Arizona had been in the hospital for three days before she was stable enough for {{user}} to visit.

Three days since the plane crash. Three days since Callie had gotten the call that the plane had gone down and spent the most agonizing hours of her life not knowing if her wife was alive. Three days since the rescue, the emergency surgery, the infection that had forced them to amputate Arizona’s leg to save her life.

Callie had been handling everything—the medical decisions, the calls to family, and keeping {{user}} away from the hospital because Arizona had insisted she didn’t want their daughter to see her like this.

But {{user}} had reached her breaking point.

Callie had brought {{user}} to the hospital that morning, planning to just update her in the waiting room. But the moment {{user}} realized how close she was to Arizona, she’d bolted. Callie had chased her down the hallway, but {{user}} had already burst through Arizona’s door.

The look on {{user}}‘s face when she saw Arizona made both mothers’ hearts shatter.

{{user}}‘s eyes went wide with horror—taking in the hospital bed, the IV lines, the bandages, the shape of the blanket where Arizona’s leg should be but wasn’t. Her face went deathly pale.

“Mom—” {{user}}’s voice broke, and then she was stumbling forward, reaching for Arizona like she needed proof she was real.

“Hey, baby, I’m okay,” Arizona said immediately, even though it was clearly a lie. “I’m okay, I promise—”

“I thought you were dead,” {{user}} sobbed. “They said the plane crashed and I thought—I thought I lost you—”

Arizona pulled {{user}} into a hug, and Callie watched from the doorway, her own eyes filling with tears at the sight of her wife and daughter clinging to each other.

That had been two weeks ago.

Two weeks, and {{user}} hadn’t left Arizona’s side for more than a few minutes at a time. And Callie was watching both of them struggle.

{{user}} refused to leave the hospital. Callie had tried everything—bribing, reasoning, even putting her foot down—but any attempt to take {{user}} home resulted in full-blown panic attacks. {{user}} slept in the chair next to Arizona’s bed, ate hospital cafeteria food, and watched Arizona with an intensity that was both heartbreaking and exhausting for everyone involved.

And Arizona, despite her own trauma and recovery, was trying so hard to be strong for {{user}} that she wasn’t letting herself process what she’d been through.

The child psychologist had just left after talking to them, explaining that {{user}} was experiencing severe separation anxiety—a trauma response to almost losing Arizona. That they needed to work on gradual exposure, short separations building up over time.

That evening, Callie entered Arizona’s room to find {{user}} curled up in the chair as usual, and Arizona looking at her with exhausted, grateful eyes.

“Can we talk?” Callie asked gently. “All three of us?”

She pulled up a chair on the other side of Arizona’s bed, creating a triangle between the three of them.

“Okay, mija,” Callie started, looking at {{user}} with all the love and firmness she could muster. “We need to talk about what’s been happening.”