Beau

Jack Abbott looked like he would rather be intubating someone in a supply closet during a power outage than standing in the ballroom of the Philadelphia Grand Hotel wearing a name badge.

That was your first thought. Your second thought was that he looked unfairly good for a man who had spent the last twenty minutes silently judging an entire conference hall.

He stood beside one of the tall cocktail tables near the back of the room, one hand wrapped around a paper cup of coffee he had not actually drunk from, his conference lanyard hanging crooked against the front of his dark sweater. He had taken off his blazer sometime between the trauma systems panel and the keynote address on "Innovative Compassion in High-Pressure Emergency Environments," which was a title Jack had heard once and immediately decided was a personal attack.

The ballroom was too warm. Too bright. Too full of physicians pretending they had never once eaten a vending machine granola bar over a trash can at three in the morning.

There were banners everywhere. There were sponsored pens. There was a man from Boston wearing a bow tie and explaining airway management like he had personally invented oxygen.

Jack had been quiet for most of it. Not polite quiet. Jack quiet. The kind of quiet that made residents straighten their backs and consultants reconsider their tone. The kind of quiet that looked harmless from across the room right up until someone said something stupid near it.

You had watched three people attempt to make small talk with him already. The first had asked what hospital he was representing. Jack had said, "UPMC Mercy." The second had asked if Pittsburgh had "much trauma volume."

Jack had stared at him for one full second too long before saying, "Enough." The third had smiled too brightly and said, "I always think emergency medicine is really about resilience."

Jack had said, "It's mostly about staffing." You had nearly choked on your coffee. Now he was standing beside you at the back of the room, radiating the particular kind of irritation that came from being professionally trapped.

"You know," you said, keeping your voice low as the speaker at the front of the ballroom advanced to another slide full of stock photos and bullet points, "some people enjoy conferences."

Jack did not look at you. "Those people need hobbies." "You're a doctor. You're at an emergency medicine conference. This is technically one of your hobbies." "No," he said. "This is Robby losing a bet and somehow making it my problem."

You turned your head, smiling into your coffee. "He made you come?" "He strongly suggested." "That sounds like Robby." "He used the phrase 'good for department visibility.'"

"Oh, no." Jack finally glanced at you. There was nothing overtly warm in his expression, exactly. Jack did not really do overt. His face was all sharp restraint and tired intelligence, mouth set like he was holding back three separate complaints and a legal disclaimer.

But his eyes shifted when they landed on you. Only slightly. Enough that you felt it. Enough that you hated that you felt it. "You laughing at my suffering?" he asked. "Yes."

"Good to know." "I'm enjoying your commitment to misery." "I commit to things." "You do," you said, before you could stop yourself. It came out softer than you meant it to.

Not flirtatious, not exactly. But too honest for a ballroom full of laminated schedules and sponsored tote bags. Jack looked at you for half a second longer than necessary.

There it was again. That pause. That tiny, dangerous bit of space that kept opening between you lately. At work, you could usually avoid it. The ED was useful that way. There was always something screaming, bleeding, crashing, coding, ringing, paging, demanding. There was always a monitor alarm or a consult call or someone yelling for a blanket warmer key.

There was no room for pauses in the ED. There was no time to notice that Jack brought you coffee when he made some for himself. No time to wonder why he always seemed to appear when a patient's family member started getting aggressive near your workstation.

No time to think about the way his voice changed when he said your name instead of your title. No time to think about his hand at your back when he moved behind you in a crowded trauma bay, not touching exactly, but close enough that you felt the heat of it through your scrubs.

No time for any of that. Here, unfortunately, there was nothing but time. Time and bad coffee. Time and Jack standing too close beside you because the back of the ballroom was crowded and neither of you had moved away.

On stage, the speaker clicked to the next slide. COMPASSION FATIGUE: RECOGNIZING THE WARNING SIGNS. Jack made a sound low in his throat. You looked over. "Don't." "I didn't say anything."

"You made a noise." "A clinical noise." "A judgmental noise." "Same system." You pressed your lips together to keep from smiling too obviously. The woman seated in front of you turned halfway in her chair and gave you both a tight look.

Jack stared back with no change in expression whatsoever. The woman turned around again. "You're going to get us kicked out," you whispered. "From this?" "That would be a shame."

"Would it?" You tried to look stern. "We are representing the hospital." "We're standing in the back drinking burnt coffee while a man named Brent tells a room full of emergency physicians to try mindfulness."

"His name is Brett." "I don't care." You lost the fight with your smile then. Jack saw it. Of course he saw it. Jack noticed everything he had no business noticing. His gaze flicked to your mouth, barely there and gone so quickly you could have convinced yourself you imagined it.

Except you had stopped giving yourself that much credit. You had been imagining things with Jack Abbott for months. Or maybe you had not been imagining them at all. That was the problem.

The speaker's microphone crackled. Somewhere near the middle of the room, someone coughed. Outside the tall ballroom windows, snow pressed thickly against the glass, turning the city beyond it into a blur of white and grey.

It had started that morning as a pretty dusting. The kind of snow people from conference registration desks called seasonal atmosphere. By lunch, it had become an inconvenience.

By three, it was an advisory. Now, at almost five in the evening, it was beginning to look like a problem. You checked your phone under the edge of the cocktail table. Three weather alerts. Two emails from the airline. One text from Dana.

DANA: Heard Philly's getting buried. Tell Abbott not to pick a fight with cardiology. You snorted. Jack's eyes shifted down. "What?" "Nothing." "You laughed." "Dana says hi."

"She does not." "She said to tell you not to pick a fight with cardiology." Jack's expression did not change. "Cardiology started it." "You haven't even seen cardiology today."

"That you know of." You sent Dana a quick reply. YOU: Too late. He's fighting the concept of conferences as a whole. Dana responded almost immediately. DANA: Sounds right. Bring him back alive. Or don't. I'm flexible.

You tucked your phone away, still smiling. Jack watched you do it. "What did she say?" "Nothing." "You're a bad liar." "You're nosy." "I'm observant." "You're nosy with a medical degree."

"That's the profession." That pulled another laugh out of you, quiet but real. Jack's mouth moved like he was trying very hard not to let his own expression change. He failed, just slightly.

It was not a smile, not by normal standards. But for Jack Abbott, it was practically fireworks. You looked away first. You had to. The thing about Jack was that he made stillness feel loud. You could handle him in motion. In the ED, with his hands gloved and his voice clipped and his body angled toward disaster, he made sense. He was built for crisis. He was decisive, sharp, controlled. He moved through chaos like he had made some private agreement with it years ago.

But stillness made him harder to manage. Stillness let you notice the tired lines at the corners of his eyes. The scarred steadiness of him. The careful way he shifted his weight after standing too long. The fact that his left hand had settled near his hip, thumb brushing absently over the edge of his pocket.

Stillness let you remember that under all that competence was a person who got tired. A person who hurt. A person who, for reasons you were trying very hard not to interrogate, had started keeping track of whether you ate during twelve-hour shifts.

You looked down into your coffee. It had gone cold. "You okay?" Jack asked. It was so quiet you almost missed it under the speaker's voice. You glanced up. "What?" He was not looking at the stage anymore.

"You went quiet." "I'm listening." "No, you're not." "You don't know that." "What was the last slide?" You opened your mouth. Closed it. Jack raised his eyebrows. You sighed. "Fine. I wasn't listening."

"Good choice." "I'm okay," you said, because you understood then that the question had not really been about the presentation. Jack held your gaze. There were days when that look irritated you. The steady, unblinking attention of it. Like he could read your pulse without touching your wrist. Like he saw whatever you were trying to tuck out of view and simply decided whether or not he was going to let you get away with it.

Today, it did not irritate you. Today, it made something behind your ribs go a little unsteady. "Long day," you added. His expression softened by a degree. For anyone else, it would have been nothing.

For Jack, it was practically a hand offered. "Yeah," he said. You both looked back toward the stage. The speaker had moved on to a case study about physician burnout that somehow included a clip-art image of a candle.

Jack stared at it. "You've got to be kidding me," he muttered. You coughed into your cup to cover the laugh. The woman in front of you turned around again. This time, she looked only at Jack.

Jack looked back. You gently touched his sleeve. It was instinctive. Barely a touch. Your fingers against the dark fabric at his forearm for one second, maybe less. "Behave," you murmured.

Jack's eyes dropped to where your hand had been. You pulled it back too quickly. Too obviously. Heat climbed up your neck, which was ridiculous. You worked in emergency medicine. You had held pressure on arterial bleeds. You had told surgeons where to stand. You had been vomited on by strangers and once had to explain to a grown man that shampoo bottles did not belong there, no matter what the internet said.

You should have been able to touch Jack Abbott's sleeve without forgetting how breathing worked. Jack said nothing. That was almost worse. The room clapped suddenly, polite and scattered. The session was ending.

Chairs scraped. People stood. Voices swelled all at once, filling the ballroom with that post-lecture noise of professional relief. Lanyards swung. Tote bags rustled. Someone near the doors started talking loudly about dinner reservations.

You stepped back from the cocktail table, grateful for the movement. "Well," you said, "that was very informative." Jack looked at you. You managed to keep a straight face for two seconds.

"Okay, no. It was terrible." "Thank you." "But we survived." He glanced toward the windows. The snow was falling harder now, fast and thick under the streetlights outside. It moved sideways in violent gusts, smearing white across the glass. People were beginning to cluster near the lobby entrance, phones out, faces lit with the blue glow of cancellation alerts.

Jack's jaw tightened. "What?" you asked. "Storm's worse." You followed his gaze. "It was supposed to slow down." "It didn't." "You secretly a meteorologist too?" "No. I have eyes."

You rolled yours, but you checked your phone again. Another airline email. Your stomach dropped. FLIGHT CANCELLED: PHILADELPHIA TO PITTSBURGH. "Oh," you said. Jack looked over immediately. "Cancelled?"

"Yeah." He did not ask to see your phone. He just read your face. His mouth flattened. You refreshed the app pointlessly, because apparently denial had a user interface. "All flights tonight?" he asked.

"Looks like mine, at least." You tapped through the airline page. "The app says earliest rebook is tomorrow afternoon, but that's assuming the airport opens properly." Jack pulled his own phone out.

He did not look surprised by whatever he found. "Mine's cancelled too." "Great." "Roads?" You opened the weather alert. The words hazardous travel, whiteout conditions, and avoid unnecessary trips were not especially comforting.

"Also great," you said. Jack slid his phone back into his pocket. "We stay another night." You looked toward the lobby, where a line was already forming at the front desk.

"Everyone is going to try to stay another night." "Then we get there before the orthopedic surgeons." You laughed despite yourself. Jack started walking.

You followed him out of the ballroom and into the broad hotel corridor. The conference had spilled everywhere now — doctors and nurses and vendors in branded fleeces, everyone talking too loudly over everyone else. The lights overhead were warm and expensive. The carpet was patterned in a way that made you suspect someone had been paid too much money to make beige feel important.

At the far end of the hall, the lobby opened wide and bright, all marble floors and high ceilings and enormous windows looking out onto a city disappearing under snow. The front desk line was already fifteen people deep.

Jack stopped. You nearly bumped into him. He glanced over his shoulder. "You checked out this morning?" "Yeah. My room was only booked through today because my flight was supposed to be tonight."

"Conference block?" "Full. I tried earlier when the delays started." His face shifted. Not much. But you saw the calculation begin. "No," you said immediately. "I haven't said anything."

