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“Okay, put the scissors on the ribbon, but don't cut it.”
Carina smiled as she watched Miranda shoot Dr. Lincoln a look that could only be described as ‘The Bailey Glare’, the shorter doctor not taking kindly to being told what to do. When Miranda had approached her with the idea of opening a clinic for women’s reproductive health, she of course jumped in to help, bringing Jo along with her. Her life and the world around her felt like it was imploding, but working to bring something good into the world gave Carina a source of happiness and satisfaction, and she was proud to be here for the official opening of the clinic that would help countless women.
After pictures were taken, Carina pulled out the champagne and flutes. After Miranda popped open the bottle and the flutes were distributed, they all clinked their glasses together to celebrate the momentous occasion. While her friends brought their glasses to their lips, Carina stood there staring at her drink, her smile that had been plastered on her face moments before, falling.
“What’s wrong, Carina?” Jo asked, noticing the subtle shift in her mentor's mood.
“Nothing, I'm okay Jo.” Carina replies, giving her a small smile.
The realization that she could drink the champagne brought an ache to her chest. She had been so sure that she was pregnant after their latest try. She was taking all the precautions in case she was pregnant, and now she didn't have to, once again, and it hurt. The fight she had with her wife this morning came flooding back into her mind, ruining the happy bubble she had managed to seal herself in with the clinic opening.
Politely excusing herself from her friends, she walked over to the bench where her purse was, pulling out her phone to see if her wife had sent her any messages. Her heart sinks when her phone lights up after tapping the screen and seeing she had no notifications. Sighing, she unlocks her phone, planning to send a message to Maya to check up on her. She knows she should give up, walk away. Maya had been hurting her continuously over the last 7 months, but she couldn’t bring herself to. She loved her wife too much to leave her, even if it was making her miserable.
Opening up the text thread she shares with her wife, she pauses, seeing the three little dots in the corner indicating Maya was typing a message. Carina feels her heart soar a bit, Maya rarely texted her these days, and if she did it was never unprompted. She sat there, heart beating a bit harder, waiting to see what her wife was going to send. A minute passed, then another, and another, and not message came through.
“Now I know you aren’t missing out on us celebrating this clinic to sit and stare at your phone.”
Carina snaps her head up, locking eyes with Miranda who had made her way over to her without even noticing.
She glances back down at her phone one last time, still seeing those dots and no message. Sighing, she locks her phone before placing it back in her bag.
“I was just checking something.” Carina said while standing back up, picking up her drink to walk back over to Jo and Dr. Lincoln.
But before she can take two steps, Miranda is in her way, blocking her path. She looks down at the doctor, furrowing her brow in confusion.
“Is everything okay with you and Bishop? Ben has told me some things and I have noticed some changes with you as well.” Miranda asks, a soft and concerned look on her face.
Immediately she feels her eyes start to sting, and her throat starts to get tight with emotion. She tilts her head back, finding a bright light overhead to stare at and will the tears to go away before they can spill over. She takes in a deep breath, before pushing it all out, groaning and shimmying a bit, trying to get the emotions out of her body.
“No, we are not okay. Not at all. But if I talk about it I will start to cry and if I start to cry I'm afraid I'm never going to stop.” Carina replies.
“Oh, Carina.” Bailey says softly.
“No, no, no. I do not want your pity Miranda.” Carina points her finger at the other doctor, “this is supposed to be a joyous moment, my relationship problems will not ruin it.”
“Okay, but if you ever want someone to talk to, I’m here for you.” Miranda tells her before turning around and heading back to where Jo and Dr. Lincoln are chatting and drinking champagne.
Carina turns her back to the group, blinking hard and letting the few tears that wouldn't leave her eyes to fall. Quickly wiping them away, and taking a few calming breaths, she turns back around and plasters a smile on her face and makes her way over to her friends.
“Carina, look at how cute Luna looks. I had to dress her in some of Scout’s clothes because she's growing so fast and nothing fits her anymore, but I think she rocked the outfit!” Jo tells her excitedly, turning her phone to show her a picture of her daughter.
Another pang of emotion hits Carina, but she ignores it.
“Woooow, she looks adorable!”
“I know!” Jo says, turning her phone back around to smile proudly at the picture of her daughter.
Jo continues to show her pictures of Luna, swiping through a never ending album of her little girl and telling her stories to go along with each photo. But, Carina isn't listening to her friend anymore. She’s lost in her mind, imagining a little girl with brunette curls and ocean blue eyes smiling up at her. Hearing the high pitched squeals and giggles as her wife chases their daughter around, both of them collapse on the floor laughing when Maya finally catches her. She feels the softness of the newborn baby boy in her arms, with soft blonde hair that sticks out in every direction, so much like Maya’s when she first wakes up.
