Chapter 14
The next day Arizona woke early having slept for over 8 hours, the longest she had slept in 8 weeks. Exhaustion had set in early she'd ended up going to bed at 8pm. Her phone on silent, if anyone wanted her, they'd page. She managed a slice of toast before heading to work intent on starting early in order to finish early to collect Sofia. If they only had a limited time together, she intended to spend every single possible second with her daughter.
Arriving early as normal the attendings lounge was empty allowing her to stow her stuff and start rounding alone, writing orders for her patients so when her residents arrived, they knew what to do. She was first in the OR, her cases lined up. She finished it going smoothly, finishing early, as if knowing she was in a rush the baby she was operating on was in the perfect position so she could cut the bands, she walked to the changing rooms, Amelia was there getting ready.
"How are you?" she asked, Arizona sighed as she tried to work out how she felt.
"Numb, exhausted," Arizona listed,
"What happened?" Amelia asked confused, although she knew Arizona lost the custody battle it was only later, she had heard from Callie and Meredith that they had returned from lunch to find Arizona missing. Her lawyer had then stood up and dropped the custody case which meant the judge had no choice but to award full custody to Callie. The rest of the court room appeared just as confused and surprised, except Bailey. Returning to Meredith's they just missed Arizona, Callie had tried to call her several times getting no response. They'd then left going to explain to Sofia what winning the court case meant. Amelia had also tried calling Arizona several times, leaving voice messages and texts but go reply, so it was a relief arriving to see Arizona's name on the surgical board.
"Torres knows everything,"
"Everything?" Amelia confirmed, Arizona nodded, wiping her face tiredly. Despite her good night sleep she felt emotionally exhausted.
"I heard her lawyer, mentally ill, disabled, slut, who didn't even want Sofia and even tried to kill herself instead of having her leg amputated. They contacted Graham; he was going to testify it was consensual"
Amelia hugged her friend tightly. She understood the pain of losing a child, and although the circumstance were different the scars were similar. Arizona relaxed slightly allowing the tears to fall again. Amelia could feel her shoulder getting wet
"We are calling her Torres now?" Amelia asked
"Callie, my Calliope, she wouldn't do those things, but i think she is gone" Arizona reflected sadly. She still loved Callie, she had never wanted the divorce Callie had, but it was clear she was on her own. Sensing Arizona's mood dropping Amelia tried to lighten it.
"I did hear one thing, who is the hot brunette you left with last night? I heard you spent a while in your office with her?" Amelia questioned trying to lighten the mood, Arizona laughed slightly.
"Natasha, is that what they're saying?" Arizona closed her eyes imagining the gossip mill. Robbins walks away from her daughter only to return to the hospital and shack up with some hot brunette.
"Don't worry about it, I got your back, so has Richard and Bailey" Amelia reassured. Arizona smiled it was reassuring she still had friends. "What are you doing tonight? we could go for drinks at Joe or trivia" Amelia asked, not wanting her friend to be on her own, not when she sensed she was really low in mood.
"I'd love too but I have Sofia tonight"
"Tomorrow?" Amelia pushed, she knew from experience the evenings were the worst, Arizona shrugged.
"We could do lunch" Arizona offered; she wasn't going to have a lunch break but felt she owed her friend something she didn't have too many to friends so couldn't risk isolating one.
"Sure, page me when you go" Amelia replied, as her patient was wheeled past, "See you" she left. Arizona made it 4 steps up the corridor when she was stopped by Alex.
"Robbins" he called jogging to catch up. Arizona sighed; she was going to get no work done today. "I heard about the custody case,"
"You and half the hospital" she snarked, before catching herself. "Sorry," she said. Alex was a friend even if she was still annoyed he hadn't testified on her behalf. He came up to her, truthfully, he was really worried about his boss although he had kept his distance in the custody case not wanting to pick between his friends, he could see the toll it had taken. She'd lost a significant amount of weight, weight she could ill afford to lose, she appeared pale, huge bags evident under her eyes like she hadn't slept and was jumpy.
"Why don't you come to ours tonight, we'll cook something" he offered.
"Thanks, I have Sofia tonight"
"Are you okay? I mean you look crap," Alex asked bluntly.
"I just lost the right to see my daughter I have to rely on Torres's good will to get visitation, she is moving 6,000 miles away, I have PTSD, flying sets off my anxiety attacks but if I don't overcome it my 6 year old has to fly alone" Arizona ranted, "And people keep interrupting my day making it longer than it needs to be on a day when I need to finish early as today might be the last day I ever pick up my daughter from school."
"I'm sorry" Alex apologised, "Its crap"
"Yeah" Arizona agreed, "It is"
"And that's everything?" he asked suspiciously, "Because something else is going on, and I don't need to know what, but I'm in your corner, and I am here" he offered, Arizona fought the urge to roll her eyes. Alex hadn't been in her corner yesterday, hadn't been standing up in court going to bat for her. Yesterday he had been Mr Neutral and that wasn't easy to forgive.
"Sure, you are Alex" Arizona stood up, feeling exhausted and it was only 9am. She returned to her ward, ready to check on her patients to make sure her morning orders had been followed.
April was stood at the desk, her stomach becoming more rounded, she was getting close to giving birth now.
"Hey Arizona" she greeted, "I'm so sorry for how it worked out" Arizona nodded tightly, opening her office door,
"Come in" she invited resigning herself to not doing much work today. April had been a good friend in the past, only Arizona's selfish actions had ended the closeness and although recently they'd been on better footing, Arizona had been the primary OB on her case until 2 weeks ago where a health scare for April had forced her to choose, April as a patient or a friend. April had chosen to be a friend and so here she was.
