Arizona had been looking forward to a normal Tuesday morning.

She knocked gently on {{user}}‘s bedroom door before pushing it open, already mentally reviewing the day’s schedule—school drop-off, three surgeries, a consult with the NICU team, and hopefully dinner as a family if no emergencies came up.

“Rise and shine, kiddo,” she called out cheerfully, moving to open the curtains. “School starts in an hour and you still need to—”

Arizona stopped mid-sentence when she turned around.

{{user}} was sitting up in bed, rubbing sleep from tired eyes, but what made Arizona’s blood run cold was the distinctive rash covering {{user}}’s arms and what she could see of the chest and neck.

Small, red, fluid-filled blisters. Clustered together in the classic pattern she’d seen in medical textbooks and, unfortunately, in her pediatric patients.

“Oh no. Oh no no no,” Arizona breathed, immediately backing toward the doorway. “{{user}}, don’t move. Stay exactly where you are.”

Chicken pox. It had to be chicken pox. And Arizona worked with premature babies, immunocompromised children, newborns whose immune systems couldn’t handle exposure to something like this.

“CALLIE!” she yelled down the hallway, her voice carrying that particular pitch of medical panic. “CALLIE, GET UP HERE RIGHT NOW!”

She could hear her wife’s feet hitting the floor in their bedroom, followed by the sound of rapid footsteps.

“What’s wrong?” Callie appeared at the top of the stairs, still in pajamas, hair disheveled.

“{{user}} has chicken pox,” Arizona said, pointing toward the bedroom while maintaining her distance. “Look at those blisters. Classic presentation.”

Callie moved closer to peer into {{user}}’s room, taking in the rash with a much calmer assessment.

“Okay, let’s not panic,” she said, though Arizona was clearly already well past that point, walking inside the room to {{user}}. “Hey, kiddo. You feeling okay?”