Over My Head (My Confessions)
Over My Head (My Confessions)
Tagline: Everyone knows I'm in over my head and I don't know what to do to but to give my confessions.
Summary: When the pressures of being unable to conceive slowly derails their relationship, Arizona chooses to take a break. She heads to Africa to work as a missionary, saving lives of the tiny humans. Yet, little to every one's knowledge, including her own, she takes a little something of Callie's with her. Now seven months later, Callie's world is turned upside down by the arrival of her ex-girlfriend and the tiny human growing inside of her. Can Callie find forgiveness for the mother of her child? Or is it simply too late?
Warning: AU Season 7
Pairing: Callie/Arizona.
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
“I can sum up everything I have learned about life in three words: it goes on.”- Robert Frost.
Chapter Ten
Callie’s entire world is spinning, she has never felt more dizzy or confused or hurt or just utterly and completely blinded in her entire life. Her knees are buckling beneath her and she literally has to grab ahold of the nurses’ desk to keep from sinking into a crumbling mess onto the floor. She gasps searching for a breath, any breath but none come to her; instead, the most heart wrenching and painful wail of a sob echo from somewhere within the back of her throat. The tears blind within her russet eyes as she clutches tightly to the desk, so much so that her knuckles begin to turn white. She feels like her entire world is crumbling around her, like everything that she ever wanted or wished for is suddenly disappearing and the darkness and the worst pain ever imaginable begins to sink in around her.
Teddy moves closer and attempts to console the clearly upset woman. Gently, she places her hand upon her shoulder but when she does, Callie reacts rather hostile and it suddenly reminds Teddy of the very reality that echoes between the two of them; the reality that she is the one who is destroying her life. She is the one who is breaking her hear. The pain that the ortho surgeon is currently feeling is because of her.
“Callie…” But her voice trails off because there are no words. No words to convey how much sympathy, and compassion, guilt and worry, the blonde feels for her. How sorry she is that this is happening to the two of them. How sorry she is that she kept it from Callie, how sorry she is that this might be the one moment that breaks the raven haired beauty apart completely. No, there are no words that could ever express what Callie Torres needs to hear.
“Tell me.” Callie demands. Teddy shakes her head, looking at the crumbling woman before her and the look of compassion and sympathy within her eyes is just enough to make Callie’s heart sink even deeper. Steadying herself against the desk, she pushes her body in an upward stand as she bites her lip to keep from creating even more of a scene.
“Damn it, Teddy. You have to tell me. It’s about Arizona. What accident? What happened? Is she okay? Where she is? You have to tell me, Teddy. You have to.” Callie stresses and when Teddy is only silent, it infuriates her, stepping on her already broken patience, “Teddy! You don’t get to play games with me right now!” Callie snaps, twisting her fingers in her raven black curls, tugging tightly in the attempts to create a pain that could perhaps make her forget about the emotional pain that radiates through her entire body.
“T-The plane crash. Arizona was on the plane. She was coming to see you. I-I knew and I wasn’t supposed to tell you and they don’t… um… they don’t know if she is going to be okay, Derek is working on her and just…” It’s all rambled together in a tumbling mess of words, words that make no sense to Callie, words that have no meaning. Nothing has meaning, not anymore, not after learning about Arizona.
“Wait, what? You knew?! You knew she was coming back and you didn’t tell me?! You knew that she was on the plane? When I told you my feeling you told me that everything was okay, that she was fine. But you knew?! You knew that she was coming back from Africa and you didn’t think, oh I don’t know, that it would be a good idea to tell me?!” Callie snaps loudly in almost delusion of the situation. When she hears the acid in her voice, Teddy sinks, recoiling back only slightly with a heavy, shaky breath.
“When you asked me about the feeling, I didn’t even know the plane had gone down then, okay? And I couldn’t tell you! I made a promise, Callie. She asked me not to say anything to you and you know Arizona, she never asks for anything so I did it because I’m her friend. I’m her best friend! I didn’t think that this was going to happen!” Teddy’s voice is shaking and on the verge of breaking. Callie shakes her head with the most disgusted and sickening laughs as she pushes up the sleeves of her white lab coat.
