A/N: Hello everyone! Just a quick note to say here is chapter 3, I hope you enjoy! This is a bit of a longer one - for some reason I find Callie so much easier to write, so the words just seem to appear for me which is great!

Again, thank you for the love and support, and as always this is on AO3 too for anyone that prefers to be over there!

I should clarify that none of these characters are mine, they all belong to Shonda Rhimes, I'm just borrowing them and making them do what I want for the sake of my fic.

Enjoy!

It was already dark by the time Callie made it home from campus, and her brain felt like mush. Having spent the entire day either in classes or hunched over her books in the library, she was drained, and thoroughly looking forwards to an evening off.

Though it was only a month into her second year, there had been no holding back on the lecturers' parts when it came to assigning work. They had thrown the med students headfirst into the deep end when it came to assignments and lab reports and impromptu tests, and it was utterly exhausting.

This week had been particularly bad, as it had been the first week of labs for two of her classes. The work had practically doubled, and Callie felt like she was drowning.

She'd been so preoccupied that she'd almost found herself forgetting to do something in response to Arizona's insane night-time workout, which was very unlike the brunette. And whilst she would admit that she had enjoyed the peace that the temporary cease-fire had brought, even momentarily considering that maybe her life would be slightly easier if she just conceded, those thoughts had been swiftly pushed away when she imagined the smug expression that would be plastered across the blonde's annoyingly beautiful face for the rest of time if she were ever allowed to believe that she'd won their little conflict. She knew by now that the woman was competitive and didn't let things go easily - there would almost certainly be no end to the taunting glances and cocky comments. Just the thought of the way her pretty blue eyes would twinkle as she threw proud glances in Callie's direction gave the Latina the urge to slap her. No, Callie couldn't let her think it was ok to have such a criminally terrible music taste, or to throw obnoxiously loud parties at least once a month. Someone had to put the bitch in her place.

Having followed this train of thought, she'd taken a pause from her reading sometime mid-week to blast some music and hoover her room.

It wasn't like she was doing it entirely out of spite, she reasoned. The room did actually need a once over with the vacuum.

Right now, however, she was choosing not to think about the annoying blonde that lived upstairs.

Because today was a Friday. Which meant she had two full days until she could be assigned any more work, which, in her books, was cause to celebrate. She almost wanted to kiss the ground in thanks to whichever deity had allowed the week to end. And yes, she was aware that the notion that there was someone up there controlling time specifically for her benefit was nonsensical, but it probably wasn't the stupidest thing that had gone through her over-worked and mildly sleep-deprived brain in the past few days.

This evening, she had decided, was going to be dedicated to finally uploading this recipe. It had been sat on the back burner all week, practically finished, just waiting on a few touch ups, but she hadn't had a spare minute to perfect it before pressing upload. It had been bugging her, a small niggling in the back of her mind adding to her already overwhelming levels of stress, so the fact that it would finally be out of her hair was more than exciting.

She let out a sigh of relief as she entered her bedroom, kicking her boots off and flicking the light on, taking in her familiar surroundings. There really was nothing like coming home at the end of a long day, and it was made even better by the fact that there was nothing but silence coming from the apartment above her. She prayed to anyone that was listening that it would stay that way.

Callie grabbed her laptop from her bag and flopped down on her bed, groaning slightly as her muscles relaxed into the mattress. An entire day of slouching forwards on a stool had done a lot of things to her back, none of them good.

The first thing that she noticed when she opened her blog page was that she had a new comment. Whilst this wasn't that uncommon, she hadn't posted in over two weeks, and most of her regular readers tended to leave their feedback within the first couple of days of a new upload, so this stood out.

Brown eyes flitted over the computer screen as she navigated her way into her inbox, a genuine smile forming across her face when she saw who the message was from.

