Fic: I'll follow you into the dark - Chapter 20 + 21
Title: I'll follow you into the darkness
Author: xredSunburstx
Pairing: Callie/Arizona
Rating: T
Summary: A patient’s father can’t accept that his daughter is going to die. Her doctor is Arizona Robbins who is now in hostage to do an operation which should save his daughters life. Will she survive and what is going Callie to do? Reviews appreciated.
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 libellous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Authors Note: I'm sorry I made you cry... I hate it to make you unhappy... but I'm still glad you still read it and like it... There will be another few Chapters! Thank you very much! - McDrama
Chapter 20
I know I can’t say much about life itself because people would say, without remembering, how should I knew what’s wrong and what is right. All my experiences are gone, I know, everything is gone, in a way. But somehow there are feelings emerging in my thoughts and I guess in life there are moments like that.
You can’t explain a feeling and maybe you don’t even ‘know’ it, but it explain itself by guiding your movements and actions.
And I feel lonely, more than I’ve ever felt in those 11 days; but it’s a feeling, a very strong one, I felt before.
It makes me cry uncontrollable; it makes me sod hard, like the place in my chest where she stayed will be destroyed.
I wanted to stay, for sure I wanted to be with her and I guess I even forgave her when I saw her crying, but everything seems so… wrong and I don’t know if I’ll be able to look her in the eyes again. Not now after what I’ve learned in such a hard way: Trust stands in connection with hurt and disappointment.
I just wish she wouldn’t be a part of the learning. I wish she could be the one I’m walking to, crying and freezing on a evening like that, in a night like this, asking for her to take the pain away, sleeping in her arms again.
But instead I just left her behind, I left the apartment and the building where I lived for 11 days and I suppose a lot longer and I realize in a uncomfortable way that where she is I feel safe, like she was the one giving me the things I wanted and needed.
I really thought she would be the one never letting me down.
How naïve I’ve been…
After 20 minutes, just standing in front of the building she lives in, I place myself outside on a bench and I realize it has been the most stupid thing I could have done.
It’s freezing cold and I don’t know where to go, because hey I forgot, I don’t know where I live. But it’s not the only thing.
She’s the reason I regret I left already 2 hours ago and I still can’t stop crying. I feel worse without her than with her.
Sometimes I guess, you can’t control your movements, and so I stand up and walk away from her, without money and without a place to go. Anyplace is better than staying at the same spot forever, looking up to the window of her apartment, thinking about what happened.
I would go back and I would work through this with her, because what I feel for her is strong, oh so strong. But I don’t want to see her cry or hear her explain everything to me, throwing her hands up into the air, waiting for me to look past through it.
But that’s not how it’s working. Life is a strange thing; at most when you are acting like a teenager, feeling like one, not knowing what the best is: following your heart or following your mind and your hurt.
So I start to walk, taking one foot in front of the other like a robot, again not knowing what to do.
I look at the bundle of keys that I kept in my hands the whole time, but I can’t differ one of them.
Where the hell should I stay?
The answer is sticking in my head and I don’t even know how I came to that solution, but I walk further on, but more with feet’s which are not mine. There are following a lead, walking into a direction I’ve seen a lot of the past 11 days because of her and when I’m standing in front of the building I feel safe, somehow.
I enter the hospital without hesitating and walk through the corridors with my small beg as I’ve know where I have to go and that’s it. I worked here and even I don’t really remember I simply do with looking at the walls, the people, typical places I’ve been and suddenly I find myself in front of a door, catching a sign that seems so familiar to me.
On - call room 6.
So I enter the room which smells abstractly. There are so many smells of many people sleeping in here, waiting for another shift to start and somewhere I can smell her. Somehow she’s everywhere I’m going.
I’m looking around in the small room and suddenly tears are streaming down my face and I can’t stop myself from crying out loud in despair. How can life feel like that? Why do I feel helpless like that? Why can’t she be here with me? Why can’t I forget?
I throw myself on one of those beds and I burry my face in one of those pillows. I try to free my mind from everything and I try to blind out the world around me, but I’m captured in a feeling and in a world I don’t want to live. I want to turn back time and remember anything without needing someone else to tell me what happened. I want so many things right now, but nothing is happening around me. It still feels the same and I feel like I’m bursting.
And suddenly the door is opening and I hope it’s her when I look up.
With every inch of my body I want her to be the one who is standing there, who was searching for me and who is trying to convince me that she is the one for me. That she’s sorry, that she wants me back more than anything else.
And I guess… I would forgive her, because all the things I want her to say to me I’d say to her. I’d tell her that she’s the one for me, that I want her more than anything else.
But when I look up I see someone else instead, looking at me concerned.
