A/N: This is a three-chapter prequel to Sweet Sixteen. Many people responded and wanted to know how Alex and Arizona ended up where they did. This is the crazy back story that my mind created for them. I know this isn't probably anywhere near what people expected - so I'd really like to hear what you think. I hope you enjoy chapter 1!
Disclaimer: Grey's Anatomy and its characters are owned by ABC and not me.
...
Arizona Robbins was always very diligent about taking care of herself. She ate a healthy diet and worked out regularly. She prided herself in taking care of her body. Her only vices were coffee, doughnuts and the rare cigarette. She had no history of major illness or disease on either side of her family. Both of her parents were in their sixties and still felt like they were in their thirties. Which is why, only two months after her annual physical, Arizona was shocked when she felt a lump in her right breast. Arizona stood under the showerhead and let the water rush over her as she poked and prodded at the new discovery. It felt like a frozen pea and it definitely hadn't been there the last time she gave herself a breast exam. Her feet stood rooted in the shower as she kept going over the lump with her fingers. It wasn't until the water went cold that Arizona broke out of her daze and got out of the shower.
Arizona knew the statistics. She went over them as she made the drive to work. She knew that she had about an eighty percent chance that the lump was nothing but just a lump, but that didn't stop her from freaking out internally. Her shock and sense of fear invaded her mind and caused her to be late for work. Once she got to work, Arizona was booked for back-to-back surgeries all day which helped keep her mind off of the lump but didn't allow her time to go get it checked out. That night, Arizona laid awake in bed all night worrying about what the lump could mean for her.
She was grateful that she had the next day off of work. By the time the sun rose in the morning, Arizona's entire apartment was spotless due to her inability to sleep and her restless mind. As soon as the clock struck nine, Arizona picked up the phone and called her personal physician. The nurse on the other end of the line tried reassuring Arizona that the lump was probably nothing but as a doctor Arizona's mind couldn't rest until she knew for sure.
Two hours after her initial phone call, Arizona was sitting on a cold bed in a sterile treatment room wearing nothing but a paper gown. Her nerves were at an all-time high while she waited for her doctor to come in. As a surgeon who worked in a busy hospital, Arizona understood that doctors were busy but that didn't make the twenty minute wait in the room any easier. The sterileness of the room didn't help matters any either. The room wasn't very inviting. Pictures of female anatomy graced the walls with reminders about yearly check-ups. Arizona missed the bright and warm colors of her pediatric department. Oh how she wished she was at work fixing tiny humans instead of where she was at. When a knock at the door signaled her doctor's arrival, Arizona took a deep breath ready to get the exam over with.
An hour later, Arizona left her doctor's office without any relief from her worries. After a physical exam and ultrasound the doctor was unable to determine if the lump was just a cyst or something more serious. She was being referred to a specialist. A diagnostic mammogram was going to be necessary to get more information. For the rest of the week Arizona was in limbo. Each test she underwent was inconclusive and required more invasive testing. With each test, Arizona's hopes that this lump was just a cyst or a fibroid got smaller and smaller.
Arizona had just scrubbed out of her second surgery of the day when she felt her phone vibrate in her lab coat pocket. One look at the caller id made her stomach drop. She had been waiting for the last two days for the results of the biopsy and the phone ringing in her hand would finally give her the definitive answers she was looking for. As soon as she answered the phone, she knew the answer to her questions. If it had been good news, the nurse would have at least hinted that it was good to ease her worries. Instead, she was just asked to come in to discuss the results.
The biopsy came back positive. She had cancer. As soon as those words came out of her doctor's mouth, Arizona mentally checked out of the conversation. Her head started swimming with thoughts and none of them were good. She couldn't wrap her head around the fact that she had breast cancer. She had done everything she was supposed to do to lessen her risk of cancer. She went green several years ago and refused to use cleaning chemicals and started buying organic. She had even cut down to one pack of cigarettes a year when she used to smoke one a month. She didn't understand how cancer had happened to her. She tried to listen as the doctor discussed further tests she needed to do to determine the severity of the disease and if it was spreading. She tried to listen as the doctor mentioned that breast cancer survival rates were good and that Arizona shouldn't worry. But Arizona was a doctor herself and knew that there was no such thing as a good cancer diagnosis. Having cancer was never a good thing.