She had several regular commenters, all of whom were lovely and tended to leave feedback that made her day. But there was one in particular that had become her favourite, always leaving friendly messages that didn't just discuss the recipe but also said lovely things about Callie as a person. Despite the fact that they knew nothing about her, they always spoke as if they were friends, and it never failed to make the brunette smile. Callie almost felt like she knew this person from the way they liked to leave a little commentary on how the recipe had gone for them, or how events in their life had coincided with the release of her uploads. Plus, they had told her that they were also a med student, and whilst the commenter didn't know that they had this in common, Callie found herself enjoying the fact that there was someone else out there in a similar position to her that also enjoyed food in the same way that she did.

Hi GBO, I know this is an impromptu mid-week comment, but I wanted to ask what happened to your enchilada recipe? I was going to make it for my friends tonight, but I noticed that it had disappeared, which is very sad both for me and for my stomach, because it is one of my most favourite of all your posts! Do you have any plans to re-upload it? I really hope so (and so does my belly!). Have a lovely weekend :) – from a Hungry Med Student

Callie found herself smiling as she read the comment. 'GBO' as a shortening of her regular sign off 'Grateful Blog Owner' had become a sort of in-joke between the two of them, and she enjoyed the way that it felt like she was interacting personally with the people that read her blog.

As for the recipe in question, she'd taken it down because she'd noticed a couple of errors in the post – she clearly hadn't proofread it properly. On second inspection, she felt that it could use some improvements and adaptation before she re-uploaded it. For the time being, it had been placed on the back burner, nothing that she was planning on looking at any time soon.

Normally she'd just reply to the comment as such, but for some reason the fact that it was this commenter in particular made her want to act differently. She wasn't one to start sharing stuff with strangers on the internet, hence why she tended to keep her blog posts free of any personal information that could be used to identify her, but they had gone out of their way to leave nice messages on literally every one of her posts. It was the hungry med student after all.

Hi hungry med student, it's nice to hear from you! I'm sorry that I messed up your evening plans by taking my post down :( If I'm being totally honest, I wasn't planning to re-upload the recipe for enchiladas for a while – I wanted to fiddle around with the ingredients a bit as I think I could make it better. But, because it is - as you said - one of your favourite of my recipes, and because you are always so lovely with your comments on my blog, I am happy to send you the old recipe if you (and your belly) would like? If you leave me your email or something, I can direct it your way. I hope you have a nice weekend too – GBO

Callie quickly fired off the response, deciding not to consider the ramifications of what she'd offered. She figured, if it came to it, she could use her old, barely used email account. Her dad had made it for her when she was a teen, and thankfully it didn't have her name in the address.

Opening the draft for her most recent recipe, she felt a familiar feeling of contentment spread through her chest. She really did love running this blog. And even if the idea of anyone in her real life finding out about it made her cringe, she didn't let that detract from her enjoyment of the routine. The regular pattern of picking a meal, reading up on other peoples' versions, experimenting in the kitchen, writing up a final version and posting it with a little bit of preamble about the process. Although it would be nice to have someone to talk to about it, she kind of enjoyed keeping it to herself anyway. It was her own secret hobby.

Callie had barely begun reading through her draft when she saw an alert pop up in the corner of her screen.

1 new comment

If that was the hungry med student, then they were quick off the mark with their reply.

Clicking on the banner, she was directed back to the comments of her most recent post.

Hi GBO. It's good to hear from you too! Please don't apologise for messing up my evening, I ended up making your chilli instead which is another of my favourites (and I promise I'm not just saying that to make you feel better!).
I will however take you up on your offer of the recipe for enchiladas, if that's not too much hassle? Since I was unable to make it the other day, I have been craving it, and now I think I'm having legitimate withdrawal symptoms.
You do have to promise me that you won't judge me for my email address though. I made it when I was ten and I was very heavily influenced by my older brother who thought it was funny. I look forwards to hearing from you – from your #1 fan (who is also a hungry med student)

There was another big grin plastered across Callie's face as she reached the final line of the reply. She knew it was stupid to get so excited about a message from a complete stranger, but there was something about this person that just put her at ease. She was convinced that they would be good friends, were they to know one another in real life.