"You're about to." "You don't know that." "I know your face." That made him pause. Something flickered in his eyes. Amusement, maybe. Or something warmer pretending to be amusement.

"You know my face?" "I know your about-to-be-stubborn face." "That's just my face." "No, your regular face is more quietly judgmental." He gave you a dry look. You smiled sweetly.

The line at the front desk moved one person forward and somehow became more chaotic. A woman in a navy pantsuit was telling the receptionist that she was a keynote speaker and therefore needed a room. A man behind her was arguing with someone on speakerphone. Near the windows, two residents were sitting on their suitcases, looking exhausted.

Jack's attention moved over the lobby once, quick and assessing. Then he looked back at you. "You can take my room." You crossed your arms. "There it is." "It's a room." "It's your room."

"You need one." "So do you." "I can figure it out." You gave him a look. He gave you one back. The trouble with Jack was that he did not posture. He did not make generous offers with softness around the edges. He did not say things to be gallant. He simply looked at a problem, decided on the cleanest solution, and expected everyone else to fall into line.

Which was irritating. Because sometimes the cleanest solution involved him being quietly self-sacrificial in a way that made you want to shake him. "You are not sleeping in the lobby," you said.

"Neither are you." "Jack." His name came out sharper than you intended. He noticed. Of course he noticed. His expression eased by a fraction, but his voice stayed even. "I'm not arguing about this in a hotel lobby."

"Then stop being wrong in one." His eyes narrowed. Not angry. Almost amused. Almost. "You always this difficult?" he asked. "With you? Yes." "Lucky me." "You bring it out in me."

Jack held your gaze for one beat too long. The noise of the lobby seemed to pull back for a second. Around you, people were still moving. Suitcases rolled over marble. Phones rang. The automatic doors slid open and let in a blast of cold air sharp enough to make someone curse.

But Jack was looking at you, and you were looking back, and there was that pause again. That impossible little pause. The one neither of you ever knew what to do with. Then the front desk clerk called, "Next guest, please," and the spell cracked.

Jack stepped toward the desk. You caught his sleeve again. This time, you did not pull away immediately. "Don't give up your room," you said, quieter now. His gaze dropped to your hand.

Then back to your face. "Don't sleep in a lobby," he said. "That's not an answer." "It is if you listen." You let go of his sleeve. He moved to the desk before you could argue again.

You stood beside him, close enough that your shoulders nearly touched, and watched as he gave his name to the exhausted-looking receptionist. "Abbott," he said. "I have a room for tonight. Need to extend it."

The receptionist typed quickly, her face already apologetic in the way customer service workers got when the computer was about to ruin someone's day. "I'm so sorry, Doctor Abbott. We're completely sold out for tomorrow night at this point. The storm has stranded most of the conference guests."

Jack's expression did not change. "Existing reservation," he said. "Room 1117." "I understand, sir. But all rooms are currently booked. If housekeeping confirms no-shows or cancellations, we can add you to the waitlist."

You leaned in slightly. "What about my reservation? I checked out this morning, but with the flight cancellations—" The receptionist looked at you with genuine sympathy. "I'm sorry. We don't have anything available."

Jack looked at her. "Anything." "I'm afraid not." "A cot?" "No cots left." "Conference room?" "Sir—" "Not for me," he said, impatient now. "For her." Your stomach did something stupid.

The receptionist glanced between the two of you. A tiny, knowing sort of understanding moved across her face. You hated her a little. "I'm sorry," she said again. "We really don't have a safe accommodation option outside of existing rooms. The city has issued travel warnings, so we're advising all guests not to leave the property unless absolutely necessary."

Jack went still. You could almost see him biting back a response. You touched his arm again, this time with warning. "Jack." His jaw worked once. Then he looked at the receptionist. "Keep the room under my name."

"Of course." "And if anything else opens, call up." "Yes, Doctor Abbott." He gave a short nod and stepped away from the desk. You followed him toward the edge of the lobby, away from the worst of the noise.

"No," you said. Jack turned. "You don't know what I'm going to say." "You're going to say I should take your room and you'll do something ridiculous like sleep sitting upright by the vending machines."

"I wasn't going to specify vending machines." "Jack." "What?" "No." He exhaled through his nose. Outside, the wind threw snow hard against the windows. Somewhere overhead, the lights flickered once, just enough for half the lobby to pause and look up.

When they steadied again, Jack's face had changed. Not softened. Settled. Like something in him had made a decision and locked the door behind it. "You're not going anywhere tonight," he said.

"Neither are you." "No." "No?" "No," he repeated. "We're not doing the noble idiot routine." You blinked. "That was directed at you, right?" His mouth twitched. Barely. "Both of us."

"Oh, progress." "We share the room." The words landed between you with the subtlety of a dropped instrument tray. You stared at him. Jack, infuriatingly, looked completely calm.

"We what?" "We share the room," he said again, like saying it plainly made it less insane. Your voice lowered. "Jack." "It has a lock. Heat. Bathroom. Presumably fewer orthopedic surgeons."

"That is not the issue." "It's a room." "It's your room." "You already said that." "With one bed?" He paused. And there. There it was. Not much. Not enough that anyone else would have caught it.

But you did. The tiny hitch in his expression. The one beat where practical Jack Abbott, the man who could handle blood and death and impossible decisions without blinking, appeared to remember that you were not simply a stranded colleague but a woman he had been standing too close to for months.

His eyes shifted away first. That almost never happened. "I'll take the chair," he said. "You will not." "I've slept in worse places." "I know," you said, softer before you could stop it. "That doesn't mean you should."

He looked back at you. The argument died a little in his face. Not completely. Jack was not built for surrender. But enough. The lobby carried on around you. People complained. Phones buzzed. The storm kept pressing itself against the glass like it wanted in.

You could feel the heat in your cheeks now. Not embarrassment exactly. Something worse. Awareness. Sharp and immediate. One room. One bed. Jack Abbott standing in front of you, close enough that you could see the dark flecks in his eyes, telling you in that maddeningly practical voice that he was not going to let you be unsafe tonight.

He cleared his throat. "It's not ideal." You let out a small laugh, mostly because if you did not laugh, you might say something dangerous. "No. I'd say it's a little past ideal."

"We're adults." "Are we?" His eyes narrowed. You lifted both hands. "Sorry. Tension response." "Clearly." "We work together." "I noticed." "People will talk." "People always talk."

"You hate when people talk." "I hate when people are stupid. Overlap, not causation." Despite everything, you smiled. He looked at your mouth again. This time, you were sure of it.

The smile faded. Jack looked away, jaw tightening like he had caught himself doing something he had not given himself permission to do. "Room's there," he said, his voice lower now. Rougher around the edges. "You can have the bed. I'll figure out the rest."

You should have said no again. You should have insisted on the lobby or found another stranded doctor to double up with or called Dana and let her laugh you through a nervous breakdown.

Instead, you looked outside. At the snow. At the city disappearing. At the people sitting on suitcases under expensive chandeliers, trying to pretend they were not scared of being stuck.

Then you looked back at Jack. He was tired. You could see it now, in the way he held himself. The conference chairs had been bad for him; standing through the reception had been worse. The cold would not help. Neither would an argument that lasted another twenty minutes because both of you were too stubborn to admit the obvious.

You sighed. "Only if you don't sleep in the chair." His brows drew together. "That's not—" "No," you said. "We are not doing the noble idiot routine. You said it. It applies."

Jack stared at you. You stared back. "I'm serious," you said. "So am I." "You always are." "Someone has to be." "You're impossible." "You keep saying that like it changes anything."

You looked at him for a long second. Then, because apparently the storm had knocked all common sense out of the sky along with the snow, you said, "Fine." Jack blinked once.

"Fine?" "Fine. We share the room." His face was very still. Very controlled. Too controlled. "But," you added quickly, "we are establishing rules." "Rules." "Yes." "For sleeping."

"For survival." His mouth twitched again. That almost-smile. The one that should not have had the power to make your chest feel too small. "Fine," he said. "Rule one: no chair."

He looked annoyed. You pointed at him. "No." "I didn't say anything." "You were thinking loudly." "Occupational hazard." "Rule two," you said, trying very hard not to think about the fact that you had apparently agreed to share a hotel room with Jack Abbott. "No being weird."

Jack looked at you. "You think I'm going to be weird?" "I think we're both going to be weird." "That's probably accurate." "And rule three…" You stopped. Because you had no idea what rule three was.

Do not look at me like that. Do not stand too close. Do not make this feel safer than it should. Do not be kind in that quiet, gruff way that makes me want things I have no business wanting.

Jack waited. You swallowed. "Rule three," you said, "we pretend this is normal." His gaze held yours. For a moment, neither of you moved. Then Jack gave one short nod. "Professional courtesy," he said.

You laughed. You could not help it. It came out softer than before, edged with nerves. "Is that what this is?" His expression was unreadable. The storm threw another gust of snow against the windows.

"Sure," he said. But he did not sound convinced. And God help you, neither were you. The elevator ride to the eleventh floor was silent. Not peaceful silent. Not comfortable silent.

The kind of silence that had bones in it. You stood on one side of the elevator with your overnight bag tucked against your hip and your coat still buttoned to your throat. Jack stood on the other side, his conference tote hanging off one shoulder, his gaze fixed on the glowing numbers above the doors like they had personally offended him.

Four. Five. Six. The elevator hummed upward. You watched his reflection in the polished metal doors because looking at the actual man felt like a risky decision. He looked tired now.

More tired than he had in the ballroom. There was a set to his jaw you had learned to read over months of working beside him. Pain, probably. Or irritation. With Jack, the two had a habit of presenting similarly unless you knew where to look.

His weight was shifted slightly more onto one side. Not dramatically. Jack did not do dramatically when it came to his own body. He was careful in a way that pretended not to be care. Precise. Controlled. Almost invisible about it.

But you knew. You had no right to know, maybe. But you did. "You're doing it again," Jack said. You looked away so quickly you nearly gave yourself whiplash. "Doing what?"

"Watching me in reflective surfaces." Heat crept up your neck. "I was not." "You were." "It's an elevator. Everything is reflective." "Convenient." "You're very suspicious for a man who just invited me to share his hotel room."

He turned his head then. Slowly. "That was not an invitation." You raised your eyebrows. His mouth flattened. "It was a logistical decision." "Ah." His eyes narrowed. "Don't."

"I didn't say anything." "You made a noise." "A clinical noise." "That's my line." "I'm borrowing it." "You need better material." "You need better coffee." "I know." That, somehow, eased the air between you.

Not by much. But enough that you could breathe again. The elevator climbed past eight. A family got on at nine, two exhausted parents and a little boy in dinosaur pyjamas clutching a stuffed bear by one ear. The mother gave you both a brief, tired smile. The father looked like he had spent the last hour on hold with an airline. The little boy looked at Jack's conference lanyard, then at his face, and immediately decided Jack was the most interesting person in the elevator.

Jack stared forward. The little boy stared harder. You bit the inside of your cheek. Jack's eyes flicked sideways. "What?" "Nothing." "You're laughing again." "I'm not." "You are internally laughing."

"Can you diagnose that?" "Yes." The little boy tugged on his mother's coat and whispered, much too loudly, "Is he a spy?" His mother's eyes went wide. "Elliot." Jack did not move.

You looked at the ceiling. The father closed his eyes like he wanted to disappear. The little boy kept staring. Jack turned his head just slightly and looked down at him.

"No," he said. Elliot blinked. "Are you sure?" "Yes." "Because you look like one." Jack considered that. Then said, "I get that a lot." You made a small, strangled sound.