“Dr. Robbins… I mean… Arizona…”
It’s a small afro American woman in blue clothes and shoulder long dark hair in front of me who looks like she just ended a long shift and I kind of remember her…
“Baileys…” I say with a whisper. She was one of my doctors; she was one of my colleagues.
But there’s more than just being concerned as a doctor or as a colleague in her eyes.
It might sound strange if I’d tell her, but her look reminds me of something really familiar. It reminds me of the look of a mother and even she’s just a few years older than I am I kind of fell a safety when she’s standing there in front of me. A safety a child feels.
(Bailey’s pov)
When I look into her blue eyes which looks just a little brighter and bluer like the depth of the ocean I feel concern rushing through my veins, like when I look at my own son after he had a nightmare and sits crying in his small bed in the night.
I know I never do things like that, because I’m a doctor who tries to avoid personal stuff while I’m working and I also try to avoid personal stuff after work, because I don’t like to be involved in all their romances, affairs, relationships and crisis.
I hate it if they talk to me and I supposed I made it clearly enough I’m not the right to talk to, but somehow there’s a sign printed on my forehead, blinking with neon letters, reading ‘Seattle Grace Talk show host’ on it?
Whatever I hated it through.
And another thing I didn’t like from the beginning was the new head from the ped wing. She was new, kind of a newborn around here, and she was perky all the time. Furthermore she stole Torres mind and also her heart and I had enough drama going on her. I just didn’t like her and I hated working with her, because every case we worked on together we fought over any decision one of us made.
But I think people can proof themselves and opinions can change.
And I realized that she’s not the perky - not caring - person and doctor I thought when I found her after an operation we did on a small 6 years old boy.
It was the first time we didn’t argue and the first time we were sure we both did the same thing and we would save his life. But then he died right under our hands and it was Arizona who kept on fighting. They looked at her with shock and disbelief, because none of them cared like her. Even I stopped because I knew it was too late, she kept on fighting, pleading for him to stay, begging god to let him go, but it was Dr. Sloane who dragged her away from the small boy and she was already crying.
When she rushed out of the OR with blood streamed hands I followed her, because I knew Torres was in the OR and she needed someone.
Usually I didn’t care that lot. Usually I would have told Sloane to follow her or call someone else to check on her. Maybe it was my mother instinct she just freed, maybe it was compassion, I don’t know.
However I followed her in one of the on call rooms and I’ve found her standing in front of the window crying. I said her name twice until she answered.
“He was innocently… Every one of them is… every time I look in their eyes my heart is aching and I ask myself why they have to spend their life, the beginning of their lives, in rooms like this. And why can’t some of them ever leave them?” Her voice was trembling and she was standing there her arms wrapped around her own body like she wanted to protect herself from the pain and the realisation that he is gone and there are other children who will not be able to be saved.
“We can’t answer those questions. We are doctors and we try everything we can to save them. We can’t do anything else.” I replied, even I was hardly satisfied with my own answer. It just doesn’t make sense, but we still have to believe in all of that. In the sense and in destiny.
“You did everything you can…” I said and with that she spun around, raising up her voice. She was furiously like I’ve never seen her before.
“I didn’t do everything I CAN! IF I had done, he would be ALIVE. He would be alive Dr. Bailey… he would be able to play football again like I promised him. We would visit the amusement park at Sunday together like I told him because we would celebrate his release… All I did was making promises I can’t take and now I have to go to his parents and tell them I just killed their son! They will ask me what happened and I’ll tell them exactly what happened. He died under my hands and that’s not acceptable! I KILLED their son… I was the one who killed Jonathan and I AM responsible…”
As doctors and as strong personalities we should we able to get through someone’s death. AS doctors we should concentrate on a case, without getting personally involved.
But I realized that’s who she is and I started to care for her, because of that. No one would believe me when I tell them my secret, but I’m also crying sometimes when someone’s dying. I still can’t stop to care and because of that I understand what she is going through. Because of that I started to like her and I did something I never did.
I took another step into her direction and I wrapped my arms tightly around her.
“You didn’t kill him, because you did all you could… You did all you could…” I said repeatedly and I wait for her to settle down again and there it is a whisper that made my heart ache. It’s the truth, a truth that’s revealing a part of her self.
“It’s never getting better…” She whispered and I could feel how she’s giving in, completely exhausted from all the feelings that came rushing down on her fragile and small body.
And I did something I do with my son each time he had a nightmare; I laid her onto one of those beds and I stood with her as she was falling asleep.
It’s the presence that counts, not what you say or what you do. It’s about letting someone know you will be there if he needs you and you still are there if he wakes up again.
