Title: Aftermath

Author: Danielle

Summary: post 7:18, post accident

Disclaimer: only the story is mine the characters belong to Shonda and ABC.

I've discovered that writing is a good outlet for all the crazy ideas about my favorite characters that are running around in my head. There's nothing like having Callie and Arizona on my mind.

Congratulations to Sara Ramirez and her new fiancé Ryan. May their life be filled with joy and happiness.

Now onto the story…

Callie's POV

It's been eight days since Sofia's birth and yesterday was a big day. I started out the day frustrated by not being able to straighten my fingers and being bedridden but my overly perky fiancé reminded me that it'll come back in time. Thankfully my arm has already come back; I can move my shoulder, elbow and wrist so it's only the hand that is giving me trouble. Never have I been so thankful that I am right handed.

Bailey and Cristina came in and joined Arizona and I and they cheered me on as I was able to straighten my fingers, it only lasted a moment but I did it. I hate to admit it but I guess Arizona's 'baby steps Calliope' statement is true.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful; Bailey and Cristina checked my healing incisions multiple times. I continued trying to straighten my fingers out to no avail. The more times I tried and failed the more frustrated I got. Thankfully the only person that saw me getting so frustrated was Cristina and being Cristina, she didn't really say anything about it.

Arizona came by and ate lunch with me and Mark came by multiple times to give me progress reports on Sofia. It must have been a slow day in Plastics because it seemed he came to see me an awful lot of times. But it was good to be able to see my baby somehow.

Dinner came by and once again Arizona showed up and thankfully her shift was over so she stayed the rest of the evening. She left for an hour to go spend time with our daughter but spent the rest of the evening with me. We talked about the wedding, and making some plans about when we are able to bring Sofia home with us. I know it won't be for a while but it was really nice to be able to think about that.

Night came and I don't know how I did it but I convinced Arizona to go home and sleep in our bed. She really didn't want to go but she and I both knew that she hadn't been getting a good night's sleep sleeping on the cot next to my bed.

So ten thirty hit and Arizona was gone and I was feeling tired so I closed my eyes only to be woken up to Cristina telling me to 'wake up', then Meredith, Alex, Lexie, April and Jackson all walked into my room with a heart monitor, an oxygen tank and I had no idea what was going on. Then they unlocked the wheels on my bed and started rolling me out of my room. I had absolutely no idea where they were taking me and I was a little scared as to what they were doing.

We headed do the hall and stopped, Jackson noticed Bailey talking to a nurse in the hall and they moved me back while Jackson went and distracted Bailey. Then we started moving again and after a few more turns we were in the hallway in front of the NICU. They were taking me to see my baby!

I couldn't actually go into the NICU but they wheeled my bed right up to the window and Alex and April went in the NICU and brought an isolette over to the window.

There she was, my baby. My little Sofia all connected to wires and tubes not too different from me actually. She's so tiny, but bigger than what I thought one pound one ounce would be. She had this little pink and white striped hat on her tiny little head and that made her look like an actual baby and not like a little doll. Then it happened, I was talking to Sofia through the window and she opened her eyes and looked right at me. It was like she knew I was her mom, now I know that newborns can't see but a short distance from their face but I swear that she was looking at me through the glass. April was right too, although Sofia's eyes are the dark blue/dark grey color that all newborns eyes are you could tell that they were going to be dark like mine and the shape of them was like mine also. That really was my baby right there in front of me.

I stayed there for a long while and really didn't want to leave to go back to my room but it was late and I was so tired. Extremely happy but tired.

They got me back to my room and connected back to my monitors and I fell right to sleep totally exhausted from the day.

Arizona's POV

It's now been two and a half weeks since the accident and at the two week mark Bailey decided that Callie was stable enough to be transferred from the ICU into a regular room. That meant that she had a TV in her room and more visitors were allowed to come and see her. She was so thankful to have that TV because as she said 'staring at the wall and only having the beeping of the monitors to keep me company was getting old'. Plus I was surprised how many of the other doctors and nurses in the hospital were coming to see her. Callie herself didn't realize how much she was loved by the staff.

Callie's has had daily physical therapy has been able to sit on her own for a week so able to go to PT in a wheelchair and been able to stand for a short while, it was with a walker but she took a couple of steps yesterday. I think that was the biggest smile that I have seen on Callie's face since I told her that we had a daughter.

Then Bailey walked in the room and asked 'how would you like to take a ride?' Callie was all for anything that would get her out of the room so with a little assistance Callie was able to stand up and swivel into the wheelchair next to her bed.