“So, you mean to tell me that if you knew the plane was going to go down, you would have, maybe mentioned something to me? Or would you still be standing on your best friend soap box trying to keep a promise rather than to save her life?!” Callie snaps and Teddy shakes her head, blinded by the tears as she takes another step toward her.
“You have to believe me, I didn’t know!” Teddy begs but Callie only shakes her head, a look in her eyes of so much hatred and disgust and the utmost fear that it shakes Teddy Altman to the core of everything that she is, the core of every emotion, of every forgetful wish and abandoned dream that has been lost long inside of her. For the first time in the three years that she has known her, and despite everything that has happened this is the first time that Teddy sees Callie like this.
Lost.
Confused.
Hurt.
Scared.
Terrified.
“Honestly? I am not so sure what I believe anymore.” Chuckles Callie, practically irate with the cardio surgeon, she looks at her, practically glares even, before she lets out a heavy sigh. She laces her shaky fingers together as she presses them against her lips, inhaling deeply to suppress the cry that desperately tries to escape from her. “W-where is she?”
“Callie.”
“Damn it, Altman, where is she?!” There’s pandemonium in her voice, freight and hurt and absolute panic. There is the shaking sound of the words as they tremble from her lips and the scowl of her wrinkled brow but tear filled eyes painted upon her face. Callie Torres, in a matter of seconds, has aged so much that Teddy almost does not even recognize the woman that is standing in front of her. Teddy opens her mouth to say something but instead, doesn’t, because she can’t. Not because she doesn’t want to but because she does not have the physical or emotional or mental strength inside of her to even form words at this point and it maddens the ortho surgeon before her.
“Nevermind, I’ll just find her myself!” Callie exclaims, pushing herself past Teddy before she takes off in a sprint to find the blonde haired woman, a woman who admittedly still holds every piece of her dysfunctional heart.
“Wait! Callie! You don’t understand!” Teddy calls out, turning to run after her but she knows the words have fallen on deaf ears, because the time they fall from her lips, Callie is already long gone. Sighing in annoyance, Teddy pinches the bridge of her nose as she inhales deeply, trying desperately, somehow, to compose herself before she, too, joins in the race to find Arizona Robbins.
--
As a surgeon, you are trained to keep your cool under any circumstance, you are taught not to get too attached with your patients. You drape their faces; you don’t ask personal questions, you do not get involved. Because, if you don’t get involved, it doesn’t affect you so much if something goes wrong. As a surgeon, you are taught to not care so much about the person but more about the science, about the technique.
However, when that patient is your friend, your colleague, someone that you see every day, someone that you have had over for dinner parties and invited to your wedding, someone who is perhaps one of the few people in the world who will ever understand you and your personality? Well, when it comes to that, Derek Shepherd has learned that all the medical school mumbo jumbo about not getting involved goes right out the window. This person lying under his hands isn’t just some stranger that he will never see again, this is Arizona. A friend. A colleague. One of his people.
Every move he makes is crucial, more important now than ever before. Because this time, if he nicks the wrong spot or accidentally slices too deep, he doesn’t just lose a patient. He loses a friend. Callie Torres loses her love. An unborn baby loses its mother. This time if something goes wrong, it’s not just something that he can chalk up to too much trauma or a misjudgment or being ‘nothing more he could do’. This time he will see the faces, the faces of the people the outcome of this surgery will affect every day. This time everything has to go perfect. Not because it’s the best option, but because it’s the only option.
“Hey, you okay?” It’s Meredith who startles him. He jumps, but only slightly, just quickly enough to regain himself and catch his hold on the scalpel so as to not create any more damage. Meredith. He looks up over his glasses to see her standing there, tiny in stature compared to everyone. Meredith, his wife. His wife. Right. It’s been so long since he has even mentally referred to her as that, that it almost surprises him at how strange it sounds. He clears his throat as he focuses on his steady hands.
“Yeah. Just a little nervous.” He mumbles his voice showing his impatience with the question that she dared to ask him. Meredith smiles weakly, a gesture that has almost all but lost meaning to the Nero-surgeon now. They are not Meredith and Derek anymore, not the way that they used to be, they lost that somewhere. Somewhere along the way of the shooting and the miscarriage and her not telling him that she was pregnant until it was too late, somewhere along the way they lost the spark, the magic, the love and it terrifies Derek to know how their story could parallel with Callie and Arizona’s with one wrong flick of his wrist.
