The First Time Ever chapter eleven
ARIZONA'S POV
I sighed heavily as we approached the door of the fifth apartment that we had looked at that day. To say that I was excited to find the perfect apartment and live with Callie was the understatement of the year, however we had been looking at apartments all day and none of them seemed right for us- it got boring after a while.
"So what do you think?" Our realtor, Jan asked us as we took our time to examine the apartment. It had three bedrooms, a living room with a conjoined kitchen, complete with two bathrooms. So far, I was impressed. It had high ceilings and it was quite open plan, but not so much that there wasn't any privacy anywhere. I loved the hardwood mahogany floors and I liked the fact that the kitchen had an island. I turned to Callie with a smile on my face to see that she looked just as happy as I did.
"This is the best one, so far." I said excitedly as I followed Callie through to the bedroom, which had an en-suite bathroom. I instantly fell in love with the pastel blue walls and the double bed that lay in the middle of the room. I took Callie's hand in mine and squeezed it. "I'm falling in love with this place." I whispered to her and she smiled down at me.
"Me too." She admitted and I breathed a sigh of relief. In every apartment so far, Callie had something to criticise. Ceilings too low, no fireplace, too small, too big, not enough windows… The list was endless. However I could see that she was completely honest with me as we stood in the bedroom of what felt like an apartment that was made for us.
We turned to Jan with equally huge smiles on our faces. "We'll take it."
"But where am I supposed to go when I run out of beer?"
"Um, the store? The bar?"
I smiled at Mark who was sitting across from Callie and I at a table in the cafeteria. Teddy was sitting to his left and we were currently discussing how on earth Mark was going to survive without Callie right across the hall.
"Those are too far away!" He protested. Teddy and simultaneously rolled our eyes at Callie and Marks 'argument'.
"Oh poor you, how will you ever survive?" Callie said with a fake pout. "Walking all the way across the street? Your legs might not be able to take it."
Teddy and I locked eyes from across the table and made a silent agreement to get away from there. "Oh look, I'm being paged." I mumbled, even though the device attached to my hip was completely silent. I stood up quickly and took Teddy by the arm and dragged her away.
"They make me laugh." I sighed as soon as we were out of earshot of them.
"When does your shift finish?" She asked me.
"Seven. You?"
"Same. Meet me at Joe's for drinks? I have some stuff I wanna tell you." She said slowly and I whipped my head up to look at her curiously. "Not bad stuff, promise." She said quickly, obviously sensing my concern. "There's a guy."
I raised my eyebrows in amusement. "There's a guy?"
"There's a guy."
"Tell me about this guy."
"At Joe's. Maybe you'll get to meet this guy."
"Oh so it's a guy."
"It is. See you tonight?"
"I'll meet you in the main lobby at seven."
I laughed as I watched her walk away, only to be met by the amused eyes of Miranda Bailey.
"You said 'guy' too many times in that sentence. It's confusing." She said, flipping her chart closed and beginning to walk away.
"Eavesdropping, Bailey?" I asked with a smile, a hint of accusation lacing my tone.
"No idea what you're talking about."
I felt perfectly content as I stepped into the familiar surroundings of Joe's. Teddy and I were greeted by a few other nurses and doctors whom we worked alongside. I made small talk with them, while Teddy appeared to be on the completely different mission of people watching.
"There he is! There he is!" She exclaimed excitedly, tugging on my arm persistently as she pulled me away from the conversation I was staging with Nurse Tyler and leading me over to a tall, dark haired man with a friendly face. "Henry, Arizona. Arizona, Henry." She introduced us.
"It's nice to meet you." I said politely as we shook hands. Teddy stood awkwardly beside us, tapping her feet. I laughed in amusement at her nervous antics, deciding to break the awkward silence. "Let's get drinks! I don't have to work tomorrow." I suggested, leading them over to the bar. I was the first to call for a white wine and Teddy looked at me with a smirk.
"Starting slow, are we?"
"I remember the last time I did shots with you, Altman. Not happening again."
The night sailed by smoothly. The conversation flowed between Teddy, Henry and I as I won at dart six times in a row, while Teddy continued to act like a hyper teenaged girl. She did however seem to be truly happy, and from what I could tell from Henry, he was a great guy.
"Can I join?" A voice from behind me whispered, and I felt a strong pair of arms wrap around my waist. I would have jumped away out of reflex had it not been for the fact that I recognised the voice, so instead of freaking out I relaxed into Callie's arms.