And when she laid there with messy blond curls I stood up, walking to the OR to check if Torres is ready and as I saw her chatting with Sheppard about the operation they just did I walked up to her.
I told her what happened and I lead her to the on call room where she was lying and where she was still crying. And as Calliope entered the almost silent room full of concern, lying down on the bed, wrapping her arms protectively around her girlfriend, being there for her I closed the door with a smile and I felt like a mother who realized her child is now in good hands.
And as I’m looking her into the eyes now, that searching desperately for mine I feel like a mother again and I walk up to her as she starts to cry desperately after I asked a simply, but a wrong, question.
“What are you doing here?”
She answers with a desperation I never heard before coming from her lips
“I don’t know… I really don’t know…”
She cries out loud in despair and there I am, sitting at her side, holding her like a mother would hold her child and I weep her back and forward.
She’s broken and no ones there to fix her.
Chapter 21
(Arizona)
I asked her to drive me home after staying in her arms what felt like hours and what I really like about her that she isn’t speaking a single word.
When I cried my heart out she was there, but she wasn’t saying anything until I settled down again. Then she finally asked if I really want to stay here the whole night and I told her I’d like to leave, but I can’t without knowing where I live.
She offered me a ride and I couldn’t say no. How should I? How could I?
I didn’t want to stay here, not knowing if she was entering the room.
If I see Calliope, I wouldn’t know what to say.
There has been a lot we both said and it’s enough weight pulled on my shoulders on one day. So I nodded and asked her to drive me home.
And even I’m sitting beneath her right now she isn’t saying a word and it feels good to stay in silence for a while, after my sobbing and my cries filled the room were we stayed a long time. I am glad she isn’t asking, but anyhow I’m opening my mouth and words are leaving without asking for permission.
I guess sometimes it’s better to share your feelings with others; even you are not sure how they will take it.
Sometimes it’s necessary to open your mouth and let the words be. I would have exploded without telling her; and somehow she was looking in my direction anyway like she really cares about me and about the things that happened, and so I start to tell her all the things I need to say. Because… because she’s the only one I really have left now.
“We fight…” I simply say and she’s looking at me for a moment. Of course she knows of whom I’m talking. I’m sure she also knows that we were girlfriends. Everyone knows.
And there’s another thing I like about her. She doesn’t ask; she just sits with me in a comfortable silent as she’s guiding her car to the place I live while I collect myself to talk.
“I know it might sound crazy… but… I was falling in love with her… within 11 days she captured my mind completely and there was nothing I could do about. I tried… I really tried to get her out of my mind and keep her away from my heart, but she just captured the sweetest feeling and I just couldn’t stop myself from loving her. Even I thought it was wrong, I finally acted on my feelings, realizing it is the best and the most right thing to do… Follow your heart… and I… I was happy. Super happy. I thought she was developing feelings for me too.”
When I’m speaking I laugh bitterly at the thought of me being that naïve and Dr. Bailey is still listening, her eyes though never leaving the road.
“Then I found out that she was lying to me the whole time… WE were girlfriends… we spent our lives together in a way and she wasn’t telling me a single thing… I just feel betrayed and I can’t shake the feeling of her acting like that… I feel like I can’t trust her and even I try to forget and forgive her I can’t… I just can’t forget what she did when I was almost going insane because I couldn’t remember anything… It feels like she was holding the knife that is sticking now in my heart… I don’t know if I can look her in the eyes ever again… Without remembering it’s too hard to take and bear the thought of… her and me… before… that happened…”
“Just so you know… I don’t do personal things, and as soon as you’re going to remember and running back to her think of that. I DON’T do personal things…” She says in a strong voice and she puts all the emphasis in it she has left in her small body. As soon as those words left her mouth I feel guilty of telling her all those things without thinking of crossing a line. But then her voice is suddenly soft and clear as she’s speaking further on.
“One thing I do know about Dr. Torres, beneath all the dirty little details and that she surprised me a lot lately is that she’s in love with you. One thing I know about her is, that she has never acted around someone like that like she’s doing it with you… I know her a long time now and I saw her going through one crisis after the other and breaking up or being left by people the past few years. I saw her crying and breaking down in the elevator and I never thought she would be able to love someone a long time, because she was broken. You see, there is one thing I DO know about her, and the thing is that you changed her. When you two got together I first thought there would be another crisis coming up soon. But you two proved that there’s love outside there and everyone knows that. It’s something special. A love that not bends in the wind and survives the storm, and believe me a love like this isn’t just going to be over or fading away. She loves you and she made a mistake, BECAUSE she loves you. You should listen your heart. Do the right thing… before it’s too late…”
I can see an expression in her eyes as she stops the car and as she’s looking me into the eyes, like she knows how it is to lose love and I nod grateful.