Two weeks to the day that she found the lump in her breast, Arizona returned to her newest doctor's office to get her ultimate diagnosis. She never thought that she would be seeing an oncologist as a patient. She did date an oncologist once but that didn't last long as hearing sad cancer stories over dinner wasn't her idea of a good time. And now she had become one of those sad cancer stories.
Stage IIIA invasive breast cancer. That was what the oncologist said when she sat down across from his desk. He pointed to her scans and showed her what he was talking about. Her tumor was three centimeters in diameter and cancer cells were also starting to clump together in her lymph nodes. The oncologist said that while the discovery of cells in the lymph nodes was troubling, that they had still discovered it very early. Arizona failed to see the good news. She didn't understand why doctors liked to refer to what she was dealing with in a positive light. It wasn't good. She had cancer and it was starting to spread.
Once the oncologist finished going over her diagnosis and what it meant it was time to talk about treatment. He went over the various options: lumpectomy, mastectomy, chemotherapy and radiation. More than likely it would be a combination of treatments that would make her cancer-free. The doctor gave Arizona his suggested treatment route but the decision was solely Arizona's to make. There were other things to consider as well. Due to Arizona only being thirty-five years old, there were fertility issues to think about. Chemotherapy had the potential to make her infertile. While Arizona had been against having children most of her life, those thoughts had changed in recent years. There were treatment options that could allow her to freeze her eggs for future use but those options could also speed up the progression of her cancer due to the hormones involved and doing so would also delay her treatment by over a month. Arizona had important decisions to make. The decisions that Arizona had to make would effect her entire future.
...
Arizona had never felt more alone that she did after getting the cancer diagnosis. While Arizona was outgoing and friendly, she was also deeply private. She didn't like sharing her emotions with anyone. She grew up with a military father who often treated her like she was one of his Marines. And Marines weren't allowed to show any emotion. Growing up, she learned not to cry when she was sad or hurt. Crying showed weakness and the Robbins weren't weak people. The Robbins also didn't air their dirty laundry for everyone to know about. Arizona was a great friend and people loved being her friend but it was only her very best friends that got to know the true Arizona Robbins. She would let people know just enough about her to think they knew her but they didn't. The things that made Arizona really tick were secrets that only those closest to her knew.
Since she returned from Africa over a year earlier, Arizona hadn't been able to let anyone back into her life. She kept her relationships on the surface only. She had been too hurt by Callie to let anyone hurt her again. Giving up her dream of Africa for her dream of a life with her girlfriend only to find that her girlfriend was pregnant with her best friend's baby was hard to swallow. Even though they were broken up, Arizona still felt deeply betrayed by Callie and Mark. Arizona never wanted to feel that pain again so she simply didn't let anyone get close to her again. The closest she had come to letting someone in was Teddy but over the past year Teddy had been in her own world with her marrying a patient for insurance, then falling in love for real and finally Henry's death. Arizona's need to keep the walls up around her led her to being diagnosed with cancer and having no one to talk to about it. She wasn't ready to let anyone in on the secret just yet.
Arizona called in sick the next day at work. Technically since she had cancer she was sick. In reality, Arizona's mind was all over the map and she didn't trust herself to operate on tiny humans. She had spent the night doing what she advises the parents of her patients not to do - googling her condition. She discovered she had a fifty-six percent chance of survival after five years. She wasn't an oncologist and didn't know cancer but she had always been hearing about how there were such great improvements in breast cancer treatments happening in the medical world. She thought her survival rate would hover around seventy-five percent, not fifty-five. Fifty-six percent was a harsh reality. There was almost a one in two chance that she wouldn't live to see her fortieth birthday. She also started researching treatment options while she couldn't sleep. She read blogs written by survivors about their choices and treatment paths. She also read blogs that had abruptly ended because the blog author had died. She spent the night alone in the dark with only the light from her laptop illuminating her bedroom. By the time the next day started she had a treatment plan. She had a plan to beat the cancer and still have the future she dreamed about. The next day she walked into the Chief's office and asked for a sabbatical from work.
