Something went awry with posting chapter 10, so I had to delete and post it again. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Disclaimer: Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is.
A/N:
I felt a little bad about announcing the hiatus without also leaving you guys with a chapter too, so here's an update; had it written out so might as well. It'll have to be the last update for a while. I'll be back again after a week-long break.
Again, thoughts, sarcasm, new(ish) phrases and garbled Calliesque word jumbles are in single quotations.
And for those of you keeping track, it's been 47 days since and storm and the confession. And, I am kind of a little tired of writing only angst-y stuff, so this chapter will be mixed. There might be a bit of contrived and forced drama. But, if it's not in real life, then isn't all drama forced and contrived?!
Review the Fic, Feed the Author.
Onward
They hadn't spoken in a week. They saw one another when Sophia changed hands, but beyond that, they only spoke when their jobs demanded it.
Callie felt humiliated. Five years, and she'd been learning and re-learning the meaning of happiness through a torrid affair that transformed into companionable stability with a light-hearted and steadfast partner. She had had a child, gone through another marriage and now she was back to where George had once left her.
But, she wasn't exactly the same person either. She was a 'kick-ass' surgeon, she was pioneering research that people in her profession only dreamed of, and she had Sophia. The love she had for her kid was unchanging, it was constant, and maybe Arizona and she weren't the forever kind of love she had thought they were, but Sophia was unerringly, unmistakably the love of her life.
And as of Friday evening, Callie also had a shiner…
Arizona risked peeking out of the exam room. The corridor looked empty-ish. She didn't mind the nurses, the orderlies or the janitorial staff. Things with them were pretty status-quo; they'd leer and whisper, but they never asked her about any of it directly. But she did find that she had to constantly duck and hide from the rest of the board members. 'Survive a plane crash with a bunch of people and apparently they've all bought life-long passes to the front row seats to witness the drama in your life!'
"Hey, Robbins!" came a loud and abrasive shout. 'Damn that man-boy!'
She sighed and turned on her good leg, 'her only leg, really'. "What is it Karev?" 'Ugh! She was saying his name in that annoyed mommy way where her voice would tapper off at the end! Obnoxious!' Her face matched her voice, 'what a treat?!'
He didn't blame her though. Everyone from his Vulcan roommate to Bailey-the-busiest-boss-that-ever-lived, were constantly looking to talk to her! 'What the heck was the big deal anyway?! What did talking ever solve?!'
He stood in front of her, a little dazed at the look of pure disdain on her face.
She noticed that amusing twilight zone of Karev's facial expressions; he was torn between concern and confusion. She relaxed a little, him she could handle - "just spit it out!" she wasn't harsh anymore, just drained, and it was showing – "you wanna talk too?!"
"No! Robbins, God no!" He said waving his hands once over, making a cross in the air.
She gave him her penchant 'speak idiot!' arched eyebrow look. "No? You sure? Because everyone and their grandmother wants to talk to me!"
"Naah. Pass." He said with a shrug of his shoulders.
She looked at him with a burgeoning curiosity. 'He was her 'friend' right? Sort of…he was the only one giving her space. Alex could be sweet sometimes…'
Her internal monologue was cut short with a nonchalant – "not like talking's gonna help you un-screw Boswell!"
'Riiiight…' "What a lovey sentiment!" She acerbically exclaimed, "now if you'll excuse me?" she turned to walk away…
"Gah!" A Christina Yang, in her face.
A creepy-honey-dripping-acidic-smile-vacantly-starin g Yang in her face - "Hello, Arizona… We need to…"
"Get you to the ER!" Karev chimed in. She turned around again, this time to find him looking a little 'iffy', nervous almost as he rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet.
"You should've led with that, Karev!" she barked. But he knew - that she knew - that he knew that she was internally thanking him for his impeccable timing.
She started walking with him quickly.
"But what about our talk?!" came a shout from behind them.
She threw back - "a Sunday from never, Yang!" over her shoulders as she continued to walk towards the ER.
"So what's the case?"
"It's Torres."
She looked at him, a small and gratuitous smile creeping on to her face. He was trying to give her a chance to talk to her wife. They'd had time to cool off, the both of them. Yes it still stung, and it added to the pile of things they had to address. She'd been inconsiderate and desperate, and just hungry for a few words from her wife. She knew Callie and Jasper were just friends, she was just jealous that he got to make her laugh and she couldn't right now. But she also knew that Callie needed someone like that right now.