It isn't too much hassle don't worry – I don't want to be responsible for your withdrawal symptoms!
I will promise that I won't judge you for your email address, however I can't promise that I won't laugh. Not that you'd know if I was laughing anyway, so you can just pretend that I'm reading it with a straight face – GBO

The reply was almost immediate.

I'll take you up on that promise. My email is iloveunicorns115 hotmaildotcom. I hope that you have a stony, blank expression as you read this. That's what I'm imagining – a completely cold, emotionless blank face. You'd better not have let me down – from a Hungry Med Student (that doesn't love unicorns anymore, I swear)

Callie snorted as she read the message. Ok so, when she promised not to judge, she hadn't been expecting to read what had appeared on her screen. Laughing was justified, she decided, when the address was like that.

She opened up her old email account, brown eyes widening as she noted just how much spam mail was sat in her inbox. It had been so long since she'd used it, she'd barely remembered the password.

Hesitating slightly, she considered whether or not it was a good idea to send something from her own personal email account to a complete stranger. She didn't know what kind of stuff someone could get up to with an email address, but she'd heard the horror stories about internet safety enough times to at least be a little apprehensive.

Somehow, however, she highly doubted that the hungry med student was the stalker-serial killer type. Granted, she had no idea what a mass murderer would get up to online to lure in potential victims, but her gut told her she was safe. Not that her gut was really all that reliable of a measure, but whatever. It was only one email that contained a recipe. What harm could it do?

From: cit107 hotmaildotcom
To: iloveunicorns115 hotmaildotcom

Hi Hungry Med Student,

It's GBO here, unless that wasn't already clear. I have to say, I am a big fan of the email address. Were you one of those My Little Pony-kids? I won't swear I didn't laugh, because then I'd be lying, but I promise I'm not judging you – my address is only normal-ish because my dad made my account, and I didn't have a brother to mislead me into choosing a potentially regrettable name (not that I think there is anything wrong with liking unicorns, I swear).

I've attached the recipe to this email, I hope that it makes sense as it's my draft version. It does have a couple of notes I wrote to myself at the bottom, but you can just ignore that bit.

I'm kind of flattered that you enjoy my blog enough that you want me to send this email. Without being corny, I do really appreciate the support – it's the response that I get to my posts that encourages me to keep uploading. And you are particularly great with your comments. It genuinely does make my day, so thank you for that. You're pretty fab.

Happy Friday and thank you again!
GBO

Callie hesitated slightly, before saying a mental fuck it and pressing send. Momentarily she was filled with panic, but it only lasted for a second before she decided there was no point in worrying. It was gone now. Too late to change her mind.

Reopening the recipe draft, Callie tried to focus on what she needed to write. She just had a couple of edits to make, plus the introduction to write, and then she'd be good to post it. It would probably take about an hour, max.

Five minutes later, and she still found herself staring at the same blinking cursor at the top of the page. Why couldn't she focus? This was something she'd been looking forwards to doing all week!

As much as she was trying to concentrate, her inquisitive brown eyes kept flicking towards her emails, which were open in the corner of her screen. It was silly, she reasoned. Just because the hungry med student had replied quickly to the comments on her blog, didn't mean they'd respond as fast to the email. They might not even reply at all – they had technically gotten what they wanted from her. They might just leave it at that, no muss no fuss. And that would be totally fine.

Callie minimised her email account and reopened the draft.

Get your shit together Torres!

She sighed. Maybe a bit of music would help.

Plugging her phone into her speaker, she selected a song, setting the volume fairly low, not wanting to tempt fate. She was already struggling to concentrate as it is, the last thing she needed was a pissed off Arizona blasting Taylor Swift at full volume.