I didn't know where we were going but had an idea where because of how secretive Bailey was being. So off we went and then there we were, on the other side of the floor at the doors of the NICU. Callie had tears in her eyes as she knew that she was about to meet our daughter for the first time.

I got the pink gowns for Callie and I while Bailey stood there motioning me to take over control of the wheelchair. Then there we were, Callie sitting and me standing in front of the isolette that held our little miracle baby, our little Sofia.

I looked down to Callie and she had tears running down her face, she whispered 'it's so good to see you up closer baby.' I wondered what that meant because she has never seen her except for the pictures that Mark or I have been showing her. The nurse came over introduced herself to Callie as Ann, I already knew Ann from my experiences with patient's in the NICU and she was an excellent nurse, in reality I had been hand picking Sofia's nurses and Ann was always Sofia's nurse when she was working.

"Would you like to touch her?" Ann asked.

Callie just nodded, Ann went to the counter and grabbed a bottle of hand sanitizer and squirted a bit of it on Callie's hands and I squirted some on mine. Callie had some difficulty with the hand sanitizer because she was still not able to move the fingers of her left hand but she did the best that she could. Then Ann opened up one of the hand holes in the side of the isolette.

Callie looked a little hesitant, "its okay Calliope you can touch her." I told her.

"But what if I hurt her?"

"You can't hurt her, just reach in and touch her, it'll be okay."

So she put her right hand through the hole and started stroking Sofia's arm and began to whisper to her, "Hi baby, I'm your Mommy. You're so tiny but Mama says you are strong and we believe Mama don't we? Mama knows about tiny humans even super tiny ones like you." She wiped a tear from her eyes with her other hand and then started crying more.

"Arizona I moved my fingers, I moved my fingers!" And she had and was continuing to do so. Not only was she holding the hand of our baby but she had seemingly regained the use of her left hand.

After a few minutes of rejoicing over the regained movement of her hand she turned back to Sofia and focused on her. She began to speak on again to our baby, "My Sofia, my little Sofia Robbin I love you and have loved you since before I knew you existed. I'm sorry you couldn't stay inside me longer to get stronger before coming out but you're going to be okay, we're going to be okay. You're so lucky you have me, Mama and Daddy all loving you and praying for you to get stronger. You'll get stronger and bigger and then we'll go home and Mama and I will be there with you and you'll be so loved. We love you Sofia."

I really wanted to be a part of this moment so I walked around to the other side of the isolette and opened the hole and reached in and held Sofia's other hand. It was so soft and so tiny but I swear she tightened her little hand around my finger.

Callie leaned in and continued talking to our baby but I couldn't hear what was being said because I was too focused on the little angel that had turned her head and was now looking with her eyes opened at her Mommy. It was really beautiful, Callie whispering to Sofia and Sofia seemingly listening to what her Mommy had to say.

Two hours later Bailey came in and said that Callie had to go back to her room and Callie started to protest but Bailey shut her down, "You'll be back tomorrow Torres."

"Tomorrow?"

"Yes, tomorrow. You are healthy enough to get into this wheelchair and Arizona, Mark or Yang can bring you over here for a couple hours each day. Then next week we'll work up to you to coming here more than once a day. Baby steps Torres."

Callie took her hand out of the isolette and readied herself for me to push her back to her room.

We got back to Callie's room and she had the biggest smile on her face that I have ever seen.

I turned to her and asked, "What did you mean when you said 'it's so good to see you up closer baby'?"

Callie got this weird look on her face, "You can't tell anyone okay?"

"Ok babe, I won't tell anyone."

She continued, "Well a week after the accident, the night of the day I was really trying to move my fingers Cristina, Meredith, Lexie, Alex and Jackson came and snuck me to the NICU and I was there in my bed outside of the NICU looking at our baby through the glass."

"Callie!" I almost shouted.

"Shh, be quiet."

So I talked in a quieter voice, "Callie you weren't stable enough to be moved at that time, what were they thinking?"

"They were thinking that I needed to see our baby Arizona, I needed to see her. I was fine, they connected me to a portable heart monitor and brought all my IV poles with me and had an oxygen tank on my bed just in case."

I was silent but I knew that that visit was probably the only thing that had kept Callie sane up to now. "Okay, I am just glad that nothing happened to you while you were on your little trip."

We continued talking until the patient care tech came to take Callie to her afternoon session of PT.

It was a good day.