“Hello, earth to Carina!” Jo says, waving her hand in front of her face.
“Hmm, what?”
“Are you going to drink your champagne? Cause if not, I gladly will. That bottle was expensive and I don't want to waste any of it.”
Carina looks down at the bubbly, golden liquid, contemplating. She knows the test said she wasn’t pregnant, but something in her is telling her not to drink it.
She starts to pass the flute over to Jo, who looks like a kid who’s been given a bag of candy, but pauses as an ambulance comes screeching into the bay across from them.
She hears the doctors on call ask what they have, and she hears a male voice float over to her. The voice sounds oddly familiar, and as she looks over the ambulance again, she notices that it's actually a Seattle Fire Department Aide Car. Specifically it’s Station 19’s Aide Car.
She sees the owner of the voice jump out of the back of the Aide Car, and it’s Jack. Carina furrows her brow in confusion, why would Jack be in the Aide Car? He isn’t an active firefighter anymore.
“Lieutenant Maya Bishop, 34 year old female firefighter found unconscious with a bleeding head wound in the gym at Station 19. Her pulse is weak and thready, and her breathing is shallow. She hasn't regained consciousness and her wound won't stop bleeding. My best guess is she fell off of the treadmill since I found her on the floor next to it.” Jack lists off the patient details to the doctors.
She must have heard Jack wrong. There was no way her wife could be in the back of that Aide Car, she was typing a message to her, she saw the little dots just minutes ago.
The gurney is being pulled out now and her world stops when she sees the blonde ponytail. The black silicone ring on her hand resting on her chest. The apple watch strapped to her wrist. Carina goes cold all over. She doesn't feel the flute of champagne slip out of her fingers. She doesn't feel the liquid splash onto her legs, soaking her pants. She doesn’t feel anything, the shock from seeing the love of her life so small and fragile on the gurney making her numb.
Jack hears the shattering of glass and looks to where the sound came from. He finds Carina standing there, pale as a ghost. He jogs over to her, seeing the tears silently streaming down her face the closer he gets.
“Carina, hey.” He says softly, the doctor hasn't taken her eyes off of the ER doors where her wife is being wheeled through. He gently grips her shoulders, trying to snap her out of her frozen state.
“Don't touch me!” Carina yells at him, ripping herself out of his hands.
Too soft. It's too soft.
“Okay, okay, sorry.” Jack backs away, hands up.
“What happened?” Carina sniffles, wiping the tears off of her face.
“I don't know.”
“What do you mean you don't know?” She snaps at him.
“I don't know what happened. I was volunteering at the station, helping Vic out with the fire camp, when I noticed her turnouts were left in the barn. It’s not like Bishop to miss a call, so I went searching for her and that's when I found her. Luckily the Aide Car wasn’t needed on the call so I made Vic help me to bring her in.” Jack explained.
As he was explaining, Vic hopped out of the driver's seat and made her way over.
“Victoria, do you know how this happened?” Carina asked, hoping the firefighter would know more since she actually worked alongside her wife.
“No, sorry. Jack found her. But I mean can any of us be surprised this happened?” Vic said, laughing a bit.
“And what do you mean by that?” Carina asked, deadly calm.
Vic at least looked a bit nervous now, but she continued on. “I mean, Bishop is practically glued to the treadmill when we aren’t on call. We all know something isn’t right, it's like she’s back to the old Maya, the Maya before she met you. Except worse. And she’s been popping Advil like it's candy. She’s been carrying around a giant bottle and randomly chucks back a handful of the pills throughout the day-” She cut herself off her ramble, noticing all the doctors had gotten still and had bad looks on their faces.
“What? What did I say?” Vic said, turning to Jack, hoping he would help her out.
Carina whips around to face her friends, panic now clearly written on every inch of her face.
“Miranda…” She pleads. She knows Miranda isn't performing general surgery right now but she needs the best to give Maya the best chance.
“I’m on it. I’ll make sure she pulls through.” Miranda replies, giving her a sad smile before marching through the doors into the ER.
“Dr. Lincoln, I know we don’t know each other -” Carina says, turning to face him.
“Please, call me Link.” He interrupts, “Plus, Jo never shuts up about how amazing you are so I feel like I already know you.” He jokes.
Jo smacks him in the stomach over that comment, causing Link to let out a small yelp of pain. Somehow in the midst of everything, they manage to pull a small smile from Carina.