The little boy nodded seriously, apparently satisfied. The elevator stopped at eleven. Jack stepped forward as the doors opened. You followed him out, barely keeping your laugh contained until the doors slid shut behind you.

Then you lost it. Not loud. Not enough to carry far down the hotel corridor. But enough that you had to press a hand to your mouth. Jack glanced at you. "Don't start." "He thought you were a spy."

"I heard." "You told him you get that a lot." "He was under stress." "He was six." "Children are often under stress." You laughed again, softer this time. Jack's expression shifted.

You almost missed it because it was small and gone quickly, but there was something there. Something like satisfaction. Not smugness. Not exactly amusement. More like he liked making you laugh and did not know what to do with that information.

That made you stop laughing. The corridor was quieter than the lobby, muffled by thick carpet and expensive wallpaper. The air smelled faintly of linen, citrus cleaner, and overheated radiators. Somewhere far down the hall, an ice machine rattled. Beyond the windows at the end of the corridor, snow blew hard against the glass.

Jack started walking. You followed half a step behind. For some reason, that felt worse than walking beside him. Maybe because it made you look at things you usually avoided looking at. The slope of his shoulders under the dark fabric of his sweater. The careful steadiness of his gait. The conference tote knocking against his side. The back of his neck where his hair sat slightly mussed from the collar of his coat.

This was ridiculous. You were an adult. A medical professional. A person who could calmly handle a dislocated shoulder, a combative drunk, and a cardiologist with an ego the size of Allegheny County.

You could walk down a hotel corridor behind Jack Abbott without constructing an entire emotional crisis out of it. Probably. Room 1117 was near the end of the hall. Of course it was.

Because apparently the universe had decided to commit to the bit. Jack stopped outside the door and pulled his key card from his pocket. Then he paused. You stopped beside him.

"What?" you asked. He did not look at you. "Last chance." "Last chance for what?" "To decide the lobby's better." You stared at him. Jack kept his gaze on the door like it was suddenly fascinating.

The awkwardness of the situation had finally caught up with him, you realised. Not because he regretted offering. Jack was too stubborn and too protective for that. But because he was aware of you.

Painfully aware. The same way you were aware of him. You were both standing in a hotel hallway with snow trapping you inside and a single room waiting beyond the door, and the months of not saying things had followed you upstairs like another piece of luggage.

You shifted your bag on your shoulder. "Do you want me to say the lobby's better?" His jaw tightened. "No." The answer came too fast. Too honest. You looked at him. He still did not look back.

"No," you said quietly. "I don't either." That made him turn. Only a little. Enough. His eyes met yours, and for one breath, the corridor felt narrower. You had said nothing shocking. Nothing romantic. Nothing that should have made his expression change.

But it did. It softened in the smallest possible way. Then the ice machine rattled again, brutally loud, and both of you looked away like teenagers caught holding hands behind the gym.

Jack cleared his throat and tapped the key card to the lock. The light flashed green. He pushed the door open. "After you," he said. You looked at him. "Professional courtesy?"

His mouth twitched. "Don't push your luck." You stepped into the room. And stopped. Because the hotel room was not bad. That was the problem. If it had been cramped or ugly or strange, you could have laughed. If the carpet had been stained or the heating had sounded like aircraft failure, you could have turned the whole thing into a joke.

But the room was warm. Quiet. Low-lit. The curtains were partly open, showing a wall of storm-dark sky and snow-lashed glass. A small desk sat near the window with a conference programme folded beside the lamp. Jack's suitcase was open on the luggage rack, clothes folded with a level of military precision that should not have surprised you and still somehow did. His coat hung over the back of the desk chair. A pair of boots sat neatly near the wall.

And the bed. The bed was large, white, neatly made, and extremely singular. One bed. One. Not two small beds pushed together. Not a fold-out couch. Not even an ottoman that could plausibly become a desperate sleeping surface.

Just one king-sized bed sitting in the middle of the room like an accusation. You heard Jack come in behind you. The door clicked shut. Neither of you said anything. The silence immediately became unhinged.

You stared at the bed. Jack stared at the bed. The bed, smugly, remained a bed. Finally, you said, "Well." Jack dropped his key card on the desk with unnecessary precision. "Don't."

"I didn't say anything." "You were about to." "I was only going to say it's… roomy." He looked at you. You looked back. "It is," you said. "It's a bed." "Yes, Jack. That's the issue."

"It's a large bed." "Again. Not helping." He exhaled through his nose and turned away, moving toward the thermostat near the door. "Heat's on." "Good." "You can take the bathroom first."

"Fine." "And the bed." You turned. "We already discussed this." "We discussed the room." "We discussed the noble idiot routine." "I'm not being noble." "You are physically incapable of not being noble in the most aggravating way possible."

Jack shot you a look over his shoulder. "That is not a sentence that makes sense." "It does to me." "That's concerning." "You are not sleeping in the chair." He glanced at the chair.

You did too. It was a perfectly nice hotel desk chair, upholstered in grey fabric, with curved wooden arms and absolutely no business being considered a sleeping arrangement by any person over the age of twelve.

Jack looked back at you. "I've slept sitting up before." "Yes," you said, "and now you are older and more breakable." His eyebrows lifted. You froze. "Not breakable," you corrected quickly. "That came out wrong."

"Did it?" "Yes." His face was unreadable, but there was a dry edge to his voice. "Older, then?" You closed your eyes briefly. "I am making this worse." "You are." "I meant your leg."

"I gathered." You opened your eyes. Jack's expression had changed again, but not in the way you feared. He did not look angry. Not offended. Maybe a little guarded, but that was Jack's baseline around any mention of his body that did not come from a medical chart.

You softened your voice. "I meant you've been on your feet all day. Conference chairs are awful. It's freezing outside. You're not sleeping upright because of me." The guard shifted.

Just slightly. His eyes flicked over your face like he was trying to find the trick in what you had said. There wasn't one. That seemed to be what unsettled him. "I'm fine," he said.

You sighed. "Of course you are." "I am." "You know, when you say that, it has started to sound less like a status update and more like a legal defence." Jack turned fully toward you.

"You keep notes?" "Mentally." "On me?" The question was dry. The look was not. You should have had an answer ready. Something sharp. Something easy. Something that would put the conversation safely back where it belonged.

Instead, you said, "Sometimes." Jack went still. The room held its breath around you. The heater clicked on with a low rush of air, warm and dry, but you felt cold suddenly in the centre of your chest.

Sometimes. What a stupid thing to admit. Except it was true. You kept notes on him.

The way he preferred bitter coffee but drank bad hospital coffee without complaint if it was hot enough. The way he always stood between you and agitated family members without making a show of it. The way he hated fussing but tolerated directness. The way his patience with interns was better when no one was watching. The way grief seemed to live near him but not always in him, like a room he knew how to pass without opening the door every time.

The way he noticed when everyone else missed something. The way he noticed you. Jack looked away first. "I'll take the floor," he said. "Oh my God." "What?" "You are impossible."

"It's carpeted." "That is not an argument." "It's a fact." "You are not sleeping on hotel carpet." "I've slept on worse floors." "Stop saying that like it helps." "It's true."

"It's depressing." His mouth twitched faintly. "You wanted honesty." "I wanted common sense." "You're asking a lot." "Apparently." You set your bag down by the dresser and slipped your coat off, mostly to have something to do with your hands. The room was too warm now after the cold of the lobby. Your skin felt prickly. Your mind was moving too fast.

One bed. Jack. Snowstorm. Professional courtesy. Very funny, universe. Tremendous work. No notes. Jack moved to the window and pulled the curtain back a few inches. Snow slammed across the glass in thick gusts. The city beyond was nearly gone, reduced to blurred lights and white movement. The roads below were barely visible. Cars crawled through slush with hazard lights flashing. At the corner, a traffic signal swung hard in the wind.

"That's bad," you said. "Yeah." His voice had changed. Less irritated. More serious. You stepped closer, stopping beside him with enough space between you to pretend you were being normal.

Outside, Philadelphia looked suspended. The usual movement of the city had slowed to something strange and fragile. Sirens flashed somewhere far off, red and blue diffused through snow. You thought of everyone stuck out in it — EMS crews, police, hospital staff trying to make shift change, patients trying to get home.

Your stomach tightened. Jack glanced at you. "Don't." You looked at him. "What?" "You're thinking about the ED." "You don't know that." "You get that look." "What look?" "The one where you start trying to personally take responsibility for weather patterns and systemic infrastructure failures."

You stared at him. "That is very specific." "You're very specific." The words landed quietly. No joke wrapped around them. You looked back out at the snow before your face could betray you.

"I just hate knowing people are stuck out there." "I know." That was the thing with Jack. Sometimes he could be blunt enough to bruise. And sometimes he said two words like they carried a hand under your elbow.

You folded your arms loosely, not because you were cold but because you needed to hold yourself together. "The Pitt will be slammed," you said. "Probably." "Dana's going to be running on spite and vending machine pretzels."

"Dana can run a hospital on spite and vending machine pretzels." That made you smile. "True." "Robby'll keep it moving." "Also true." "They don't need us tonight." You looked at him then.

Jack kept his eyes on the window. It occurred to you that maybe he had said it for both of you. "They don't," you agreed. A gust of wind hit the glass hard enough to rattle it.

The lights flickered. Once. Twice. Then steadied. You both looked up. "Comforting," you said. Jack let the curtain fall back into place. "Hotel'll have a generator." "Probably."

He gave you a look. You smiled faintly. "Sorry. I'll stop being reassuring." "That was you trying?" "Barely." He crossed to the desk and picked up the room service menu. "You eaten?"

The shift was so abrupt it took you a second to catch up. "What?" "Food," he said. "Have you had any since lunch?" "Yes." Jack looked at you. You looked back. "Define food," he said.

"That feels hostile." "It was a simple question." "I had half a muffin during the afternoon break." His eyes closed briefly. "Don't make that face." "I'm not making a face."

"You're making the doctor face." "I am a doctor." "You're making the disappointed attending face." "With cause." "It had blueberries." "It was conference food. It had the concept of blueberries."

You laughed, despite yourself. Jack picked up the phone. "Room service." "You don't have to—" "I'm ordering food." "I can order my own food." "Good. Then you can tell me what you want."

You opened your mouth. Closed it. He waited. You crossed your arms. "You are very bossy." "Yes." "No denial?" "I'm tired." That caught you off guard. It was small, the admission. Almost nothing.

But Jack did not give away small things without meaning to. Your expression softened before you could stop it. "Yeah," you said. "Me too." His eyes met yours. For a second, the argument fell away.

The bed was still there. The storm still existed. The whole strange shape of the night still waited around you. But so did the exhaustion. So did the fact that you had both been awake since before dawn, sitting through panels and making careful conversation and pretending, always pretending, that the invisible line between you was not getting thinner every day.

Jack looked away first, but gently this time. "What do you want?" he asked, lifting the phone. You glanced at the menu. "Grilled cheese." He paused. "What?" "Grilled cheese."

"They have salmon." "I don't trust conference hotel salmon during a weather emergency." "Sensible." "And fries." "Of course." "And whatever dessert looks least disappointing."

Jack's mouth tilted slightly. "There's chocolate cake." "Done." He nodded once and lifted the receiver. You watched him order with the same brusque efficiency he used when calling consults, except instead of demanding neurosurgery he was asking a very overwhelmed kitchen employee for grilled cheese, fries, black coffee, tea, and chocolate cake.