But there’s still something inside of me I need to get clear with, but I also realize that I want to work through this.
I… I want her… But I don’t know if I can fight for it. I don’t know if I can do the things I want. If I’m strong enough to forget when I’m feeling lost, not knowing and vulnerable like this. I can’t, even if I want.
I thank her with my entire heart for everything and I smile underneath before I leave the car with the bag around my shoulders and the keys in my hands.
It’s time to be a part of my old life again, I tell myself as she’s leaving the place and I’m on my own again.
(Callie)
2 painful days has passed.
2 days in which I cried more than in a year.
I know that 2 days has passed, because the sun is coming up for the third time now, rising slowly in front of my window.
All I did those three days was lying in my bed, hugging the pillow she slept with tightly and I’m not letting it go. Instead I’m burying my whole face in it and I smell it. I take a smell and another one, again and again, for 2 days and 3 nights now, because it still smells like her. Even the bed sheets still smell like our love making and when I’m closing my eyes I feel her hands on my hips and her breathe on my shoulders.
But I know as soon as I’m opening my eyes she’ll be gone again and so I stay in the same spot for hours, dreaming of her and the thing I destroyed.
I first stood up each time after I jolted awake because of the nightmares she was involved, after I heard her words and saw the pain in her eyes again in front of my inner eyes. Each time that happens I’m running to the bathroom pulling some fresh water into my hot and tears streamed face.
Afterwards I’m crawling back under the sheets again without eating and drinking.
I always thought it is pure stupidity when people are not eating because they are love sick. But now I understand all of them.
I can’t eat and I can’t drink, because all I think of is her and when I’m thinking of her I feel sick and my stomach is hurting badly like the butterflies are dying right there, sending a sorrowful and painful stroke through my veins, punishing me for the things that happened. And it’s there right to do so.
I think about staying here forever, looking out of the windows, knowing when a new day is starting, counting the hours since she left.
I just don’t feel worth enough doing something else. I live automatically, I follow my normal needs, but living is something else.
And suddenly the door is opening and I jolt up in my bed, but as soon as I hear the steps I let myself fall down again.
I hoped it would be her coming back to me, but it’s not the way she’s walking, not as bouncy like it and if it’s her she would call out for me in a sweet or concerned way. But there’s nothing like that. Instead the door is opening, lighting up the room more than I wanted it and there’s his voice interrupting my thoughts.
“Callie?” I don’t look up to see the concern in his eyes. Of course he is worried after I avoided calling him for 2 days now. Of course he is worried, because his best friend is staying in a bed, with the same clothes on for days, drowning in her own caused pain.
“What do you want here, Mark?” I murmur annoyed.
I want to be left alone, because I don’t deserve anything else…
(Arizona)
When I first entered my apartment two days ago I felt strange being her all alone, walking around looking at the pictures at the wall, presenting me strangers, hoping I would remember. It’s strange to stay in a place you don’t feel home and I’m surprised that her home is feeling more home to me than my own and I realize it’s because of her…
After all everything is fitting me very well. There are things every where around I like and it’s just perfect. But there are things I just don’t use.
As I’m entering the bathroom to shower there’s the first proof that I didn’t live her alone. Taking one of the shampoos which are standing on the shelve in my hands I’m taking a smell before I use it and it smells exactly like her hair and when I’m closing my eyes I can see her, feel her, smell her right in front of me, beneath me, right at my side. And it’s killing me in a bittersweet way.
After I’m ready showering and drying my hair afterwards I place myself in front of the TV and I zap around, but there’s nothing I can keep my attention on. Instead it’s her body I’m searching for with my hands. I try to find her body, lying next to mine as I’m making myself comfortable on the couch. But I’m all alone here, left in an apartment I’ve first entered two days ago.
And suddenly the phone is ringing at 20 o clock in the evening and I shriek. What should I do? I don’t know, but I can’t just let it ring and so I take the call, simply answering the phone with a “Yes?”
“Oh god! I’m so happy I’ve finally reached you! I’ve already tried 3 days ago, because I was worried, because of you! You promised you would call me back after you were called in because of an emergency!” A voice starts to ramble and it’s hard for me to listen, but it’s harder to recognize the one who is talking to me.
I’m ashamed of myself, because the woman on the other line seems to know me very well, but I… I don’t know her.
“Who are you?” I ask and then there’s a very uncomfortable silence at the other line.
“Ari, hon… Am I talking to you?” There’s the voice again I should recognize. I should, but I can’t.
“I… I am sorry… I guess you are talking to Arizona you think you know… and I’m still the same… in a way… I know it’s super complicated now, but… I guess I’m not the same…”
I’m stuttering nervously and then there’s silence.