“Link, my wife has a pre-existing ankle injury, and she’s reinjured it lately. I don't know how bad it is because she won't let me look at it, but do you think you could…” She trails off, feeling slightly guilty for asking.
“I’m on it!” He replies, already jogging into the ER.
After watching Link disappear through the doors, her gaze lands Vic and Jack standing off to the side. Suddenly, Carina couldn’t stand the sight of the firefighter anymore. She couldn’t stand to see the Seattle Fire emblem on her shirt, or on the Aide Car behind them.
“Victoria, leave.” She says calmly, trying to keep her composure.
“What? Why? Maya is a part of the team.”
At that moment, something cracked open in Carina. All the emotions she had been trying to keep at bay came flooding back, and condensed into anger.
“Part of the team?” Carina laughs without humour, “what team stands by while they know something is wrong with one of their members?”
“Woah, Carina, that isn’t fair. You know how prickly Maya is.” Vic says, defensively.
“Because she’s in pain!” She yells out. “She has been suffering and in pain for months, Victoria!”
“There’s no way we could have known, she keeps everything to herself!” Vic tries to argue back.
“Oh, stop it! Every single one of you has training with Crisis One! You should have been able to see the warning signs, and help her, despite how pointy she may be! Instead, she has been slipping away right in front of my eyes, but I refuse to give up on her, because that's what a real family does, not the fake one Station 19 claims to be!”
“I think you mean prickly, not pointy” Jack interjects, which only earns him a glare from Carina. “Sorry, I'll shut up.”
Silence hangs between them. Carina is breathing hard, hot angry tears are streaming down her face.
“Carina, I’m sorry-” Vic tries.
“No. I don't want to hear your fake apologies. It’s been 7 months, and the thing that gets you to realize how bad things are is finding my wife unconscious and her angry wife yelling at you. Go away, Victoria. I can’t stand to see the sight of another firefighter from 19 right now.”
Vic hangs her head, shame settling on her features. Carina watches as she walks back to the Aide Car, starting it up and drives away before she collapses to her knees.
All the anger that had been coursing through her veins while talking to Vic has burned out. She feels so many things but also nothing at all. She feels like screaming, but she also feels like never speaking again. She feels like crying, but she also feels like she may never be able to produce another tear in her life. She feels like running into the ER and never leaving her wife’s side, but she also feels like running as far away as possible.
She doesn’t know what to do or how to feel. The love of her life, her anchor, her home, was just wheeled into the hospital, unconscious, and facing possible complications from ibuprofen overuse.
“Maya, amore mio. ” She whimpers, staring at the doors that lead into the ER. She can see the commotion in the busy department, feeling nauseous thinking of everything that’s happening to her wife. She knows she should be in there, by her side but she can't bring herself to move. Instead she tilts her head back, staring up at the sky.
“Non puoi portarla via da me. Per favore, lei è tutto ciò che mi resta.”
(You can’t take her from me. Please, she’s all I have left.)
“Carina, you need to get up. You’re shivering.” Jack tells her.
“ Non mi interessa.” She says, still staring at the sky, silently begging God to grant her mercy and save her wife.
(I don't care)
“Carina, we can’t understand you.” Jo says softly.
“ Che cosa?” She says, looking at the duo standing in front of her.
(What?)
“You’re speaking Italian.” Jo tells her.
“Oh.”
She tilts her head back up, not done talking to the sky.
“ Hai preso mia mamma e mio fratello. Hai rovinato la mia infanzia, lasciandomi con la mia papa. Non puoi prendere mia moglie. Lei è l'amore della mia vita. Lasciala vivere. Per favore. Per favore.”
(You took my mamma, and my brother. You ruined my childhood, leaving me with my papa. You cannot take my wife. She is the love of my life. Let her live. Please. Please.)
“Carina, hey, look at me.” Jack asks softly, having dropped to his knees to mirror her.
“ Per favore. Maya. Ti amo.” Carina whispers, not paying attention to her surroundings.
(Please. Maya. I love you.)
“Carina.” Jack tries again, a bit louder.
“ Amore mio, mi dispiace.”
(My love, i'm sorry)
“Carina, I'm going to touch you.” Jack tells her, unsure of how to get her to stop speaking in Italian to the sky. “Please don’t hit me.” He mumbles under his breath before reaching forward and resting a hand on her shoulder.
Carina slaps at the hand on her shoulder, glaring at Jack.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know how to get you to stop. You’re starting to scare us.” Jack says.
Carina glances over at Jo standing nearby, takes in the sad, concerned look on her face. Her gaze lands back on Jack and he has an almost identical expression on his face.
“Can I help you stand up?” He asks.
