone until the second ambulance would arrive to take them to the hospital, she jogged over to the chief. Noticing that the firefighters had secured the second car and put out the small fire, she stopped next to her new boss, surveying the work of the rescue squad as he spoke, "Can you climb into the car through the passenger's side door to brace his neck? We need to cut off the roof and we can't risk him moving too much."
"Of course", Arizona replied with a sharp nod, grabbed the third collar and got into the car. It came with the job, but she never liked being in a car while the rescue squad worked on the metal body. There was always the chance that something could go wrong. And she couldn't help but feel trapped in a tin can – not exactly a comfortable feeling – but she had to trust their crew to do their job right. "Alright, we're ready." The next sound that filled her ears was the screeching noise of the flex as it cut through the metal. Closing her eyes until it was over, the blonde then helped lifting the patient out of his damaged car. Getting out herself, the easy way by jumping out of it since there was no rooftop left, she waited until he was on a gurney before she checked his vitals. The drizzles had turned into a down-pouring rain and it blurred her sight. "Alright, I have a heartbeat and a pulse, but neither is perfect. Help me get him into the ambulance?" A few firefighters nodded, pushing the stretcher in the direction of the vehicle. For a crash that bad, the patient definitely could have ended up with injuries much worse than what he had. The blonde had definitely seen worse. From shattered legs to a total lung collapse, she had seen all of it.
Once inside, Arizona hooked her patient up on a portable monitor to observe his vitals after she established a vascular access to administer fluids and pain medication. "Do you need anything else?", Callie asked her, standing there as if she didn't have anything else to do. With her helmet in her right hand and the uniform jacket unzipped despite the heavy raindrops, her left hand fumbled with the edge of the high temperature resisting visor as the Latina looked indecisive and kind of vulnerable at the blonde. Add this to the strange and icy demeanor from earlier, Arizona didn't know how to react or what to say. But she also could not deal with this right now. She had a patient to take care of, and so many things to think about. "I'm good", she answered curtly and refocused on her patient. Shortly after the weird incident, April closed the back doors, fired the engine and took them to the hospital.
"What the hell, Callie?", Arizona immediately confronted the Latina when she got back from Seattle Presbyterian and found the Latina alone in the locker room as she obviously wanted to put on a fresh shirt. "You cannot do this. You are not allowed to do this. First you don't want to talk to me, and then, when I have to keep my eyes on a patient – of all things – you think it's a good idea to speak up?" The blonde was furious. She had had enough time to stew on her pent-up anger on the way back and with every second she was given to think about everything that had happened today, she became even more enraged.
"I just-", the brunette started but stopped. Initially, she wanted to congratulate Arizona on the good work. Knowing how much the blonde despised being in a totaled car, she had always admired how calm her ex-lover remained while being in that very situation. And congratulating her was what she always used to do, back when they were working together, living together, when they were happy together. But when the Latina saw the blonde in the car, all courage left her when she remembered that the past was the past. And she suddenly felt like she didn't deserve the right to tell her that anymore. So she chose different words. Nevertheless, she wanted to get this off her chest. "You did great today. That's what I wanted to say. Not that you have ever been not great. You are the best paramedic I know. But... you were amazing, today. Better than I have ever seen you work. That's all I wanted to tell you", she said, playing with the freshly washed fabric in her hands, using it as a distraction from the fluttering feeling in her stomach and to calm herself. There were so many things she wanted to say, so many unsaid words that wanted to be set free, but she stopped herself.
Staring at the woman in front of her with her mouth hanging wide open, she had no idea what to reply. It was so not what she had been expecting. At all. "I... thank you", she eventually said with a cracking voice, her eyes never leaving the Latina's face, even though Callie didn't meet her gaze. "It's been two years. I've learned a lot." After that, silence overcame them and for Arizona, it felt like it was slowly crushing her. She just wished she could erase the painful part of their past and go back to normal. And if the brunette would be up for it, even if it was just a tiny bit, she was sure they could fight through it. "Malia has gotten so big." The words left her mouth with a smile, although, originally, she didn't mean to say them.
Finally, obsidianeyes searched for blue ones and the wild, energetic flapping of butterfly wings in her stomach became harder to ignore. She still loved Arizona, so much that it hurt not to hug her, not to touch her, not to kiss her. But she couldn't drag the blonde into her life. Not with everything that had happened and was still going on. It wouldn't be fair to her. "It's been two years", she whispered eventually, repeating her ex-lover's words just loud enough so the other woman could hear her. And so much had changed in these two years. So much that Callie didn't understand how she even managed to handle all of it without Arizona by her side. The blonde used to be her rock, her shoulder to lean on. And she had been Arizona's in return. That was what love was supposed to be like, in good times and in bad, right? Through heaven and through hell, if one believed in that. But she had gone through hell alone because she had pushed away the one place she called heaven. And now everything was different.
AN2: So, we got a little information of what happened. It's always dark before the dawn, isn't it? And it's the darkest right before the sun rises. We're not there yet. It'll get worse before it can get better.
AN3: Also, just FYI, I'm going on a break for 2-3 weeks. And after that, I'll hopefully be back with an update for OUAD.