“You shouldn’t be. You are the best surgeon, one of the top surgeons in the nation. This is a procedure that you have performed numerous times. Don’t get caught up in it, don’t overthink it, or overanalyze it. It’s just a surgery.” Meredith states in an attempt to calm him but Derek only shakes his head with a grit of his teeth.
“This isn’t just a surgery. This isn’t just a patient who ended up on my table. This is Arizona. Dr. Arizona Robbins. Who in case you haven’t noticed is very much pregnant with a baby that Callie Torres does not know about, a baby that happens to be hers. This isn’t just a surgery, Meredith, because if I screw this up, Callie could potentially lose not only her child, but the love of her life. The world could lose one of the best surgeons there is! And this kid could grow up without knowing its mother, well-one of its mothers. So, no. This isn’t just a surgery. This is a pretty big one!” Derek snaps in frustration and Meredith almost recoils at the hostility in his voice. However, there is another voice that almost whispers through the room.
“And you are a surgeon with a pretty big talent. You have this, Derek. Callie would hate you more for not trying and letting her die than if she died while you were trying to save her. Please. I’ve seen you work with much more damage before. You can do this. We all know you can.” Addison encourages and Derek nods quietly with a heavy, long exhale before he slowly begins to probe in her brain in search of the damage that he could fix. In the silence of the room however, Meredith shares an observant gaze with the woman who is now monitoring the baby’s vitals; how is it possible that even though they practically said the exact same thing, he ripped her head off but took Addison’s words as encouragement?
------
There is something that strikes the epitome of fear inside of you when you know that the person that you love most in the world is hurt and you cannot manage to get to them. It starts off with sweating palms and quickened breath sounds, but after a few minutes has passed and you realize how serious the situation is, the calm that you told yourself to be is long forgotten and you are practically in a full fledge panic trying to find them. At least, for Callie Torres that’s how it feels.
Seattle Grace-Mercy West is a hospital with what seems to be endless floors, unless you are trying to hide from someone. Yet, only one floor is truly dedicated to operating rooms and she knows Arizona has to be in one of these rooms but she just can’t seem to find it. Or perhaps, she doesn’t want to find it? Because finding it means it’s real. It means Arizona is really hurt. And seeing that, hearing that, facing that reality, well, it’s one that Callie is not so sure she can handle.
She can hear Teddy’s voice repeatedly in her head saying those words, saying Arizona’s name and accident in the same sentence, telling her about the accident and with every passing moment that she does not see the perky Peds surgeon in front of her, the reality of the situation becomes more and more real. Callie’s breath gets lost somewhere inside of her as her chest tightens, her eyes widen with panic and trepidation as she rounds the corner and finds endless amount of hallways full of doctors, interns and nurses. She can feel herself hyperventilating as the awareness sets in but the thought to calm down is one that she emotionally and mentally cannot comprehend.
“Cristina!” Callie shouts, noticing her ex-roommate as she comes out of what she assumes to be a patient’s room. The cardio surgeon jumps a little before shooting a glare in the direction of the voice, not even attempting to soften when she realizes who it is. Callie’s heart rate quickens as she swiftly makes her way through the mass of interns and nurses with a few muttered curses and apologies. Cristina grabs a chart from the cart, rolling her eyes as she takes out her pen and begins to make notes.
“Where is she?” Callie intrigues, desperate to catch her breath when she finally makes her way to the shorter woman. Cristina does not even bother to look up from the file; however, she only manages to continue writing, just as calm and emotionless as before.
“I am not a mind reader, Callie. If you expect me to tell you where someone is usually starting with a name might help. Like, I don’t know, Joe, Amy, Frank, Sarah, something along the lines of that.” Cristina mutters under her breath and Callie rolls her eyes in annoyance and impatience. To love Cristina Yang takes an acquired taste and to be honest, Callie probably loved her more than she knew, but at this exact moment the love for the shorter woman is unquestionably fading.
“Arizona. Where is Arizona?”
“Africa. Jeez, did you hit your head or something?” Cristina replies, nonchalantly as she continues her scribbles in the medical file. Growling in intolerance, Callie grabs the file from the Asian woman in frustration, clutching it between her hands as her eyes meets Cristina’s in a firm glare.