It took her a moment, but eventually, she began to focus. After re-reading what she'd written a couple of times, she started to notice things that needed editing, and before she knew it, she was in full flow. Brow furrowed and tongue poking out of the corner of her lips, she put all of her efforts into making sure that this draft was worthy of sharing with her followers. She didn't like to half-ass when it came to her blog. It had to be perfect.

She was roused from her thoughts by the buzzing of her phone, unsure of how much time had passed. She was almost shocked by the rush of adrenaline that shot through her bloodstream at the idea that it might be a reply to her email.

Disappointment hit the Latina as she saw that the notification wasn't a response from the med student, like she'd been hoping, but instead a text from Addison.

Addison: Joe's? I need a drink and a rant

Callie groaned. She really didn't want to go out tonight. She wanted to stay put, finish her blog post and maybe watch a film or something. As much as she loved Addison, she definitely didn't want to sit in a stuffy, crowded room, nursing a flat beer and listening to the redhead complain about her day. If that made her a bad friend, then so be it. She'd had a long week too.

Callie: I was kind of looking forwards to a night in. Raincheck?

Addison: Please Cal?

Addison: I'll buy you a drink

Callie: But I want to find out what happens at the end of my film

Addison: Come on, I can guarantee you're watching a horror movie you've seen before anyway

Addison: Two drinks

Callie: I don't know…

Callie sighed, knowing that she probably wouldn't get out of this one. As much as she had been looking forwards to her night in, she wasn't one to bail on her friends. Addison had been there for her enough times, she couldn't really say no.

Addison: Three drinks and your cab home

Callie: Fine. See you in 20

It was barely nine and Joe's bar was already packed. This wasn't unusual, seeing as it was a Friday night, the place being a popular student hangout. In fact, it was the opposite of unusual; this was completely to be expected for any patrons entering the crowded space.

It didn't make Callie want to be there any more.

She practically had to wrestle her way through the throngs of bodies to reach her friend at the bar, distinguishable from the rest of the crowd only by her bright red hair.

Addison was sat alone, chin resting on her palm as she stared blankly at the bottles that lined the back wall of the bar, eyes focused on nothing in particular. Directly in front of her were at least six glasses, half of them empty, the other half holding a variety of coloured beverages. Some guy was standing to her right, leaning against the bar, clearly trying to get her attention. She was not entertaining him.

Callie couldn't help but snort as she approached her friend. She almost felt sorry for the man – he was definitely not going to get Addison's attention. She was picky at the best of times and straight-up rude at the worst. And judging by her current expression, the man probably had about 10 seconds before he heard something along the lines of "I would seriously like to know what about this interaction is giving you the impression that I am interested in your musty ass?".

"Callie! Thank god you're finally here," Addison exclaimed, her face morphing into a grateful smile as she noticed the brunette approaching her. "For a moment I thought it was just going to be me and Mr 'I-play-lacrosse-although-you-wouldn't-know-it-looking-at-my-puny-arms' over here," she muttered, gesturing to the man standing next to her.

Callie watched as the man's facial expression morphed from one of cocky confidence to that of someone whose pride had just taken a knock. It only took a moment before he slinked away, looking for someone else to focus his attention on.

"You're a little bit mean. You know that?" Callie snorted, taking a seat next to the redhead at the bar, wondering briefly how she'd managed to keep a stool free. The place was heaving – there was barely a single seat left available in the whole establishment.

"Hey you! Get your ridiculous shirt and your horrible BO out of my personal space!" Addison yelled at some poor innocent man that had accidentally moved too close to the redhead.

Ok, so that answered Callie's question.

Addison turned to face her friend. Reaching forwards, she pushed half of her collection of glasses in front of the brunette, her lips forming into a grin as she watched Callie's eyebrows shoot up and her eyes widen.

"I promised you three drinks, so I bought you three drinks," she said, as if to explain the collection of glasses in front of her, her words slightly slurred.

The Latina glanced down. There were definitely more than three glasses in front of her. She counted a full beer bottle, a large glass of red wine and four shots on the counter. There went any hopes of a calm quiet evening.

