A very big thank you goes to Netread for volunteering to help beta my chapters. This one she just managed to read through because I sent it to her very late at night. Be prepared for better and less error-filled chapters to follow after this.
And thank you to everyone who read and left a review, it really does help to encourage.
I hope you enjoy this and I also hope to hear from you. It is my plan to post the next chapter in a few days.
xx
"Calliope." Arizona swiftly cut Tara off as she reached Callie first. She took Callie's elbow and maneuvered them away from the approaching woman to a more secluded area of the deck.
"I see nothing has changed in three decades," Callie teased as they settled against the ship's railing.
"I have no idea what you are talking about." Arizona tried to deny the obvious reaction she had when she saw what she felt was Callie in danger but they both knew better.
"As gallant as that was, I don't need you to save me anymore." Callie caught Arizona's disappointing reaction to her words and felt immediately guilty. There was no intent to make Arizona feel badly for her bravery and compassionate nature. "Tara's kinda sorta a friend." She peered over Arizona's shoulder and sent Tara a nod silently saying they'd catch up later.
Arizona gave Callie an unbelieving look.
"No really. I introduced her to her wife about 20 years ago. One day, out of the blue, she contacted me to apologize for being such a bitch to me in high school. She admitted she was gay and jealous that I was out and she couldn't face it."
"Tara's gay?" Arizona asked in disbelief. "Then why did she bully just you and not me?"
Callie shrugged. "Because I was an easy target, I never stood up for myself but you stood up …"
"For you. For us both." It made sense now that Arizona looked back.
"It didn't help that she had a little crush on me, too. But I was with you so she lashed out not knowing how to handle her feelings."
The conversation was making Arizona feel weird so she nodded and went for a change of subject. "So, for somebody deathly and paralyzingly afraid of boats, you've been standing awfully close to the edge."
Callie laughed. "Yeah, I'm over that. I spent a bit of time in Seattle and some days you had no choice but to board the ferry or sit in hours of traffic," she explained. "You look … you look great, Arizona," she said giving Arizona the once over. Now that they were settled, she finally had a good look and she couldn't deny she liked what she saw.
Feeling suddenly, self-conscious, Arizona started to pull at the hem of her dress. Her daughter's dress to be exact. Yes, she let Molly help pick out her wardrobe for the weekend. After running ten miles, every single day for the past month, Arizona wanted to show off her progress. Or at least that's what she kept telling herself as she zipped up her 17-year-old daughter's tight, low cut, red dress. It had nothing to do with Callie. She was over Callie.
She was.
"So, where's your husband?" Arizona had no idea why she asked such a question.
Callie's forehead wrinkled before looking around to see just who Arizona was speaking to. Nobody else was there. "What?" Callie raised an amused eyebrow.
"The guy from the restaurant? The Abercrombie underwear model?" Shut up, Arizona!
Callie let out a long and vibrant laugh. "Mark? Mark Sloan?"
The named rang a bell but Arizona couldn't place him. Maybe he really was an underwear model. "If that's his name."
"Mark Sloan, Arizona. He was a senior when we were sophomores. Played football. Dated Addison Montgomery."
Oh shit, Callie married the captain of the football team. Fuck!
"How long have you two been together?" She stuttered her question in curious disappointment. She now remembered they shared a weird friendship in high school but nothing super close or anything she could say resembled romantic. She hoped for their sake that they hadn't had anything romantic in high school.
Callie laughed again but this time so hard she had to hold her stomach as it cramped. "Arizona, I'm not married to nor dating Mark Sloan. Ever. He's my agent and through the years, my best friend," she explained. "Do not ever tell him he's hot enough to be an underwear model, his ego is big enough. Trust me on that one." She continued to laugh.
Arizona let out a sigh of relief. "Oh. I just thought, when I saw you two together at a romantic restaurant and your wedding ring, that you two were together."
She pouted as Callie let out another healthy laugh. "Stop laughing."
"No, no, it's just, it's cute. You were jealous of Mark Sloan. It's cute." Callie teased.
"So if Mark isn't your husband, is your …" What the hell was she supposed to call them without insulting Callie's bisexuality? "Your … spouse close by?"
Callie's smile fell as she unconsciously started twirling the wedding rings on her finger in nervous habit. "No, uh …" she swallowed hard as she formed the horrible words she hated having to share, "she, uh, I lost her in an accident few years back." She looked down at her hands. "I haven't taken them off, it's just a habit." As she looked back up at Arizona, there was a sheen of tears in the blue eyes staring back at her.
"I understand, a couple of years ago, I lost my wife to cancer."
