A/N: I'm back! My finals are officially over, and though I have a couple hectic weeks coming up, I should be able to update this more regularly. Again, I apologize for the shortness of the chapter, but it seemed like a good place to stop. Also, believe it or not, I totally set out to write a completely saccharine, feel your teeth rot, fluffy chapter. This came out instead. Blame my finals-addled brain.

Chapter 14

"I'm being released in two weeks," Arizona said suddenly but quietly from her place against the wall. Her knees were bent tightly into her chest, while her chin rested on her right knee. Callie hummed in solemn recognition of the fact that neither wanted to face. Arizona picked at the food by her feet, occasionally bringing a morsel to her mouth and promptly grimacing as she swallowed. "Certainly not going to miss the food," she said flippantly.

"Wow. Please rub it in some more." Callie huffed and sat back in her bed, stuffing a piece of unidentifiable meat in her mouth indignantly.

"Callie…" Arizona started, not entirely sure how to rectify the situation.

"Whatever."

"I don't like this situation any more than you do." Arizona winced as soon as the words came out, realizing her mistake almost immediately.

"No, Arizona. No. You don't get to pretend like this is going to be just as hard on you as it is on me. You are leaving to go back to your perfect life with your perfect job and I will be here for another ten years. Do you understand that? Do you?"

"Perfect life? You seriously think my life is anywhere near perfect? I was in jail, Callie. It will take me a while to get my job back. I have nothing to go home to."

"You and I both know that's bullshit. You'll get your job back. And you have a home. You have a family. I have nothing, Arizona. When I get out of here in a fucking decade, I will have nothing waiting for me." Callie desperately wanted to be mad at Arizona, mad at her for bringing this sore subject up in the first place and mad that she was leaving her behind, but instead her voice just gave out, indicating her abject desolation.

"You'll have me," Arizona responded meekly.

Callie scoffed and shook her head. As she processed Arizona's words, she began to chuckle through her tears. The harder she laughed, the more tears streamed down her cheeks, before her laughter gave way to heaving sobs. Arizona immediately sprang from her position on the floor and enveloped Callie in her arms, cradling her face in her hands and pressing light kisses against her temple.

"Please don't," Callie whispered, her voice still racked with emotion. When Arizona didn't move away, Callie continued. "Please don't pretend that we mean anything beyond these walls. Please."

"I'm not pretending, Calliope. We do mean something. I'm going to wait for – "

"Can you just stop being so damn naïve for one second and be realistic?" Callie jerked our of Arizona's grasp. Her words were no longer doleful or plaintive. Now she was just angry, and she had every intention of taking it out on Arizona.

Arizona rolled her eyes. They'd had this fight far too often. "I am not naïve, Callie. I am telling you that I am willing to wait!"

"You're going to wait for me for ten years, Arizona? Ten. Years. Do you have any concept of how long that is?" Callie really couldn't have sounded more condescending if she tried.

"I am not a child! I'm not exactly happy about having to wait for you for 10 years, but I'm telling you that that's what I'm going to do. This is not your choice to make."

"Oh yeah?" Callie laughed mirthlessly. "It's my choice to break up with you."

"You really went to such lengths to get me switched to your cell just so you could break up with me?"

"Well, a girl has needs," Callie replied with a nonchalant shrug of her shoulders. Arizona knew she was being purposefully cold and distant, but had no idea how to get through to the brunette.

"You know damn well this was never just about sex, Callie."

Callie shrugged again but remained silent. "Tell me you don't love me. Tell me that this was all just some stupid game for you and that you never loved me and I will walk away from you in two weeks and you will never see me again."

"I don't love you," Callie replied almost immediately. "Maybe at one point I thought I did, but this was never anything more than a fling." Callie's strangled words and inability to look directly at Arizona proved what they both already knew: that her statement was a blatant lie.

"Now, look me in the eye and tell me that," Arizona challenged, almost allowing a proud smirk to grace her face. She knew she was right.

Callie inhaled deeply and sat up straight. She puffed out her chest and squared her jaw. Looking directly into Arizona's deep blue eyes, she almost faltered at the love and passion she saw gazing back. "I don't love you." She held Arizona's gaze as her deliberately painful words settled over them.

Without warning, Arizona rose to her knees on the bed and snaked her hand around the base of Callie's skull, forcing their lips only millimeters apart. "Then you should feel nothing when I do this."

Arizona closed the infinitesimal gap between them and forced her tongue between Callie's lips almost immediately. The brunette groaned into the kiss and brought her own hand up to cup Arizona's cheek. She instinctually swirled her tongue around the blonde's, engaging in the passionate dance they had perfected. When Arizona moved to straddle the taller woman, Callie's intrinsic habits surrendered to her obstinacy. She roughly swiped at Arizona's hair, wrenching her backwards with enough force to pull out several blonde strands.

"Callie," Arizona whimpered in a mixture of physical and emotional pain.

"We are over, Arizona." Her voice was devoid of any emotion and Arizona involuntarily shivered at the hollow tone. "Please leave me alone."

Arizona sat back on her haunches and stared at the brunette for what seemed like several minutes. Callie's glare was unwaveringly cold, and it was enough for Arizona to concede defeat, at least for that one fight.

Those walls that Arizona had managed to break down over her year in jail had been built right back up alarmingly quickly. This time, though, it seemed as though Callie was determined to build an impenetrable fortress. Determination, however, was not something the blonde was exactly lacking, and Arizona was not going to let her go without a fight.