B for Babies

22

"Hold the elevator!" Meredith shouted as soon as she saw the doors start to close. It was hard manoeuvring herself around the hospital in her condition. She was beyond grateful for the comfortable work attire, her scrubs were the only thing she actually enjoyed wearing outside of her home. Her sneakers met with the gap of the door, she let out a tired breath as she shuffled into the elevator, eyes meeting with Arizona's. The blonde offered Meredith a smile as she sank her fists into her coat pockets.

"Morning Dr Robbins," Meredith said in a cheerful tone. It was something she was working on. Alex had kindly pointed out that her mood swings weren't making her any friends. "I wanted to say thank you again, you know for taking care of the kids over the weekend." She started, turning to face her friend and colleague.

Arizona wasn't entirely certain how she was supposed to act. Overhearing a conversation she wasn't supposed to be part of. It had made everything unbelievably uncomfortable for her. She didn't know what to make of it, what Meredith was saying didn't make any sense to her yet at the same time it fit in perfectly with what had happened. When she had first discovered the pregnancy, Meredith laughed in her face at the thought of Alex being the father. She had assumed the shock of it all had made her act that way, but now she knew that wasn't the case. She swallowed thickly as she tried to compose herself. "That's perfectly fine. I had a great time with them, made me miss my daughter though." She said sweetly, fingers wrapping around her cell phone deep into her pocket. She really needed to call Callie, find out when she could visit again, maybe it would be soon, maybe she wouldn't have to awkwardly avoid Alex in the hallways.

Meredith nodded her head. "You should go and see her," she said warmly, reaching across to squeeze the other woman's arm. Arizona pulled away as soon as the door opened. It wasn't her floor, the button she had pressed was still in the queue. "I forgot I have a chart to pick up on this floor. Have a great day Dr Grey." She said quickly, a forced smile on her face as she rushed out into the hallway.

"What's up with her?" Amelia questioned as she stepped inside. She took a sip from her disposable coffee cup and pressed another button. Meredith let out a long sigh, she didn't feel like having a long chat with Derek's sister, but there was no way of escaping.

"I don't know. She had to look after three children for a whole weekend, maybe it's lack of sleep," she commented, giving Amelia a tired response just to pass the time.

As soon as she reached for floor Meredith sped out of the elevator herself, she just needed to get stuck into a case, one that preferably involved a lot of sitting down on her big pregnant ass.

Alex locked the door behind him as he slipped into an on-call room. Meredith sat up on the bed she'd been napping on for the past half an hour. Her morning had included a lot of walking, a lot of talking, and a lot of wearing her feet out. When she finally had time for a lunch break, all she wanted to do was get some sleep. The weekend had taken a lot of energy despite Maggie's intentions for it to be a relaxing getaway. Alex sat down beside her and handed over the tray of food he had grabbed her from the cafeteria.

She let out a groan as she started unscrewing the bottle cap of her water. "Remind me to never have sex again." She said to him. She didn't know if it was due to her being older, or if this pregnancy was just different to her others, but she was definitely feeling the weight of her work affect her more than she ever expected it to.

Alex just chuckled, in all of the years he's known Meredith, she's never been able to give up sex completely, excluding the grieving widow period of course. She wasn't impressed by his reaction and slammed her fist into his bicep to make sure he knew it. "It's not funny, I am serious. Whoever said my uterus was hostile all those years ago, they should look at me now. I bet I could get pregnant just by looking at a naked man." She complained, knowing it was an exaggeration, but not caring because she was allowed to be dramatic when she was growing a tiny human inside of her.

"Why don't you just learn how to use condoms like everybody else?" Alex asked her as he stole one of her cold fries. He had meant to find her something a little healthier, but fries were made from potatoes so he thought it was better than nothing.

"Ha ha, very funny." She was wallowing in her own exhausting misery, and in no shape or form did she need Alex kicking her while she was down. "Have you seen Arizona today? I saw her in the elevator this morning, did I do something?" She asked. It was probably her paranoid baby brain but she wanted to double check regardless of that, just to ease her own mind.

"I don't know, she has this big surgery coming up tomorrow, maybe she's freaking herself out over it." He shrugged. He hadn't seen her all day, it was a big hospital and it wasn't uncommon to go days without seeing some of the people you worked with. He wasn't worried about it. Meredith nodded her head and hummed softly as she closed her mouth. It wasn't something she was going to worry about either. They were surgeons, they saved lives, they had bad days, she hadn't done anything wrong so she had nothing to feel guilt over, or to worry about as far as she was concerned. "You want another one?" She offered, holding out her tray. He shook his head and set the tray down on the floor beside the bunk they were sitting on. "I have to go pick up the kids." He reminded her with a smile, dipping his head to leave a sincere kiss to her cheek. "I'll see you at home later?" He asked, fingers playing with the sleeve of her scrubs. She nodded her head and made a show of waving him off. He was grinning from ear to ear when he left the room.

Arizona was beginning to hate elevators. It was the second time within the space of 24 hours that she was stuck between floors with someone she didn't want to be around. Alex was standing across from her, neither one of them would break the silence. She didn't know how she could speak to him without blurting it all out, she wanted to scream, wanted to tell him that she knew he wasn't the father, that the secret was killing her. This wasn't something she wanted to hold on to, she didn't need to know anything about Meredith's sex life, but when she saw what had unfolded between Alex and Jo when she realised he was protecting his best friend, it just made her stomach squirm and make her feel physically ill. As soon as Alex left her elevator she let out a sigh of relief, she couldn't hold onto something like this it would surely eat her alive.