Hey everyone! As you may have guessed, I've been pretty busy getting ready for final exams and whatnot, and haven't been writing as frequently as I would like. I just finished some exams, and now my day is free. I thought I'd take a study break and give you all a little something. It's been a while, and a lot of stuff has gone down since last time. I'm not sure how I'm going to get at it yet, but I'll try my best to give you a good chapter!
Friday is my birthday, reviews would be fantastic!
-.-.
"So…"
"So…"
"I hope you've done your homework," he said with a grin.
"Oh," she began, "I rocked my homework…"
"Mark!" she called across the hall.
"Callie? What do you want, it's like, three in the morning!"
"I know, I just got off work. I need your help." She gave him her best pouty face.
"Alright, Torres, what is it?"
"Perkins gave me homework."
"Homework?"
"Yes. He wants a list of five things I want in my future."
"What for? That seems a little nosy to me."
"I don't know," she said, "my subconscious probably needs to prioritize or something. I don't know, psych was never my thing!"
"You know what it could be? Perkins and Teddy probably want to know so Teddy can go tell her bff Arizona what's going on in your head. She's probably trying to figure out if you're going to make her give you those 10 kids!"
"OK, Mark," she sighed, "first of all, I'm going to ignore the fact that you said 'bff' because it freaks me out. Next, Andrew can't tell anybody anything that I say in therapy because he took an OATH. Also, that's devious, and Arizona wouldn't do that. She told me that she agreed to have kids if and when we were ready. I'm not in a hurry, and I know she won't go back on her word. Lastly, could you picture us with ten? Uh, no. Old woman living in a shoe? Not my thing."
"That'd be great," he said smiling, "your hair would turn completely grey by the time you were 40, Robbins would be way less smiley, both of you would want to spend more time with me, and I could probably teach the kiddos some pretty nasty tricks to play on their Good Ol' Moms."
"Exactly why that will never happen. Just help me with the list?"
"Fine, but those kids you do have?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm still going to teach them nasty tricks."
Callie smiled as she pulled the list from the pocket of her scrub top. She had spent an hour listening to Mark spout stupidity about what she should put on the list. His number one was, "Sex everyday" or "Bacon everyday", both of which Callie could have if she really wanted. It was nights like those that made her seriously question what had to be wrong with her in order to have such a strange best friend.
"Ok, so I'm going to ask you to read me off your list, but instead of reading it as written, I want you to rank the list for me. Least important thing first, most important last."
"That kind of changes things," she admitted.
"How so?"
"What if I can't figure out what I want more than something else?"
"That's up to you. I will say, if you often have trouble choosing what's most important versus what's least important in your everyday life, this exercise should be very beneficial. Instead of looking at your list as a whole, look at the contents separately. Ask yourself if what you read is important, and then compare that importance to the next thing. If one is clearly more important, it'll help you rank them. Once you have an absolute top and bottom, the middle doesn't matter as much."
"I knew this had to be harder than it seemed," she tried to joke.
"It's not supposed to be easy Callie, but it will be beneficial."
She spent a few minutes rearranging the list in her head, until she had it rewritten perfectly.
"You ready?" he asked.
"Number five: Win a Harper Avery."
"Why is this number five? It's a pretty big goal," he asked.
"I want the Harper Avery," she said, "but I'm not willing to sacrifice the rest of the list to get it. If it happens, it'll be after the rest."
He smiled, sensing that she understood the lesson, "Four?"
"Number four: Become department head."
"Ok," he laughed, "why is this?"
"Well, department head gets to be in charge of the entire department. I'm an attending, a badass attending, and I know that I could run the department better than any other attending in this building. Probably in this region."
"Wow, sounds a little cocky to me," he teased.
"Maybe," she said, "but true. Plus, I would get paid way more, I would get amazing hours, and it'd give me a lot more time at home when I wasn't knee-deep in paperwork."
"I can't argue with that," he said, "Please continue."
"Number three: Buy a house. I know you're going to ask anyway, so I'm just going to say. I want to buy a house so that I have somewhere to go when I need to go home. I like my apartment, but that's all it will ever be. I want a home. I want to have Christmas dinner in my glorious dining room, and have Superbowl parties in my living room. I really want to be settled."
He nodded his approval, not having anything to add, as she continued.
"Number two: Start a family. It's obvious that I want to be a mom. I'm ready to go whenever, but that's not what I mean. Yes, someday, I want to have kids. I learned through this whole thing though, families aren't always the typical two parents and a few kids. Families are the sister that takes you into her house when you have a crappy apartment, and the people who notice when you're having a sucky day at work, and the best friend who lets you wake him up at three to help you do trivial things. Families are the people we love, and who love us, even when the world gives us every reason not to. Family is the person who would die for you, because they love you so much that being in the world without you is worse than death."
She let a tear escape and fall down her cheek and he smiled internally. He had heard the stories many times. Meredith Grey telling Gary Clarke to shoot her, Owen Hunt getting shot so Christina Yang could operate on Derek Shepherd, but neither of those stories struck him as hard as Callie and Arizona's. Meredith and Owen were willing to die for the people they loved, yes. But something about their sacrifices were expected. It's easy to protect your husband. Standing between a gunman and the woman you love, when you're unsure that she even likes you as a human, that's something else.
"Are you ok to go on?" he asked, as they both regained composure.
"Even though the kids thing isn't as big a deal to me now as I thought it was, I'd still love to have a little girl. I want a perfect little girl, with amazingly blue eyes and an incredible smile. She'd be beautiful enough to mask her naughty streak, and funny enough to make me forget to be mad at her for getting her clothes all dirty or playing too roughly. I'd love to give my heart to a girl like that. I'd love for Arizona to love her just as much. Have you ever heard of such a thing?"
He smiled widely, "Believe it or not, I have," he said, "Do I need to guess number one?"
"Number one: Arizona."
"Why is Arizona your number one?" He asked, though he knew she had been number one before Callie had said.
"Arizona is my number one because without her, 2-5 don't even matter. Without her, nothing matters."
-.-
I just realized that what I thought was double spacing was really 1.5 spacing. No wonder the formatting never matched! Hope you all enjoyed the chapter!