"Wow, who knew we'd both be widows before fifty." Callie joked humourlessly as her heart broke for Arizona. Callie knew better than anyone how painful it was to lose a spouse but the difference between them was, Callie didn't have to watch her wife slowly dying. That being thought, she didn't know which was better, getting to say goodbye but enduring the suffering or having the rug pulled out from beneath you but having nothing but greatness up until that point. Both pretty much sucked beyond recognition.
"Oh em gee, if it isn't Callie and Arizona back together again! Yay!" The very annoying, high-spirited voice of the cheerleading captain bellowed down to them from the deck above. Groaning in unison, they both turned around with mirroring fake goofy smiles on their face as they sent overly enthusiastic waves toward the woman above.
"You'd think after thirty years she would be over us being her token lesbians and have found another pair of gays to latch onto." Arizona mumbled under her breath for only Callie to hear. "Do you think she still uses us at parties, 'Oh, I know a lesbian, two of them. I'm so hip and in the know.'"
Callie chuckled as they turned back around. "I slept with her." She said it so nonchalantly, Arizona choked on the sip of wine she'd just taken.
"I ran into her after we … about a year after you left for southwest Asia and it's not like I planned it. We were out drinking and she was whining about her marriage and the next day I woke up with her in my bed. She pleaded with me to keep her secret." Callie grinned.
"Good job at that, Calliope." Arizona teased even if an aggressive amount of jealousy was obvious in her tone.
"Hey," Callie ignored the sarcastic tone, "she never told me how long I had to keep her secret." She was smart enough to know Arizona wasn't congratulating her on her inability to keep a secret but instead it was purely jealous sarcasm.
"Is there anyone from high school shy and geeky Callie Torres didn't sleep with?" She didn't mean to sound so harsh but she could tell without Callie saying as much, that she'd also slept with Mark Sloan.
"I slept with you." Callie cracked a grin but when Arizona only rolled her eyes, her voice dropped low and monotone. "Jeez Arizona. It's not like you were a nun after me. I'm sure you didn't lock yourself away in a convent pining over our lost love."
"You're right. You're right. I'm sorry." Arizona apologized.
Deciding it was best to get off the topic of Callie's sexual history, Arizona changed the subject to a neutral territory. Something she could also talk about with pride and love. "So, you said you had kids, how many?"
Callie paused, biting her lip in contemplation. "I do. How about you, did you and your wife have any?" If news of Callie's sex partners of past didn't send Arizona running, she was certain ten kids would.
Arizona nodded. Callie was not going to believe the woman who really didn't want children, ended up with eight of her own. "My wife was from a big family and always wanted kids so, yup."
Callie eyed her suspiciously. She knew very well the stalling tactics of disclosing personal information. The look on Arizona's face was first-class avoidance. Callie laughed.
"How many kids, Arizona?" She tried to sound less interested than she really was.
"You first." Arizona smiled awkwardly.
Callie sighed. "Same time," she dared.
At the exact moment, they both answered.
"Ten."
"Eight."
Both women burst into a fit of laughter at hearing the other's number of children.
"You're kidding, right? Messing with me?" Arizona asked figuring Callie easily found out she had eight kids by going to her biography on the Academy's website and this was some joke.
"Trust me, I don't have enough closets to hide them in, ten kids is not a joking matter." Callie chuckled awkwardly.
"Ten kids?" Arizona asked still in shock.
Callie nodded with a proud look on her face. "Well, we had four and adopted six. Well, fostered six but we kept adopting them. You having eight is a pretty big deal, I'm pretty sure we couldn't agree on even one back in the day."
Arizona shrugged awkwardly. She knew while the subject of children wasn't a main reason they ended up apart, it helped play a role in their lack of fighting for each other, for rolling over and accepting what fate had handed them. "Angela came from a big family and I was in a different place in life. My career was stable and I was climbing the ladder, easily. I was so in love with her, I'd have given her my left leg if it made her happy. After Benny was born, I was hooked anyway. I wanted twenty more of him. Now, some days, I could do with one less of him and his attitude." Arizona admitted.
Callie laughed. "I have those days with Lane, she thinks she knows everything at seventeen and I can never do anything right." Her face fell as she continued. "It's hard not having that united front any more, being their everything, and when they hate you, they have nobody. I feel helpless more often than not."
They stood there staring at each other, an intimate understanding between the two. For the first time in too long, Callie's heart wasn't so weighed down with grief and Arizona, she didn't feel so alone. When Callie reached over to squeeze Arizona's hand, she didn't expect her to hook their fingers together in what could be described as timid romantic gesture. And she didn't expect it to bring back all the feelings from years before. It felt natural … scary, but welcome.
To be continued . . .
