"No."
"Arizona, I said get out."
"No."
Frustrated. "Do you think I invited Simon round so I could sleep with him?"
"It seems a very intimate date with someone you only met twice before."
She scoffed, "not that it's any of your business, but I wasn't going to sleep with him."
"How do you know? He may have, erugh, charmed the pants off you. Even with that stupid hair. I mean you palmed Sofia off to Grey for the night, so clearly you were expecting to cook him breakfast the next morning too, right?"
Palming off? The accusation she was that easy? She became enraged, but Arizona didn't stop.
"You know what Callie, do what you want, screw the guy if you really want to. Maybe that's what you wanted all along huh? A dad for Sofia? Then there's me, hanging by the sidelines, not belonging to anyone, not having anyone belong to me. You were gonna ditch me, get me out of your life and then be one big happy family without me! My family were going to leave me!"
Her voice fluctuated between anger, upset, terror, vulnerability and just a plethora of emotions that Callie couldn't quite catch. And maybe not the best turn of phrase, considering the circumstances, but it then hit Callie. Arizona's fears of not being good enough, being left behind, had come to the forefront, something she always held in the back of her mind.
Callie sighed; she knew this was the kink in Arizona's armour, she knew her father's and she knew her ex-wife's. Deciding they needed to start again, she felt a calm wash over her. "Arizona, sit."
Arizona didn't move, but she decided to speak before Callie could dismiss her, again.
Pleading, "I'm sorry, I- I'm sorry okay? I didn't mean it, I just, I-"
Callie held out her hand, gesturing for the blonde to take hold. She slowly approached, wondering if it was a peace offering or if she was being pulled closer so she was in punching distance.
"You, Arizona" she looked her in the eyes, "are my family, you and Sofia, and we're yours. Whatever happens with me and someone else or you and someone else, us three, we'll always be family. Okay?"
Arizona looked down at their hands, they had somehow become intertwined. She had snapped, again, and laid everything out, all of her emotions were out on show, she hated it. The anger that someone could hurt Callie, the realisation she was still in love with her and the fear of losing her family, it was too much. Tears started to form, what Callie said is all she had ever wanted to hear, and most importantly for it to be true. Her confidence fragile, her heart vulnerable, her voice weak, she managed to breath out "yeah?"
Callie smiled; she knew Arizona's fears manifested as jealousy. The peds surgeon had two types of jealousy. Jealous when she thought Callie was with someone else, and jealous when she thought she was going to be removed from her & Sofia's life. "Of course, you mean more to me than anything, nothing comes before you-"
She stopped. She remembered.
Her instant pause, and what appeared to be realisation come across her face, Arizona sat in closer.
"Callie? Callie? What's happened, are you okay? Callie!"
"I-I- remember Arizona, I remember what happened."
The blonde pulled herself in further, put her other hand on their interlaced and tightened her grip. She waited for her to continue.
"We- we were talking, we were talking about our lives, h- he said he was enjoying his job but was looking to open his own accountancy firm. I told him about my projects, it was fine, but then he spotted the photo of you, me, Mark & Sofia on my fridge, you know the one from when we first brought her home?"
"I know the one" she smiled, "I have it up at home too." Home, she meant the place where she slept.
"He asked who you all were, I told him about Mark, the plane crash and you. He said he was sorry, and that it must have been hard to become a single mother when Sofia was so young."
Was Callie telling people I had died in the plane crash? Again?
"I told him I wasn't, that you were still here, and we co-parent, and work together, that we are a family… that you both mean more to me than anything. Then he snapped."
Arizona didn't want to hear about Callie being attacked, she didn't want to envisage her wife getting beaten up, but Callie needed to get it out.
"H- he said you couldn't be a part of any family if he & I ended up together, that it would just be me and him. He then added Sofia half a second after, but he didn't seem… happy to include her."
It was all coming back, her date didn't seem enamoured in having a child in the picture, and certainly was ruling out the possibility of Arizona staying in her life. That was never going to happen.
Arizona sat there, externally unmoved, internally? Raging.
"I- I thought he was joking", she looked into distance, "this was our second date, but he looked me dead in the eye and he tore down the picture."
Callie looked in disbelief, Arizona clenched her jaw.
She continued, "I- I told him, you may be my ex-wife, but you and Sofia would always be first, just because our marriage ended didn't stop the care and love we have…"
Wait, LOVE? Did she just… Present tense?! No Robbins, head in the game, head in the game.
"…and there was no way was I going to not have anything to do with you. I asked him to leave and that's when it happened."
Arizona was sure she'd end up damaging her jaw but wanted to remain as calm as possible. She needed anything Callie said to be a memory, and not a reaction to her rage. She bit her tongue.
"I know he hit me at least once, threw me to the floor and then kicked me. I- I was in shock, I remember putting my arms to my face, but that left my stomach exposed, I- I, why would he do that? Why didn't he just slam the door and leave if he was so angry at what I said?"
The tears were flowing now, Arizona, forgetting about Callie's ribs, got up and pulled her as closely as she could, sitting on the bed next to her.
"It's okay, it's okay, he's gone now, you're okay, Sofia is great, you're… wonderful."
Arizona withdrew and lowered her head to meet Callie's downward gaze, in an almost whisper, "I don't know why he did it, but thank you for saying what you said-"
"I meant it Arizona, I didn't just say it, I meant it."
The peds surgeon gave a mix of a soft, happy, and reassuring smile. They looked at each other in the eyes, focus locked, like it was just the two of them in existence. It had been the closest they had been since their marriage ended. Emotions were high but between them, there was a calm. Unfortunately (or fortunately if you were her patient), Arizona clocked the time, she would be due to start her pre-op checks very shortly.
Callie noticed the brief pause in the moment, "you have surgery?"
"I can postpone-"
"No you can't Arizona, and you know that" she let out a soft chuckle, "the tiniest of human needs you, you need to go and be a hardcore rock star."
"So I'm hardcore and you're bad ass?"
"You know it."
"So Sofia is gonna be a bad ass hardcore peds-"
"Ortho-"
A third voice, "General surgeon."
They both looked up, Dr Webber was ready for his shift, "it's okay Robbins, I got it from here."
Arizona turned back to Callie, a thousand questions in her mind, but Callie answered the most pressing one.
"I'll still be here, I won't leave, Webber has me for now", she glanced at her former Chief, "right?"
"Absolutely."
Arizona ruefully sighed, she had done this rota so everything was covered, she just hadn't expected her wife to remember everything about the night before and essentially declare them, unashamedly, family. The amount of emotions she'd experienced since her Callie shift started had warn her out, but she was happy at its conclusion.
She felt like the ball was in her court, so she made the decision. Surgeons have to make split second decisions all the time, it's what they train for, it's what they teach, it's what they learn and it's what comes naturally. She stood up, leaned over her wife and gave her a gentle, slightly lingering kiss to her forehead, pulled back and gently cupped her cheek. She was lost in those brown orbs, Callie no doubt lost in blue.
"You better not Torres."
