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To say it was a long day would’ve been an understatement.
Not only it wasn’t a day, but rather one and a half or even more, and it wasn’t just long, it was painful and severely tortuous. Disasters followed by complications even before the sun was up. With her mind playing it as a broken record, repeating events time and time again except new memories resurfaced minute after minute.
She didn’t even know how much she remembered.
Sofia’s birthday was always a memory of the accident. Of jealousy and marriage proposals and a truck coming out of nowhere. Arizona would never forget it. The ones related to the haunting phrases of that day, you’re nothing , I’m not getting a heartbeat , and so many others, plagued her nightmares for years. Not leaving her alone, even when apparently I lost you , and couldn’t find a heartbeat joined.
But nothing would ever come close to outshine the fact that it was the day she held her daughter for the first time. It was more than what Arizona thought she could survive. All her fears and all her horror dreams turned into reality and condensed in thirty-six hours. And it was the day she met Sofia, who was way too small but perfect in every single way.
At the time it seemed the reactions were so strong that she could just stop feeling them at any moment. But she didn’t, instead fright and love, being so happy and powerless mixed together into a strange blend of emotions. She had a child and a fiance, and both of them were in intensive care units, fighting for their lives.
And it was her fault.
The Wallace family would now be tied to the same fate. Bittersweet memories, remorse that goes unspoken. To have a scar in the middle of their daughter’s chest, and a mother in the ICU who might faint in the hands of a father that had the consuming knowledge of being a liability to his family.
Even if it wasn’t on him.
Once again it was Arizona’s fault.
She wanted to put the day behind her. Get home with Sofia, spend time with her. Braid her hair, eat a pint of ice cream with some excuse so they could cuddle on the sofa and play a Disney movie they had seen hundreds of times. Hug her close, remember how it was to have her heart beat for the first time. The overwhelming sensation that her chest might explode out of the adoration and joy she was experiencing for the first time.
Kristen’s mother said, in the most hideous way possible, keep an eye on her . The tone she used was enough to make her skin crawl with extreme dislike, sorrow for the poor teenager that was screaming for her mother in the other room, and the baby who was going to be born with the fear of a shadow she never met.
It also made her want to scream how she couldn’t.
It was all she could think about. Sometimes she woke up, trying to remember the schedule and when it was her turn to pick up her daughter from daycare, just to then realize that it wasn’t her routine anymore. Sofia wasn’t in the hospital. She wasn’t the baby playing with her dad across the hall. She wasn’t the small girl that played with Zola and blocks for hours waiting for her moms to be done with their shift. She wasn’t going to come home from kindergarten explaining colors.
She was in New York, across the country, far away from Arizona.
Saying so seemed like the only time Kristen felt any compassion for her, shown any form of kindness. If everything had gotten as the teenager thought they would, they wouldn’t be in the same situation. Kristen would’ve gotten to keep Ellie and see her, have her in the same state. And she pitied the doctor because her daughter was three thousand miles away.
Nevertheless, things weren’t so easy, and things happened to people.
Arizona took a breath, a weak attempt at calming down.
Sitting in her car was probably not a good idea, but she knew that driving in her current state was a worse one. Both of her legs stung, one because of not taking her prosthetic off for over forty-eight hours, and the other one for carrying her weight for that amount of time. Sometimes she felt so powerless, so out of control. Years had passed and she still couldn’t trust her body to just drive. Not without hearing the voice of her ex-wife, filled with anxious dread.
She can’t get in the car, it’s not safe.
Arizona had caused that. A sheer, disproportionate panic to the one she knew was the love of her life. And if she was going to break down, the least she could do was to make sure she didn’t cause any more harm. Not test her luck when it had proven to be disastrous more than once. Even today.
She didn’t mean to make it worse.
I asked her to, I told her to.
Guilt kept climbing through her chest, and she couldn’t help but suffocate in it. She meant it when she said it was her fault, and maybe if Bryan Wallace just took her word and blamed Arizona for it, she would be able to find some peace. Yet he didn’t point the finger to anyone but himself, meanwhile his wife and child were fighting for their lives, and he had a cut on his forehead that would leave a scar too similar to the one she had. Or maybe not, because Karev wasn’t there to stitch him up.