"How much have you had?" Callie questioned, raising an eyebrow.

"I may have already been here for half an hour when I texted you," Addison stated bluntly, not even bothering to pretend otherwise. That in itself said it all. "I bought you three drinks, and then I realised I was a bit ahead of you." She mimed taking a shot. "So, I thought I'd catch you up when you arrived. And you are ten minutes late, so you'd better get going." Her voice was so matter of fact it almost made Callie laugh. "Don't just stare at them! Drink up!"

The brunette glanced over at the redhead, eyes wide in question. Addison's facial expression indicated that she was not in fact joking.

"Did you not think that maybe waiting until I arrived and letting me choose what I wanted myself would have been more appropriate?" Callie questioned. She had found that her friend tended to make rash money-spending decisions when she had been drinking, which had led to several situations that started just like this one and often ended with a prolonged relationship forming between Callie's stomach and the toilet.

"Counterpoint – are these not the drinks you would have ordered anyway?" Addison slurred, raising her hand and pointing a finger at the brunette.

Callie couldn't fault her on that one – she did normally stick to a good beer or a glass of red wine whenever they went drinking. Tequila shots - only when she was intending to get drunk, but that hadn't been on her agenda for the evening. She didn't feel like raising that one with her highly inebriated friend, however. It wasn't an argument she'd win.

"Bottoms up my love," she grinned, her eyes sparkling mischievously as she raised one of the shot glasses up to Callie's lips.

"Don't call me that," Callie quipped, holding her breath as she took the shot and tipped it into her mouth.

The cool liquid burned the back of her throat and she swallowed, her face pulled into a tight grimace as she shuddered at the sensation. Sure, she liked tequila, but when it was her first drink on an empty stomach, it was enough to make her want to gag.

God, she wished she was tucked up in her bed right now. She could have uploaded her post by this point, and already be halfway through a film.

"You're really bad at that for someone that's been a student for over four years," Addison grinned, nudging Callie with her shoulder as she handed her the beer as a chaser.

Callie would have frowned if her face weren't already pulled into a tight wince. Instead, she settled for shooting Addison eye-daggers.

Taking the beer from her hand, she took a long sip, clearing the taste of tequila from her mouth.

Now that that was out of the way, her mind wandered to the reason they were even here in the first place. There was clearly something up with Addison – she had practically said as much, and whilst initially irritated that she was here rather than at home, she was actually concerned for the wellbeing of her friend.

"Ok, so." Callie placed her bottle down on a beer mat in front of her and turned her body to face her friend, leaning her head on her hand. "What's got you drunk before nine pm?"

"Nu-uh," Addison drawled, frowning. "You've got to have at least one more shot before I start telling you about my woes. You know, to even the playing field a little."

Callie gave her friend a stony glare, as if to question Addison's logic.

Pausing to glance down at the collection of empty glasses in front of her friend, Callie took a moment to assess exactly how bad the situation was going to be. Her friend liked to drink her troubles away, and the Latina had learnt to judge the magnitude of the problem by how many her friend had put away.

There were at least five empty shot glasses, plus an almost-drained beer bottle sat in front of the redhead. Ok, so pretty bad, but not the worst she'd seen. The crown for that one was held by the time Addison had found out her ex-boyfriend was cheating on her. Callie had arrived at the bar to see that she'd purchased a whole bottle of tequila and had already made it through a third of the clear liquid, and she'd only got there about fifteen minutes after the redhead.

Eventually deciding that the situation probably wasn't life-or-death, Callie sighed, before picking up another of the shots and downing it in one.

"Happy now?" she asked, taking another large gulp of her beer. God, at this rate she was going to be on the floor herself pretty soon. She made a mental note to watch herself, and her friend – Addison seemed to have some insane ability to just make drinks appear out of nowhere, without anyone noticing her buy them.