And then the explanation starts...
Author: xredSunburstx
Pairing: Callie/Arizona
Rating: T
Summary: A patient’s father can’t accept that his daughter is going to die. Her doctor is Arizona Robbins who is now in hostage to do an operation which should save his daughters life. Will she survive and what is going Callie to do? Reviews appreciated.
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 libellous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Authors Note: I'm sorry I made you cry... I hate it to make you unhappy... but I'm still glad you still read it and like it... There will be another few Chapters! Thank you very much! - McDrama
Chapter 20
I know I can’t say much about life itself because people would say, without remembering, how should I knew what’s wrong and what is right. All my experiences are gone, I know, everything is gone, in a way. But somehow there are feelings emerging in my thoughts and I guess in life there are moments like that.
You can’t explain a feeling and maybe you don’t even ‘know’ it, but it explain itself by guiding your movements and actions.
And I feel lonely, more than I’ve ever felt in those 11 days; but it’s a feeling, a very strong one, I felt before.
It makes me cry uncontrollable; it makes me sod hard, like the place in my chest where she stayed will be destroyed.
I wanted to stay, for sure I wanted to be with her and I guess I even forgave her when I saw her crying, but everything seems so… wrong and I don’t know if I’ll be able to look her in the eyes again. Not now after what I’ve learned in such a hard way: Trust stands in connection with hurt and disappointment.
I just wish she wouldn’t be a part of the learning. I wish she could be the one I’m walking to, crying and freezing on a evening like that, in a night like this, asking for her to take the pain away, sleeping in her arms again.
But instead I just left her behind, I left the apartment and the building where I lived for 11 days and I suppose a lot longer and I realize in a uncomfortable way that where she is I feel safe, like she was the one giving me the things I wanted and needed.
I really thought she would be the one never letting me down.
How naïve I’ve been…
After 20 minutes, just standing in front of the building she lives in, I place myself outside on a bench and I realize it has been the most stupid thing I could have done.
It’s freezing cold and I don’t know where to go, because hey I forgot, I don’t know where I live. But it’s not the only thing.
She’s the reason I regret I left already 2 hours ago and I still can’t stop crying. I feel worse without her than with her.
Sometimes I guess, you can’t control your movements, and so I stand up and walk away from her, without money and without a place to go. Anyplace is better than staying at the same spot forever, looking up to the window of her apartment, thinking about what happened.
I would go back and I would work through this with her, because what I feel for her is strong, oh so strong. But I don’t want to see her cry or hear her explain everything to me, throwing her hands up into the air, waiting for me to look past through it.
But that’s not how it’s working. Life is a strange thing; at most when you are acting like a teenager, feeling like one, not knowing what the best is: following your heart or following your mind and your hurt.
So I start to walk, taking one foot in front of the other like a robot, again not knowing what to do.
I look at the bundle of keys that I kept in my hands the whole time, but I can’t differ one of them.
Where the hell should I stay?
The answer is sticking in my head and I don’t even know how I came to that solution, but I walk further on, but more with feet’s which are not mine. There are following a lead, walking into a direction I’ve seen a lot of the past 11 days because of her and when I’m standing in front of the building I feel safe, somehow.
I enter the hospital without hesitating and walk through the corridors with my small beg as I’ve know where I have to go and that’s it. I worked here and even I don’t really remember I simply do with looking at the walls, the people, typical places I’ve been and suddenly I find myself in front of a door, catching a sign that seems so familiar to me.
On - call room 6.
So I enter the room which smells abstractly. There are so many smells of many people sleeping in here, waiting for another shift to start and somewhere I can smell her. Somehow she’s everywhere I’m going.
I’m looking around in the small room and suddenly tears are streaming down my face and I can’t stop myself from crying out loud in despair. How can life feel like that? Why do I feel helpless like that? Why can’t she be here with me? Why can’t I forget?
I throw myself on one of those beds and I burry my face in one of those pillows. I try to free my mind from everything and I try to blind out the world around me, but I’m captured in a feeling and in a world I don’t want to live. I want to turn back time and remember anything without needing someone else to tell me what happened. I want so many things right now, but nothing is happening around me. It still feels the same and I feel like I’m bursting.
And suddenly the door is opening and I hope it’s her when I look up.
With every inch of my body I want her to be the one who is standing there, who was searching for me and who is trying to convince me that she is the one for me. That she’s sorry, that she wants me back more than anything else.
And I guess… I would forgive her, because all the things I want her to say to me I’d say to her. I’d tell her that she’s the one for me, that I want her more than anything else.
But when I look up I see someone else instead, looking at me concerned.
