Epilogue

Title: Finding – Epilogue

Author: wbelisabeth

Rating: NC-17 (For chapter 7, the rest is pretty much PG-13)

Summary: Things don't just disappear. Inanimate objects. People. Feelings. Pink Elephants. Nothing truly disappears. Not when you want it to.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the copyrighted materials referenced in this fic. I am not making any money out of this it's just for fun. References to any real people, places events etc... are done so in a fictional context only.

Thank you to everyone who has reviewed over the last two weeks. I know I promised EPIC, but I also wanted to finish before the episode today, so... I had to compromise a little. I hope you enjoyed it.

ARIZONA's POV

I drop the phone like it is red hot, like it has burnt my fingers. It hasn't burnt my hand but it has scarred me. I stand in the same spot, looking down our hallway that our children have always filled, now with the both off at College, the emptiness fits.

It's bizarre, but I am not totally surprised.

I remember back to the day that Daniel was born.

I looked down into his eyes and I didn't understand. I didn't understand how my very own eyes can look back at me. I didn't understand how I didn't want him, how I wished him away, how I wished that Calliope was not pregnant. I didn't understand how I couldn't see teaching him about cars, teaching him to how to hit a home run, teaching him about being a gentleman.

I didn't understand that in that moment, with a few blinks from the tiny baby how I could love something so much. He was half Calliope, how could I not fall for him instantly?

But now… I didn't know they were looking and I'm not sure if it's that that hurts me or the other news, but I am hurt just the same.

But how did I not know… of did I already know?

When Daniel was 4 and a half we were outside having a barbeque and Calliope and Daniel were messing around. He ran from her and yelled "Come catch me Mom" as he ran to the tire swing he loved so much. Both Calliope and I stiffened. I had a sense of déjà vu, it wasn't until later that Calliope confessed the same later. She'd seen it before and it was actually what made her decide she was doing the right thing.

Sarah and Daniel were always as thick as thieves. I was happy to have convinced my wife that our children should share the same genes. I guess the fights we had then now make today much more worth it. I have never been so happy to not have given in.

I remember that day when I cursed children, I cursed them for being things that I didn't want. I listed items which I have been able to tick off one by one, and now I can put a final tick on the list. I have never once heard a lie cross the lips of my children. We taught them that even if it was something we didn't like it was better to tell us than not. Admittedly there were times when little white lies came and went, but an out and out lie about something this big, I had not heard cross their lips until today. Or rather I heard their lie, but I was just made aware of it today.

They had said that they didn't want to know. That it was irrelevant. But now? They went by Torres, but it doesn't make it any less obvious, not to me. It's their right to know, but I just wish they hadn't lied about it.

This is a mess, a big weird mess. I feel I should wake up from my dream any second now, with Calliope rubbing my back, telling me that it was just a dream. I remain still. I am still in shock.

But am I really?

The scrapes, the traits, the way he does the uppity thing with his mouth and the way her mind works. It's always been familiar. But how? I mean there was no way of me even conceiving this idea in my head the sheer implausibility of it. This is just so far fetched, but I can't help but think that maybe, on some small level, I did know.

I should be happy. I guess. I should be feeling more connected, but I don't feel much of anything right now, all the different emotions are cancelling each other out.

"Arizona? Are you ok?" She looks at me with those brown eyes and she still takes my breath away, even after 23 years and two kids, her voice is still enough calm me instantly.

She needs to know. I have to tell her.

So I start at the beginning.

"Am I speaking to Arizona Robbins?"

"Yes, may I ask who is calling?"

"My name is Leon Patterson I'm calling from the California Fertility Clinic. This is rather awkward, and I don't really have a precedence to work with this, so… Ma'am, are you aware that your brother Captain Daniel Robbins used our cryo-bank for storage?"

I blink. Several times.

"No. I was not."

"In 2004 he participated in a program we had for Servicemen. In 2009, when his five year storage plan ran out, we tried to contact your brother. We obviously could not contact him and were led to your parents. They allowed for the sperm to be added to our donations and they elected to be the point of contact. Now I understand this may be difficult, because you may not be aware, but your brother's donation has resulted in two children. They are now both looking to meet their father, obviously that is not possible. Now as I say, we do not have a precedence for this, but if you feel able to meet them, or perhaps to get into contact with them-"

"What are their names?"

Before I was even told, I knew. But I listened anyway.

"Daniel and Sarah Torres. They are brother and sister, aged 21 and 18…"

They gone behind our back they were blatantly hiding what they were doing.

