Two days later and in the midst of the morning chaos, Callie handed Arizona a cup of coffee as she yelled at Sofia to bring out her school bag and struggled to push her laptop into a leather satchel. "Ummm," Callie said and Arizona looked up, she was concerned suddenly by the serious expression on Callie's face. "I've booked my flight back to New York for tomorrow night, I have to be at work on Thursday."

Arizona felt a tightening in her throat. "Oh, of course," she said, unsure of what to add. They hadn't spoken much more since Callie's first night, just spent time with Sofia and let some of the mundane routine of school drop off and pick up and dinner take up their time. "I'll be home this afternoon, unless there's something urgent. I just have to go in for a couple of surgeries this morning."

"That would be great, I was actually wondering if I could take you out to dinner tonight. Dinner and drinks?" Callie asked.

Arizona nodded though her mind rushed to a million different places. "I'll see if the sitter is free or if Sofia can go over to Meredith's maybe."

Callie coughed. "I had coffee with Meredith yesterday and she said she would be home and Sofia loves having sleep overs still."

Blushing, Arizona nodded. "You've already organised it, that's great."

"Only if that's okay. I didn't want to be presumptuous."

"It's fine Callie, how about you drop me at work and then you can have the car for the day - drop Sof at school and then pick her up and to Meredith's. I'll grab a cab home."

"Sure, except I can pick you up. Just let me know."

Arizona shrugged, she was used to organising everything for herself these days. And, she needed to get home and shower, do some basic personal grooming before she donned any kind of restaurant attire. She was already thinking that she could sub herself out of her last surgery, let one of the more experienced residents run it with Karev as backup.

Dates always made her nervous. And this sounded like a date.

XXX

Arms hooked over her crutches, Arizona re-secured the towel wrapped around herself and opened the door to her bedroom. She took a few steps and eyed Callie from across the hall before stuttering a few words. "Is there a hairdryer in your bathroom?" she asked quickly. "I'm not sure where mine is." Her cheeks flushed and she knew they would be burning red.

"Hairdryer huh? Just wanted to check what I was wearing?"

Arizona couldn't help but laugh; Callie was right. She just wanted to catch a glimpse of Callie to ascertain the tone of the night - was it more of a cocktail dress evening or something more casual. She was glad she checked though, Callie was dressed in a pair of skinny black jeans, a sheer flowing red top paired with a gold pendent that sat in the crest of her breasts. She already had a pair of low cut boots on, just a small heel. "Sometimes I forget how well you know me," Arizona responded eventually, still smiling.

"And you should know that you could come out in a pair of sweats and I would think you were as beautiful as ever," Callie answered and Arizona was envious almost of her bravery.

Again, Arizona laughed though. "I'll try to do a little better than that. I won't be needing the hairdryer, by the way."

She disappeared back into her bedroom, Callie's chuckle audible. It didn't take her long to get ready then, choosing her leg and securing it before pulling on a pair of dark blue skinny jeans. She wore knee high black boots though; she loved that the sharp pointed toes made up for the flat heel in her biased opinion. She settled quickly on a black strappy top that sat firm on her waist but loose and comfortable over her abdomen. Just loose enough that it moved subtly over her chest as she walked.

Callie was waiting for her in the kitchen when she walked out, bent over her cell phone where it lay on the bench top. She was scrolling through something on her screen. "Ready to go?" Arizona asked, announcing her arrival. She could remember their dates, from the early part of their relationship and the excitement and anticipation that she felt that night was very similar. She wasn't sure when they stopped going on dates and why that was. Perhaps all couples eventually lost some of that initial fire. Not all couples went through what they did though.

"I am," Callie answered, dropping her phone into her handbag and rounding the bench. She grinned at Arizona and stepped in, kissing her lightly on the cheek. "You look…amazing," she said softly. "And those boots…I need some of those. They are divine."

"You look stunning, Callie," Arizona said in return, dismissing Callie's comments.

"Thank you. Now, are you good? I have a cab waiting outside."

Arizona nodded and led the way out when Callie jiggled her house keys and locked the front door behind them. The cab ride was short and Callie was out of the cab first and offered a hand out. Arizona found herself looking at it for just a second longer than necessary before laying her fingers over Callie's palm and stood, stepping up on to the sidewalk.

"Have you been here before?" Callie asked, and Arizona shook her head, acutely aware that Callie's fingers stayed wrapped around hers. She made no effort to break their touch; she had always felt so comfortable with her hand in Callie's. Even after they had separated; it had always brought her calmness and comfort.

"No, but I've heard it's incredible. It apparently has a great tapas menu and a massive wine list; there was a write up recently in the newspaper. I've been wanting to try it out."

"Oh good, that's excellent. And I thought it would suit us, we were always hopeless at choosing main dishes."

Arizona laughed. "Because we wanted to try everything."

Nodding, Callie approached the restaurant entrance and discussed their reservation in Spanish. "Go on," she said to Arizona, dropping her hand and instead, placed an open palm to her hip as they followed one of the waitstaff to their table. After all of their years together, Arizona could barely speak a few words of Spanish and didn't understand much more. Another regret perhaps. "Comfortable?" Callie asked as they were seated and Arizona nodded. "I thought it would be too cool outside."