“Dr. Robbins… I mean… Arizona…”
It’s a small afro American woman in blue clothes and shoulder long dark hair in front of me who looks like she just ended a long shift and I kind of remember her…
“Baileys…” I say with a whisper. She was one of my doctors; she was one of my colleagues.
But there’s more than just being concerned as a doctor or as a colleague in her eyes.
It might sound strange if I’d tell her, but her look reminds me of something really familiar. It reminds me of the look of a mother and even she’s just a few years older than I am I kind of fell a safety when she’s standing there in front of me. A safety a child feels.
(Bailey’s pov)
When I look into her blue eyes which looks just a little brighter and bluer like the depth of the ocean I feel concern rushing through my veins, like when I look at my own son after he had a nightmare and sits crying in his small bed in the night.
I know I never do things like that, because I’m a doctor who tries to avoid personal stuff while I’m working and I also try to avoid personal stuff after work, because I don’t like to be involved in all their romances, affairs, relationships and crisis.
I hate it if they talk to me and I supposed I made it clearly enough I’m not the right to talk to, but somehow there’s a sign printed on my forehead, blinking with neon letters, reading ‘Seattle Grace Talk show host’ on it?
Whatever I hated it through.
And another thing I didn’t like from the beginning was the new head from the ped wing. She was new, kind of a newborn around here, and she was perky all the time. Furthermore she stole Torres mind and also her heart and I had enough drama going on her. I just didn’t like her and I hated working with her, because every case we worked on together we fought over any decision one of us made.
But I think people can proof themselves and opinions can change.
And I realized that she’s not the perky - not caring - person and doctor I thought when I found her after an operation we did on a small 6 years old boy.
It was the first time we didn’t argue and the first time we were sure we both did the same thing and we would save his life. But then he died right under our hands and it was Arizona who kept on fighting. They looked at her with shock and disbelief, because none of them cared like her. Even I stopped because I knew it was too late, she kept on fighting, pleading for him to stay, begging god to let him go, but it was Dr. Sloane who dragged her away from the small boy and she was already crying.
When she rushed out of the OR with blood streamed hands I followed her, because I knew Torres was in the OR and she needed someone.
Usually I didn’t care that lot. Usually I would have told Sloane to follow her or call someone else to check on her. Maybe it was my mother instinct she just freed, maybe it was compassion, I don’t know.
However I followed her in one of the on call rooms and I’ve found her standing in front of the window crying. I said her name twice until she answered.
“He was innocently… Every one of them is… every time I look in their eyes my heart is aching and I ask myself why they have to spend their life, the beginning of their lives, in rooms like this. And why can’t some of them ever leave them?” Her voice was trembling and she was standing there her arms wrapped around her own body like she wanted to protect herself from the pain and the realisation that he is gone and there are other children who will not be able to be saved.
“We can’t answer those questions. We are doctors and we try everything we can to save them. We can’t do anything else.” I replied, even I was hardly satisfied with my own answer. It just doesn’t make sense, but we still have to believe in all of that. In the sense and in destiny.
“You did everything you can…” I said and with that she spun around, raising up her voice. She was furiously like I’ve never seen her before.
“I didn’t do everything I CAN! IF I had done, he would be ALIVE. He would be alive Dr. Bailey… he would be able to play football again like I promised him. We would visit the amusement park at Sunday together like I told him because we would celebrate his release… All I did was making promises I can’t take and now I have to go to his parents and tell them I just killed their son! They will ask me what happened and I’ll tell them exactly what happened. He died under my hands and that’s not acceptable! I KILLED their son… I was the one who killed Jonathan and I AM responsible…”
As doctors and as strong personalities we should we able to get through someone’s death. AS doctors we should concentrate on a case, without getting personally involved.
But I realized that’s who she is and I started to care for her, because of that. No one would believe me when I tell them my secret, but I’m also crying sometimes when someone’s dying. I still can’t stop to care and because of that I understand what she is going through. Because of that I started to like her and I did something I never did.
I took another step into her direction and I wrapped my arms tightly around her.
“You didn’t kill him, because you did all you could… You did all you could…” I said repeatedly and I wait for her to settle down again and there it is a whisper that made my heart ache. It’s the truth, a truth that’s revealing a part of her self.
“It’s never getting better…” She whispered and I could feel how she’s giving in, completely exhausted from all the feelings that came rushing down on her fragile and small body.
And I did something I do with my son each time he had a nightmare; I laid her onto one of those beds and I stood with her as she was falling asleep.
It’s the presence that counts, not what you say or what you do. It’s about letting someone know you will be there if he needs you and you still are there if he wakes up again.
And when she laid there with messy blond curls I stood up, walking to the OR to check if Torres is ready and as I saw her chatting with Sheppard about the operation they just did I walked up to her.