"It'll do," Addison smiled. Then, as soon as the smile appeared, it disappeared again, her face falling into a sad frown as she ran her finger around the rim of her own glass. "So, you know how my parents are complete control freaks?"

"Always a great place to start," Callie said, only somewhat joking. Addison's parents were notorious for causing shit in their daughter's life. Something the two had in common.

Addison pulled a face.

"Sorry. Please continue," Callie said, refusing to acknowledge the glare that was being thrown her way.

"They're utterly obsessed with my relationship status. Over the summer they wouldn't stop going on about my prolonged stay in single-town - I swear it was endless." Addison put on a mockingly high-pitched voice and begun to wave her hands around in front of her. "'When are you going to get a new boyfriend Addison?'. 'We really liked that Derek boy; you should give him a second chance Addison'. 'Come on Addison, you're not going to stay young forever'. 'Look at Archer, he's getting married next month – when are you getting married, Addison?'." The more she spoke, the more aggressive her hand movements became.

Callie grabbed her wrists, forcing Addison to stop and look at her. She had heard this spiel before – Addison's parents were notorious for not only being overly obsessed with their daughter's image; they also were constantly comparing the redhead to her brother. Again, something else she could relate to. It was no wonder the pair had become such great friends.

"Ok, first of all, stop flailing. There are way too many glasses around," Callie said, soft brown eyes looking into green, able to see the frustration behind them. She could see how bothered her friend was, and she regretted the fact that she couldn't change the way she was feeling. "Secondly, the fact that your parents are super weird about your dating life isn't news, is it?"

Addison frowned, and Callie watched as her demeanour switched from agitated and angry to defeated. Gently letting her friend's hands go when she decided the risk of her making a mess had gone, she sat back in her seat and took another sip of her beer.

"No, it's not," Addison muttered. "But I'm not finished." She picked up one of the shots in front of Callie and downed it without even flinching.

"Please help yourself," Callie drawled sarcastically, although secretly glad that Addison had reduced the number of tequilas she'd have to drink.

"I bought them," Addison shot back, downing the last of her beer. "And I know I told you that stuff already, but what I didn't tell you was that after about two months of it I cracked and now I may have gotten myself stuck in a lie." She sighed again.

"How big of a lie?" Callie asked, eyebrow raised.

"The kind of big, fat, shitty lie that buries you headfirst in a giant pile of your own crap," Addison slurred.

Callie chucked at the statement, before fixing her face into a solemn expression when Addison through another death glare in her direction. Ok, so, not funny. Gotcha.

Clearing her throat, Callie continued. "Care to elaborate?"

"I told them I had a boyfriend!" the redhead exclaimed dramatically, before burying her face in her hands.

Jesus Christ. Callie knew that her friend had a bit of a tendency to be excessively dramatic, but this seemed to be pushing it a little bit.

She couldn't help the way her eyebrows raised. How was this the end of the world?

"How is this the end of the world?" Callie repeated her thought out loud.

"Because, as previously mentioned, if you'd been listening." Addison shot a glare at her. "My stupid perfect angel-child brother is getting married soon. And I mean like super soon." The redhead picked up another of Callie's shots, however the clear fluid wasn't able to make it to her lips before the brunette took it gently from her hand, throwing her a concerned expression as if to say, 'I think that's enough'. "I just found out that the date got pushed forwards. Something about my mother wanting some fancy flowers that are only in bloom for five minutes at the buttcrack of dawn when the cows start mooing, or something like that."

Callie couldn't hide her snort. Addison didn't even try to seem mad at her.

"Now the wedding is in two months. So, I have until then to find a boyfriend that I have been with for half a year already." The redhead sighed.

"Can't you just tell them that you and the fake boyfriend broke up?" Callie suggested. It was times like this that she was almost glad that she didn't have all that much contact with her parents anymore. At least she didn't have to spend her life constantly failing to meet their impossibly high expectations.

