Title: Extraordinary Measures
Author: J.M. Flowers
Rating: M
AN: Yea, I think I get the award for least disciplined writer ever. But! The chapter is here and we're hard at work finishing chapter 12 and my vacation was awesome and I feel delightfully well rested. So, thanks for continuing to read and I hope you enjoy!
Veritas vos liberabit
The truth shall make you free
I stumble backwards, out of the room, colliding with a passing nurse before I turn on my heel and run. My running shoes smack against the linoleum, like they did that night three months ago when I ran to the emergency room. Only this time I'm running from something and my feet are a million times louder and there's screaming in my head because everything is absolutely, horribly wrong. Because Teddy is dead and Dr. Lewis is dying and suddenly Denia was more than just a nurse who answered an ad in the newspaper. Dr. Lewis has daughters. Dr. Lewis has a life here, something real.
I barge into our usual on-call room, startling a couple of residents swapping spit on a bunk. "Get out!" I yell, sending them fleeing and certainly alerting the entire floor to where I am. I don't bother locking the door; I know someone will come after me soon enough. Instead, I pace the floor in long, loping strides - two to each side.
Everything is backwards here. I never thought - I never even imagined - that so much would change just because I'd saved Arizona. It was all meant to be like before, but with her there. The two of us talking about children and buying a house, about starting our lives. We were never meant to be mourning deaths. Losing residents from the program.
And I thought I'd have Dr. Lewis, at least! If something went wrong, he was always supposed to be back in that old building with the machine, waiting there with a second chance, and he'd understand. He was the scientist, and this was our experiment and if it didn't work he could fix it. He was supposed to fix everything if I couldn't.
But I ruined all of it.
I collapse onto a bed, defeated and very aware of how unstable I feel. Maybe Arizona was right to want to leave me - I feel crazy here. I think I am crazy, here. At least without her I had a reason.
She opens the door slowly, tilting her head slightly to the left and allowing the lights from the hallway to illuminate her ponytail. She's taken off her scrub cap, shoved it haphazardly in the pocket of her scrubs. The wispy hairs around her face have curled, a side effect of working in a warm operating room. She brushes them off her forehead as she closes the door.
"What was that?" she asks softly, leaning against the wall as the telltale sound of a lock clicks into place.
Tears sting at the backs of my eyes and I bite at my bottom lip to hold them back. She knows the look, knows the signs that I'm breaking. She steps forward, lowers herself between my legs.
"Callie," she whispers, setting her hands gently on my thighs, "What happened?"
But she isn't Mark. And she isn't really Arizona, not the woman I know. The last three months have changed her. Changed us both. I'm not sure how to tell her, even though I need to. I need the truth out; I need to stop struggling and holding all this in. It's been less than 24 hours and I'm exhausted.
I just want her back.
I want her to have me back.
"I need to tell you something," I begin, tugging at her hand until I can pull her to sit on the bed next to me. I run my thumb down her cheek. My breath hitches when she closes her eyes. The tears begin to fall.
I lean forward and press my lips against her own. Just a soft peck, just something gentle to remind her that I love her. Just in case; this Arizona could leave me.
"You didn't know?" she asks, "That Senna's father was Dr. Lewis, from the news?"
I shake my head as I wipe at my tears. "I know him."
"What are you talking about?"
"I need you to listen to what I have to tell you. Because I can't lose you, Arizona, not again. Not ever." The tears fall faster. I give up trying to wipe them away.
She sucks in a breath and for a second I think she might just stand up and leave. That it might just be over, as simple as that. I choke out a sob that makes her freeze.
"Okay," she whispers. "But that's it, Callie. This is the last time."
I have to make her believe.
"That scar on your shoulder isn't actually from falling off your bike - it's from jumping off a shed when you were six years old, pretending you could fly."
She stills.
"Your brother tried to run away because he thought it was his fault; he'd given you his Superman cape to play with."
"I've never -" she tries to interrupt, but I press on.
"When you were seven you told your Mom you were going be Pocahontas, and then you tried to colour your hair black with a magic marker. You slept in the backyard in a tent for all of one night before you gave up on that idea and decided to be Ariel, but your mom wouldn't let you sleep in the bathtub.