“No, too soft.” She shakes her head. Jack gives her a confused look but respects Carina and takes a step back to give her room.
With more effort than it should have taken, Carina pulls herself off the ground. Her knees are soaked through, causing her pants to stick to her uncomfortably. Good, she thinks to herself, not too soft.
“Let’s go inside.” Jo suggests.
“I can’t. I can’t. I can’t lose her too.”
She starts to pace around, not able to stand still any longer.
“You won’t.” Jack says, trying to reassure her.
“You can’t know that.” She pauses for pacing for a moment, pointing a finger at Jack.
“Bishop is a fighter. She’s the most stubborn person I know, she’ll pull through.”
“Oh, Jack, stop! You don’t know how bad it’s been, how worn down Maya is. I’m not sure how much fight she has left in her.” Carina stops pacing, looking at Jack with blurry vision as more tears fill her eyes.
“You’re right. I don’t know how bad it’s been. I feel like it's partly my fault for taking off and ghosting everyone, and I’m sorry for that.”
“Why are you even still here?” Carina asks.
“Because once upon a time, when the station wasn’t there for me, she was.”
“What?”
“I guess she never told you this.” He pauses, seeing Carina shake her head. “After the skyscraper fire a couple years ago, I ended up getting some pretty bad PTSD. The team noticed something was up after a while and they staged an intervention and forced me to go to therapy. That was it though, they never really checked up on me. Except for Maya. She met up with me after every appointment. I know all 3 of us have a weird relationship, but I want to be here for her. And for you too Carina.”
Carina walks over to Jack and punches him in the arm.
“Okay, ow. I’m sure I deserved that but I'm not sure what I did.” Jack says, backing away from Carina, holding his arm.
“You.” She takes a step towards him, her finger pointing at him. “You remind me so much of my stupid little brother, it infuriates me.”
“I’m sorry?” He offers.
Before she can say or do anything else, they’re interrupted.
“Carina.” She hears her name called from the doors into the ER.
Looking over she sees Miranda standing there, navy blue scrubs on, but no scrub cap or gown.
“Carina, she’s awake and asking for you and refusing treatment until she speaks to you. We tried to talk her out of it, but she’s damn stubborn.” Miranda tells her.
“She’s asking for me?” Carina says, pointing her finger at her chest. Despite everything that’s happened between them over the last 7 months, and the whirlwind of emotions she’s gone through tonight, she still feels butterflies stir in her stomach knowing Maya wants her.
“Yes. Now hurry up and get inside. Her injuries aren’t life threatening but she does need treatment and I don't want to be here all night.”
She takes a deep breath before hurrying towards the door to follow Miranda. She’s certain she looks like hell. Her hair was whipping around in the wind, her eyes are bound to be red and puffy from crying, her makeup is probably streaky from her tears, and her pants are wet, but she doesn't care. Her wife needs her. Her Maya was asking for her.
Maya doesn’t notice her as she quietly enters the trauma room. Her wife has her knees to her chest, hugging them tight, staring out one of the windows. Carina can see her face is wet and her shoulders are shaking softly. Her heart aches for her wife, she wants to fly across the room and hold her tight, but she doesn't know where they stand at the moment.
“ Bambina?” She says softly.
Maya looks over at her wife, and starts crying harder.
Carina approaches the bed, reaching out to place a hand on her wifes wet cheek.
“I’m sorry Carina. I'm so sorry.” She says before a sob takes control of her.
“It’s okay, my love.”
“No, no it isn’t.”
Carina looks down at her wife, confused. She opens her mouth to speak but is cut off.
“Please, I have some things I need to say and I need to get it all out, uninterrupted.”
“Okay.” Carina leans down, placing a small kiss on her wifes head, mindful of the bandage. She grabs one of the stools in the room and sits down, leaving her hand palm up on the bed.
Maya grabs her hand instantly, bringing it to her lips, giving her knuckles a small kiss before bringing their hands to her lap. She starts playing with the rings on Carina’s fingers. Despite the heaviness of the situation, Carina can’t help but smile a little bit at her wifes nervous habit.
“I’m so, so, sorry you aren’t pregnant.” Maya says, locking eyes with Carina. She can’t help the fresh wave of tears that start falling from her eyes. “I’ve been such an ass to you the last couple months, there aren’t enough words to express how sorry I am. I’m sorry that it took me seriously getting hurt to realize how not okay I am. Lane’s voice has been so loud in my head, screaming at me to run and keep my eyes forward. But I'm so tired, Carina. I can’t keep fighting.”