Because Alex was an idiot with all the letters, and assaulted DeLuca just to then, on top of it, take a plea and go to jail for who knows how many years. It was fair, to pay for what he did, but all Arizona wanted to do was to hit him with a brick and scream at him and hold him close and make him promise to not leave because she trusted him, and she needed him. She needed her other half of the team, someone who understood her.
A sob threatened to escape and she quickly drowned it. As much as she wanted to cry it wouldn’t be fair to come home and make Andrew see her breaking down. Not because of the guy who attacked him.
There was something in them, Alex and Andrew. Pieces of other people she knew, pieces that if she looked inside herself she could find. Andrew sometimes smiled like Nick, and his clothes, the rare times he left them scattered around the house, reminded her of silly fights during her childhood.
The ever presence of her brother’s ghost still invaded her life, her house. There was always something about Tim that she could remember, a part of him Arizona knew that would always be engraved in her. Sometimes too faint, an aura of someone she once knew. A memory of the people they were. Other times she could almost hear his voice and see his face coming home.
But there was no Tim, and there was no Nick. And Alex was gone and Andrew was scared and she had to be strong.
Asking people not to leave never worked, because promises broke. Things happened to people, and sometimes she happened to people. She told Mandy Wallace to put her feet up. She cheated. She didn’t let Alex get on the plane. She drove her car against a truck. She did the surgery on Wallace Anderson even when she wasn’t sure.
And all she needed was for the bad dreams to go away, even if she could already sense the nightmares.
She knew taking her phone wasn’t a good idea, but she couldn’t stop herself.
It took three beeps , each of them making her consider more and more to just hang up and send a message apologising in case she woke someone up. But instead she stood frozen in her seat, until her ex-wife’s voice sounded clearly on speaker.
“Arizona?” Callie asked. “Is everything okay? Did someone die?”
“No.” She said, biting her lip to make sure her weeping would be contained and not heard by the other side of the line.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah.”
Arizona’s heart skipped a beat. She didn’t mean to lie, but she couldn’t help herself. She had to be a good man in a storm, to be okay. She wasn’t allowed to suffer in this situation, one that she created for herself. Because it was her fault that the injuries were worse, and it was her decision that Sofia was in New York.
And she was the one who called even if she shouldn’t.
“You shouldn’t call me at this hour if there’s nothing wrong.” Callie spoke, a bluntness in her voice that made Arizona flinch.
“I- I know.”
She couldn’t handle it anymore. She couldn’t handle how cold she feels in her car and how much her leg hurts. And she couldn’t handle the memories that keep playing, the fears that should be long gone but still feel frozen in time, affecting her almost as much as the first time. And she couldn’t handle the other woman telling her how, again, she’s not her responsibility.
“Oh honey.” Callie’s voice changed, as if a switch was turned.
It was sweeter, calmer. Compassionate. Arizona could almost see it, how her edges of her lips would curve and show a half smile. And then she would reach out with her hands, because her ex-wife was never too good with words. She would put her into a hug and stroke her hair until the tears dried and things looked brighter.
“Callie, what-” another voice – Penny’s – said.
But she was in New York.
“It’s important. You go back to sleep.” Callie ordered. “Do you want me to wake up Sofia? I will wake up Sofia. She was sad that you didn’t call tonight.”
“I’m sorry.” Arizona muttered, trying to find her voice. “I- You know what? It’s okay, I shouldn’t have called. Let Sofia sleep, I don’t want to throw off her schedule, and please go back to sleep. I’m really sorry.”
“I’m going into her bedroom now.” She explained. “We can afford a late morning tomorrow, or maybe she can skip. She hasn’t skipped school any day since you left. Maybe the day off would be good, I don’t have any early surgeries and I can move the others. Please, let me do this.”
It’s been years. Aeizona knows it, she remembers the date it happened and by now, they’ve been apart for a long time. It’s been years since they were together, and with time, the sweet gestures and supporting each other went slowly away. It was too painful, overly so, because it wasn’t enough. Yet, there she was, offering to help just because Arizona called and the words couldn’t come out.
