"Arizona! Arizona! Wake up! I need to tell you tell me what happened!" Callie said as she aggressively rubbed my sternum, trying to awaken me.
Where am I? I sat up quickly, the room spun around me. I was at Seattle Grace ER. Why? What happened? Why were there so many nurse huddled around me. Why were their eyes shifting, avoiding my gaze, looking to Callie for answer, who herself looked overtly concerned. Why was there the familiar buzz of panic in the air? How did I end up here?
Oh my god. The accident.
Tim and I, we had been driving to the hospital. He had convinced me to come here to tell Callie that I chose her and I wanted to be with her. That I loved her. He said he was coming with, that he was going to watch me from afar while I professed my love to Callie. Like a complete dork, he actually pulled out binoculars he was planning on using. He said he wanted to see me happy, truly happy, before his deployment. He was driving, perfectly, innocently to the hospital to help me find Callie...
When another driver came out of nowhere, at a busy intersection on the highway less than a mile from Seattle Grace. Had it been an old woman who mistook the gas pedal from the brake? Or a teenager texting and driving? I don't know. I do know the other car smashed into the driver's side of my old, questionably safe car. Had the airbags even gone off? Did I lose consciousness after that?
No. I remember screaming. I screamed and screamed and screamed. Not because my right elbow hurt like hell, (which it did, I had felt my once strong, healthy bone crumble into a million pieces beneath my flesh) but because Tim was slouched over the steering wheel, blood gurgling out of his mouth. He was gasping for air, his chest concave and all the while he was staring at me, trying to form words. I couldn't do anything but scream. I couldn't move, I couldn't see, I couldn't think, I just screamed, watching my only brother bleed out inside of my shitty car.
One of the paramedics covered my mouth and dragged me out of the car. Apparently I was distracting the other paramedics who were trying to get my lifeless brother out of the car. So, I started to shake. Instead of screaming, I shook. Muscular men in paramedic uniforms were yelling around me. "Driver looks rough, get him out now!" "He's bradycardic and hypotensive. He's lost a lot of blood internally. Call Grace and tell them to have O neg blood on hand STAT" "Passenger is shaken up. Elbow looks shattered but no life threatening injuries appreciated. Give her 0.5 Ativan and 75mcg fentanyl en route"
I remember them shoving a needle into my quadricep when I couldn't stop shaking long enough for them to get an IV placed. The medicine they gave me made me groggy and slightly dulled the throbbing pain in my arm, but even that couldn't erase my memory of Tim, the blood trickling out of his mouth, his eyes wide with fear of death.
I must have lost consciousness at some point before we arrived at Seattle Grace. The meds must have hit me.
Because now, Callie was standing over me. She had awakened me. I was awake. More than awake, panicked.
"Where is he Callie?" I screamed, ripping my out my IV and tearing the monitors off my chest.
DR TORRES, TRAUMA ROOM 1, DR TORRES, TRAUMA 1 the overhead speaker blared to the rest of the ER. Knowing that it was Tim, I darted to the left, knowing exactly where trauma room 1 was. Before I could take more than two steps, Callie grabbed my right arm, my hurt arm. I yelped in pain and slapped her across the face.
"WHERE IS MY BROTHER" I screamed at her. She was holding her cheek, hurt initially, before her eyes softened again.
"Arizona, you need to get in bed, now" Callie yelled at me, pointing in the direction of my bed.
"No! No! I need to find him!" I said, trying to get past her.
DR TORRES, TRAUMA 1, DR TORRES, TRAUMA 1, the overhead speaker repeated.
"Please, Arizona, I need to go help your brother and I cannot do that unless you get in that bed. I cannot think unless I know you are safe!" Callie said calmly but firmly. The nurses, who were initially giving us a small amount of space, were closing in around me.
"No Callie, I need you, please! Please don't leave me. I am so scared. He can't die, please. Don't let him die! He isn't even supposed to be here! I made him come here. I shouldn't have done that. I did this. Oh my god, I did this" I sputtered frantically. Anxiety pulsed through my veins.
DR TORRES, TRAUMA 1, DR TORRES, TRAUMA 1. the overhead speaker blared once again. Callie sighed quickly, pushing her bangs out of her face.
"Your elbow is shattered. I will be back for you, I promise. No one is going to fix that elbow but me. Tim needs me now" I stood there, pleading with her, shaking. Again, I was frozen, beside myself. He was going to die. He was going to die and it was my fault.
Dr. Hunt rounded the corner, his eyes wild, blood dripping from his gloves.
"DR. TORRES get your ass to Trauma Room 1. His cervical spine is unstable. We lost his airway. He has gone into asystole twice now. You and I need to take him to the OR, NOW!" He screamed at her. She gave him a curt nod and followed him towards the elevators to the OR. I followed behind her, instinctively holding my right elbow in place, feeling the pain shoot up my shoulder with even the softest steps.
"Don't let him die!" I sobbed behind Callie and Owen as they quickened their pace into the elevators to the OR. Tim, in a gurney surrounded by two other doctors and nearly ten nurses, laid there unconscious, a tube down his throat and wires running every which way out of his chest.
"Arizona, we got this. We need to go, now" Owen yelled as he hit the door close button on the elevator.
"Please" I uttered as the door shut in my face. Callie's eyes were down in concentration, but I know she heard me.
No more than a few moments later, I collapsed. Maybe it was the intensity of the elbow pain. Maybe it was what I saw in Callie's eyes, beyond the focus and concentration; fear. Maybe it was the fact that I was watching my brother die right in front of me.
Maybe it was all three of those things.
Or maybe it was the all too familiar feeling of my world, my life, crumbling beneath my feet.