Callie was different. She and Callie, they were very different. She put up walls and moats and tuned everything out till the loud discontent of her heart and soul echoed throughout her being. And one day, the ghost of her unhappiness, evolved from tired melancholy, to a virulent and entrapped pain, till it banged at the edges of her consciousness and broke out in a white and blinding heat - pushing away those she loved. It always left her alone and spent; until Callie happened. But, that was before…
Callie was different; where Arizona folded in on herself in a tight and ugly clutter till the whole mess fell apart, Callie's pain sprang outward, passionate, roaring. When Callie was in pain, she looked to find love, and friendship and kindness, because that was what she was taught to give when she saw someone else in pain. There was never anything ugly about Callie. She could be loud, and she could be involved, and she could be pushy, but if you bled her - she'd bleed love.
"Karev…" she sighed, "it's nice of you to try and get us to talk…"
"No, no" he cut her off, "it's actually Torres!"
"What's actually Callie?" 'Ugh! Maybe Callie was right; he could be a big dumb Gorilla sometimes! Or maybe she was the gorilla, 'cause she took him under her wing and then lost a freaking leg!'
"In the ER? Getting stitched up?" He asked all sing-song, looking at her like she'd lost her mind.
She took off immediately, shouting a "why didn't you say so you moron?!" the last syllable stretching in the air.
He just shrugged – "it's just a shiner!" He cupped his hands over his mouth, making sure she heard him "it looks kindda hot!"
Callie was sitting on a bed in the ER, having Avery stitch up her brow. 'God, this was so colossally stupid! Adultery and assault?! When it came to her, everything in the hospital was always up on a bulletin board!'
The noise of shoes beating on the hospital floor drew her attention away from some extreme thumb twiddling action in her lap. As she looked up she felt a sharp tug at her skin and an unpleasant pain jolted through her entire face.
Arizona was standing at the doorway, bent at the waist, her hand on her knees, trying to catch her breath. As she looked up, she caught her wife's gaze.
"What happened?" She looked on, concerned. Not waiting for an answer or to be waved inside, she began walking in and surveyed the room. There he was, Jasper Callahan, sitting in the corner, looking extremely guilty.
She came up to Callie, just as Avery finished suturing Callie's brow and began to apply some protective padding at the wound site. She shooed him away, and without ceremony, took over the menial task.
"Callie…" she tenderly shifted to touch her wife's cheek, but at the slightest contact Callie flinched away.
Disappointed, but not deterred, she asked again in an even tone, this time arching her body towards her right and speaking to Callahan – "Dr. Callahan?"
The man looked up at her.
"Care to explain what happened to my wife?" there was an inexplicable bite in the last word, and it definitely had something to do with that suspiciously guilty look on the otherwise smug trauma surgeon's face.
"We were at Joe's." Arizona whipped her head back to her wife, her eyes wide with surprise. Callie was speaking to her.
"Alright?" 'Say something, just anything' – she'd missed just listening to Callie speak.
"And this guy… he… he" she went silent, looking a little sheepish and awkward. She finally hazarded a look at Arizona. The blonde was looking at her, concerned and inquisitive.
"He wouldn't let up…"
"Let up what?" Arizona asked, losing patience, her mind was crowded with worry for her wife.
"He kept hitting on me, okay?!" Callie said, a little too loud for all their comfort.
"And then what?"
"He got…" Callie hesitated a moment longer but was determined to continue…"he got handsy…" She was going red 'of all the stupid things on this Earth, in the middle of all this, they got in a…'
"A bar fight?!" Arizona roared, outraged when the realization hit her.
Callie ducked her head, 'God! If only the ground would open up and swallow her whole!' "You're telling me, my thirty…"
She heard the loud and scratchy noise of a throat being cleared effectively stopping her from blurting out Callie's age – 'Callie was picking now to be cute?!'
"It's not her fault Doctor…" Callahan was met with a steely death glare…"Robbins", his voice seemed to die down and get lost in the recesses of his throat. "What happened next?" she asked turning back to look at her wife.
Before she could get an answer, they were interrupted by the nurse coming in with pain Killers for Callie. A consensual silence fell over the three of them. "There you go Dr. Torres", the nurse said handing Callie the pill while she smiled at her sweetly, too sweetly. Three pairs of eyes tracked the woman as she was leaving the room.
"Nice!" came Callahan's voice from the far side of the room.
"Ugh!"
"Shut up!" the two women said together, rolling their eyes.
"Continue" the blonde said curtly to her wife, dangerously polite.
"Then, nothing. Jasper stepped in and…"
Callahan cut her off quick – "I have a consult" – he got up to make a beeline for the door.
"Sit down Dr. Callahan!"
"How can someone so blonde be so… so scary?" he mused out loud as he found himself taking the seat like a reprimanded child asked to take a corner in a classroom.