“Thank you.”
Two words was all she could manage, but with her mind foggy and unwillingness to over analyze their conversation, there was no other way to explain how meaningful the small act of kindness was to her.
She closed her eyes, attempting to center her attention on her phone. She could barely make out some words, like mommy and morning . Maybe Arizona should have called it off, tell Sofia to go to bed and plead to Callie to forget it even happened, but instead she pretended that for a second she’s not in the icy hospital parking lot.
That she can just hold her daughter and talk to her.
That they’re sitting in their house, the one that was supposed to be their fresh start. And that after a long day she was home, with the pink walls of the bedroom and the temporary cardboard sign that said Sofia Robbin Sloan Torres , in sparkly purple letters.
“Mommy?”
“Hi big girl!” She forced a smile, trying to make sure her voice won’t break. “I’m sorry I couldn’t call earlier, I know it’s very late, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, I was sleep.” Sofia explained, apparently unaware of how strange the situation was. “Mama, how late is it?”
“Two in the morning.” Callie answered.
“That is very late, I know.” Arizona continued. “But I miss you so much, and I didn’t want to go to bed before talking to you.”
“I miss you, mommy.” Her daughter said. “Will you come here? I wanna show you my toys. Abuelo sent me new ones, and there are crowns! Mama doesn’t want to play Moana with me anymore.”
“Oh, she doesn’t?”
“Nope,” the little girl accentuated the ‘p’ at the end of the word, “she says we watch it too much. But I really like it.”
“And what do you like about it?”
“The pig! And the songs, and I like that it is at the beach and I miss the beach.” Sofia replied excitedly. “When can we go to the beach?”
“Well, not right now. You have to go to school, and I have to work, also it’s very chilly and cold to go to the beach, don’t you think so?”
“Mhm.” The kid agreed. “Mommy, did you save babies today?”
“Yeah, I did. There was a little girl and I had to fix her heart.” Arizona explained.
She usually loved to talk about her patients with Sofia. Her daughter would make a face, trying to process the new found information, followed by a smile, clearly proud of what her mother did everyday. It reminded her of Callie, how she made her feel on the top of her game, on the top of the world.
You are… great.
“Is she okay?” Her little girl interrupted her thoughts.
“She’s super.” She promised confidently. “She’ll have a tiny, tiny scar, but she’ll be okay.”
“Like me?”
“Similar to you.” Too similar for Arizona’s liking. “How was school today?”
“Good. We are learning the numbers and today we learned what a hundred means. I made a new friend. Her name is Camila, and we played with Isabella and Emma. Olivia is sick so she wasn’t at school today.” Sofia rambled. “Oh! And Camila knows spanish.”
“That’s so cool!” Arizona replied, attempting to keep the conversation going. “Did you go to ballet today?”
“I did! And I got two stamps, and my teacher told me I did really good.”
“I’m so proud of you, which stamps did you get?”
“I got one for dancing and I got one for listening.” Sofia explained, followed by a yawn. “Mommy, can I go to bed again?”
“Of course, I’m sorry I woke you up.” A sad smile crossed her face. “Goodnight, Sofia Robbin.”
“Goodnight mommy.”
She could hear the girl passing the phone back to Callie, but couldn’t bring herself to hang up.
Arizona wished the call could last longer, even if it was late and she was tired. It was something she could hold on to. With the weight of the problems coming down on her, hearing her daughter’s voice was grounding. Forcing her to recall the schedule she tried to memorize, remember the details and ask for more. A reminder to be as involved as she could.
Keep an eye on her. Pay attention.
The Colonel was a good father. Strict, but kind and caring. He doted on his children, protected them. He took her to skate when moving to a new city, and even if the memory of it was tainted for years, she could recall a faint feeling of safety. Yet, he was also absent, leaving way too many duties to his wife. Forgetting recitals and football matches.
Arizona never intended to resent him for it, and even if she understood him better as she got older, a part of her was still bitter. Similar to the five years old who cried because her father was away for most of the day, and begged him to take her wherever he went.
She wondered if Sofia would resent her too. If in an attempt to make Callie happy she had tainted the relationship with her daughter beyond repair.
