Callie let Arizona help her make dinner after much protesting. Honestly, Arizona knew that she was terrible in the kitchen but she couldn't bear leaving Callie alone.
"Arizona, you're going to burn the sauce," Callie said.
"Oh," Arizona said, resuming her stirring. "Sorry."
Dinner was hard. Callie knew she had to get Arizona talking, but Arizona couldn't seem to relax. "Eating is still hard," she finally admitted.
Callie nodded, "Just eat as much as you can."
"It's not the actual eating," Arizona said. "It's the feeling like your equal part. I was only gone for a year. I know that. But it felt like so much longer."
"Did you tell Dr. Evans that today?" Callie asked, biting into whatever chicken dish she had managed to throw together from their meager groceries.
Arizona nodded. "Yeah. I...I told him what I told you...and then some other stuff..." She trailed off and sat her silverware down on the table.
"Do you want to tell me?"
"I might need help," Arizona said. "It's hard." Callie nodded and sat her own silverware down. "What...what was the last thing that I told you?"
Calliope made sure to look her in the eye. "That they raped you."
"Did I..." Arizona searched for something to tell her. "Did I tell you that they were going to send me to Taiwan?"
Callie's eyebrows shot up. "No. No you didn't."
"That's where they were going to sell me to. Taiwan. If they got tired of using me."
"Oh," Calliope tried to process this while thinking of something to ask. She knew once Arizona started talking she wouldn't be able to stop for a while. At least, the old Arizona wouldn't. "What happened after they raped you?"
"They left me for a couple of days. Then...Penny came back," Callie said. "She made me..."
"What did she make you do?"
"Suck her." Callie took a breath. Penny and Whitney both had been surgeons. She had trusted Penny. "She...She was nice to me."
"Nice to you?" Callie almost spat.
"She took care of me, she cleaned my wounds. She didn't let Whitney hit me too hard or for too long. When Whitney wasn't there she let me eat with my hands. She made sure I got food." Arizona said each sentence slowly, pausing. "But...She almost killed me."
"How?"
"The night I left the curtain open." Arizona said, shuddering, her memories were overtaking her. She fought to keep talking.
"What did she do?"
"She threw me against the wall," she said. "She called me a - cunt."
"Okay," Callie said, prompting her to more.
As Arizona continued to talk, Callie continued to support Arizona. "She grabbed me by the hair," Arizona said, taking her hair in her hand to demonstrate. Calliope winced. "And dragged me to the back room."
Callie was absolutely sure that she did not want to hear what was coming.
"She threw me into the room like I was a rag doll," Arizona whispered. "She chained me to the table." Arizona slipped out of her chair and knelt on the floor, putting her wrists to the edge of the table. Callie's breaths were shallow. She wanted to run over and pull Arizona up to her feet, but something was keeping her rooted down. She could barely hear Arizona for the blood pounding in her ears. "And then she whipped me."
"Zona."
She shook her hand. "She kept whipping me. My back was being torn apart," she channeled the vivid memories into details for Arizona, keeping herself in the present," I could feel my skin ripping. I could feel the blood running down my back. She just kept going."
"Callie."
"Whitney came in and stopped her. They didn't want me to die. They needed me alive," Callie said, her head resting on the table. "But Penny wasn't done."
"Arizona."
"She began hitting my face, until Whitney made her leave," Arizona said softly.
At this, Callie finally moved. She fell to her knees beside Arizona and took her hands from the table. She closed her hands over her girl's wrists and massaged the callouses there with her thumbs gently. "No one is ever going to hurt you like that again, Arizona."
"They left me there. I thought I was going to die," Arizona looked at her. "I thought I would die without ever seeing you again."
Callie's heart was breaking. "I searched for you. I was on TV all the time, making speeches. Trying to find you. I couldn't believe you were dead."
"I know," Arizona said. "I saw you."
Callie stopped her rant. "What do you mean?"
Arizona looked away. "They made me watch while beating me, telling me to tell you to shut up. Or they would hurt you and they would hurt me."
"Oh Baby," Calliope sighed. "I'm so sorry."
"They didn't hurt you?"
"They threatened me," Calliope admitted. "I had to leave the apartment. I stayed with probably everyone at the hospital. Teddy, Mark, Meredith, my scrub nurses, Cristina, Owen, all for a few days at a time. Your father stayed here."
"Dad?"
"He was here for three weeks, coordinating efforts to save you. We weren't giving up, Zona. We were going to find you. We were not going to rest until we found you. I never gave up on you."
"Where were you when they found me?" Arizona asked, not sure that she wanted to know the answer.
"When I got the call? It was about three am. I was at Joe's. Getting drunk."
Arizona nodded. They were both silent. Callie could not believe everything that had happened to her.
Slowly, Arizona fell into Callie's grasp on the floor.