It should not have been attractive. It absolutely was. You turned away and busied yourself with your bag. You had packed badly. Not disastrously, but with the optimism of someone who thought she would be back in Pittsburgh by midnight. You had a spare blouse, a phone charger, toiletries, and a soft sleep shirt you had only thrown in because your last flight delay had taught you humility. No actual pyjama bottoms. No extra jumper. No thick socks.

Wonderful. Jack hung up the phone. "Forty-five minutes," he said. "Not bad." "Kitchen sounds like a war zone." "Poor them." He glanced toward your bag. "You need anything?"

You looked up too quickly. "What?" "Toiletries. Shirt. Charger." "Oh." You swallowed. "No. I'm okay." He watched you for half a beat. "You packed for one night." "So did you."

"I have clothes." "Congratulations." "You're doing the defensive thing." "You're doing the observant thing." "Occupational hazard," he said again. You looked down at your open bag.

It was not a big deal. That was what you told yourself. It was just clothes. Just a hotel room. Just a storm. Just Jack. You were so tired of the word just. "I have a shirt," you said. "No bottoms. I'll survive."

Jack did not react obviously. Which somehow made it more obvious that he was reacting. His gaze moved to the dresser. "I have sweats." "No." "They're clean." "That was not my concern."

"They have a drawstring." "Also not my concern." "You'd rather sleep in conference pants?" You looked down at your trousers. They were perfectly professional and deeply uncomfortable after a twelve-hour day.

"I hate that you're making sense." "Happens." "Rarely." Jack opened his suitcase and pulled out a neatly folded pair of dark sweatpants. He held them out without looking directly at you.

The gesture was so practical. So simple. So completely dangerous. You took them. Your fingers brushed his. Barely. Nothing. A nothing touch. Except Jack's hand stilled for a fraction of a second, and your pulse jumped like an idiot.

"Thank you," you said. His voice was rougher when he answered. "Professional courtesy." You glanced up. He was looking at you now. There was humour there, buried under exhaustion and restraint. But there was something else too. Something careful. Something that knew exactly how thin this joke was becoming.

You held the sweatpants against your chest. "Right," you said. "Professional courtesy." The bathroom was small and aggressively hotel-like, all marble counter, bright mirror, and towels folded into shapes no one needed. You changed quickly, keeping your sleep shirt on and tying the borrowed sweatpants as tightly as they would go.

They were too big. Of course they were. They sat low on your hips and pooled slightly at your ankles. They smelled faintly of laundry detergent and something cleaner underneath. Jack's suitcase, maybe. His soap. The same faint scent you sometimes caught when he leaned over a chart beside you.

You stared at yourself in the mirror. "Oh, this is bad," you whispered. Not bad because you looked bad. Bad because you looked comfortable. Bad because the pants were his.

Bad because you could already imagine walking out and seeing him notice. You pressed both hands to your face. "Get a grip." A knock came at the bathroom door. You jumped.

"You alive?" Jack asked from the other side. You opened the door too quickly. "Do not say it like that." He was standing a few feet back, one hand braced on the desk chair, his shoes off now, his sweater sleeves pushed to his forearms.

He looked at you. Then very pointedly looked away. It was possibly the least subtle thing he had ever done. Your stomach flipped. "They're too big," you said, because apparently you had chosen death.

"They have a drawstring," he said. "I used it." "Then they're functional." "Is everything functional to you?" "No." The answer came too quietly. You looked at him. He was still not looking at you.

The air changed. That was the only way you knew how to think of it. Changed like weather. You stood barefoot on hotel carpet in Jack Abbott's borrowed sweatpants, and he stood across from you in his shirtsleeves, and the room felt suddenly too small for the amount of not saying happening inside it.

Then someone knocked on the door. Both of you startled. Actually startled. Jack recovered first, because of course he did. "Room service," he said, like that was not obvious.

"Right." He crossed to the door. You sat on the edge of the bed without thinking, then immediately stood again because sitting on the bed felt insane. Jack opened the door and accepted the tray from a harried-looking employee who looked one room away from quitting the hospitality industry entirely. Jack thanked him, tipped him too much, and shut the door with his hip.

The smell of hot fries filled the room. You nearly groaned. Jack set the tray on the desk. "You look like you're about to propose to the food." "Don't judge me." "I'm not. It's the most enthusiasm you've shown all day."

"That's not true." "No?" You stepped closer to the tray and lifted the metal cover from the plate. Golden fries. Grilled cheese cut diagonally. A small bowl of tomato soup you had not ordered but immediately respected.

You looked at Jack. His expression was neutral. Too neutral. "You ordered soup." "It came with it." "Did it?" "Yes." "Jack." "What?" "You ordered soup." "It's cold out." You smiled.

He looked annoyed, but not enough. "Professional courtesy?" you asked. He pulled out the desk chair and sat down a little carefully. "Eat your sandwich." You did. You sat on the edge of the bed because there was nowhere else to sit, balancing the plate on your knees while Jack took the chair at the desk. It should have been awkward, but food helped. Food made it normal, or something adjacent to normal.

The storm raged outside. The room smelled like fries and coffee and radiator heat. Jack ate like a man who had forgotten hunger existed until food was placed in front of him. You pretended not to notice. He pretended not to notice you noticing.

The silence between you grew less sharp. You dipped a corner of grilled cheese into the soup and looked over at him. "So," you said, "besides Robby and department visibility, why did you really come?"

Jack did not answer immediately. He leaned back in the chair, coffee in hand, eyes on the window. "For the conference?" "No, Jack. For the ambience." His mouth twitched. "I was asked."

"You always do what you're asked?" "No." "Exactly." He took a sip of coffee and grimaced. "Bad?" "Hotel bad." "You ordered it." "I was desperate." "You could have had tea."

"I'm not eighty." "That is hurtful to tea." "Tea will recover." You smiled, but you did not let him off. "Why did you come?" Jack looked down into his coffee. For a moment, you thought he was going to dodge again.

Then he said, "Robby thought I should get out of Pittsburgh for two days." That was not what you expected. Your face softened. "Why?" Jack's thumb moved along the side of the paper cup.

"Because he's annoying." "Jack." He exhaled. Not quite a sigh. "He thinks I've been working too much." "You have." His eyes lifted. You held his gaze. "What?" you said. "You have."

"You're one to talk." "I didn't say I was innocent." "No. You just keep mental notes on me and forget to eat." You looked down, smiling despite yourself. "That sounded almost affectionate."

"Don't get excited." "Too late." Jack's eyes stayed on you. The smile thinned a little on your face, not because you stopped feeling it, but because suddenly feeling anything seemed dangerous again.

He looked away. "Robby wanted someone senior here," he said. "I had the time. You were already going." There. Quiet. Almost buried. But there. Your fingers tightened around your fork.

"You came because I was going?" Jack did not move. "I didn't say that." "You kind of did." "I said it was a factor." "A factor." "Yes." "In the logistical decision." He glanced at you, and there was that dry look again. The one that made your chest ache because it was almost easier than softness.

"You're enjoying this." "A little." "Dangerous habit." "Noted." You ate another fry to give yourself something to do. But your mind had snagged on it. You were already going.

Not a confession. Not even close. But with Jack, half the time the truth came wrapped in enough caution to survive impact. You wondered how many other almost-truths he had offered you over the months that you had been too careful to pick up.

Outside, thunder cracked. Not thunder, maybe. Something heavy and distant. A transformer. Ice shifting. A city noise made strange by snow. The lights flickered again. This time, they went out.

The room dropped into darkness. For one second, everything disappeared. You heard yourself inhale sharply. Then the emergency lighting kicked in, faint and amber from the hallway through the crack under the door. The city glow outside the window blurred through the curtains. The heater went silent.

"Jack?" "I'm here." His voice came immediately. Close enough that your panic had no time to grow teeth. Then your phone screen lit up where it sat on the bed beside you, buzzing with an alert.

WINTER STORM WARNING. SHELTER IN PLACE. You stared at it. "Well," you said, trying for lightness and not quite getting there. "That feels dramatic." Jack stood. You heard the chair shift, then the careful sound of his movement in the dark.

"Stay there." "I wasn't planning on sprinting." "Good." He moved across the room with a confidence that made something inside you ache. Even in near-dark, even in a strange hotel room, Jack was calm. Measured. One hand found the desk. Then the lamp. Then the wall.

A second later, his phone flashlight clicked on, casting sharp white light across the room. You blinked. He aimed it toward the floor, not your face. "Power's out," he said.

"Really? I thought they were setting the mood." His eyes flicked up. Even in the thin flashlight glow, you saw the look. "Joke response," you said. "Ignore me." "I usually try."

"No, you don't." "No," he said after a beat. "I don't." You looked at him. The darkness softened everything except the places it sharpened. His face was half-lit, half-shadowed, the lines of him drawn in silver and black. His sweater was gone now, you realised belatedly, leaving him in a dark T-shirt that made him look less like the attending who could silence a trauma bay and more like a man trapped in a room with you and all the things neither of you said.

He crossed to the dresser and opened a drawer. "What are you doing?" "Looking for extra blankets." "In the dark?" "I have a light." "You also have a habit of ignoring your own limits."

He stopped. Not for long. Just enough that you knew he had heard the thing beneath the words. Then he pulled open the lower drawer and found a folded blanket sealed in a plastic bag.

"Found one," he said. "Of course you did." He brought it over and handed it to you. You accepted it, fingers brushing his again. This time, neither of you moved away as quickly.

The room was colder without the heater already. Or maybe that was your imagination. Maybe you were just suddenly aware of every inch of space between you. Jack's hand was warm.

Steady. Scarred along the knuckles. You let go first. Barely. "We should call the front desk," you said. "They're aware." "Because of the power outage?" "Because half the hotel just started calling them."

"You're probably right." "I usually am." "Incredible how you say things like that and expect people to like you." His mouth moved. "Some people manage." Your breath caught.

Jack seemed to realise what he had said at the exact moment you did. His expression locked down. But not fast enough. You saw it. The flash of something unguarded. The room felt very quiet.

Too quiet. Then his phone buzzed in his hand, cutting through the moment with brutal efficiency. He looked down. "Generator's delayed," he read. "Hotel says emergency lights remain active, heat may be intermittent, guests advised to stay in rooms."

"Great." "Could be worse." "How?" "We could be in the lobby with orthopedic surgeons." You laughed. You really could not help it. The laugh came out tired and a little shaky, but it was real.

Jack looked at you for a second with that almost-soft expression again. Then he glanced at the bed. You followed his gaze. One bed. One extra blanket. No heat. Professional courtesy, your traitorous brain supplied.

You pulled the blanket against your chest. "So," you said carefully, "this got more complicated." Jack's jaw shifted. "Yeah." "We can still be adults." "Probably." "Probably?"

"I'm accounting for variables." "Such as?" He looked at you. In the phone light, his eyes were darker than usual. "You," he said. Your pulse jumped. Jack looked away almost immediately, like he had not meant it to come out like that.

But it had. And now it was in the room with you. You. Not the storm. Not the bed. Not the lack of heat. You. You swallowed. "I'm a variable?" "A persistent one." You should have laughed.

You almost did. But his voice had gone too quiet. Too honest. So you only said, "That sounds inconvenient." Jack's gaze returned to yours. "It is." The snow hit the window hard.

Neither of you moved. Then, somewhere down the hall, someone shouted, "Power's out on ten too!" and another voice yelled back something about flashlights, and the moment snapped before either of you could decide what to do with it.

Jack exhaled, low and controlled. "You should finish eating before the food gets cold." You blinked. Then laughed softly, because of course. Of course that was where he went.