"And then what? I'm back to square one, except this time it's worse, because Archer will be actually married."

Callie really wasn't sure what to suggest. What was there to suggest?

"Dating apps?" she tried.

Addison didn't even dignify that with a response.

Callie couldn't blame her.

Out of the corner of her eye, Callie noticed a that familiar face had entered the bar and was now sat a couple of tables away from her. A familiar face that had an annoyingly perfect dimpled smile and stupidly pretty bright blue eyes, both of which Callie could make out from over here. She was sat opposite an attractive brunette, who had her hand on the blonde's arm as she gushed over the woman. The whole scene filled Callie with a low bubbling rage, even though there was no real reason for it. Arizona just pissed her off so damn much.

Callie had never seen her in this bar before, it clearly wasn't one of her usual hangouts. Of course, she had to pick tonight to give it a try. The brunette could have sworn that the women went out of her way to annoy her in real life, as well as through their shared floor.

She was pulled out of her thoughts by a sharp punch to her shoulder.

What the fuck?

Addison looked genuinely pissed off for a moment, and Callie found herself confused as to what she'd done now.

"Hey! What was that for?" the Latina exclaimed, rubbing her now-sore arm.

"You were ignoring me!" Addison stated, before turning her head to follow Callie's line of sight.

She turned back to face her friend, a knowing expression replacing the angry one on her face. "Ahh, it's our favourite resident noise-maker," she positively grinned.

"Least favourite," Callie muttered under her breath, glancing across at the blonde again, who was looking intently at the woman sat opposite her. "Did I tell you about the workout she decided to start at ten the other night? Who the fuck exercises at te-"

"When are you going to stop pretending to hate her so much?"

Callie felt her mouth drop open at Addison's statement. Jesus, the woman must be drunk. Her friend had never suggested anything that stupid before.

"I- I do not!- I am not pretending to hate her!" the brunette spluttered. She could feel her cheeks heating up, although she wasn't entirely sure why. The notion was just so absurd. "I genuinely do hate her! She's without a doubt the most irritating person I have ever met!"

Addison raised an eyebrow and fixed Callie with a pointed look.

"You're drunk," Callie muttered. "Drunk Addison likes to shit-stir." Which was true – she would often come out with the most insane proclamations when inebriated. And this one was truly insane. Callie really couldn't stand her upstairs neighbour, she did nothing but piss her off. She was childish and petty and competitive and had no respect for anyone else around her. All in all, she was an absolute pain in the ass human being, and Callie wished she'd stop making her life hell.

Callie was snatched from her thoughts again by a punch to the arm, again. God, why did she choose someone so dramatic for her best friend?

"What was that one for?!" she whined, not liking the redhead's new method of communication.

"For being a woman," Addison stated, matter-of-factly, as if that was something that was within Callie's control.

Callie just raised an eyebrow.

"If you were a dude, I'd take you to the wedding, problem solved."

"I see we're back to talking about you," the brunette said sarcastically, although she was glad that the conversation had moved on from the blonde that was situated across the room.

"You could be my fake boyfriend," Addison muttered.

"I would make an excellent fake-boyfriend." Callie retorted, smirking.

"You would," Addison grinned in response, her eyes drifting off to focus on a spot above Callie's head, as if she was actually considering the two of them fake dating. Or real dating. Who knew what went on in that woman's mind.

Her eyes snapped back to Callie's face. "I actually half considered taking you anyway and telling my parents that I was into girls now, just to see the look on their faces."

Callie snorted again. She had met Addison's parents on one occasion, and the was enough for her to be able to picture the way they'd react to that revelation. It would probably be something similar to her own parent's reaction. And that hadn't ended so well.

She found herself glancing over at Arizona across the room. That brunette was practically sat on her lap, laughing animatedly at whatever the blonde was saying.

Ugh, get a room. They were in a public space! Again – no respect for those around her.