“Look, I know she’s here. Teddy told me. And I know that you and Teddy are freakishly conjoined at the hip, which I understand, she’s a cardio God or whatever, and you want to show her that you are godlike too. But that also means that she tells you things which means that you know that Arizona is here and you know where she is. And I think it would be best if you could tell me where she is.” Callie snaps her voice tight with acid and ire. Cristina, however, does not flinch, does not back down, and does not so much as even blink at the threat.
“Maybe you should ask your baby doctor best friend since she’s so good at keeping secrets,” quips Cristina in a heated snap. Callie wrinkles her brow with a confusing shake of her head as she studies the woman before her.
“What are you even talking about?” Callie asks with a dramatic sigh before she lets go of Cristina’s file with a grumbling moan, “why did I even bother? It’s not like you care about anyone but your own damn self anyway. You hated Arizona. You hated the two of us together, thought we were too happy and perky. You certainly aren’t going to tell me where she is. I just… if something happens to her… I need to see her. But I’ll find her on my own. Please. Don’t bother going out of your way to be compassionate.” Barks Callie as she storms past her but Cristina stops her.
“OR Two.” Cristina calls out and Callie stops, turning around to face her friend, “She’s in OR Two. And I swear to God, if you ever embarrass me like that in front of the interns, I think you should remember that I did live with you before McPerky moved in and I do have some secrets that I could divulge that would have you mocked for years!” She shouts after her and Callie shakes her head with a soft smile as tears fill within her eyes.
“T-thank you.” She whispers softly and she only takes the time to watch Cristina nod her head softly before she disappears once again on the chase to find her way back to Arizona.
What feels like an eternity later, she can’t remember how she got there, if she stumbled over her own feet, pushed doctors and nurses out of the way, if she ran like a spaz or if she just mimicked the ever so popular fast walk. However, as soon as Callie Torres bursts through the door of OR Two’s gallery, she feels the impending doom swallowing her heart whole. Before she even sees the surgery, before she even sees Arizona’s face or makes sure this is her love at all, Callie’s knees begin to buckle beneath her and a whole new wave of terror and despair washes over her.
As a surgeon, you are taught to be prepared for the worst, no matter what the situation. You are taught to remain calm and concise, to be able to think clearly and understand the consequences of distraught thoughts and miscalculated actions and words. However, as a human being, when the unknown happens, you are programmed to think the worst case scenario. And that is just what Callie is doing as she staggeringly makes her way toward the glass. She is prepared to see anything. A missing limb, a blown off face, legs amputated, half of her brain exposed through her skull, she’s ready for the worst of the worst. Or, at least, she likes to think that she is.
Yet, the truth of the situation arises itself completely when she looks down into the OR. Lying so lifeless and alone on the table is Arizona, or, at least, what is left of her. Her face, partially covered by the blue cloth, is darkened with soot ad gashes and Derek Shepard is probing deep within her brain. Her body is crumbled, a mess of the sprightliness that Callie once remembered it as being. She does not have to see her face well enough or see the blue eyes or any other distinguishing feature to let her know that it’s Arizona because she can feel it in her heart.
It’s Arizona lying on that table.
Her Arizona.
The woman that she had hoped, prayed, and wished would come back to her. Though, had she known that she would return like this, Callie never would have wished to see her face again.
Callie’s body shakes in tremors as the most heart wrenching, hysterical sob erupts from her lips. Her world spins in quick, fasting swirls as she desperately tries to slow it down with long blinking of her eyes. Her breaths are uneven and are anything but full and deep as she clutches to the scrub fabric over her heart. How could this be happening? How could her entire world be falling apart like this? How could the one thing that she wants more than anything else in the entire world be so close to her and yet so far away?
“Arizona.” Callie wails. She is so focused on what is going on below her that she does not even see Teddy come in behind her. In fact, her attention is completely absorbed by her soulmate and the doctors working on her that is oblivious to the other blonde’s existence at all.
Callie Torres has known pain before, but nothing, in a million years, could ever come close to the heart stopping, mind numbing, waves of anguish that wash over her now. Despite all their hardships, Arizona is and will always be the love her life, the one good thing and true thing that she has. Despite all the crap and the anger and everything else Callie has held toward her for the past seven months, Arizona Robbins still holds every piece of her fragile heart and seeing her so lifeless and vulnerable like this, breaks her completely.