“Arizona, are you still there?”
She considered for a second not answering, pretending to have a signal problem, Not dealing with the conversation she had set herself up to.
“Yeah.”
“Will you tell me what happened?”
“I had to go to a prison, with Bailey and Jo.”
“What?”
“A girl… a mom was having a problem. She went into labor while we were there. And Callie, she,” Arizona took a deep breath, “she is a teenager. And she was screaming for her mom to be there, and her mom was in the other room and just didn’t see her. She barely asked for her.”
“That’s horrible.” Callie stated, encouraging Arizona to continue.
“I know. Then the mom asked me if I had a daughter, and I said yes, and she told me to keep an eye on her, that she didn’t know for what but that something must’ve been wrong . Kristen, the girl, was so broken and she had no one by her side.” Arizona took another deep breath, knowing that the second the words leave her mouth she will regret them, but she couldn’t stop herself. “I was supposed to be there, but my mind was in Sofia. I want- I need her to know that she’ll be loved, no matter what. Even if she makes a mistake. I need you to make sure she knows I love her.”
“Arizona...”
“We were going back to the hospital, in the car, and Alex took the plea.” She wasn’t planning on telling it, but she needed to channel the talk into another direction before it was too late. “Bailey told us that he did it, and no one knows where he is. Alex is in some jail , Callie. And I’m not sure how long he will be there. I saw DeLuca days after it happened and his eyes... his eyes were still red, his nose was wrecked. But it’s Alex, Callie, it’s Alex .”
The tears that she thought could contain make their appearance, and for a second she was impressed about being still able to cry. It wasn’t the first time that she thought she shouldn’t have tears left. After the crying in Africa. About the plane crash, about the leg. After crying for days for Callie and Sofia, after crying for years for Tim. Arizona shouldn’t have tears left, but there she was again, wailing in a failed attempt to relieve some of the pressure.
She wasn’t even sure if crying was worth it, if she was allowed to cry when compared to other moments things seemed so minimal yet the sadness and remorse left her breathless, gasping for air while the tears wouldn’t stop. It was making her feel even angrier at herself, frustrated because she couldn’t turn off her emotions. Couldn’t fit them in small rooms in her head.
“I know, but also he’s Alex, he will be okay.” Callie promised, with a failed attempt at comfort. “He knows you care, he will talk to you. It just happened today, give him time.”
The words didn’t help as much, and Arizona wondered if it might be too late.
Too late for Callie to comfort her, their relationship far gone. The bond that once existed between them, simply absent. Excessively foreign with each other. Not knowing how to talk even if she still knew the old her by heart. Or maybe they never worked well with words.
“There was also a car crash. A pregnant woman, and her husband. Her husband crashed into the cab that was taking her here. She was so injured and it was, it is, my fault.”
“Arizona, you weren’t even there.”
“But I told her to put her legs up over the dashboard. I just wanted it to hurt less. But all I did was make things worse. I had to operate on her and the baby, because there’s no one nearly competent in peds. And I thought I was going to lose both of them.”
There’s a silence, an understanding of what it was.
They never worked well with words, Callie never tried to and Arizona wouldn’t pressure her into it. It happened, the crash, both of them knew it. It was painful, long, horrible weeks and a variety of different procedures and surgeries. It was cuts in the forehead and a whiplash she hid from her fiance. It was an open sutures and saying yes .
It was watching how they opened her little girl, her beating heart in the middle of the screen when she ran away from the operating room.
No one should see their own daughter’s heart.
“I didn’t mean to make it worse. I just wanted to relieve the pressure.” Arizona repeated again, taking air through her mouth in an attempt to stop her hectic breathing.
“It’s okay, honey, I know.” She promised. “Are you safe?”
“Yeah, I’m in my car.” The regret of having shared too much was slowly setting in, and a need to flee came with it. “Goodnight Callie.”
“No- No, wait.” She interrupted. “Can you stay on the call while you drive? You don’t have to talk, just put me on speaker and tell me once you’re home.”
“It’s okay, I’m fine. I can drive.”
“Please, Arizona.”
