Carina POV
You left home early this morning, as I thought. I was hoping to awake hearing you get up so I could say hello, wish you a good day, and see your smile, your eyes. I turn off the alarm, and I realize you've sent me a text:
- You look so beautiful when you sleep. Have a nice day, I love you. -
Maya Bishop, you're amazing!
- I wanted you to know that you can wake me up whenever you want... if you do it like I did to you tonight;-) be careful, see you later .-
I send the text and get up, before the bed calls me to it, and I could risk being late.
- Already awake? I thought you had another hour before you had to get up. Anyway, okay, I'll make a note. But know you may find yourself sleeping very little, Doctor! -
You know my schedule, and you know I hardly get up early to go to work. I'd like to tell you why I'm already up, but I'm not sure it's okay to do it by text and while you're on a shift, so I decide not to answer. I know if I did, I'd lie to you. I'll put on some music before I get in the shower. The random mode decides to immediately propose to me a song that can only make me think of last night.
Birds flying high
You know how I feel
Sun in the sky
You know how I feel
I feel good... you make me feel good. I feel the warm water running over my body, and I can almost feel your hands on me again, touching me, intoxicating me, making me feel yours... totally, completely, irretrievably yours.
My mind goes back to when I told you I wasn't in the habit of fixing broken people, but now it's like I feel like I have cracks. And I'm really hoping that talking to Arizona will help me fix them before I fall apart.
I arrive a few minutes early to our meeting place, which is definitely not for a pathological latecomer like me. I see her from behind, sitting on a table just inside the coffee bar. I couldn't help but recognize her right away. I see a waitress approaching her, to take her order I guess, Arizona turns slightly towards her and for a moment I freeze to look at her, through the glass window of the diner. It shouldn't have that effect on me, at least I think it.
I take a breath, before walking in and as soon as the bell attached to the door rings, she turns around... and smiles at me.
Carina, take it easy.
I sit down and say hello. How is it possible that my heart is already racing? The waitress comes back and asks what we want her to bring us. She orders a coffee, but I've skipped breakfast so in addition to a heavy dose of caffeine, I also ask for something to put under my teeth. Everyone at work tells me about the donuts they have here, so I opt for one of those.
"I was afraid you weren't coming..." she tells me, lowering her gaze slightly. I can understand why she thought that: in fact, I was surprised too when I proposed to see her, but maybe I didn't think it would be so soon.
"Why shouldn't I?" I answer fake, in a very unmasked way.
"So... what did you want to talk to me about?" I keep trying to figure out why we're here. I'm really looking forward to it, or maybe I hope whatever you say makes me feel better.
"I'm moving back to Seattle", she replies, lapidary. At the very moment she says these words, the maid arrives and leaves our order on the table. That gives me a few seconds to think... think, Carina, formulate a thought, a sentence, a fucking reaction!
Those words are enough to make me feel like a train has just passed over my stomach, and the feeling of hunger I had disappear in half a second. She understands, however, that I wouldn't be able to formulate a sentence right now, so she decides to go ahead and spit it all out.
"I asked Bailey to get my job back and she said yes"
I mean... not only is she coming back to town but we have to work together again? I'm screwed. She gives me a few seconds, hoping I'll be convinced to say something.
"Carina, talk to me, say something please", she asks me, hesitating. She understood that the news obviously did not leave me indifferent.
"I don't know what to say, Arizona... and New York? What about Sofia?" I'm asking. But there's one last question coming out of my mouth, and I don't know why I'm asking it.
"...and Callie?"
Her gaze fades, but it is these last words of mine that give her the final blow.
"With Callie... it didn't work. We tried for Sofia, but we weren't happy. We were for a while, but then things started to not work out again and then things got worse and worse. I agreed with Hermann that if I convinced Miranda to give me back my work at Grey Sloan, I would continue to collaborate with her foundation occasionally, going to New York only for non-transferable operations in Seattle... and trying to get a grant for her project from Catherine Fox." "Well, I'd say you've made a good plan... I'm glad it was just supposed to be for a consult", I say, disappointed. I don't really know if I'm more pissed off that you're officially back or bitter because...
"You broke up with Callie", I tell her.
"Yes" she replies, perhaps thinking there's some interest behind my words. She couldn't be more wrong. Actually, what I meant was something else, and I want the message to come out loud and clear.
"Well, apparently it's your thing to leave people", I say, before I grab my bag and get up, ready to leave.
"Carina, please", she whispered to me, grabbing my arm. That touch blocks me, not just physically. I sit back, trying to calm down.