Food. Practicality. A safe surface after stepping too close to the edge. "Right," you said. "Professional courtesy." He looked at you for one long second. Then he said, very dryly, "Don't make me regret naming it."

You sat back down on the edge of the bed with your plate and the extra blanket over your lap. Jack returned to the chair, phone flashlight propped against the lamp base so it lit the room in a strange upward glow.

You ate in semi-darkness while the storm pressed against the windows and the hotel groaned softly around you. And for a while, neither of you talked about the bed. Neither of you talked about variables.

Neither of you talked about the fact that the room was getting colder. But Jack took the blanket from the foot of the bed and draped it around your shoulders without asking.

And you let him. When his hand brushed the back of your neck, neither of you said anything at all. By the time you finished eating, the fries had gone soft, the grilled cheese had gone lukewarm, and the room had become noticeably colder.

Not freezing. Not dramatic. Just cold enough that the tips of your toes had started to curl against the hotel carpet. Cold enough that you had pulled the borrowed sweatpants lower over your ankles and tucked the extra blanket tighter around your shoulders. Cold enough that Jack had noticed, because Jack noticed everything, and was pretending he had not noticed in a way that meant he absolutely had.

The emergency light from the hallway bled under the door in a thin amber line. Jack's phone was still propped against the lamp base, flashlight angled at the ceiling so the whole room sat in a pale, strange glow. Shadows gathered in the corners. The window was a black mirror now, occasionally flashing white when the wind threw snow hard against the glass.

The hotel was quieter than it had been. Or maybe it only felt that way because the power outage had changed the sound of everything. No humming heater. No elevator chime. No faint television from the room next door. Just wind, the distant murmur of stranded guests in the hallway, and the occasional muffled thunk of something outside giving in to the storm.

Jack stacked the empty plates back on the room service tray with the kind of precision that suggested he could not quite tolerate mess when there were too many other things he could not control.

You watched him from the edge of the bed. "You know they have people for that." He did not look up. "For what?" "Stacking plates like you're preparing them for sterile processing."

"That would be a terrible use of sterile processing." "You understood my point." "Unfortunately." He set the cutlery on the plate, folded the napkin once, then stopped when he caught you watching.

"What?" "Nothing." "You keep saying that." "You keep asking." "You keep looking at me like you have commentary." "I always have commentary." "That's true." You smiled faintly.

The silence that followed was softer than the ones before. Less sharp, anyway. The food had helped. The ridiculousness had helped. The fact that you were both too tired to maintain full emotional defences had helped in a deeply inconvenient way.

Jack took the tray to the narrow table near the door, then checked his phone. "No update?" you asked. "Generator crew's working on it." "That sounds fake." "It does." "Do you think they're lying?"

"I think they're busy." "That was generous." "I have moments." "You hide them well." He glanced at you, dry. You tucked your feet under the blanket and tried not to shiver.

Failed. Jack saw it. Of course he did. His gaze dropped to the blanket around you, then to your bare feet, then back to your face. "You cold?" "No." "You're a bad liar." "I'm fine."

"That one's mine." "I'm borrowing it." "You use it worse." "You use it constantly." "With more conviction." "With more denial." His expression shifted. Not a flinch exactly. Jack was too practised for that. But something in him went still around the edges, like your words had touched a place you had not meant to press.

You regretted it immediately. "Sorry," you said, softer. "That wasn't—" "It's fine." "Jack." He turned toward the suitcase instead of looking at you. "You need socks." "I don't."

"You do." "I'm not taking your socks." "Why?" "Because there are lines." "There's a line at socks?" "Yes." "But not at sweatpants." You looked down at yourself. The borrowed sweatpants were still much too big, bunched slightly at your waist where you had tied the drawstring tight enough to survive a storm. You hated that they were comfortable. You hated more that you had stopped noticing they were not yours.

"That was an emergency." "So is hypothermia." "I am not hypothermic." "You're shivering." "I'm dramatically chilly." "Clinical distinction?" "Emotional distinction." Jack opened his suitcase.

You sighed. "Jack." He pulled out a pair of thick dark socks and held them out. You stared at them. He stared back. The socks hung between you like the dumbest possible symbol of intimacy.

"You're very bossy," you said again. "You're very cold." "I could put my shoes back on." "You're not wearing shoes in bed." The sentence landed. Both of you heard it. Both of you froze.

In bed. Not the bed. Not that bed. In bed. The words sat in the dim room, far too casual and far too specific. Jack's jaw tightened. You took the socks mostly so neither of you had to keep looking at each other across the space between you.

"Thank you," you said. His fingers brushed yours as you took them. A small touch. Accidental. Still, your hand warmed like his skin had left a mark. Jack stepped back too quickly and turned toward the window.

You pulled the socks on under the blanket, trying to do it with dignity. It was impossible. The blanket slipped off one shoulder. The sweatpants rode up. You nearly kicked the nightstand with your heel.

Jack did not turn around. Which meant he was very deliberately not turning around. Somehow that made it worse. "There," you said when you were done. "Feet saved. Crisis averted."

"Good." His voice was rougher than before. You looked at the back of him. He stood near the window with one hand braced against the frame, shoulders slightly bowed. The phone light made a dark outline of him against the curtains. Without the hotel noise, without the conference, without the ED, he seemed more human in a way that made your chest ache.

Still Jack. But less armoured. You wondered if anyone else at The Pitt had ever seen him like this — barefoot in a hotel room, tired around the edges, quietly trying to make sure another person was warm without making it a scene.

Probably not. The thought did something strange to you. "Are you cold?" you asked. "No." "Bad liar." He did not look over. "I'm fine." "Worse liar." His mouth moved, barely visible in profile.

"Probably." That answer felt too honest. You watched him for another moment, then looked away before he could catch you looking again. The hotel groaned softly around you.

Somewhere down the hall, a child laughed. A woman shushed him. A door opened, then closed. The storm kept pressing at the windows, steady and relentless. You reached for your phone on the bed and checked the time.

8:47 p.m. It felt much later. You had been awake since four-thirty that morning, because the first flight out of Pittsburgh had seemed like a good idea when you booked it. It had not seemed like a good idea when your alarm went off in the dark. It had seemed actively hostile by the time Jack appeared at the airport gate with black coffee, a conference folder, and the expression of a man who had already decided the day was guilty until proven otherwise.

You had laughed at him then too. He had handed you the coffee without comment. You had not asked how he knew your order. That was the thing with Jack. He gave things in ways that made asking feel impossible.

He would notice. Adjust. Provide. Protect. Then act like anyone would have done the same. Anyone would not have. That was the problem. You scrolled through your notifications. Dana had texted again.

DANA: You alive? You smiled. Jack, still near the window, said, "Dana?" You looked up. "How did you know?" "She asks that when she wants reassurance but refuses to phrase it emotionally."

"That is… uncomfortably accurate." "What'd she say?" "You alive?" Jack huffed softly. It was almost a laugh. "See?" You typed back. YOU: Alive. Snowed in. Power out. Abbott still hasn't killed anyone.

Dana's reply came fast. DANA: Yet. DANA: Where are you staying? Your thumb hovered over the keyboard. Ah. There it was. The simple question with the deeply complicated answer.

You glanced at Jack. He had turned from the window and was watching you now. Not suspicious. Aware. Always aware. "Dana asked where I'm staying," you said. Jack's expression went carefully blank.

"What are you going to tell her?" You looked down at the phone. That was an excellent question. The truth was simple. You were in his room because the hotel was full and the city was shut down and neither of you had any better options.

The truth was also impossible. Because Dana would understand the logistics. Dana understood emergencies. Dana understood bad weather and full hotels and professional adults making practical decisions.

Dana would also absolutely hear the silence between the words. Dana had eyes. Worse, she had instincts. Even worse, she liked you. You typed. YOU: Hotel. It's chaos here. Everyone stranded.

Not a lie. A strategic omission. Jack watched you send it. "She'll know," he said. "Probably." "You omitted relevant details." "I learned from doctors." "That's charting, not lying."

"Overlap, not causation." His eyes narrowed slightly, but there was something warm under it. "You're getting too much use out of my lines." "You should write better ones."

"I'll workshop it." Dana's next text buzzed through. DANA: You dodged that question so hard I felt the wind from Pittsburgh. You pressed your lips together. Jack saw your face.

"What?" "She knows." "I said that." You set the phone face down on the bed. "I'm ignoring her." "Sensible." "I can practically hear her eyebrows." "Dana has loud eyebrows."

"She really does." You both smiled. The room went quiet again. This silence was different. It was domestic in the strangest, most dangerous way. You were sitting on his bed in his sweatpants and socks, ignoring a text from Dana while Jack stood by the window in his T-shirt, and for one awful second you could imagine this without the storm. Without the conference. Without the emergency explanation.

A room. Food containers. Shared warmth. Jack looking at you like you were something he had learned the shape of without meaning to. The thought was so clear it startled you.

You stood abruptly. "I should brush my teeth." Jack blinked. Then gave one short nod. "Okay." "Then we should probably…" You gestured vaguely toward the bed, immediately regretted it, and turned the gesture into pointing at your bag. "Sleep. Eventually. Because we're exhausted. And adults. Professional adults."

His mouth twitched. "Professional adults brush their teeth?" "They do." "Good to know." You grabbed your toiletries and escaped into the bathroom. The mirror was bright only because of your phone flashlight propped against the soap dish. Without the overhead lights, your reflection looked softer and stranger. Tired eyes. Messy hair. Jack's sweatpants. Jack's socks.

You brushed your teeth with too much focus. Then you stood there for a moment with your hands braced on the sink. This was fine. Fine was a word doing heroic work tonight.

You had shared tighter spaces with coworkers before. Ambulance bays. Trauma rooms. Supply closets during disaster drills. Once, a hospital break room with six people, one working microwave, and a smell you all silently agreed not to identify.

This was not different because of square footage. It was different because of Jack. Because every quiet thing he did felt louder in the dark. Because he had remembered food. Socks. Blankets. The fact that you got anxious when you thought too long about the ED functioning without you.

Because he had said, You were already going. Because he had called you a variable. Because when the power went out, your first instinct had been to say his name, and his first instinct had been to answer before you could be scared.

You rinsed your mouth, dried your face, and stared at your reflection. "Normal," you whispered. "We are being normal." When you opened the bathroom door, Jack was sitting on the edge of the bed.

Not in it. On it. His prosthetic was off. You stopped before you could stop yourself. It was not the first time you had seen him without it. Not exactly. The ED had a way of stealing privacy from everyone eventually, and Jack was not secretive in the way people assumed. He was matter-of-fact about the reality of his body when he had to be.

But this was different. This was not clinical. This was not a glance through a curtain gap or a practical adjustment after a brutal shift. This was Jack in the low light of a hotel room, one leg extended slightly, his liner set aside with careful precision, his hand resting near his thigh. His posture was composed, but there was something in the stillness of him that made you understand, immediately and painfully, that he had not expected you to come out just then.

His head lifted. His expression closed. Fast. Too fast. "Sorry," you said softly. You did not know what you were apologising for. Walking out. Seeing. Making him feel seen. All of it.

Jack looked away first. "It's fine." There it was again. The legal defence. You stayed where you were by the bathroom door, toiletries in hand. For once, you did not tease him.

You did not say he was a bad liar. You did not try to make the room easier by making a joke. Instead, you said, "I can give you a minute." His jaw shifted. He looked at you then, and there was something in his eyes you could not read.

Not embarrassment, exactly. Not shame, though something close enough to make your chest hurt. Wariness, maybe. A man used to people either looking too long or looking away too fast.

