A/N: Wrote this when I couldn't sleep from chronic pain, so if any of it sounds nuts, thats why LOL. hope you enjoy it anyway ❤️
The slight shudder in the mattress wasn't what drew Callie out of sleep so much as the suffocating heat of her skin under the thick down comforter. Her whole body was burning up and she could feel the beginnings of sweat on her scalp. It was the first time in a while she'd woken up in the middle of the night because of it, before it got to the point of creating a puddle on the sheet beneath her.
Her scalp was always where it started, though. Her thick, curly hair was one of many parts she loved about how she looked, but this was, by far, its least sexy quality, no matter what Arizona had to say about it after a long night.
She slid her feet carefully out from under the duvet for some quick relief, but ended up kicking it off of her entirely in her need for a quick escape from her absurd internal temperature. The cool air was an immediate balm, like she had stepped straight out into the winter air, and she felt herself start to equalize.
Her eyes peeked open into the pitch dark to check the alarm clock on the bedside table.
2:43am
She flung her arm out blindly beside her to lay the back of her hand on her wife, who was curled on her side facing the opposite edge of the bed, legs tucked up to her chest, and shivering ever so slightly.
Callie ran hot. She always had, which was an absolute nightmare in Miami, where the heat came with its own damp, no sweat necessary, although it was no less inevitable. She never had issues when the Seattle winters cooled her apartment down, and often even that cold wasn't enough to keep her self-made heat at bay.
She was the kind of sleeper to kick the blanket off the bed and wake up drenched in sweat anyway. It was like hell was founded inside her and only reared its ugly head when she let her guard down.
For Arizona, even the comforter couldn't always hold off the chill. She couldn't figure out if it was some kind of anemic thing, genetics, or some kind of generational curse from an evil ice witch. Ever since she was young, she had just run cold, for whatever reason. Maybe it was just a side effect of being relatively active; she was mostly lean muscle, so she didn't hold much heat unless she was laid out in the summer sun.
She used to have an electric heating pad to sleep on when she was living alone, but it was too hot for Callie even from the other side of the bed, so she had gotten rid of it in favor of extra blankets just for her.
This winter night was especially cool in their bedroom. No amount of extra blankets could warm her. The heater must not have been working right, either, because Callie couldn't hear any fan blowing, and it was always blowing in the last few weeks, which had been cold beyond all explanation. She would have to call the landlord and give him a piece of her mind for making her wife sleep in these conditions.
No one kept Arizona up in the middle of the night except Callie. And her little patients, she supposed. And maybe some other important people, probably. Semantics.
"Honey?"
The shaking stopped for a second. "Hmm?" a sleepy voice came in reply.
"You're cold."
"Mmm… M'fine, Calliope." Arizona flipped onto her stomach, turning to face Callie with her usual sleeping pout and reaching a hand out to land on her chest.
It was like ice when it hit Callie's bare skin, offering immediate relief to her overheated body. She grabbed the limp hand and used it like her own special cold pack, holding it to the side of her neck and sighing at the break from the choking fire that burst from her every pore.
"Come here, polar bear."
Callie pulled Arizona by her wrist, looping her arm under the half-sleeping body and letting her hand dip under her wife's t-shirt, sending a decidedly temperature-unrelated shiver down her spine at the feeling of taut abs. She pulled Arizona in by her waist until she was halfway on top of Callie, blonde head now curled into her shoulder, gasping at how cool her skin was. A groan fell out of her mouth as she savored the release from her burning prison.
Already she could feel herself cooling down more than she already had in the air alone, her perfect icicle molding to her body and slowing her breathing.
Arizona lifted her leg to wrap it around Callie's thigh and found a warmth there that reached down into her bones and drew the cold out of her with every exhale. The soft tan skin was like a radiator, and she searched out every exposed inch in her desire for more of that warmth. She slipped a hand in Callie's shirt, and exhaled deeply at how hot her chest and stomach were against her palm. Arizona's other arm dug under her neck, forcing her wife to lift her head and move her dark hair. Her thumb dragged back and forth along the smooth skin of Callie's sternum, soothed deeper into her slumber by the rise and fall of the chest under her hand.
Callie combed the hair out of Arizona's closed eyes.
"Better?"
Arizona smiled and pressed a kiss to the warm skin of her favorite heated blanket.
"Better."