"I'm good," Arizona responded, tucking loose strands of curly hair behind her ear. She exhaled a lengthy breath and settled in to look at Callie; to really look. Sitting opposite her was the most beautiful woman she had ever known, ever dated, ever slept with. She still knew some of her idiosyncrasies and what they meant; the way that Callie was biting the end of her tongue as she perused the wine list was simply a slight anxiety. She would be wanting to choose something first that they both really liked, even though Callie would often rush to a full bodied red and not bother with a champagne or white blend which was Arizona's go to. She played with the fingers of her left hand too, flicking her nails and running her thumb over each of her fingers again and again. That had always meant she was nervous. "Have you chosen something?" Arizona asked softly.

"You were right, there are so many options. Would you be happy with champagne to start? I don't know the whites well, but do you want to look? They're more your expertise. Or we could just buy by the glass. Or different bottles? Ummm, here, you should look."

"Champs is great, Call," Arizona responded and she found herself trying to ease Callie's anxiety despite her own. "I'll even settle for a $100 bottle of Veuve rather than a $500 Bollinger."

Callie laughed and finally looked up. "Sorry, I'm actually really nervous all of a sudden."

"I can tell," Arizona said. "I like it." She earned rolled eyes in response. "I am too," she conceded.

"Occasionally over the last few months I've kind of daydreamed and tried to imagine us doing this again and I kept trying to tell myself that it wouldn't happen or it couldn't. And it mostly felt impossible."

"You could have told me, you know? Earlier than you did."

They were interrupted briefly for their wine order and Callie added in a few small starters. "Then we can order the share plates after?" she asked and Arizona nodded. "I don't know," Callie said after a few moments. "There seemed so many reasons not to. I wanted to be sure…sure 'ish' anyway and I didn't know what was going on for you. I didn't want to interrupt anything."

"There was nothing to interrupt."

"Really?"

Arizona shrugged again. "There was someone last year, for a while but it didn't work out."

"What happened? If I can ask, you don't have to answer of course."

"Do you know what ghosted is?" Callie gave her a blank expression in response. "See, this is because we're old. Apparently it's something people do. They just leave, without a word. No explanation; no phone call, no note."

"People do that?"

"Yes!" Arizona said, although she laughed. "So yes, I was ghosted. I can assure you, it's not good for the self esteem. One second she was here and the next, her apartment was empty. Clearly, we were not meant to be given I didn't even know it was humanly possible to just disappear without so much as a word."

"That is actually terrible."

"I wasn't too traumatised in the end but I wouldn't recommend the whole ghosting thing. At least I learnt a knew word, I suppose." Arizona wanted to ask about Penny, but wasn't sure how or even if she should. Callie had phoned her when they broke up but it had been a brief and pointed phone call, simply to let her know that Penny had moved out and that Sofia might mention it. She could still remember Callie's sad voice on that call and how she had hung up before Arizona had much opportunity to offer anything more than a quick sorry to hear that.

"Penny and I didn't have any big fight or falling out or anything," Callie said, appearing to read Arizona's mind. "We just drifted apart, kind of. And we both agreed to separate and that was that. It was very civilised and mature. We talked one night and the next weekend, she moved out."

"I remember you calling me to let me know, you sounded so upset."

"Oh yeah," Callie said, nodding. "My response was weird when I look back, not for being sad of course. But I wasn't particularly sad that Penny had moved out, all of my stuff was around being the common denominator. That I couldn't make something work. And then when I got my crap back together and started going out again and trying to meet people, I just kept thinking about you."

The glasses in front of them were being filled then and some small tastings of lemongrass prawn placed between them. The first of many. They ate and drank seamlessly through the evening, conversation moving from intense and personal to completely absurd and back again. They laughed; tears welled and throat lumps were swallowed as their discussion ebbed and flowed.

"Do we need to talk about what we do next?" Callie eventually asked, reaching across the table and stroking a thumb over Arizona's cheek.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but making that decision after two bottles of wine seems like a dangerous thing."

"I know, but I leave tomorrow night."

"Well then, you leave tomorrow night. That's what happens next."

"I can come back, if you want me to."

Arizona struggled with the dialogue running around her head and she knew that her eyes were glazing with tears as she contemplated how to answer. She wanted to say yes, there was no question about that and she could say it more emphatically if she was being particularly honest in that unfiltered, alcohol influenced moment. But the past was such a strong influence; it created fear and uncertainty.

"You need to be really clear with me Arizona, if you don't want me to. Everything about you seems to want to be here but then all I saw when I said that, was panic."

Arizona swallowed. "I smothered you. That's what you told me; you said that I smothered you and I'm not sure how to do that differently. How do I say yes, come back every weekend, every holiday, every chance you get when I'm not sure I've fixed what made you stop loving me."