"I wanted you to hear it from me that I was going back to Grey Sloan, but that's not all I wanted to talk to you about. I wanted to apologize..."
I look her in the eye and I know her words are sincere. Her eyes don't know how to lie, neither do her. You can see it in her face when she does. That night, too, when she left me, telling me she was going to New York, saying that it was to make Sofia happy again. But then she also said she loved me, so maybe I'm wrong about her. She takes courage, probably sensing my trust in his words.
"I know I should have told you these words a long time ago. I'm sorry... I'm sorry for making you suffer, for telling you that you didn't understand, while you were just trying to fight for us, for our story... I'm sorry for giving you the idea that it was easy to leave you behind, like you weren't important to me. It wasn't like that...you were important to me, our story was… but the good of my daughter came first. And I really thought that was the best for her. I was so wrong. I knew when I heard her crying in her room, while Callie and I were arguing. That night I realized that I couldn't be happy there and that Sofia would suffer more seeing us like this, rather than spending alternate periods with each of her moms."
Anger seems to sigh, watching her eyes shine.
"I don't know what to say, Arizona, you tell me you're sorry, and what do you think I should say? Do you think it has been easy? Do you think I had moved on like that,from one day to the next? You destroyed me that night. And I know I should have understood why you were doing this for Sofia, but it wasn't easy. I was in love with you, Arizona! As much as I'm a prudish person when it comes to talking, that doesn't make me an easy girl, much less someone who lives relationships lightly. I didn't, and you knew that, you knew how important you were to me."
I get it all out, unfiltered… part of me has been waiting almost a year for this moment. The other part of me lies. She lowers her gaze, obviously mortified by my words, but that's not enough to stop me.
"It was hard to put the pieces back together, to put back together...me. You've left a furrow of pain that hasn't quite healed. Then, luckily, I met Maya..."
Yeah, and then I met you, Maya. I still remember seeing you walk into the E.R. with a nose in a plastic bag. I don't know what struck me about you, but when I saw you leave I thought I'd never see you again. Such a shame, I thought. And then I saw you at Joe's. And that's when I realized I'd be a fool to throw away the chance to know you.
"It wasn't easy with her at first. She was a broken person, and as far as I'm aware, so was I. When she told me she betrayed me..."
I start this sentence and freeze for a second. I wonder why I'm telling her this… then I realize that if I'm really here, it's not for Arizona...but so I can move on, move on and live my relationship with you to the fullest. I catch my breath before I continue.
"When she told me she cheated on me, that pain came back. I even thought about going back to Italy, but I wouldn't leave my brother. I was devastated, feeling that I didn't deserve anything, that I didn't deserve anyone's love. Because for the second time in a short time, someone had broken my heart. And I felt like I could physically feel it crumbling inside my chest."
"Carina, I had no idea..." she says, looking at me, misty-eyed. She caress my arm.
"How could you... you left without looking back. The days before you leave, not a word, not a message. Nothing. That's what I was worth to you... nothing." "That's not true... I was afraid to make things harder. If I turned around, if I talked to you... I wanted to turn around, to see how you were, comfort you, make you feel... less broken. But if I had, I would have just made it harder and you know that", she replies. I know she's right. I hate she's right.
"Maybe... but who knows? All I know is that's what Maya did. She retraced her steps, begged me to forgive her. Actually, Teddy helped her with that, too."
"Teddy? Teddy Altman?" she asks for surprise. "Yes, but that's another story…" I reply, laughing through tears.
"What I'm trying to say is... if you want to apologize to me, to let me know that you're really sorry, you have to at least know the whole story, know what I went through when you left me, feel what you couldn't see with your own eyes", I tell her.
And I finally feel more free.
"You're right...you're absolutely right. Thank you for telling me all about it. And really, I'm sorry for what you went through because of me. You're an amazing person, Carina... and you deserve to be loved. And Maya loves you, I knew it right away the evening I met her. I'm only sorry I threw away our chance..." These words strike me, they are sincere. "Arizona, life goeson. We fall and we get up in life, and I have fallen many times, but I have gotten back up just as many times, relying on myself, on my strength. I just want to put the past behind me. Il passato è passato!"
I'm smiling. I can do that now.
"Damn, it's getting late, maybe we should go. But I want to tell you something: sarà un piacere lavorare di nuovo con te!"
"You do remember that I don't speak Italian, don't you?" she asks me puzzled.
"Oh, of course I remember, Arizona!" I answer, winking at her. We burst out laughing as we leave the bill money on the table and go to the exit. I didn't think I could laugh with this woman again. Now, however, everything seems possible, without this weight on my heart.