"When you were nine, you kissed a girl on your little league team. Her brother punched your brother in response. You begged your mom to let you quit the team, but she refused. You won the championship tournament that year."
"I've never told you these things," she whispers, shaking her head. "How do you...?"
"Your mom told me, after you died."
She jumps up, crossing the room to stare at the wall. "Callie," she murmurs, her voice cracking.
"I'm from somewhere else," I continue. "The dreams were... I don't know what they were. I can't explain it. But I can tell you that Dr. Lewis is a brilliant scientist who created an amazing machine. A machine like nothing you've ever even imagined, and you believed in it. You filled a box in your closet with articles about it."
She shakes her head, turning back around to face me. "I threw all of that out. They retracted his story, said he'd made it all up. They blamed it on the cancer."
"That's not true." It can't be true. "Dr. Lewis made The Memory Machine. It worked. I know, because I used it. I used it to save you."
She shakes her head harder. "I don't want to hear about the dream -"
"It wasn't a dream, Arizona. You died that night. You were coming home from dinner with Teddy, talking and laughing. She was driving, her Mazda. You were in the passenger seat. The oncoming car was a green pickup - it ran a red light and hit you from the right hand side, where you were sitting. You were mid laugh, telling Teddy a story about our morning, about how late I'd been.
"And the other driver was drunk. He kept his foot on the gas long after he'd hit your car. The glass scratched your face, a piece got stuck in the side of Teddy's head. The seatbelt yanked against your abdomen so hard it ruptured your liver. Your body filled with blood.
"It was Teddy who climbed out of the car and called the ambulance. She held your hand until the paramedics got there... Your left hand, though, because your right arm was so cut up with glass you were scared to move it - you told her you were scared to move it. You were conscious until they cut you out of the car, but you made Teddy take off your necklace before that. You didn't want them to cut the chain. She had it in her pocket."
She slides to the floor, tears now present on her face, too. She clasps a hand over her mouth, trying to stifle the sound of her sobs.
"The first time that night happened, they addressed your brain bleed first. Shepherd repaired the damage, but when they cut open your abdomen you were already bleeding out. They made a mistake that night, and you died on the table. 10:51 pm. It was Teddy who survived."
She swallows roughly, taking a deep breath before she speaks. "What do you mean, the first time?"
"The Memory Machine is real," I whisper.
She stands up quickly, startling me, unlocking the door before I can even think to stop her. She disappears into the hallway. I follow frantically, the door hinges creaking as I throw it open, the knob loudly hitting the wall. I barely get two feet before I see her, frozen in place.
Senna stands in front of her.
I approach carefully, uncontrolled tears still marring my face, knowing Arizona is equally distraught. Knowing I couldn't do it, I didn't do it. I haven't made her believe and she's leaving me. We're over. All of this was for nothing.
Senna catches my eye, swallowing hard enough that I can see the bob of her throat even from five feet away. Arizona follows her gaze, seeing me behind them and flinching. Her face is swollen and red, sobs still echoing through her chest.
"You have to listen, Dr. Robbins," Senna says, voice quivering but full of that stubborn strength I've watched her exhibit all day. The daughter of a scientist. A girl who doesn't know how to give up.
Arizona shakes her head, trying to turn away from both of us.
"I heard," Senna continues, "All of it. The accident, the machine... That you believe what they said about my father on the news. They were wrong, Dr. Robbins. He lied to them."
Arizona takes a step back from Senna, closer to me. "I read every article, Dr. Hamilton. I watched the whole process and read every retraction. I know he lied."
Senna shakes her head, fervent. "He lied to the reporters, about it not being true. The machine exists. I can show it to you."
This time, it's me who takes a step backwards, a wave of relief washing over me with such force that it feels like the floor is pushing up against me and I'm tumbling away. Almost like the push of the needle, the tip away from reality and the dive into the past. The breath before reliving.
But I don't go anywhere. I remain in the hallway, staring at the daughter of the man who changed my life, the back of the head of the woman I risked everything for. The control has been placed in Arizona's hands; it's her decision where we go from here. Whether she leaves her crazy wife or believes her. Whether we follow Senna to the machine, or she walks away. Whether I go back to living without her.
Arizona nods her head.