...
Alex Karev was in the middle of his fifth year of his surgical residency. It was the most important year of his young career. At the end of the year he would have to sit for his board examination. If he didn't pass, his future in pediatric surgery was over. Alex had gotten by in college and medical school by last minute cramming. His ability to learn information in short periods of time was impressive but for the boards it wouldn't work. There was simply too much information to learn and not enough time. If he studied the entire year for the exam he still wouldn't know everything possible. But Alex thought ahead and at the beginning of the year he asked his mentor for help and she said yes. Arizona had spent the last two years grooming Alex for the pediatric surgical fellowship at Seattle Grace-Mercy West and she wasn't about to lose him because of his poor study habits. Arizona made it her mission to help Alex pass his boards. They spent two nights a week studying in Arizona's office. If they both worked the overnight shift and it was a slow night, Arizona would spend the free time quizzing him instead of sleeping. It was all going well until Alex heard rumors that Arizona was leaving the hospital again.
Alex was furious when he heard the rumor that Dr. Robbins had quit. She had already left him once and those were two of the worst months of his residency. He decided that if she was going to leave again, he was going to let her know how he felt about it.
"Were you even going to tell me yourself?" Alex yelled as he walked into her office.
Arizona sat behind her office desk with her mouth gaping open. She didn't know what had gotten into Alex but he knew better than to storm into her office and demand things from her.
"Huh?" Alex demanded again when Arizona didn't say anything. "You're just going to leave me again? Leave the department? What about my boards? You promised me you'd get me to pass!"
Arizona slowly realized that something must have leaked about her sabbatical. She only hoped that the reason for her sabbatical wasn't common knowledge. She told the Chief to tell people that she was taking time off to research. She would tell people the real reason eventually but she wasn't ready for that yet. She wasn't ready to deal with fake sympathy from people that barely knew her. She needed to know what Alex knew.
"First off, stop yelling at me. I'm your superior, Karev," Arizona said firmly. "Secondly, what are you even talking about?"
Alex crossed his arms over his chest as he stood by the chairs opposite the desk, "Yang just told me you quit. You're leaving again."
"Karev -," Arizona tried to interrupt Alex's rant but he wasn't listening to her.
"Why are you leaving this time? Back to Africa? Or can you just not deal with seeing Callie, Sloan and Sofia around? Because I thought you were over that."
Arizona had enough from Alex. He was her subordinate and had no right to talk to her like that, no matter how friendly they had gotten during their study time. "Karev, you need to stop talking before I throw something at you."
At the threat of violence Alex promptly shut his mouth.
Seeing that Alex was going to let her talk, Arizona was ready to try to answer his questions without telling him the real reasons. "I am leaving. But not permanently. I'm taking a sabbatical for research purposes."
"What?" Alex asked. He spent a lot of time with Arizona at work and while studying and she never once mentioned research opportunities.
"I'm not sure how long I'll be gone. At least six months. But you're going to need to find someone else to help get you through your boards. I recommend Callie. She's got great study methods. She got the highest scores in her class on her intern exam and boards."
Arizona saw Alex's face visibly deflate when she mentioned that she was going to be out for at least six months. She just hoped that he wouldn't ask questions. She tried to shift the conversation to his boards as a way to deflect for comments on her sabbatical.
"I don't want Torres. I want you. You know where I'm at and what I need to learn. Not her."
"Alex, there's nothing I can do. I've already accepted this opportunity," Arizona explained.
Alex threw his hands up in the air, "What about the department? Who's taking over this time?"
Arizona cringed. She knew Alex wasn't going to like the answer. "Stark."