My next thought fill me with horror as I remember Calliope was trying to convince me to have my own brother's baby. The thought makes me sick to the stomach. How did this not come up? I know it had already been organized and she was just… but… I shake the thought from my head. Not wanting to dwell on that idea.

The moment I saw Daniel I knew his eyes were my own. I thought God had granted me a miracle. Maybe this was the miracle?

"Uh Ma'am?"

And that's about all I could take and I proceeded to drop the phone.

I look over at her, after finishing the story and she is clearly shocked by my revelation.

"Huh."

"You've said that 7 times already Cal."

"I'm just shocked."

"Yeah."

"I can't believe they lied to us about it. I mean, we offered to help them. We said we wanted them to know."

"That's what you're shocked about?"

"Well, I am shocked that your brother is the father of our children." She leans forward in her chair and rubs her face with both hands, a sign I've learnt over the years, means she's more upset about something than she is saying. But I know she's upset. This whole situation is just so unsettling. "I bet you feel vindicated about the whole 'let's keep their biological parents the same' thing… which, I'm not sure about you, but I'm feeling kind of queasy about what I was trying to convince you to do."

I look over at her and give her a smile, letting her know that thought had already crossed my mind.

"As my brothers only living relative, I should contact them. As their mother, I'm thinking the silent treatment."

Calliope laughs at me, knowing full well that it was always a threat I couldn't deliver. The kids both knew how to capitalize on their dimples, particularly Sarah since she had the deadly combination of Calliope's eyes AND dimples. I always struggled to be a disciplinarian, or even to stay mad at them for more than a few minutes. The whole 'Spanish Mama' Ortho surgeon thing was definitely scarier than a Peds surgeon who makes believe and pretends about fairy dust.

"We'll just sit them down and tell them together. Then I will yell at them for the lying."

Calliope paces back and forward talking to herself in Spanish, in front of the couch, which our son and daughter happen to be sitting on.

I watch their faces as they get more and more terrified. It's the purpose of the Spanish rant. She tried to teach both of them the language and Sarah seemed to pick it up a little better than Daniel did, but neither could really be described anywhere near fluent.

Suddenly she stops pacing. She stops talking and she just moves in front of them.

"You are both adults. You are both entitled to make your own decisions. But I expect better than to be blatantly lied to about your decisions. Your mother and I, we understand that sometimes the truth isn't always what we may want to hear, but we would prefer it to being lied to by the people we most love in this world."

Daniel immediately straightens, willing to defend his sister. Calliope just lifts her hand and motions for him to stop.

"That being said, you wanted to know who your biological father is and I can understand that. You have to understand that I had an option. I could have elected to choose an anonymous donor. I could have decided that you wouldn't know, but I decided that you should have the opportunity, so when you tell me that you want to know where your DNA come from, I will be fine with it."

The both look at her with the same deer in headlight expression we seemed to have mastered in the months leading up to Daniel birth.

"So are you going to tell me?"

"We, uh… how did you know?"

"Are you going tell me and your mother?" I can feel her anger rising.

"We just – we know that you say it's ok, but I didn't really think it would be ok." Daniel stands so that he on an even playing field to his mother. His eyes meet Calliope's. He then looks at his feet. "I'm sorry. It was my idea. We – I – was curious."

Then silence.

I tried not to, I really did, but I can't help but laugh. Not just giggle but all out belly rumble type laugh. I've seen this scene before. I was the one sitting next to my brother watching him confess how it was his idea to play baseball and he hit the home run and he suggested we retrieve the ball and how he suggested we tried the fruit. I've seen this before. I look over at Sarah and I know immediately what she's feeling and, it makes me laugh harder.

Calliope looks over at me and raises an eyebrow. I get up from my own seat and stand side by side with my wife. I really look at my son for the first time since finding out and I look over at my daughter. It doesn't make me feel any different about them.

I still feel the same as I did when Daniel took his first steps, or when Sarah said her first word.

I look over to her and smile.

"Danny used to always defend me just like Daniel just did. And judging by the look on Sarah's face, she feels the same way I used to." I'm not sure if it's the way we bought him up or a direct link to my brother, but either way there is still a smile plastered on my face. I look between them and sigh, no use in putting this off. I look at Calliope and she grabs my hand. "Sit down Daniel." I try to say as reassuringly as I can. He does and I sit back down across from them this time with my wife by my side.

"Ok, so… I don't need to tell you about your biological father or donor or however you want to put it." I look at them and they have blank faces. "I don't need to tell you because you already know all about him."

Calliope's confused face that I adore so much appears on both of my children and it brings a smile to my face.

