It was two days after her birthday dinner that Callie walked into Jules' new room on the med/surg floor to find it decorated with streamers and balloons. Sam, Spike, Wordy, Shelly, the girls, Ed, Leah and Greg were waiting for her wearing little hats with glittery Pom Poms on top. The blew into their noisemakers and said, "happy birthday!"
Callie smiled widely. "Wow." She hugged everyone.
"We made you a card!" Holly held it up for Callie. It was covered in glitter and on the front in block letters carefully cut from yellow construction paper (Callie's favorite color) it said 'Happy Birthday Callie!" On the inside there was separate, big drawing of the four of them playing outside with a big heart as the sun. On the inside of the card it said, 'we love you!' And was signed by each of them.
"Aww thank you. I love it!" She hugged the three girls tight.
"You guys didn't have to do this." Callie looked at them with love.
"The girls heard they missed your birthday and wanted to do something special." Wordy explained, pointing to the decorations and hats the girls had insisted they wear.
"Daddy helped me put up da stweemers." Lily told her proudly.
"They look awesome. Good job." Callie winked at her.
"Next year we'll have a big party!" Holly put out her hands to show how big.
Callie smiled at her. "Sure."
Suddenly the lights went off and Callie looked towards the door to see Spike at the switch. Then from behind her there was a glow. She turned and saw that Sam was lighting candles on a beautiful yellow frosted cake Jules was holding.
"Happy birthday to you," Jules started them off and everyone joined in.
She closed her eyes, made a wish and blew out the candles.
"Yay!" The little girls cheered and Shelly had to remind them that they were in a hospital with sick people trying to rest.
While they ate the cake, the girls told Callie how they had helped Mommy pick out the cake and frosting. And, that they had baked it with only a little help from Mommy. Callie told them she was very proud of them. Once they had finished and were talking about general stuff, Jules cleared her throat.
When everyone quieted down, she looked at Callie. "We wanted to get you...something and in light of...your recent disappearing act...we got you this." She took the small yellow wrapped package Sam handed her and gave it to Callie.
Callie looked around the room then at the package and opened it. Inside was a brand new Apple iPhone. It started to ring. Callie looked at the number, it said 'Jules Cell'. She looked at Jules who had her cell to her ear and laughed.
Jules looked at Sam and crossed her arm across her stomach and put her arm with the phone on it. "She must be busy."
Callie laughed again and picked up the call. "Hi Jules."
"Now we won't ever be out of touch." Jules said.
"This is.." Callie smiled then hung up the phone.
Jules looked at the phone incredulously. "She hung up on me!" Then it rang. "Hello?"
"Hey it's Callie. Sorry for hanging up on you. I love my present."
Jules looked at Callie and smiled. "I'm glad. Bye."
"Thank you all so much. This is awesome." She turned the phone over and saw they had it in a yellow rhinestone case.
"Your mom loved the idea. Now you can call her whenever, wherever." Spike said.
"You have unlimited talk and text for the next year. We figured someone your age would need that." Ed added.
Callie smiled at him.
"You have one more!" Allie grabbed the present and handed it to Callie.
"More?" Callie smiled at her.
"Yeah." Allie smiled excitedly. She knew Callie would love it.
Callie opened the box and inside was a framed picture of her with everyone at the museum and the floral dress Allie had let her borrow. She looked at Allie. "Your dress?"
"Now your dress." Allie smiled.
"Thank you. That's so nice of you!" She picked up the picture and looked at each person's face. Happiness, love, family.
"So, how was school?" Sam leaned back against the wall.
"Uggh." Callie rolled her eyes. When Sam chuckled she continued, "I swear my chem teacher Mr. Gordon has lost his mind! Now he wants us to memorize the atomic weight and what type of elements are on the periodic table. What do I need to know that for?"
Spike shrugged. "Depends on what you want to do in life. Anything in the sciences will need it."
"What if you want to be a physicist or rocket scientist?" Ed added. At her funny look he said, "ok, maybe not."
"What about your paints?" Leah said. "They have different chemicals in them. How do you know which ones you have to use paint thinner with and ones that just need water to clean up?"
"Oh that's easy, acrylics and watercolor brushes a can be cleaned up using water and oils up you have to use turpentine." Callie waved a hand.
"Right, but do you know why? What chemicals are in there that make them water soluble?" Leah asked, her eyes twinkling.
"Huh. No I guess I didn't think of it that way." Callie looked at Leah with admiration. Callie moved to Jules' side. "So now that you're here, you're moving towards getting to go home right?"
"Oh yeah. I'm busting…out soon." Jules smiled.
"Good." Callie smiled.
Jules had been right. It was another four days later that she was finally discharged from the hospital. They had gotten her up and walking around on the crutches and she was cruising around the halls whenever she could. She and Callie had probably clocked a mile or two every day. It was a good time for them to catch up on what had happened that day.
Callie did end up making a few friends at school. One of them was Mitzy's former lemming Hannah Young, niece of Lewis Young, the team's fallen brother. Hannah was in Callie's art class and had been very impressed with Callie's, now famous, painting.
Her other friend was the head cheerleader, Zeliah (zee-lee-ah) Tumbway. Callie had been surprised that such a popular person talked to her, but they hung out together, and with Hannah, and became fast friends. The three were inseparable. Callie was especially happy about that.
It'd been weird for Callie to introduce Zeliah and Hannah to the team. They were her adult friends while the other two were her 'tween' friends. She still spent a lot of time with the Wordsworth girls. The four of them love to hang out and she essentially became an adopted sister. Wordy and Shelly became more like second parents to her. In the same sense Sam and Jules were more like parents to her too.
It was a hard road for Jules to get back to the team. After she got out of the hospital she had to wait at least a month before she could get her cast off and another three weeks of pt before she could get back into running. When she finally did start running again, Callie Zeliah and Hannah ran with her before school.
Finally, two and a half months after the accident, Jules was ready to requalify for the SRU.
Having everyone there made her a little nervous, but Sam ran the course with her and Callie, Zeliah and Hannah ran next to it. "Jules is so cool! Zeliah had said excitedly as she watched. "I know." Callie smiled proudly.
After Jules passed it all easily, they had gathered at Jules' house to celebrate and they finally got to the UNO game Spike had been looking forward to for months.
When Callie sat down next to him grinning from ear to her he looked at her in horror. "Oh no you don't UNO monster." He got up and had Hannah switch seats with him. When she asked why he simply said, "you'll see."
Callie couldn't help but laugh. It was a big game, they had to have two decks for the eight people that played. Allie had begged Wordy to let her play so he did. Ed and Greg opted to man the grill while Shelly, Sophie, Dean and Clark kept the little girls entertained. Leah was hanging out with Sophie and Shelly in the backyard.
Zeliah, Hannah and Callie had been quite smitten with Clark and Dean when they all met. They had huddled in the corner talking behind covered mouths. Sophie had walked by them and then Ed and Greg and said, "lock up your sons," as she looked back at the giggling girls. Greg and Ed had shared a look and a laugh.
"What? Again!?" Hannah cried as Callie laid down yet another draw two. "What do you hoard those things or something?"
Spike laughed and pointed at her. "Now you know why." His smile faded when Zeliah played a wild draw four. "How about yellow?"
Spike narrowed his eyes at her then looked at Sam, Jules and Wordy who were laughing hysterically. "It's a conspiracy!"
Callie couldn't help but laugh. She looked around at the chaos of everyone being in the house together and thought, "there's nowhere else I'd rather be.
It wasn't until a couple of months later, when bombs started going off all over the city that she had to worry about being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
AN: I hope you liked it! And stay tuned! As hinted here, there may be another Callie story before too long!