"Stark?" Alex yelled. His anger was starting to build again. "That guy ruined peds while you were in Africa."
"I know but he's the only one willing to take a short-term contract. And he's actually a really great surgeon. He's just not a people person."
"What is this research program even about? Why haven't you mentioned it before?" Alex asked again. He was trying to find any way to convince Arizona to stay and he couldn't do that if he didn't know what she was leaving for.
Arizona opened her mouth to speak but was cut off by the sound of both of their pagers going off. With a quick glance to her hip to see that it was an urgent page to the NICU, Arizona grabbed the coat off the back of her chair and got up to leave the room.
Arizona grabbed Alex by the arm and pulled him into the hospital corridor, "I'm not leaving for six weeks, Alex. I'll do all that I can to help you until then. But for now, we've got work to do."
...
Word quickly spread around the hospital about a shouting match between the pediatric dream team in Arizona's office. News of Arizona's sabbatical spread like wildfire and by the end of the day everyone was wondering just what was going on with Arizona.
Alex was in a sour mood the rest of the day. Arizona was one of the only people in the hospital who believed in him from the start. She ignored his gruff exterior and saw the great doctor that he could be. Alex was on call all night and luckily for him it was a slow one. He spent the night on a computer in the research lab. It was his turn to do some googling. He started by googling Arizona's name. If she had been selected to do this research then surely there would be a press release or something about it but nothing came up in the search results. The last hits on Arizona's name tied back to her work with the Carter-Madison grant program. Then he did general searching about pediatric surgery research programs but that came back with too many results to discover anything. He didn't give up his search for information. He spent the next few days asking everyone in the department what was going on with Dr. Robbins but no one knew anything more than the fact that she was given this opportunity and couldn't turn it down.
After having his boss and mentor ignore him for the past several days, Alex had had enough. His desire for answers led him to be knocking on her condo door at eight o'clock on a Wednesday night. He knew that she had the night off of work and as far as he knew she didn't have much of a social life at the moment so she had to be home.
Arizona was surprised to hear someone knocking on her door on a random Wednesday night. Lately the only visitors she received were food delivery guys and she hadn't ordered any food that night. She had been spending her night doing what she had been doing every night since her diagnosis - researching breast cancer treatments online. Upon hearing the knock, Arizona put her laptop on the coffee table and got up to see who it was. She looked through the peep hole and was surprised to see Alex Karev standing on the other side of her door. She wasn't in the mood to deal with him that night so she tiptoed away from the door and hoped that he would go away.
After waiting a minute with no answer Alex knocked on the door again. He waited for an answer. He knew Arizona was home. He spent every Tuesday and Thursday studying with her and she often spoke of her Wednesday nights which were always spent at the gym and then catching up on reality television shows. She had even gotten him hooked on her favorite, Top Chef, and Alex knew that a new episode would be on in an hour so Arizona had to be home to watch it. When Arizona failed to answer the door again, he leaned his ear up against the door to listen for sounds of activity inside. He could hear the faint sounds of music which signaled to him that she was home. Arizona was such a champion of the environment that she'd never leave anything in use if she wasn't using it.
Alex knocked again. "Robbins," Alex called out through the door. "I know you're in there. Just answer the door."
Alex gave Arizona a chance to answer again but she stayed rooted in the kitchen. She didn't dare move for fear of Alex hearing it.
"Robbins!" Alex bellowed even louder. "I will make a scene if you don't open the door."
Arizona sighed. She knew Alex was telling the truth. He had no problem making a scene and she didn't need her neighbors knowing her business. She had no other option but to let him in. Arizona quickly cleaned up the living room that had turned into a cancer research center. She closed her laptop and moved it as well as all of her papers onto the kitchen table.
Wordlessly, Arizona opened the door and gestured for Alex to enter.
"What are you doing here, Karev?" Arizona asked once she shut the door behind him.
Alex stared at her, hoping that his stare would get her to finally tell him the truth. "I want answers."
"I told you already. I'm going to do research."