I told her what happened and I lead her to the on call room where she was lying and where she was still crying. And as Calliope entered the almost silent room full of concern, lying down on the bed, wrapping her arms protectively around her girlfriend, being there for her I closed the door with a smile and I felt like a mother who realized her child is now in good hands.
And as I’m looking her into the eyes now, that searching desperately for mine I feel like a mother again and I walk up to her as she starts to cry desperately after I asked a simply, but a wrong, question.
“What are you doing here?”
She answers with a desperation I never heard before coming from her lips
“I don’t know… I really don’t know…”
She cries out loud in despair and there I am, sitting at her side, holding her like a mother would hold her child and I weep her back and forward.
She’s broken and no ones there to fix her.
Chapter 21
(Arizona)
I asked her to drive me home after staying in her arms what felt like hours and what I really like about her that she isn’t speaking a single word.
When I cried my heart out she was there, but she wasn’t saying anything until I settled down again. Then she finally asked if I really want to stay here the whole night and I told her I’d like to leave, but I can’t without knowing where I live.
She offered me a ride and I couldn’t say no. How should I? How could I?
I didn’t want to stay here, not knowing if she was entering the room.
If I see Calliope, I wouldn’t know what to say.
There has been a lot we both said and it’s enough weight pulled on my shoulders on one day. So I nodded and asked her to drive me home.
And even I’m sitting beneath her right now she isn’t saying a word and it feels good to stay in silence for a while, after my sobbing and my cries filled the room were we stayed a long time. I am glad she isn’t asking, but anyhow I’m opening my mouth and words are leaving without asking for permission.
I guess sometimes it’s better to share your feelings with others; even you are not sure how they will take it.
Sometimes it’s necessary to open your mouth and let the words be. I would have exploded without telling her; and somehow she was looking in my direction anyway like she really cares about me and about the things that happened, and so I start to tell her all the things I need to say. Because… because she’s the only one I really have left now.
“We fight…” I simply say and she’s looking at me for a moment. Of course she knows of whom I’m talking. I’m sure she also knows that we were girlfriends. Everyone knows.
And there’s another thing I like about her. She doesn’t ask; she just sits with me in a comfortable silent as she’s guiding her car to the place I live while I collect myself to talk.
“I know it might sound crazy… but… I was falling in love with her… within 11 days she captured my mind completely and there was nothing I could do about. I tried… I really tried to get her out of my mind and keep her away from my heart, but she just captured the sweetest feeling and I just couldn’t stop myself from loving her. Even I thought it was wrong, I finally acted on my feelings, realizing it is the best and the most right thing to do… Follow your heart… and I… I was happy. Super happy. I thought she was developing feelings for me too.”
When I’m speaking I laugh bitterly at the thought of me being that naïve and Dr. Bailey is still listening, her eyes though never leaving the road.
“Then I found out that she was lying to me the whole time… WE were girlfriends… we spent our lives together in a way and she wasn’t telling me a single thing… I just feel betrayed and I can’t shake the feeling of her acting like that… I feel like I can’t trust her and even I try to forget and forgive her I can’t… I just can’t forget what she did when I was almost going insane because I couldn’t remember anything… It feels like she was holding the knife that is sticking now in my heart… I don’t know if I can look her in the eyes ever again… Without remembering it’s too hard to take and bear the thought of… her and me… before… that happened…”
“Just so you know… I don’t do personal things, and as soon as you’re going to remember and running back to her think of that. I DON’T do personal things…” She says in a strong voice and she puts all the emphasis in it she has left in her small body. As soon as those words left her mouth I feel guilty of telling her all those things without thinking of crossing a line. But then her voice is suddenly soft and clear as she’s speaking further on.
“One thing I do know about Dr. Torres, beneath all the dirty little details and that she surprised me a lot lately is that she’s in love with you. One thing I know about her is, that she has never acted around someone like that like she’s doing it with you… I know her a long time now and I saw her going through one crisis after the other and breaking up or being left by people the past few years. I saw her crying and breaking down in the elevator and I never thought she would be able to love someone a long time, because she was broken. You see, there is one thing I DO know about her, and the thing is that you changed her. When you two got together I first thought there would be another crisis coming up soon. But you two proved that there’s love outside there and everyone knows that. It’s something special. A love that not bends in the wind and survives the storm, and believe me a love like this isn’t just going to be over or fading away. She loves you and she made a mistake, BECAUSE she loves you. You should listen your heart. Do the right thing… before it’s too late…”
I can see an expression in her eyes as she stops the car and as she’s looking me into the eyes, like she knows how it is to lose love and I nod grateful.