Carina stares into her favourite blue eyes. She has spent hours staring into them, knowing exactly what her wife is feeling just from the way her eyes change colour, or the expression in them. But now, they are dull and unreadable.
“ Bambina , I'm going to ask you a question, and I need you to be honest with me.”
Maya nods her head, her eyes filling with tears.
“Did you hurt yourself on purpose?”
Maya closes her eyes, letting the tears spill out from under her eyelids. She slowly nods her head.
“Oh, my love.” Carina says, getting up from the stool and crawls onto the bed, no longer able to resist not holding her wife.
Maya doesn't hesitate, turning to cling onto Carina, burying her face in her neck. They hold each other while they both cry. After a couple minutes pass, and their sobs have quieted, Maya talks again.
“Lane’s voice was screaming at me. I felt so bad for how I acted this morning, and then Andy benched me near the end of our call cause she could tell I was hurt. Then she tried to talk to me about it and I just couldn’t deal with it. I got on the treadmill and started running as hard as I could, Lane’s voice screaming at me that I’m a failure and a loser. Screaming that I’m ruining our marriage, I’m a failure at work, I’ll never be good enough for anyone or anything. My leg gave out, so I turned the speed up on the treadmill and ran harder, trying to prove I could overcome it. Next thing I know I’m waking up here, realizing how stupid I’ve been.”
Carina held Maya closer to her. She was so grateful her wife was finally opening up to her, but she still needed to ask her one more question, and she was scared to know the answer.
“ Amore mio ,” she pulls back a bit so she can look at Maya’s face. “You said you’re tired and you can’t keep fighting, what do you mean by that? Do you mean us fighting or…” She trails off, unable to bring herself to ask.
Maya is quiet for a moment. She can see the apprehension on her wifes face, and it only makes her more concerned that what she thinks the answer is is correct. She sees Maya take a deep breath before talking.
“I never told you this, but ever since I was 12, I think about dying. I used to fly all over the country for track meets, and I used to look out the plane window and think about jumping into the clouds. They always looked so fluffy, and like I could finally relax if I was amongst them. So when I get anxious or can’t sleep, I think about jumping into the clouds and it's soothing. Those thoughts slowly went away after I met you. I didn't need to think about the release of the clouds to feel safe and relaxed, I just had to think about you, about us. But those thoughts have also been coming back over the last couple of months. A part of me was disappointed when I woke up here, that I wasn't in the clouds. But that thought was also a wake up call. I don’t want to keep fighting against the way I feel. I don't want to keep hurting you. I want to get better, but I’m so scared. What if I can’t get better? What if I'm beyond help? What if-”
“Maya, bambina , look at me.” Carina says, pulling away from her wife to be able to grab her face between her hands. She knows the telltale signs of Maya’s panic attacks, and she needs to help her get it under control before she spirals.
Scared, ocean blue eyes lock onto her.
“Good, that's good bambina .” She takes one of Maya’s hands and places it on her chest, right over her heart. “Now breathe with me.”
After a minute of breathing together, Carina can see that Maya has calmed down.
“My love, I’m so proud of you for telling me all of this. I would also like to say I’m sorry with how I went about trying to get you to get professional help. I could tell that you were in so much mental pain, and I’m not equipped to deal with that. I want us to break our cycles, and I could see you getting sucked back into it and I didn’t know what to do.”
“I'm sorry I didn’t listen to you. You were right, I do need help.”
They sit there, clinging onto one another and staring into eachothers eyes. Carina can see some of the heaviness Maya has been carrying around start to lift from her eyes.
“ Ti amo tanto.” Maya whispers.
Carina’s breath hitches in her chest, and a thousand butterflies burst in her stomach. No matter how many times her wife speaks to her in her native tongue, it always has the same effect on her.
“ Ti amo tanto.” She whispers back.
She sees a small smile start to spread on her wifes face and it's the most beautiful thing she has seen in months. She can see the warmth start to return to her features, the love return to her eyes.
“Can I kiss you?” Carina asks.
“Please.”
Carina slowly leans forward, rubbing her nose against Maya’s, before closing the distance that remains and locks lips with her wife. It's a brief, gentle kiss, and when Carina pulls back, she places her forehead on Maya’s, keeping them close together.
She knew they had a long, rocky road ahead. Just because Maya could finally see she needed help doesn’t mean that everything is going to be fixed. There were many difficult conversations ahead for them, and she foresees Maya’s therapy journey to be difficult on them as well. But in the moment, holding her wife in her arms, and actually feeling her be present for the first time in months, she felt optimistic about their future.
“We’ll be okay, my love.” She whispers to Maya. “I promise.”