"I want details. I want to know what is so great that you're leaving again," Alex shoved his hands in his pockets. "Last time you didn't just leave the department and Torres. There were others that needed you too. You left us with Stark once and you can't do that again."
Arizona shook her head sadly, "I don't have a choice, Alex."
"Bullshit. You always have a choice."
Arizona rubbed at her temples. The drugs that she was on to stimulate her ovaries for egg retrieval were causing some of the worst headaches she had ever had and combined with all of the other stresses in her life, Alex yelling at her was just pushing her over the edge. She needed caffeine and pain killers. "I need a drink. You want anything?"
"No," Alex replied curtly and followed Arizona into the kitchen. "I don't want anything from you until you answer my questions," he figured Arizona was just trying to stall him.
Arizona ignored Alex as she opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of wine. Her mind raced as she found the corkscrew in a drawer and started opening the bottle. She needed to figure out what to tell Alex to get him off of her back until she was ready to let people in on her secret.
Arizona didn't need to figure out what to say. When she turned around, Alex was standing at her kitchen table holding up a stack of papers. While Arizona was busy pouring wine, Alex was checking out her kitchen. He had only been to her place once before when she was sick at home and needed Alex to bring her some case files. Alex couldn't help but notice her normally tidy ways weren't so tidy in the kitchen that day. Sitting on the kitchen table was a stack of papers that looked like they had just been thrown there. Being a curious person, Alex couldn't help himself as he moved closer to the kitchen table. He noticed that the papers looked like copies from medical journals. He was honestly just curious about what Arizona was researching. He figured it was probably about a patient they had at work. It wasn't until he had picked them up that he noticed that the top page was an article about breast cancer. Alex quickly wondered why Arizona would be reading about breast cancer. With Arizona's strange behavior and her sudden sabbatical for research Alex knew that there was only one answer. Arizona had cancer.
Arizona's mouth dropped open when she saw Alex holding the papers. She nearly dropped the two glasses of wine she was holding but managed to put them down on the counter before she could make a mess. Alex was also in a daze as he stared at Arizona who was staring at him. He couldn't believe it. He didn't understand why Arizona was lying. Especially to him. He had been through cancer with Izzie. He understood cancer.
"Alex," she started to explain herself.
"You have breast cancer?" Alex asked with a sad look on her face.
The look on his face was exactly why she didn't want people knowing. She didn't want people feeling sorry for her. But Alex knew and that couldn't be undone. She couldn't even be mad at him for snooping because it was her fault for wanting to get a drink which brought them both into the kitchen where she had stashed the paperwork.
Arizona sighed, "I do."
"That's why you're taking a sabbatical?" Alex still couldn't believe it.
"Yes."
Alex needed a drink. Yet another important woman in his life had cancer. Alex grabbed a glass of wine and handed it to Arizona before taking a glass for himself, "Where are you doing treatment?"
Arizona took a long gulp of wine, "Seattle Pres."
"You're going to the enemy?"
Arizona took another gulp of wine, finishing her glass. She went back for the rest of the bottle. "They have the best breast cancer specialist in the area," Arizona explained as she filled her glass and topped off Alex's.
"That sucks," Alex said plainly.
Arizona let out a meek laugh, "Yeah it does."
"I'm sorry," Alex said as he reached out and touched Arizona's forearm. He genuinely cared for Arizona and hated that she was dealing with this.
Arizona just nodded. She seemed to be holding back tears so Alex didn't say anything else. They both stood silently in the kitchen for several minutes as they finished their glasses of wine.
Alex placed his empty glass back on the kitchen counter, "I guess I'll leave you to the rest of your evening then. Sorry for intruding."
"Why don't you stay? Top Chef is on soon and there's only a few people left. It'd be fun to snark on the cheftestants together. It's been a bad day and we could both use it," Arizona suggested. She knew Alex watched the show as they often talked about it during surgeries. With the heaviness of cancer weighing down the mood of the room, she really needed something lighter and watching reality television was great for mindless entertainment.
"You sure?"