"We recently found out that your Uncle Danny decided to store some sperm in a storage facility in California, and that upon his death, my parents nominated it to be added to the database and be used as an identity release donor, as my brother had elected in his paperwork. A couple of months later your Mom picked him from a database. So it turns out that he is where you get your dimples from."

They blink in unison. I watch them as they look at each other. They look at Calliope and me.

"Huh." Daniel utters in such a way that makes me laugh, for as much as I can see myself and I guess now, my brother in my two kids, sometimes they are all Calliope. And I love my wife. I really do. I have never regretted marrying her, not even for a moment. The very minute it was announced that Washington State would adopt Same Sex marriage I planned on proposing to her. Even before it was announced I had it planned all out, I thought of everything. Except one thing. I didn't plan that Calliope would beat me too it. Our children were shipped off to their Uncle Mark and Aunt Addison's house and she made very good use of the spa bath, welcoming me with candles and champagne and nakedness, which I have to say, was SUPER to come home to. While it was a given that I would say yes, she pulled out all stops. My favorite flowers, my favorite music, my favorite meal, and of course my favorite woman, she made me feel so loved and it was a night from heaven. Then she asked.

"I know you are going to say yes to me."

I looked at her incredulously. She couldn't be thinking that she was going to get out of this so easy.

"I know you are going to say yes to me, and yet I am here, giving you all this attention and love, but you and me we don't need this stuff. We don't need champagne and flowers and candles and the music, we don't need it. But I want to give you everything I can, I want to spend my life giving you everything, because I want to see you smile everyday, and I want to see your eyes light up everyday, and I want to feel your skin under my fingers everyday. I know we've signed papers that we are domestic partners and all that, but being able to call you my wife...well very little in this world can top that. While I know I don't have to ask… I love you and you have shown me time and time again how much you love me, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you, loving you. Will you marry me?"

At first I was half-tempted to say no, as a joke. But when I realized I couldn't talk, I just nodded.

It didn't take us long to arrange. We didn't want it to be the event of the century, just our small group of friends and our families. We just wanted to be married so badly, that it wasn't about what we were wearing or how big the cake was, it was about being able to commit to the love of my life like everyone else.

Our honeymoon, now that – that was well worth the four year wait. Almost as much as waiting to hear Calliope say 'I do'.

Derek and Meredith, who had, for some reason married fairly abruptly before Daniel was born, decided to volunteer to look after the two kids for two weeks. I insisted that it was a bad idea, but they refused to listen. An almost 4 year old and a six month old was probably the best and worst introduction to parenting they could get. I found Meredith crying in the women's toilets two weeks later. She had found out she was pregnant and horrified at what she had got herself into.

I suppose it was probably best that I found her and not Calliope, Calliope would have told her that motherhood was absolutely fantastic and she would have a million kids if she could and all that. That's my wife, she was born to be a mother and born knowing she was going to be a mother, she just has this way, but I knew what Meredith felt like. I had stood there looking into the future and completely unsure of what lay ahead. And I leapt and was blessed with two beautiful children, who are now sitting in front of me.

"It doesn't change anything does it?"

I look at Daniel and shake my head no.

"Huh."

This time it is Calliope who laughs.

"OK, so what did you learn from today?" Calliope's motherly patronizing tone comes to play.

They look at her and roll their eyes.

"Look, you two maybe adults now, but I am still your mother, now… what did you learn from this?"

"To be honest."

"Good. Now go running or catch-up with your friends or something." Once they leave the room she looks over at me and ask if I am alright. I shrug. It doesn't change anything. It doesn't make my children any different to before and it doesn't bring my brother back either.

"You did a really good job of finding a male me."

"Apparently." She wraps her arms around me tightly and nuzzles her nose into my neck, her breath hitting my neck.

"Are you ok with this?"

"It doesn't change anything. We've had 21 years not knowing and as great as it is to know that they are genetically linked to you, if they weren't it would be ok. I got that little boy I had in my dreams who says words like super and awesome, and his genetics didn't teach him how to say super and awesome, his mother did." She pauses and breathes me in. I love this woman so much. "Are you ok with this?"

"When Daniel was born, I looked into his eyes and I saw my own. When Sarah was 10 and we gave her that rubix cube and she did it in 10 minutes, I saw my brother. I'm conflicted because I'm shocked, but I also feel like I already knew. You are right though, it doesn't change anything."

"Because they are still who you raised them to be Arizona, no matter their DNA says, they have always been yours, so that is why it doesn't change anything, because you were already all in."

She kisses my jaw and I turn to look her in the eye.

We had done drama's before and got through them, but this just seemed like a blip on the radar. We were all still healthy, we were all still happy and I was in the arms of the woman I loved.