But there’s still something inside of me I need to get clear with, but I also realize that I want to work through this.
I… I want her… But I don’t know if I can fight for it. I don’t know if I can do the things I want. If I’m strong enough to forget when I’m feeling lost, not knowing and vulnerable like this. I can’t, even if I want.
I thank her with my entire heart for everything and I smile underneath before I leave the car with the bag around my shoulders and the keys in my hands.
It’s time to be a part of my old life again, I tell myself as she’s leaving the place and I’m on my own again.
(Callie)
2 painful days has passed.
2 days in which I cried more than in a year.
I know that 2 days has passed, because the sun is coming up for the third time now, rising slowly in front of my window.
All I did those three days was lying in my bed, hugging the pillow she slept with tightly and I’m not letting it go. Instead I’m burying my whole face in it and I smell it. I take a smell and another one, again and again, for 2 days and 3 nights now, because it still smells like her. Even the bed sheets still smell like our love making and when I’m closing my eyes I feel her hands on my hips and her breathe on my shoulders.
But I know as soon as I’m opening my eyes she’ll be gone again and so I stay in the same spot for hours, dreaming of her and the thing I destroyed.
I first stood up each time after I jolted awake because of the nightmares she was involved, after I heard her words and saw the pain in her eyes again in front of my inner eyes. Each time that happens I’m running to the bathroom pulling some fresh water into my hot and tears streamed face.
Afterwards I’m crawling back under the sheets again without eating and drinking.
I always thought it is pure stupidity when people are not eating because they are love sick. But now I understand all of them.
I can’t eat and I can’t drink, because all I think of is her and when I’m thinking of her I feel sick and my stomach is hurting badly like the butterflies are dying right there, sending a sorrowful and painful stroke through my veins, punishing me for the things that happened. And it’s there right to do so.
I think about staying here forever, looking out of the windows, knowing when a new day is starting, counting the hours since she left.
I just don’t feel worth enough doing something else. I live automatically, I follow my normal needs, but living is something else.
And suddenly the door is opening and I jolt up in my bed, but as soon as I hear the steps I let myself fall down again.
I hoped it would be her coming back to me, but it’s not the way she’s walking, not as bouncy like it and if it’s her she would call out for me in a sweet or concerned way. But there’s nothing like that. Instead the door is opening, lighting up the room more than I wanted it and there’s his voice interrupting my thoughts.
“Callie?” I don’t look up to see the concern in his eyes. Of course he is worried after I avoided calling him for 2 days now. Of course he is worried, because his best friend is staying in a bed, with the same clothes on for days, drowning in her own caused pain.
“What do you want here, Mark?” I murmur annoyed.
I want to be left alone, because I don’t deserve anything else…
(Arizona)
When I first entered my apartment two days ago I felt strange being her all alone, walking around looking at the pictures at the wall, presenting me strangers, hoping I would remember. It’s strange to stay in a place you don’t feel home and I’m surprised that her home is feeling more home to me than my own and I realize it’s because of her…
After all everything is fitting me very well. There are things every where around I like and it’s just perfect. But there are things I just don’t use.
As I’m entering the bathroom to shower there’s the first proof that I didn’t live her alone. Taking one of the shampoos which are standing on the shelve in my hands I’m taking a smell before I use it and it smells exactly like her hair and when I’m closing my eyes I can see her, feel her, smell her right in front of me, beneath me, right at my side. And it’s killing me in a bittersweet way.
After I’m ready showering and drying my hair afterwards I place myself in front of the TV and I zap around, but there’s nothing I can keep my attention on. Instead it’s her body I’m searching for with my hands. I try to find her body, lying next to mine as I’m making myself comfortable on the couch. But I’m all alone here, left in an apartment I’ve first entered two days ago.
And suddenly the phone is ringing at 20 o clock in the evening and I shriek. What should I do? I don’t know, but I can’t just let it ring and so I take the call, simply answering the phone with a “Yes?”
“Oh god! I’m so happy I’ve finally reached you! I’ve already tried 3 days ago, because I was worried, because of you! You promised you would call me back after you were called in because of an emergency!” A voice starts to ramble and it’s hard for me to listen, but it’s harder to recognize the one who is talking to me.
I’m ashamed of myself, because the woman on the other line seems to know me very well, but I… I don’t know her.
“Who are you?” I ask and then there’s a very uncomfortable silence at the other line.
“Ari, hon… Am I talking to you?” There’s the voice again I should recognize. I should, but I can’t.
“I… I am sorry… I guess you are talking to Arizona you think you know… and I’m still the same… in a way… I know it’s super complicated now, but… I guess I’m not the same…”
I’m stuttering nervously and then there’s silence.
And then the explanation starts...