"I'm sure," Arizona said picking up the bottle of wine and gesturing for Alex to take his glass into the living room with them.
Over an hour later, Arizona had laughed more in one night than she had in two weeks. She had forgotten that she had cancer and instead got lost in Alex's running commentary about the show. She didn't know that Alex could be that witty. He was great at one-liners. She liked it.
Even though she hated feeling weak around others, Arizona had to admit that she felt relief not keeping her secret to herself anymore.
...
Almost six weeks later, Arizona was finishing up her last day at work. She didn't know how long chemotherapy was going to take but she hoped to be back in six months. Her oncologist estimate four to eight months so she split the middle with six. She hated leaving the department in the hands of Dr. Stark but he was a competent doctor even if he was a crappy human being.
The department threw her a goodbye party but Arizona couldn't enjoy it because she felt like a fraud. After six weeks she was able to keep the real reason for her sabbatical quiet. Only four people knew the truth: Owen Hunt, Alex Karev and her parents. She didn't have to worry about her parents ratting her out since they lived on the other side of the country. Hunt had no reason to gossip about her so she knew he wouldn't tell. And Alex - she trusted Alex too. After she told him that she had cancer, Alex had given her an awkward hug and told her that he wouldn't tell. Since then he hadn't mentioned it once to her.
Alex stood in the corner picking at a piece of cake throughout the party. He had respected Arizona's privacy since he found out about her diagnosis. He didn't know how severe the cancer was but judging on the fact that Arizona was taking a long sabbatical he assumed it wasn't early-stage. He genuinely cared for her and hated to see her going through this. He also hated that she was going through it alone. Alex couldn't believe that she hadn't told anyone. He expected Teddy to at least know but after listening to Teddy gush about Arizona's research prospects for ten minutes over cake he assumed that she had no idea. Alex couldn't take another minute of Arizona pretending to be happy. He knew that she had to be torn up on the inside and watching her fake it was making him sick. Alex threw the rest of his cake in the trash and left the party.
Arizona watched from across the room as Alex left the party. She was sad that he couldn't stay but she realized that he was in a tough position since he knew the truth. So she did what she had to do. She tried to put on a happy face as she mingled with the nurses and doctors who were wishing her the best and telling her that they couldn't wait to see her back. She tried not to think about the egg retrieval surgery she had the next day or the double mastectomy she had scheduled for the day after that. Everyone around her thought she was going off to do prestigious research that would make her famous in the pediatric surgery world and she needed to act like it.
...
Alex was wrapping up his shift for the day when he heard a loud crash coming from inside Arizona's office. Alex worried about Arizona's safety and immediately rushed to see what happened. Alex wasn't the only one who heard the crash. He was joined by several other hospital staff as they slowly opened the door to see what had happened.
Immediately, Alex saw Arizona standing in the middle of a mess. Her desk had been flipped on its' side throwing everything on it and inside of it into a disarray. Arizona was standing in the middle looking like she was teetering between breaking down in tears and throwing her bookshelf on the floor with the desk. Arizona looked up with a glare when she saw she had company.
"Don't you people know how to knock?" she said angrily as everyone stared at her.
Alex whispered in hush tones to everyone else to leave as he entered the room and shut the door behind him. He started picking up random pieces of paper on the ground in front of him.
"Just leave it and go," Arizona told him as she joined him in picking up the mess.
Alex ignored her and kept picking up the papers that were strewn about the office floor.
Arizona stood up and ripped the papers from his hand, "I said leave it and go. You're off shift. Go home. This isn't your mess."
"I'm not leaving," Alex stood his ground. He knew Arizona needed to talk to someone and since he was the only one who knew he was it.
Arizona ignored him and grabbed a strewn stack of files off of the floor and put them on a bookshelf. They continued to work in silence until most of the mess was cleaned up.
"So are you going to tell me what caused you to go all Real Housewives of New Jersey on your desk?" Alex broke the silence as he helped her flip the desk right side up. He noted that it was a solidly built desk. Arizona must have been really upset to have the strength to flip it.