You did neither. At least, you tried not to. "You don't have to," he said. His voice was low. Rough. You nodded once and crossed to your bag, setting your toiletries inside with deliberate calm. Not ignoring him. Not staring. Just letting the moment exist without making it bigger.

Jack watched you for a second. You could feel it. Then he reached for the compression sleeve beside him and adjusted it with efficient, practised movements. You turned toward the window and gave him privacy without leaving.

The snow was still falling hard. The glass had frosted slightly at the corners, feathered white around the dark. The city lights outside looked blurred and far away. Behind you, fabric shifted. Jack moved carefully. The bed creaked once.

"You can turn around," he said. You did. He had pulled the blanket over his lap, sitting upright now, back against the headboard. The bedside lamp was useless without power, but his phone flashlight on the nightstand lit the lower half of the room. His face was half in shadow.

"You okay?" you asked. Then immediately wanted to kick yourself. Jack's eyebrows lifted. "I mean—" You stopped, exhaled. "Sorry. Stupid question." "Not stupid." "You hate that question."

"I hate most questions." "True." His mouth twitched faintly. The tension eased by a millimetre. You sat carefully on the opposite side of the bed, leaving as much space as possible between you. The mattress dipped under your weight, and both of you noticed.

How could you not? One bed. One room. No power. The space between you suddenly felt measured in inches and bad decisions. Jack reached for his own toiletries. "Bathroom's yours?"

"I'm done." He nodded and shifted to stand. You looked away before he could need you to. It was instinct. Respect. Maybe both. But before he moved, he paused. "You don't have to do that."

You looked back. "What?" "Look away like I'll break." The words were quiet. Flat, almost. But something under them hurt. You swallowed. "I'm not looking away because I think you'll break."

Jack held your gaze. "Then why?" You thought about lying. You were both good at it, in your own ways. Little lies. Necessary ones. The kind that kept rooms functioning. I'm fine.

It doesn't hurt. I don't care. This is professional courtesy. But the storm had narrowed the world to this room, and the lights were out, and Jack had given you socks like it meant nothing when it meant everything, and you were so tired of talking around the truth.

"Because I don't want to make something private feel less private," you said. He went still. You could hear the wind dragging snow across the window. Then Jack looked down.

For a long moment, he said nothing. When he spoke, his voice was quieter. "That's considerate." You tried to smile. "Don't sound so surprised." "I'm not." "You are a little."

"I'm used to people being curious." That landed hard. You kept your voice gentle. "I'm curious about you, Jack. Not about that." His eyes lifted. Oh. The room seemed to stop.

You realised what you had said a second too late. Not about that. About you. There was no good way to pull it back. No joke quick enough. No professional framing strong enough to cover it.

Jack looked at you like you had put a hand directly over a bruise. You opened your mouth. Nothing came out. Then he looked away, and the moment passed. Or he let it pass. You were not sure which.

"I'll be quick," he said. He stood, carefully, and you kept your gaze on your hands this time. Not because he had asked, not because you thought he needed saving from being seen, but because the room already had too much honesty in it and you were not sure either of you could survive another piece.

The bathroom door closed. You exhaled slowly. Your phone buzzed against the blanket. Dana again. You turned it over. DANA: You are absolutely not telling me something. DANA: Fine. Don't die. DANA: Also Abbott better not be pretending he doesn't need sleep. He does.

You smiled despite yourself. Dana was the human equivalent of a locked medication cabinet and a warning label. She saw more than people wanted her to see, kept what mattered safe, and made sure you knew when you were being stupid.

You typed back. YOU: He is being managed. You stared at it. Then deleted it. Absolutely not. You tried again. YOU: We're both going to sleep soon. Power's still out. Dana replied.

DANA: Both? You closed your eyes. Of course. Of course she caught that. Before you could decide how to answer, the bathroom door opened. You dropped your phone face down like a teenager hiding contraband.

Jack paused in the doorway. "That subtle?" "Shut up." "Dana?" "No." "Liar." "Fine. Yes." "What did she say?" "Nothing." He gave you a look. You sighed. "She noticed I said both."

Jack's expression did something complicated. "Ah." "Exactly." He moved back to his side of the bed with his toothbrush and toothpaste in hand, then set them on the nightstand. The room was colder now, enough that goosebumps had lifted along your arms where the blanket had slipped.

Jack noticed. He pulled the top blanket down on his side. The bed suddenly became a real object again. Not a prop. Not a joke. A place where both of you were expected to sleep.

You stood. Too quickly. "I can sleep on top of the covers." "No." "Jack." "It's cold." "I know." "So don't be stupid." You looked at him. "Did you just call me stupid?" "I told you not to be."

"Fine distinction." "Important one." You crossed your arms. He leaned back against the headboard and looked up at you with tired, unamused patience. "We are not doing this for another hour," he said.

"Doing what?" "Pretending either of us is sleeping anywhere but the bed." The bluntness of it sent heat straight up your neck. Jack noticed that too. His gaze flicked away, but his mouth tightened like he regretted nothing.

"You could phrase things less aggressively," you muttered. "I could." "You won't." "No." You stared at him. He stared back. Then, because exhaustion was apparently making you brave, or reckless, or possibly both, you said, "Fine. But the pillow stays in the middle."

Jack looked at the row of pillows stacked against the headboard. "One pillow?" "One pillow." "As a border?" "As a diplomatic boundary." "That's not what pillows are for."

"It is tonight." He considered this. Then reached for one of the pillows and placed it lengthwise down the centre of the bed with dead-serious precision. You watched him.

The absurdity hit first. Then the tenderness. Jack Abbott, attending physician, military veteran, professional misery enthusiast, was sitting in a powerless hotel room during a snowstorm creating a pillow wall because you had asked him to.

Your chest did that stupid, aching thing again. "There," he said. "You made it very official." "It's a terrible wall." "It's symbolic." "It's structurally unsound." "Most emotional boundaries are."

He looked at you. You looked back. For a moment, neither of you smiled. Then Jack's mouth twitched. You laughed quietly and climbed under the covers before you could think about it too much.

The sheets were cold at first, crisp against your legs. You slid carefully onto your side, keeping the pillow between you. Jack stayed sitting up for another moment, phone in hand, probably checking alerts. Or pretending to. You suspected he was giving you time to settle before he moved.

The thought made you ache in a way you did not know how to name. Finally, he set his phone on the nightstand with the flashlight still aimed upward and lowered himself under the blankets.

The mattress shifted. The world narrowed. You were lying in bed with Jack Abbott. There was a pillow between you. There were several inches of careful space. There were covers pulled up to your shoulders, socks on your feet, snow at the window, and a storm blocking every exit the two of you had spent months pretending you needed.

"This is normal," you said into the darkness. Jack turned his head slightly. "Is it?" "No." "Then why say it?" "Manifestation." "That doesn't work." "Evidence?" "This." A laugh escaped you before you could stop it.

Jack's eyes were on the ceiling, but his expression had softened. The flashlight glow caught the line of his jaw, the tired slope of his mouth, the lashes casting faint shadows beneath his eyes. He looked exhausted now. Not just annoyed. Not just inconvenienced. Truly worn down.

Something in you quieted. "You should sleep," you said. "So should you." "I will." "Good." "You too." "That was implied." "Was it?" "Yes." You smiled into the dim. For a while, neither of you spoke.

The hotel settled around you. The storm battered the window. Somewhere distant, a door opened and closed. Your phone buzzed once more, but you ignored it. The cold made the bed feel smaller than it was. Or maybe awareness did that. You could feel the heat of him on the other side of the pillow. Not touching. Not even close enough, really.

Still, you knew exactly where he was. Every breath. Every subtle shift. Every careful movement made by a man trying not to make this harder for either of you. "You asleep?" Jack asked eventually.

"No." "Why?" "Because you asked me if I was asleep." He huffed softly. You smiled. A long pause. Then he said, "Your flight tomorrow. What time?" "Rebooked for two-thirty. Assuming the airport doesn't stay closed."

"Mine's three." "Good." "Good?" You stared at the pillow boundary between you, barely visible in the dark. "Means I'm not leaving you stranded here alone with all the orthopedic surgeons."

"You'd make that sacrifice?" "I'm heroic." "You forgot to eat today." "I contain multitudes." "Mostly bad decisions." "That's rich coming from you." He was quiet for a beat.

Then said, "Fair." The honesty of that made your smile fade. You turned onto your back carefully. "Can I ask you something?" Jack did not answer right away. His gaze stayed on the ceiling.

"That depends." "On what?" "Whether you're about to ask something I don't want to answer." "I don't know if you'll want to answer it." "Then probably no." "Jack." He sighed.

"Ask." You hesitated. The question had been sitting in you since dinner, since you were already going, maybe even before that. Since the airport coffee. Since the way he always turned up near you without making a thing of it.

"Why do you do that?" His head turned slightly. "Do what?" "Take care of people and pretend you're not." His face went unreadable. You rushed on before you could lose courage.

"The coffee. The food. The socks. The room. At work too. You act like it's all logistics, but it isn't always." Jack looked back at the ceiling. The silence stretched. You almost apologised.

Then he said, "It's easier if people don't make it a thing." Your chest softened. "Why?" His jaw moved once. "Because then they expect you to talk about it." The answer was so Jack that it almost hurt.

You turned your face toward him. In the low glow, he looked carved out of restraint. "You don't always have to talk about it." His eyes shifted to yours. "No?" "No." "What do I have to do?"

The question was quiet. Too quiet. You were not sure he meant it the way it sounded. You answered anyway. "Let someone notice." Jack did not move. Something passed over his face — guarded, tired, almost unbearably vulnerable before he buried it.

"I let people notice plenty." "Charting irregularities don't count." His mouth twitched, but it faded quickly. "People notice what they want," he said. "That's not true."

"It's often true." You studied him across the ridiculous pillow. "Then let me notice." The words came out before you could stop them. Soft. Plain. Terrifying. Jack looked at you.

Fully now. The room seemed to contract around his silence. You felt your heartbeat in your throat. Outside, the storm kept going. Snow against glass. Wind at the windows. The city hidden. The hotel powerless. Everything ordinary stripped away until there was only this: you and Jack, inches apart, pretending a pillow could hold back months of almosts.

Jack's voice, when it came, was rough. "You already do." You could not breathe for a second. He looked away first. But the damage was done. The truth was there between you, small and live and glowing.

You did not know what to do with it. So you did nothing. Maybe that was the only thing either of you could manage. You lay there in the dark, his words moving through you like warmth.

You already do. For a while, neither of you spoke again. Eventually, exhaustion began to pull at you. The edges of the room blurred. The storm became a dull, steady rush. Your body, traitorous and tired, stopped caring about awkwardness and started caring only about heat.

The bed was cold where you were not touching anything. Your feet were warm in Jack's socks, but your shoulders were not. You curled slightly on your side, facing the pillow wall, tugging the blanket higher.

Jack shifted on the other side. "You cold?" "No." He made a low sound. You did not even open your eyes. "I know. Bad liar." "Terrible." "I'm fine." "Mine." "I know." The mattress dipped as he adjusted, and the blanket shifted over you, tucked more securely near your shoulder. Not intrusive. Not too much.

Just enough. His hand brushed your upper arm through the fabric. You opened your eyes. Jack's hand withdrew immediately. "Sorry." "It's okay." "I was just—" "I know." His face was close now.

Closer than before because you had both shifted toward the middle without noticing. The pillow was still between you, crushed slightly under the weight of your shoulders.