Suddenly, the silence of the operating room is erupted by the blaring of a sound that no-one ever wants to hear. Callie’s eyes snap up from Arizona’s crumbled body to the heart monitor that is now flashing with a long, flat line and instantly, her heart sinks so deep inside of her that Callie almost swears it will never resurface again.
Before she can catch herself, she slams her fist against the Plexiglas, loud and hard and dramatic. So loud, in fact, that the doctors hear it over the wailing of the heart monitor and look up to find her standing there.
“NO! ARIZONA! ARIZONAAAA!” Callie shrieks in a sobbing wail, beating her fist against the window, trying desperately to get a response from the woman, sobbing in a screaming cry of pain, clutching desperately to her own heart that is literally breaking inside of her.
“Damn it, Derek! What happened?!” shouts Addison over the blaring wail of the machine as she glances down at the fresh sheet revealing the baby’s vitals and Arizona’s contractions. She wrinkles her brow as she looks at the vitals with a heavy, deep sigh before she glances back up at the Neuro surgeon who is deep inside of her patient’s brain. The sweat drips from Derek’s face that is now growing pale, his eyes wide with panic and almost terror as he tries to do something, anything, to fix the complication.
“I don’t know. I didn’t do anything! I didn’t even get to clamp yet! She’s got a lot of bleeding! Damn it, damn it, damn it, I knew this was going to happen!” Derek shouts, the professionalism suddenly leaving his voice as he pulls out his probe. Addison shakes her head as she studies the next sheet from the machine before she slowly stands.
“You have five minutes to get her back before I go in and take the baby.” States Addison, sharing a glance with Derek, “come on, Derek. Don’t panic. You can do this. Don’t give up on her just yet.”
“Suction! Damn it, Meredith. Don’t just stand there!” Derek shouts at the smaller woman who practically jumps at the acidy tone that her husband now takes with her. She literally stumbles over herself as she jumps to the rescue with the suction and begins to withdraw some of the blood from the woman’s brain.
“Damn it! Damn it! There’s so much blood. She’s losing too much blood. Come on, Arizona. Don’t do this on me. Don’t you dare die on me and leave Callie to take care of this baby all her own. When my dad died and left my mom to raise me and my sister, she never forgave him for that and we were never a family. You kid deserves a family. Fight. Fight for Callie. Fight for your baby.” Derek demands desperate to find the source of the blood that seems to be multiplying in size with every passing second.
“Derek, I don’t want to take this baby out. It’s too early. We don’t know the affect the crash has on the baby yet. Don’t make me do this.” Addison declares as she takes another sheet of the paper in her hand, her eyes scanning the vitals as her brain tries to formulate a plan. Derek shakes his head softly as he explores the brain, his eyes squinting carefully as he tries to find the damage that seems to be causing the blood. He feels his hands begin to shake beneath him and he almost curses at the fact that his own nerves seem to be getting the best of him, something that has never happened to the skilled surgeon before.
“Grey! More suction!” Derek shouts and Meredith quickly obliges, trying her hardest to get rid of the blood that seems to be enlarging with every second, a sign that all three of the surgeons know not to be a good one. As another sheet of paper falls into Addison’s hands, she shakes her head softly as the nurses put on a pair of gloves for her before she approaches Arizona’s stomach.
“The baby is in distress. I am going to have to deliver. We are going to have to be extra careful with this one, it’s going to be small and we are going to have to rush it to the NICU as soon as possible, does everyone understand?” Addison presses, looking around at the sea of nurses who all nod their heads in agreement. The red haired woman inhales deeply before she looks up in the gallery, her eyes studying her best friend carefully.
“I hope you can forgive me for this.” Addison whispers under her breath before she mumbles a soft prayer to a God she is not so sure that she even believes in; praying that He may give her the strength and skill to do this, praying that Callie could forgive her, but most importantly praying that this baby will live.
--
There is an old saying that ignorance is bliss but Callie never believed in it, she said that she always wanted to know what was going on because she wanted to be prepared, she always wanted to know everything, the good and the bad. Because knowing is better than not knowing.