"I thought you had surgery." I said as I turned round to greet her with a kiss.
"It got postponed. My patient thought it would be a wise idea to eat before surgery, despite my instructions not to." She explained, before turning to Teddy and Henry. Introductions were quickly exchanged and we resumed our game of darts, and I quickly took the lead yet again.
"Haha! Suckers!" I exclaimed, doing a mini victory dance in celebration of yet another win. I danced straight in to Callie's arms, fixing her with an elated smile. By this point I was just passing the point of tipsy, which also meant that in my opinion, the night was over because there was nothing more important in this world right now than going home with Callie. "What do you say we get outta here?" I asked, pulling her close and softly nipping her left ear with my lower teeth.
"I like your thinking." She breathed
"Let's do this!" I exclaimed, lifting an empty box from the pile and dragging it through to my bedroom. Callie quickly followed my suit, both of us excited to get this moving process on the go.
It had been roughly two weeks since we had finally agreed on an apartment, and just two days ago we had finished signing all of the papers and had been given the keys. The prospect of living with Callie officially positively thrilled me. I was so excited to take this next step in our relationship and our lives. It reminded me yet again of all the positivity that Callie had brought to my life. Before her I thought I would never be happy again, and moving in with her now was just another way of the universe proving me wrong.
"You're such a clean freak." Callie mumbled under her breath as she stared in to my perfectly organised closet. My organisation skills were yet another side effect of growing up in a military family- organisation and timing played a key role in my upbringing.
"You can't complain. My organisation skills are the only thing that got us through the past two weeks." I laughed. Packing up apartments was stressful. Finding enough boxes for everything and organising everything into those boxes was what made it so stressful. However, my organisation skills combined with my experience of moving house several times in my life made it just that tiny bit easier.
"Yeah, whatever." She mumbled again, reaching into the closet and beginning to pack clothes into the plastic boxes.
I had to admit, I was slightly anxious about this move. Not so much about actually moving, but how it would affect our relationship. I mean, I loved Callie more than anything in this world, but what if she realised that actually living with me full time was a lot different than spending the night at my apartment every few nights. What if she ended up hating the clean freak side of me? What if she hated the way I organised the spice shelf? What if she couldn't deal with the nightmares like she thought she could?
"What's up?" She asked, setting the box down. Her voice snapped me out of my thoughts, and I looked around to realise that I had completely stopped what I was doing and had begun chewing on my thumb nail again, a habit I had picked up during my long hours of studying during college.
"Hmm?"
She sighed, making her way over to me. "You only do that when something's bothering you. So what's bothering you?"
I sighed in defeat, realising I had been caught. "It's just…" I trailed off. "What of you don't like living with me?" I asked timidly.
She raised her eyebrows. "Why wouldn't I like living with you?"
I lowered my head. "Cause I'm kind of a clean freak… And the spice shelf is in alphabetical order… And I still have nightmares sometimes and they always wake you up…" I trailed off, feeling like a child who was admitting to something bad. The rational side of me knew that these fears were irrational. Callie knew what she was getting herself into. However, that didn't stop that tiny bit of fear making itself known.
She furrowed her eyebrows, pulling me in close and resting her chin on the top of my head. "You know you're being silly, right?"
"Yeah."
"Of course I'm going to love living with you. And I like that you're a clean freak- it keeps everything in line. And when was the last time you had a nightmare?"
"A month ago."
"Exactly." She said softly, tucking a stray strand of hair behind my ear. "I love you. And you've come so far. There's no way that I'm leaving now." She told me, a smile stretching across her face. "And besides, you might not like the fact that I sing all of the time, or that I talk in my sleep or that I always forget to take the clean clothes out of the washer."
I smiled up at her. "I love all of those things. Your singing voice is amazing and you say the funniest things in your sleep. And yeah, forgetting the washing isn't great, but you always remember to put it in in the first place." I reminded her, giving her a soft kiss and hugging her once more. "Of course I'll love living with you. I love you."
"And I love you."
Hey guys, I know this chapter is kind of short and uncoordinated. I had major writer's block. However I've planned out exactly what I want to happen next and I think the block is officially over. Also, school is starting up over here soon so chapters might be further apart. Apologies in advance!
On a brighter note, I got my exam results back and I'm super happy with them! Four As and three Bs.
I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Please review! Happy Existing!