The flashlight had dimmed as his phone battery dropped, turning the room softer. Jack's eyes were dark in the low light. You should have moved back. You did not. Neither did he.

"You should sleep," he said again. His voice had changed. Low. Careful. Like he was speaking near a wound. "So should you." "I'm trying." "Are you?" "No." The honesty made something in your chest go still.

Jack closed his eyes briefly, like he regretted it. You watched him. Then, because you were too tired to be wise, you whispered, "Me neither." He opened his eyes. There it was again.

The pause. The dangerous pause. His gaze moved over your face, not quickly this time. Not hidden. He looked at you like he was memorising the cost of wanting something. Your fingers rested near the pillow between you.

His hand lay on the blanket on the other side. Not touching. Almost. Almost had become a language between you. Jack swallowed. "We shouldn't," he said. You had not asked what.

You both knew. "No," you whispered. But you did not move. The room held very still. Then the hallway erupted with noise. A door slammed somewhere. Someone laughed too loudly. A man cursed about the emergency lights. The spell shattered so abruptly you almost flinched.

Jack looked away. You let out a breath you had not realised you were holding. The pillow wall suddenly looked absurd again. Useful, maybe. Merciful. You turned onto your back, staring at the dark ceiling.

"Orthopedic surgeons," you murmured. Jack was quiet for half a second. Then he huffed a laugh. A real one. Small. Exhausted. But real. It loosened something in the room. You smiled.

The two of you lay there in the dark while the hotel settled again and the storm carried on, pretending nothing had almost happened. Eventually, your eyes grew heavy. Your body warmed under the blankets. The borrowed socks were soft against your feet. The bed no longer felt quite as cold. Jack's breathing evened out beside you, slow and controlled, though not quite sleep.

You drifted in and out. At some point, the pillow between you shifted. You were too tired to know who moved first. Maybe you curled toward the warmth. Maybe Jack turned in his sleep.

Maybe the bed dipped and the pillow slid down between your knees and neither of you woke enough to correct it. The room had grown colder. The blankets had tangled. The storm was loud.

You came halfway awake to the feeling of warmth against your forehead. A steady body near yours. An arm, heavy but careful, resting around your waist. For one hazy second, your mind did not understand.

Then you felt Jack's breath against your hair. You should have startled. You should have pulled away. Instead, half-asleep and freezing, you made a small sound and shifted closer.

The arm around you tightened. Not much. Just enough. Jack murmured something you could not make out. His hand settled flat against your back, warm through the borrowed shirt. His body curved around yours with a kind of unconscious care that made no room for embarrassment because neither of you was awake enough to choose it.

The pillow boundary was gone. The diplomatic border had failed. You tucked your face against his chest. He was warm. So warm. The storm battered the window, but under the blankets, in the dark, the world narrowed to the steady rise and fall of him.

Jack's chin brushed your hair. His hand rested between your shoulder blades. You fell asleep like that. Not deciding. Not confessing. Not crossing any line either of you could name while conscious.

Just cold and exhausted and drawn, somehow, to the safest heat in the room. Outside, snow buried the city. Inside, Jack held you like he had been doing it for years. Jack woke before the power came back on.

For a few seconds, he did not move. That was habit. Old habit. Useful habit. The kind of stillness that came before assessment. Before pain caught up. Before memory sorted itself into place. Before the body told the truth the mind had not agreed to yet.

Dark room. Hotel. Storm. Philadelphia. Conference. You. That last one arrived slower. Not because he had forgotten. Because his mind seemed determined to give him one merciful second before handing over the evidence.

Warmth against his chest. Soft breath through the fabric of his T-shirt. A hand curled loosely near his ribs. Your knee tucked between his. His arm around you. Jack stared at the ceiling.

The phone flashlight had died sometime during the night. The only light came from the window now, weak and blue-grey through the curtains, the city beyond still blurred by snow. The power was still out, or the room would have been humming. Instead, the silence was deep and cold around the edges, broken only by wind and the steady sound of your breathing.

You were asleep. Against him. Not beside him. Not near him. Against him. Your cheek rested over his heart like you had chosen the exact place designed to ruin him. Jack did not move.

He should have. That was the first reasonable thought. The second reasonable thought was that if he moved, you would wake up embarrassed, and then he would have to watch you apologise for something that had been as much his fault as yours.

The third reasonable thought was that he had no idea how the hell the pillow had ended up near the bottom of the bed. He looked down slowly. The diplomatic boundary, as you had called it, had collapsed sometime in the night. One end of the pillow was wedged between the blankets near his shin, completely useless. The other had vanished under the duvet.

Structurally unsound, he thought. And then, despite himself, almost smiled. Almost. His hand was spread against your back. He became aware of that next. Not gripping. Not possessive. Just there. Warm through the cotton of your sleep shirt. His thumb had found the small space beneath your shoulder blade and rested there like it belonged.

It did not belong there. That was the problem. Or one of them. Jack should have moved his hand. Instead, he let himself feel the weight of it for one more second. One more second, he told himself, was not a crime.

You shifted in your sleep. Jack went completely still. Your fingers tightened faintly against his shirt, and your face turned a little closer into his chest. A small sound left you, half breath and half protest against the cold room.

His arm responded before he could stop it. It tightened by a fraction. Your body settled. Jack closed his eyes. Idiot. The word had no force behind it. He had been called worse by better men and disagreed less.

Because this was stupid. Not the storm. Not the hotel room. Not even the bed, in itself. Those had been logistics. Bad logistics, but logistics. This was something else. This was waking up with you tucked against him and feeling, for one unguarded awful moment, not alarmed but relieved.

Relieved. Like some part of him had been waiting for the world to arrange itself like this. Like he had slept better with your breath against his shirt than he had any right to.

That was the dangerous thing. Not desire. Desire was simple enough to recognise and avoid. Jack had been avoiding wanting you for months with the grim discipline of a man disarming a device he refused to admit was live.

But this— This quiet. This ease. This body-deep reluctance to leave. That was what frightened him. Your breathing changed. He heard it before you moved. A slight catch. A deeper inhale. The soft, muddled shift of someone beginning to surface.

Jack opened his eyes. He still did not move. There was no good version of this. If he pulled away now, you would wake to rejection. If he stayed, you would wake to everything.

You stirred again. Your hand slid a little against his shirt. Then stopped. Your body went still. Jack held his breath. He felt the exact moment you woke properly. Your fingers curled.

Your cheek lifted a fraction. For a second, neither of you did anything. Then your eyes opened against the dim grey of his chest. You blinked. Once. Twice. Jack watched your face change.

Sleep-soft confusion. Recognition. Horror. Not horror of him, he thought. Not that. Horror of the situation. Of your hand on him. Of your leg tangled with his. Of his arm around you like he had made some claim in his sleep that he had not had the courage to make awake.

You lifted your head very slowly. Your eyes met his. Your hair was mussed on one side. Your face was warm from sleep. There was a faint line from his shirt pressed into your cheek.

Jack's chest tightened with such abrupt force that it bordered on pain. "Morning," he said. It came out low. Too rough. Your mouth parted. Nothing came out for a second. Then, because apparently you were both determined to survive by saying the least helpful things possible, you whispered, "Hi."

Neither of you moved. His arm was still around you. Your hand was still on his chest. The room was still cold. The snow kept hitting the window in softer gusts now, less violent than the night before but steady. The world outside had gone pale and quiet, buried under white.

Your eyes dropped to where his arm lay across your back. Jack became very aware of his hand again. He loosened it at once. "Sorry." The word left him before he could stop it.

Your gaze snapped back to his face. "No," you said quickly. "No, I'm— I'm sorry. I must have—" "We both moved." You stopped. Jack watched that land. You looked down between you, where the blankets were tangled around your legs, where the pillow boundary had failed catastrophically, where all the evidence suggested neither of you had been an innocent bystander.

"Oh," you said. Jack's mouth twitched faintly. It was not exactly funny. Except it was a little funny. You saw the almost-smile and exhaled a small, embarrassed laugh. "The wall failed," you murmured.

"Poor construction." "I blame the contractor." "You approved the design." "I was under duress." "You were under a blanket." "That too." The tiny rhythm of banter returned like a match struck in the cold.

It did not fix the intimacy. It made it worse, actually. Because neither of you had moved away. Not properly. Jack's arm had loosened, but his hand had not left your back. Your hand had shifted lower against his ribs, but it had not disappeared. Your knee was still pressed against his thigh beneath the covers.

You both knew. You both pretended not to know for one more second. Then you said, softer, "Are you okay?" Jack looked at you. He could have answered the usual way. He almost did.

The word sat ready. Fine. A shield. A reflex. An old door that knew how to close itself. But your face was close to his, and your voice had none of the clinical edge people usually carried when they asked him that. You were not asking about pain only. You were not asking whether he needed help. You were not asking because you had seen something and wanted reassurance that it had not disturbed you.

You were asking because you had woken in his arms and still wanted to know if he was alright. Jack looked away. "Yeah." A beat. Then, because the room had apparently stripped him of common sense, he added, "Better than expected."

Your expression changed. Slowly. Carefully. Like you did not want to frighten the admission by looking at it too quickly. "Yeah?" you asked. Jack should have corrected course.

He did not. "Yeah." Your fingers relaxed against his shirt. The movement was tiny. He felt it everywhere. "I'm okay too," you said, though he had not asked aloud yet. He looked back at you.

"You sure?" You nodded. Your cheek was still marked from his shirt. It made you look younger somehow, more vulnerable, and he hated that the sight of it did something warm and unreasonable to him.

"I'm sure." The words settled. No one moved. The morning had made the room visible in pieces. The room service tray near the door. His suitcase open on the rack. Your bag on the floor with a sleeve hanging out. The dead phone on the nightstand. The useless lamp. The curtains breathing faintly whenever the wind found a seam at the window.

And the bed. The two of you in it. Too close to pretend it meant nothing. Not close enough, a terrible part of him thought. Jack shifted his gaze to the ceiling. "You're probably cold."

You blinked. Then laughed, the sound soft against him. "That's where we're going?" "It's relevant." "Is it?" "The power's still out." "Ah. Logistics." "Yes." "Professional courtesy?"

He looked down at you. The joke had been easier last night. Now it sounded like a challenge. His hand, still traitorous, rested against your back. Your body was warm where it touched his.

He could feel your heart beating. "No," he said. The word left quietly. Barely more than breath. But it changed everything. Your smile faded. Not in a bad way. In the way a person goes still when a door opens somewhere they thought was locked.

"No?" you asked. Jack swallowed. The smart thing would be to move. Sit up. Reach for his phone. Check the flight status. Talk about snowplows and airport delays and work schedules and the thousands of ordinary facts that could bury this one extraordinary one.

He was good at ordinary facts. He was good at burying things. But you were looking at him, and for once, the cost of silence seemed heavier than the cost of speech. "No," he said again.

You looked at him for a long moment. Then your hand flattened gently against his chest. Not pulling him closer. Not pushing away. Just there. "Okay," you whispered. Jack had no idea what that meant.

He had no idea if you meant okay, I understand or okay, stop or okay, me too. He had no idea how a single word could make him want to lean in and run at the same time. His voice came out rougher than he wanted.

"You should know better." Your eyebrows drew together. "Than what?" He looked at you. "Than to get involved with me." The words were blunt because bluntness was easier than fear.

There. Said. Ugly thing on the table. Except there was no table. Just a cold hotel room, a failed pillow wall, and your hand over the centre of his chest. Your expression shifted.