“I’m fine.”
“I care.”
It takes a second before the words collide, leaving Arizona breathless. A pit forms in her stomach, and she’s sure it is pure guilt . She was selfish, she was forcing her ex -wife to care for her. She broke Callie, probably more than once. With words, with actions. And still had the audacity to call for her.
She was suffocating her again. Holding her back when Callie should be in bed with her girlfriend.
“Arizona?”
“Please, go to sleep.”
“I will once you’re home. It’s just a five minutes drive, put me on speaker and turn on the radio if you don’t want to talk to me. But please, stay on the call.”
“Okay.”
Carefully, she let her phone sit on the dashboard, with the microphone pointing to the radio. Letting whatever was the last thing she played in the car fill the air.
Immensely aware of the presence at the other side of the line, Arizona started the engine. The car crash had left them with fear, taking more precautions than ever when driving. After losing her leg, her mobility, Callie took most of the responsibilities. Taking Sofia from one place to the other, making sure her wife was on time for physical therapy, managing her own schedule. It only made her more weary, more aware of the fact that she couldn’t control her body as well as she used to.
Even if she drove them against a truck when she still had two legs.
The first time she drove after the plane crash was after the storm, and she wasn’t sure how she didn’t have an accident. She was too focused on finding her daughter, on getting to the Shepherd’s house, that she might’ve forgotten the leg. All she could remember was fear, being terrified of losing her. Of never seeing her again, of Callie taking her and never coming back. Losing another child.
She was nothing, and then she was the adulterous cheating wife, so there was no reason why she shouldn’t be alone.
Leah reminded her of it. Of her mistakes, of each nail she put on the coffin. The break, therapy, her fellowship. Lauren. How broken she was at the time, the emptiness. During those months, it seemed like a recurrent thought, how she was missing the weight of her leg, the limb just gone. And how she was supposed to be pregnant, but there was no heartbeat.
The resident was just a recollection of her treason.
Eliza wasn’t helping, with her incessant flirting, too confident in herself. Congratulating her on using her method , as if that didn’t mean that she had accidentally betrayed Richard. It was playing with fire, she knew, but the rush of it kept calling her. Her reputation was gone long ago, and even if years passed, the mark was still on her.
Traitor, hypocrite, workaholic, selfish, sex crazy, irresponsible.
Nevertheless, she was keeping Callie on the phone, forcing her to listen to some pop song that she didn’t even know the name of. Hurting her, calling her in the middle of the night and pretending that they trusted each other. The things that she said, the things she left other people call Arizona didn’t stung.
But she didn’t have a right to be damaged, not when she drove the person she loved the most to her limits. When she had inflicted pain after loss, when she ruined everything.
As much as Arizona still loved her, she was an unstoppable source of pain for the one she considered the love of her life. And it seemed like a sick joke to think that she could love her so much until her body hurted and air would leave her body but that there was nothing she could do to make her happy.
Arizona couldn’t live without her and their children, without the promise of going home to her; but Callie could live without Arizona.
Callie was better off without Arizona.
“I’m home now…” Arizona announced, taking back her phone and turning off the radio. “And, Callie?”
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry. I know it was my fault, and I know we never talked much about it. But I’m really sorry about that day… the crash. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
I’m sorry I’m the reason you couldn’t carry another baby, I’m sorry I lost our baby. I’m sorry I almost made you lose Sofia twice.
I’m sorry I destroyed your dreams.
“No, it wasn’t your fault. Not this time, not that time.” Her ex-wife promised firmly, leaving out a tired breath. “You don’t have to apologize for it, not ever, but if you need to hear it, I forgive you Arizona. I forgive you. And you should forgive yourself.”
Callie made a pause, and Arizona decided against speaking, too scared of breaking the atmosphere, of saying the wrong thing and it circling into a fight.
Of ruining the inexplicable truce between them. Of injuring their relationship any further. Of hurting her again.
“I’m sorry too.” Callie said, finally.
“Callie-”
“You should go to sleep.” She cut in. “Goodnight, honey.”
The phone call cut before Arizona could mention anything else, but still, she whispered: “Goodnight, Calliope.”