Callie could feel her stomach twisting in a way that was highly unpleasant and filled her with a low bubbling anger that was spreading up to her chest the longer that she looked at the pair.

"Ugh! What am I going to do?" Addison groaned, drawing Callie's attention back to her companion, whose eyes were scanning the bar to see if there were any drinks left that she could down. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on where you were sitting, she had drained all of the glasses in front of her, and Callie had removed any full ones from her reach.

"Can I have your wine?" she asked, batting her eyelids at the brunette.

"What happened to you buying me drinks in exchange for my wonderful company?"

"Yeah well, the company is lacking," Addison deadpanned, reaching for the wine glass and taking a long sip.

Rather than frowning, Callie began to laugh, a sure-fire sign that the alcohol was starting to hit her bloodstream. Everything felt a little lighter, her rage from moments ago starting to lift.

So what if Arizona was here with a girl? Callie knew nothing about the woman other than that she had the world's most terrible taste in music. The brunette could be a friend, and who was Callie to start throwing eye-daggers at someone just trying to enjoy her night out? It wasn't like she was actually doing anything to annoy the Latina at the moment. She was just sat there.

She stole a glance in the direction of the table.

The brunette had her lips attached to Arizona's neck.

Ok so, definitely not just a friend.

Whatever. Callie had suspected as much of the blonde from what she'd heard on odd occasions through the ceiling. No man, not even one with a high-pitched voice, could hit the notes that some of those screams reached. As much as Callie desperately tried not to listen, she'd heard multiple different female voices up there over the year that Arizona had been living above her, none of them belonging to the blonde, all of them yelling either her name or that of some higher being.

Callie shivered at the thought of the noises.

And it wasn't that she was homophobic.

She almost laughed at the thought.

No, she was very much the opposite of homophobic.

It was just not something she needed to be listening to when she was trying to sleep. Or something she needed to be watching across the bar when she was trying to have a conversation with her drunk and upset friend.

"How about Mark?" Callie suggested, turning back in Addison's direction, shaking the thoughts of the definitely R-rated noises that sometimes came from the room above from her mind.

If she was honest, her mind was still elsewhere, and she hadn't really been thinking about the words that came out of her mouth. She knew the moment that she suggested it that it was a terrible idea. Whilst one of her best friends, Mark was more than a bit of a player, which was a fact that became glaringly obvious to anyone that spoke to him for more than five seconds. He was just about the last person you'd ever want to invite to meet your family under any circumstances.

Addison didn't even respond to Callie's statement, she just laughed, head thrown back as if the brunette had just told the funniest joke in the world.

"Oh, come on, he's not that bad!" She wasn't sure why she was trying to defend her friend; he truly was terrible.

Addison just laughed harder.

"Ok fine maybe he is that bad, but it doesn't look like you're in the position to be picky does it?"

That made the laughter stop. Addison's face fell into a pout as she sighed and drained the rest of Callie's wine. The brunette made a mental note to not let her have any more.

"Ugh, why don't I have more male friends?"

"You once told me that you 'didn't believe in men as a concept'."

"Touché," Addison sighed. "And I stand by that. Unless one wanted to marry me right now just so I could rub it in my stupid family's faces."

"Maybe if you'd been a little bit nicer to Mr Lacrosse guy earlier-"

"This isn't funny!" Addison swatted the smirking brunette's arm.

"What! I'm just saying!"

"Ugh, whatever. I don't wanna talk about it anymore," Addison muttered, staring down at her empty glass. "Just drink up and you can buy the next round."

"I think you need a glass of water."

"The night is yet young Cal. I'll have water later. Right now, I need tequila."

Callie sighed, knowing there was no point in trying to stop her friend from buying more drinks.

Glancing over at Arizona's table again, she noticed that the pair had disappeared. Brown eyes scanned around the room before falling on a shock of blonde hair on the dancefloor. A shock of blonde hair that was attached to the head of a woman that was pressed very closely up against the same brunette from before

God help her this was going to be a long night.