That drew a satisfied smirk from the blonde. Giving Callie her attention again, she asked "you were saying?"
"Jasper defended my…" she grimaced – "tried to defend my honor " she trailed off. Arizona inhaled loudly, poised to ask the tight-lipped-two-man-circus another question, but Callie quickly cut her off.
"He went to throw a punch and tripped!" she could feel the beginnings of a fit of laughter and worked desperately to stop herself, laughing right now would hurt like a mother.
"Okay?"
"And the guy was kindda going to punch him at the same time, but Jasper slipped so…"
"So you obliged his fist with your face…" Arizona did that silent-mad eyes thing that always made Callie break into nervous a sweat.
"It's not like I was looking to get punched. He was a douche-bag! " She could be heard in the halls now. Jasper coward to the side of the room; he was flinching at how quickly this thing was escalating.
"You're a mother now, Calliope! You can't get in bar fights!"
"I wasn't really in a bar fight!" Callie shrank back a little.
"You just said you were! Don't talk us in circles!"
"There are a lot of things we shouldn't do because we're mothers now Arizona!" 'There! It was out in the open! She'd said it.'
"Not here!" the blonde said in a terse and loud whisper.
"Fine, tomorrow then" Callie said, beginning to get up.
Arizona looked at her, flabbergasted – "oh no! You're coming home with me!"
The brunette looked at her like she'd grown two heads. She spoke, defiant, hands on her hips, standing a little taller – "and why would I do that?!"
Arizona looked stung and infuriated, "what do you mean why?!"
"I'm not some damsel in distress; I don't need to be rescued! The last time someone tried" she comically waved at her bruised eye.
"Do you have a concussion?" Arizona asked standing up slowly.
"A mild one, what does that have to do…" As she looked at Arizona's perfectly arched eyebrow issuing her a silent challenge, she came to a slow realization and unhappy realization. A concussion would mean that she'd need monitoring. "I can go… ummm…" 'Fishing, Callie was fishing really hard right now!' "…I could stay with Bailey!" She exclaimed with a slight smile that turned into a grimace as the pain in her eye registered.
"I'm sorry Torres" Callahan's voice drew their attention – "you know she left to be with Ben, Tucker's with his dad for the weekend… so? You could come to my place?"
Callie saw the blonde's face drop instantly. The ice in her heart thawed a little. Their eyes met, and holding her wife's gaze she resigned herself to the fact that right now Arizona needed to be with her as much as she'd needed to be with Arizona.
"Naah! I've seen you're apartment buddy, you walk in with a concussion, and you walk out with bed bugs. No thanks! I'll pass!"
Callahan started to move to the door – "suit yourself Torres!"
Arizona turned back from watching Callahan leave. She took a look at Callie's face again. Callie could feel it. This was like one of those brief moments in their day that they'd remember and use in order to get through the rest of it. Arizona would look at her, and it felt as intimate as a breathless and desperate kiss. Her eyes would drink her in and everything outside of them would just… it would just fall away. Arizona's eyes welled up with tears as her hand traveled to Callie's injured brow. She risked it – touching Callie, she couldn't help herself. 'She never could.'
Callie hissed again in pain, but her eyes remained open and locked on Arizona's; she didn't think to flinch away this time, the need to feel her wife getting the best of her, making her forget her anger.
Her sigh of pain caused Arizona to momentarily lose control and a few tears got away from her, but she recovered quickly, wiping at her face.
"So", Callie asked almost reaching for her wife's hand, but then stopping herself, it didn't go unnoticed by the blonde – "you wanna go get Sophia from day-care?"
"Yeah, let's go."
The two started walking together in a comfortable and familiar silence.
"Callie?"
"Yeah?"
"Will you do me a favor?"
"I'll think about it…"
"Next time you see two idiots about to start a rumble?"
"Hmmm?"
"Try not to stand around?" 'Smirking! Arizona was smirking!'
"Sure. Sounds do-able."
They'd reached the entrance to the day-care now. Right before they were about to enter, Callie stopped to look behind Arizona and then moved to look back at her. The look Callie was giving her made the blonde a little anxious.
"What is it?"
"Have you noticed?" Callie looked behind Arizona yet again and made her turn around with a light push on the shoulder. "They're all looking at us."
There, standing right outside were Yang, Derek and Grey, with weird looks on their faces. 'What was Grey even doing there?! Wasn't she on maternity leave?!'
"What's that about?" Callie asked, a little freaked by the entire crew of bug-eyed weirdos staring at them like they were alien clowns.
"Oh that?" Arizona smirked as she started walking past Callie and into the day-care center – "they just want to talk" – she said mysteriously.
A/N 2.0: Next up – Callie and Arizona talk.