Even now, with the anguish and torment of watching the love of her life flat line before her very eyes, the thought has not changed. She would much rather know that Arizona is here and dying, than to simply not know that she is in Seattle at all.
The pain is like waves crashing into the shore, each one stronger and more powerful than the last as she gasps lividly to catch her breath, the most god-awful sorrow of sound echoing from somewhere deep inside of her. The tears fall freely, without so much as an effort as the pang of guilt and distress pulls at her heart.
How could this be happening? How could Arizona be lying down there dying and there is not a thing that she can do about it? Why on earth did she come back? No calls, no emails, no anything for months but then suddenly, she is on her way back to see her and the plane goes down? No. No. This cannot be happening, not here, not like this, not when there is so much left that she wants, that she has, to say to her. Arizona needs to hear that she loves her, that she is in love with her, that she never stopped loving her. She needs to hear how she has not moved on, how Callie wants to spend the rest of her life with her, kids or no kids. Arizona has so much life left to live, so much that she has to experience, to see, to feel. No, Callie bawls, she cannot lose her, not before she has even had the chance to be with her.
“C-Callie. Callie.” Teddy stutters, the tears springing from her emerald jades as she shakily reaches out for the other woman. Normally, under any other circumstances, Callie would have pulled away; she would have glared at Teddy and made a grumbling scene about how she does not need her sympathy, especially when she knew about Arizona’s adventure all along. However, this time Callie does not fight her away and gives into the embrace, holding onto the woman tightly as she cries.
“I… I am sorry. I am so sorry.” Teddy whispers softly, gently rubbing small circles into Callie’s back. The raven haired beauty sniffles in a cry, stepping back from the hug, glancing back down at the hysteria in the operating room. Suddenly her motions cease when she finally notices Addison in the room and her brow furies together.
“Wh-what is Addison doing in there?” Callie enquiries, sharing her gaze with the blonde woman beside of her back to the Neonatal surgeon below who seems to be making some sort of demand to her nurses who all scramble to get her what she has asked for. When a few seconds pass without Teddy answering, Callie pushes again, “Teddy.”
“There’s something else.” Teddy begins, staring down at the floor and Callie shakes her head, confused.
“What is it?” Callie asks and when Teddy inhales deeply, Callie can feel her heart plummeting even farther down inside of her, “Come on, Teddy, you have to tell me. It certainly cannot be any worse than this! Arizona is dying; if this can help her then you have to let me know.” Teddy shakes her head with a sniffle as she twists her fingers in her golden mane, tugging hard.
“Arizona’s pregnant.” Teddy sniffles in a whisper and Callie shakes her head with a brief laugh of skepticism. She steps back with the most bewildered look upon her face, quickly glancing down at the operating room before looking back at Teddy who is literally breaking down in front of her.
“What? She’s… she’s pregnant? So, what did she do? Huh?! Did she go to Africa and meet a guy and decide to fuck him?! Is that why she came back? To rub it in my face that she fucked some asshole and now is going to have his baby? God, I cannot believe that she would do that! That’s so hypocritical of her! She’s the one who hated Mark, who cringed when we even so much as hugged and she went to Africa, fucked a man, and is now having his child? How is that even…?” However, Teddy interrupts her with a rather loud and quick snap.
“It is your baby!” Teddy’s voice echoes with desperation and Callie’s head snaps up as she practically shrinks at the news, “When you guys had sex that night… the last time that you tried… it took. Okay? It took. You were the one who made love to Arizona, you were the one who put the sperm inside of her, and you were the one who made this baby. That is your baby, Callie! It’s yours.” And suddenly, Callie’s entire world crumbles around her with that declaration.
Shaking her head in disbelief, she looks down at Addison, watching as she lifts a very tiny and fragile body from Arizona and suddenly it is as if a thousand different strings are tethering her to this one place, this one moment, here and now. It as if the past somehow managed to fade away into nothing and the only thing that has ever mattered is suddenly in Addison’s arms. Suddenly Callie has hope again, purpose, meaning. Suddenly, she feels the tether that binds her here, in this moment, with this child and it is as a feeling that she never in a million years thought she would ever experience. Shaking, her hand presses against the Plexiglas as she stares down at them, her heart leaping into her throat.
That is her baby. Her baby.