"Are you okay?" she asked sitting on the visitor's chair as Arizona sat in her normal chair. Arizona sighed, she needed her best friend back, she needed a confident, that wasn't Bailey, her boss, Richard, her local father figure, or Amelia, who was too close to Callie's best friend Meredith and Callie new best friend Owen. Although she had always been trustworthy, Arizona wanted her best friend back, and that was April or Teddy. As Teddy was in Gemany thousands of miles away that left April.
"No" Arizona said honestly, "But I only have 2 weeks left with Sofia until she goes to New York so I can't fall apart again until she has gone" She admitted, "I can't give Torres any reason to not let me see her"
"Torres, we are calling her Torres now?" April picked up, Arizona nodded tears in her eyes as she wondered how much could one person cry before the tears ran out? She had to be hitting the maximum soon.
"After what she pulled in court, I can't call her Callie, she isn't my Calliope anymore" Arizona explained,
"What happened? I heard you dropped your case?" April asked,
"It's a long story, for another time, I promise just….."
"When Sofia is gone, she is your focus I understand" April said standing up, "Just make sure you eat, you've lost too much weight" she added worriedly, Arizona shrugged,
"I don't eat when I'm stressed" she explained, and the last few weeks had been very stressful. April nodded,
"Jackson keeps hiding snacks everywhere I go" she complained,
"Callie used to do that" Arizona reminisced sadly, thinking of the love she had once shared with her ex-wife; her pager went off not a 9-11 but still urgent enough to go straight there. She excused herself finding one of her women scheduled for surgery, babies had become bradycardic, which meant they needed to go in and repair the babies heart now. She paged Maggie Pierce to meet her in the OR.
She scrubbed in before Maggie arrived beginning the procedure, the women was 26 weeks and the babies heart beat had dropped to 100BPM, if it went below 60 they'd have to deliver.
She had opened the womb when Maggie arrived and was waiting for the cardiac surgeon to arrive before bringing her out.
"Sorry was doing a valve" she explained, "Guess baby couldn't wait for surgery"
Together they began the tricky job of repairing the heart defect doing the amazing job of repairing a baby's heart before it was even born before putting her back in the womb and sealing her back in.
Afterwards they were scrubbing out,
"How are you doing?" Maggie asked, Arizona shrugged,
"Tired, thanks for looking after her"
"You're welcome, I love spending time with kids and Sofia is great so intelligent and fun" Maggie gushed, Arizona smiled, a proud Mamma,
"Uh huh, she is top of her class in maths" She bragged.
"Wow, I loved maths at school, a real geek, I think what I am trying to say is she is a smart kid, she will be fine wherever she goes, and she knows you love her, she told me three times" Maggie said, Arizona gave a genuine smile, she knew Sofia loved her but hearing it from a 3rd person was lovely.
"Thank you, Maggie," Arizona nodded before leaving the scrub room, she now had to go and check on her patient she was meant to do second but should be able to finish her 3rd surgery before meeting Amelia for lunch.
Amelia met her in the canteen, Arizona's first time going there since returning to work unwilling to be the subject of gossip and speculation, they were barely sat for a minute when April and Jackson joined them, then Jo and Karev. They were chatting about anything other than the court case when Owen, Meredith, Penny, and Torres walked in.
Arizona felt a jolt of pain stab right through her heart, Torres looked happy, so did Penny and they were holding hands. On seeing her Callie dropped Penny's hand and started walking towards her. Feeling nauseous and not ready to talk to her ex-wife face to face Arizona stood stumbling slightly, Amelia was there holding her arm.
"Are you okay?" she asked,
"I have to go I have a..." Arizona trailed off, her brain unable to think of an excuse, instead she fled the canteen. Amelia closely behind.
"This is crap" Alex muttered hitting the table with his fist, he was frustrated watching his mentor fall apart and not being able to do anything to help.
"It's more than just the custody case though" April speculated, "Something is really wrong"
The table fell silent as each tried to work out when they had first noticed something was wrong, struggling to come up with one answer. Even as Callie arrived asking why Arizona had ran from her.
Arizona made it to the nearest bathroom going into the stall and vomiting. Amelia was right behind holding her hair.
"I'm sorry" Arizona apologised feeling exhausted and pathetic. Just seeing Callie, no Torres had brought all those feelings of hurt and betrayal to the surface. She couldn't think of her as Callie anymore, Callie would have never done what Torres had done.
"It's okay, I'm worried that you're still getting so sick after your concussion though, I'd like to do some bloods and a CT and make sure we aren't missing anything" Amelia offered. Arizona nodded in truth she was worried, she had felt nauseous and had missed meals before, but this was extreme, it had been over 9 weeks and she was showing no signs of being able to eat a full meal. All of her clothes were now loose, and she'd had to have her prosthetic adjusted twice to cope with her shrinking frame.
"Great, let's go while everyone is at lunch" Amelia offered, she helped Arizona to her feet, they went to CT first, Amelia swearing the tech to secrecy glad to see it was Hugo. He wasn't one to gossip.
"CT is clean" Amelia told her friend feeling relieved, "Let's get those bloods" she ordered, meeting Arizona outside the scanner. They took the bloods in Arizona's office, Amelia adding on pregnancy hormones, and cancer screening, just in case.
"I'll page you when the results come in" Amelia promised, Arizona nodded putting on her lab coat to hide the small puncture mark.
Amelia dropped the bloods off to the lab sending a silent prayer that everything was clean, her friend couldn't go through too much more.
Okay so Arizona is actively avoiding Callie who wants to talk, will they ever get to spend time together?
Will she end up pregnant