Callie's lips were on hers instantaneously and Arizona knew she was kissing her back. She wasn't sure if it was instinct or want or something completely different but she did it all the same. Arizona blinked hastily as Callie sat back on her chair. "I find it hard to articulate what I was feeling and maybe I won't explain it well right now but it just seemed like all we were doing was hurting each other. All the time. And I know that I didn't understand properly but at the time I just kept feeling like you wanted me around but for the wrong reasons. At some point, I stopped feeling like your wife and more like…I'm not sure what like. But I thought that if I didn't feel like your wife then we must have been irreparable."

"If I could go back," Arizona said, "I would have done a lot of things differently. But no one can turn back time and I can't really say that given the same circumstances in the same time and same place, that I would have been different. I know that it was my fault you felt like that and I will always be so incredibly sorry."

Callie shook her head and she placed her hand over Arizona's where it rested on the table. Her other hand holding her wine glass. "I didn't mean it was your fault and I didn't mean to bring it back up again."

"No," Arizona interrupted, "we need to talk about it. We have to."

"I have such a list of things that I would do differently; things that when I think about them, I feel sick. I feel like we hung up everything about us that made us, us. And in our place we tried to be doctors; we tried to be control freaks; we tried to be functioning."

"What if that is us though, under pressure. We can't just be good together when life is smooth and carefree."

"I would have gone to Africa," Callie said, slowly and she stared intently into Arizona's gaze. The sincerity and intent felt palpable to Arizona. "I would have gone and worked beside you for however long it took and then we would have talked about what was next."

Arizona cleared her throat. "I would have said yes, to a baby, before it took a crisis for me to realise how much I wanted to share that dream with you."

"I would have hugged you more."

"What?" Arizona asked, shaking her head. "You were more affectionate than I was."

"No, well sort of. I would have hugged you more when you were sad or stressed; I thought early that you were just an army kid who was stubborn and independent. I was wrong, you just piled these walls up and instead of being kind of intimidated, I would have shown you that you didn't have to, with me."

Arizona again, slowly shook her head. She would never deny her rock solid defence mechanisms, they were well established and had been since she was such a small child. But, she had never had them named so overtly before. "I would never have thrown your phone over the back seat of our car. Before the accident."

"Arizona that's crazy. I shouldn't have taken my seat belt off; I shouldn't have been on my phone when we were going away together. You have nothing to change about that."

"I have so much I would change, Calliope. About everything."

"Hey, this was my list. I wasn't finished; I would have taken time off work after the plane crash. I would have taken months off, to sit next to you in hospital, day in and day out. I wouldn't have been in surgery when you lost consciousness; I would have been there and known before hand, and we could have talked about a change in plan."

"I would have agreed to them taking my leg in Boise. I would have told you it wasn't your fault. I would have asked you for help. I wouldn't have had an affair. I would have tried again and again, to have our baby. I,"

"Stop. Please stop."

Arizona took a deep shaky breath, aware that Callie's fingers were slowly stroking the skin of her forearm.

"Please stop," Callie said again and her eyes were staring at her when she glanced up. Everything they were saying was true but it seemed useless too. "I just wanted you to know that I own so much of how we got to be where we got to. When I said that I didn't feel like your wife; it was because I wasn't treating you like mine, either. But love, Arizona? Love was never part of the equation; love was at times the only thing I had."

"I want you to come back whenever you can and I want us to try. And it does completely fill me with panic because the end of us was one of the hardest things I've ever done. In my head, we would always be together, until we weren't."

Callie nodded and she squeezed Arizona's wrist, looking down at her hand. "I missed you."

Arizona exhaled and sadly smiled. "I missed you too."

XXX

"We should go pick up Sof and do the airport run, I guess," Arizona said, walking across the lounge room from where she had just repacked a pile of Sofia's books back into the bookshelf.

Callie nodded, she sat on a stool with a cold mug of coffee next to her. "Well, I've just booked my flights for the weekend after next, so at least there's something set."

Scowling, Arizona shook her head. "I was meant to book the next flights, you don't need to pay for them all."

Callie rolled her eyes and smiled. "It's all done, you can do the next ones if it makes you feel better."

Wringing her hands, Arizona scanned the room for something else to tidy and distract herself with. "Okay," she said, moving a cushion slightly. She wasn't sure if she was feeling anxious about Callie leaving or the process of saying goodbye. She wasn't particularly surprised though when Callie interrupted her internal dialogue and made the decision for her.

"Come here and give me a hug?"

Approaching Callie, Arizona drew in a deep breath and shared a glance briefly before stepping between her legs where she sat on the stool and learnt into Callie's body. Strong arms wrapped tightly around her back and she felt Callie breathe into her neck. "We'll talk during the week?" Arizona half asked, half stated.

"Of course, any time."

"And we'll tell Sofia that you'll be visiting but we won't say anything else yet?"

"Yup, see how her behaviour goes."

"Okay," Arizona murmured, leaning back. Her gaze fell from Callie's eyes to her lips and she actively avoided thinking as she softly kissed her.

They smiled as they separated and Callie slowly nodded, pulling Arizona back into her arms.

TBC...