Arizona just laughed, "I'm just having a bad day. Like I don't have enough of them already."
"Is it...," Alex said before lowering his voice like someone was going to over hear them. "The cancer?"
Arizona just continued to laugh. Laughing at her problems seemed like the only way to get through them some days. "No, not exactly. It's about sperm."
Hearing the word sperm had Alex instantly curious. "Sperm?"
"Yeah," Arizona nodded. She wasn't sure why she was sharing this information with Alex but he was the only person she could talk to in Seattle. "Part of the reason why I haven't done treatment yet is because I've been doing ovarian stimulation for egg retrieval. I'm actually having that done tomorrow before the big surgery on Thursday."
"And you picked a crappy sperm donor?" Alex asked wondering what the big problem with sperm could be. Almost every guy had an endless supply of it. To him it was nothing special.
Arizona sighed as she flopped onto her office couch, "No, I picked a great sperm donor. This guy was pretty much everything I wanted. High IQ, athletic, tall and he had a really cute baby picture."
"Then what's the problem?" Alex asked as he sat next to her on the couch.
Arizona ran her hands over her face trying to rub the headache that had taken up permanent residence in her head away, "The stupid lab that received the sperm hires incompetent people is the problem. Some idiot left the lid to the fridge slightly open and now all of the sperm they had in that fridge, my sperm , is destroyed. And all they could offer me was this chemical engineer's sperm." Arizona pulled out a sheet of paper with his profile from her pocket and handed it to Alex, "The guy is a total nerd. I want smart but I also want socially competent. And I can't change the date since you know the eggs are ready."
"That sucks," Alex empathized as he read the sheet of paper.
Alex was able to succinctly sum up her emotions for her. He could be abrasive but he was truthful. "Yeah, it does."
Alex handed the paper back to her, "That dude sounds like a first class dweeb. You are too hot to have dweeby babies."
"It's my only option," Arizona stuffed the paper back in her pocket.
"No, it's not," Alex said.
"Yes, it is," Arizona didn't get what Alex was failing to comprehend. It was simple. The good sperm was ruined and only bad sperm was left.
Alex looked Arizona in the eyes, "Use mine."
Arizona couldn't believe what she was hearing. Alex said it so calmly and so simply like it wasn't a big deal.
"I have lots of sperm," Alex expanded on his thoughts. "I don't need it and you do. You can have it."
Alex went back to laughing, "Alex, it's not that easy."
"Yes, it is. You tell me when and where and I'll do it in a cup. Then, they take it and squirt it into your eggs. Very easy."
Alex was right. Technically and scientifically it was very easy. But Arizona was thinking about the emotional aspect of it. "And what happens when your sperm and my eggs turn into a crying baby? How is that easy?"
"It'd be your baby, Robbins," Alex shrugged his shoulders. "Just because I provided half the DNA doesn't mean anything. I'll sign what I need to sign."
"That easy?"
"Yep," Alex affirmed. "Unless you don't want my sperm. But my sperm is good. And I'm not a dweeb. I'm smart. I was a state champion wrestler. I don't have any baby pictures but I'm sure I was cute. How could I not have been cute to turn out looking this good?"
"I don't know," Arizona said. She was very unsure about this situation. She never wanted to know her baby's father. She liked it being anonymous but using Alex would definitely not be anonymous.
"Look, I've done this before. For Izzie. It's not a big deal."
"But you and Izzie were together at the time," Arizona countered.
"But we aren't now and who knows what she's done with the embryos. I know you'll be a good mom and that's all that I care about for my swimmers," Alex could tell that Arizona needed time to think this over. "I'm just saying that you have another option than that dork. Think about it and if you need me for action tomorrow, call me. I'm not working," Alex said as he stood up from the couch and made his way to leave the office.
Arizona watched Alex leave but didn't say anything as he left. It took a lot to make Arizona Robbins speechless but at that moment she was. She had no idea what to think or what to do. It was going to be a very long night.
...