Not hurt. Not quite. Angry, maybe. Softly. The way you got angry with patients who apologised for needing help. "Jack." He looked away. "I'm serious." "I know you are." "You work with me."

"I noticed." His mouth tightened despite himself. "You know what I mean." "I do." Your voice stayed quiet. "But I also know I'm not a child, and I don't need you to make decisions for me because you've decided you're complicated."

His eyes came back to yours. That hit somewhere precise. You knew it too. He saw it in the way your face softened after the words landed, like you had not meant them to bruise but were not taking them back either.

"You are," you said. "Complicated. So am I. So is everyone who works where we work and keeps showing up anyway." "That's not the same." "No," you agreed. "It isn't." The honesty of that did more damage than reassurance would have.

You did not pretend he was easy. You did not pretend there was no grief in him, no damage, no history that stood in rooms before he did. You did not smooth him down into someone more convenient. You did not make him harmless.

You just stayed. "You deserve someone who—" he began. "No." Jack stopped. Your voice had sharpened. Not loud. Not harsh. Just firm enough to cut through the sentence before he could use it against both of you.

"No?" "No," you said. "You don't get to do that." His brows drew together. You pushed yourself up a little, enough that your faces were no longer so close, though your hand still rested lightly on him.

"You don't get to decide what I deserve if the only reason you're doing it is because you're scared I might choose you anyway." Jack went utterly still. Outside, the wind dragged snow across the glass in a long hiss.

Your own face changed then, as if you had surprised yourself. But you did not look away. Brave, Jack thought suddenly. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just there, under the borrowed sleep shirt and the oversized sweatpants and the line from his shirt on your cheek.

Braver than him, maybe. Often. His throat worked. "That's not—" he started. You waited. He stopped. Because it was. Of course it was. The room was quiet. You sighed softly, not with impatience. With tiredness. With tenderness. With something that made him feel more exposed than anger would have.

"I'm not asking you for everything right now," you said. "I'm not asking you to have some perfect answer in a hotel room with no power after six hours of sleep and terrible conference food."

"Good," he said, because he was still himself. "That would be unreasonable." A smile broke over your face before you could stop it. Small. Affectionate. Devastating. "There he is."

His chest tightened again. You said it like you had been waiting for him under all the fear. Like the deflection was not all of him, but it was a familiar enough piece to love.

Love. No. Not going there. Not yet. Jack looked at your hand on his chest. Your fingers shifted as if you had only just realised you were still touching him. You began to pull away.

He caught your wrist. Gently. Not enough to hold you if you wanted to go. Just enough to make you pause. You looked at him. Jack stared at the place where his fingers circled your wrist.

Your pulse tapped against his thumb. Fast. Not fear, he thought. Or not only fear. His voice was low when he spoke. "I'm not good at this." Your face softened again. "I know."

That might have offended someone else. For Jack, it felt like relief. "I mean it," he said. "I know." "I'll make it harder than it needs to be." "Probably." His eyes flicked up.

You shrugged a little. "What? You will." A faint laugh moved through him before he could stop it. You smiled, and the whole room changed around it. "But I'm not exactly known for choosing the easy thing," you said.

"No?" "No." "That seems like a character flaw." "You would know." His thumb moved once, unconsciously, over the inside of your wrist. You looked down at the movement. So did he.

The banter faded. The air shifted again. Jack let go of your wrist. But slowly. Very slowly. Your hand did not retreat this time. It lowered to the blanket between you, close to his.

The space from last night returned. Almost. A language, you had made it into. A habit. Jack was tired of almost. That was the problem. He had been tired of it for a while.

He had just called it professionalism. Timing. Caution. Decency. Self-preservation. He had dressed fear up in enough adult words that it could pass through most rooms unchallenged.

But here, in the low morning light, with your hair mussed and your body still warm from his and your eyes not letting him disappear inside his own excuses, it looked exactly like what it was.

Fear. And wanting. Both. Your phone buzzed. Neither of you moved. It buzzed again. You closed your eyes. "Dana," Jack said. "Probably." "Persistent." "You respect that." "I do."

The phone buzzed a third time. You groaned softly and reached toward the nightstand, nearly overbalancing because the blankets were tangled around your legs. Jack's hand moved to your waist automatically, steadying you.

You froze. So did he. His palm was warm through the shirt. Your eyes met. The phone stopped buzzing. Neither of you said anything. His hand stayed where it was. You were close again.

Not accidentally this time. Not entirely. Jack could see the hesitation in your face. Not doubt. Not regret. Just awareness. The same line both of you had been walking for months, suddenly under your bare feet.

He should have let go. He did not. Your gaze dropped to his mouth. It was so quick he might have missed it if he had not been looking for some reason not to be the only one losing the fight.

His breath changed. You noticed. Of course you did. "Jack," you whispered. He had heard his name in every possible context. Shouted across trauma bays. Snapped in frustration. Called over noise. Written on charts. Spoken by patients, colleagues, strangers, people dying, people grieving, people angry enough to spit.

He had never heard it like that. Soft. Terrified. Wanting. It reached somewhere he had not fortified well enough. He lifted his hand from your waist slowly, giving you time to stop him. Giving himself time to stop.

Neither of you did. His fingers brushed your jaw. Barely. A question more than a touch. Your eyes fluttered, then held his. He leaned in. Not all the way. Just enough. Enough that your breath warmed his mouth. Enough that the whole room seemed to vanish except for the inch between you. Enough that if either of you moved, there would be no pretending this was about weather or beds or professional courtesy.

Your phone rang. Loudly. You both jerked back. The sound tore through the room with the violence of an overhead page. Your phone skittered slightly on the nightstand as it vibrated.

Dana's name lit the screen. For one second, you and Jack stared at it. Then Jack closed his eyes. You made a sound that was half laugh, half despair. "I'm going to kill her," you whispered.

"No, you're not." "I might." "You like her." "That's the only thing saving her." The phone kept ringing. You grabbed it, cheeks flushed, and answered with the tone of someone clinging to the last scraps of dignity.

"Dana." Jack lay back against the pillows and looked at the ceiling like it had personally wronged him. You avoided looking at him. Mostly. "What? Yes, I'm alive. No, the power's still out." You paused. "No, I'm not in the lobby."

Jack's eyes closed harder. You sat up a little straighter, dragging the blanket with you. "No, I found somewhere safe." Another pause. "Dana." Jack turned his head slightly.

Even in the dim light, you could see the amusement beginning to break through his exasperation. Your face warmed further. "Because I'm an adult and I don't have to give you my full lodging itinerary." You listened, then looked briefly skyward. "Yes, I ate. Yes, actual food. No, not just coffee."

Jack mouthed, barely. You glared at him. He looked almost pleased with himself. "I am ignoring that," you said into the phone, though you were not entirely sure whether you meant Dana or Jack. "How's the ED?"

The shift was instant. Jack saw it. Felt it, almost. The way your face changed. The softness tucked away. The clinical focus returning. Concern sharpening your posture even though you were sitting in his bed in his clothes with your hair a mess.

You listened for nearly a minute. The room changed with you. Jack watched quietly. "They got extra staff in?" you asked. "Good. Is Robby there? Of course he is." You smiled faintly. "Tell him Abbott hasn't caused an interstate incident yet."

Jack gave you a look. You ignored it. "No, don't tell him the rest." A beat. "There is no rest." Jack's eyebrows rose. You covered your eyes with one hand. "Dana." Your voice dropped. "I'm hanging up now."

Whatever Dana said made your mouth fall open. Jack could not hear it, but he could guess the flavour. You pointed at the phone like she could see you. "That is harassment."

A pause. "Love you too." You hung up. The room went quiet. You set the phone down very carefully. Jack waited. You did not look at him. "She knows," he said. You nodded once. "She knows something."

"What did she say?" "No." "That bad?" "She said…" You stopped, pressing your lips together. Jack watched your restraint with growing interest. "She said?" You turned to him, face hot. "She said if I'm with you, she hopes you're being less emotionally constipated than usual."

Jack blinked. Once. Then looked away. You waited. His shoulders moved. Just slightly. Then again. "Oh my God," you said. "Are you laughing?" "No." "You are." "I'm not." "You absolutely are."

He pressed his fingers to his brow. It was contained. Barely audible. But it was there — a low, reluctant laugh that seemed dragged out of him against his will. The sight of it did something catastrophic to you.

Jack Abbott laughing in a dark hotel room under a snowstorm because Dana had called him emotionally constipated. Your heart did not stand a chance. "It's not funny," he said.

"It's very funny." "She's insubordinate." "She's charge." "That explains the confidence." You laughed then too, and the room warmed a little around the sound. It helped. It saved you, maybe.

Or delayed the inevitable. Jack's laughter faded first, but not completely. There was still something loose around his mouth when he looked back at you. For a second, it was easy to imagine waking up like this again. Not in a hotel. Not because of a storm. Just morning. His voice. Your phone. Someone from work interrupting with unnecessary accuracy. Jack pretending to be annoyed while secretly pleased you had people who checked on you.

The thought must have shown on your face because his expression softened. Not much. Enough. "ED's okay?" he asked. You nodded. "Busy. Not catastrophic. Roads are bad, but night shift got stuck, day shift came in early, everyone's annoyed but functioning."

"Normal disaster mode." "Pretty much." "Good." "Robby told Dana to tell you that if you're bored, you can review the conference notes and send him bullet points." Jack's expression went dead flat.

You grinned. "He did not." "No." "Good." "He did say, apparently, that you should not pick fights with anyone from cardiology while stranded." "Cardiology keeps coming up."

"You have a reputation." "I have standards." "Same system?" "Same system." The quiet settled again, gentler this time. You were sitting up now, blanket around your shoulders, and Jack was still half-reclined beside you. The accidental closeness had been disrupted, but not erased. If anything, the interruption had made the unfinished thing between you brighter.

You both knew what had almost happened before the phone rang. Neither of you could unknow it. Jack looked at your phone, then at the dead lamp. "We should check flights."

"Probably." Neither of you moved. A beat passed. Then another. You turned your head toward him. "Jack." He looked at you. There was caution in his face again, but not the closed kind. More like a man standing at the edge of a room he had avoided for years, listening for whether it was safe to step inside.

You swallowed. "We don't have to pretend nothing almost happened." His jaw flexed. "No." "No, we don't?" "No," he said. "We don't." The answer was steady. Your pulse was not.

"Okay." "Okay." It would have been easier if one of you had looked away. Neither of you did. Jack's hand rested on the blanket near your knee. Yours rested beside it, fingers curled in the fabric.

Close. Almost. Again. This time, you moved. Only a little. Your fingers brushed his. Jack looked down. You waited. His hand turned beneath yours. Slowly. Palm up. An offering.

Not dramatic. Not polished. Not the kind of gesture that belonged in speeches or films. Just Jack, quiet and tired and scared enough to be careful, letting you decide if you wanted to take what he could give right now.

You slid your hand into his. His fingers closed around yours. Warm. Firm. Real. Something in your chest unknotted so abruptly it almost hurt. Jack kept looking at your joined hands like he was studying an X-ray for a fracture line.

Then he said, "This is a bad idea." You squeezed his hand once. "Probably." His eyes lifted. You smiled faintly. "You're not the only one allowed to make bad decisions." "That's not reassuring."

"It wasn't meant to be." "You could try." "I could." "You won't." "No." A faint almost-smile tugged at his mouth. The shape of it was so familiar now it made you ache. "What happens when we get home?" you asked.

There. The real question. Not the storm. Not the bed. Not the almost-kiss. Home. The Pitt. The ED. Dana's loud eyebrows. Robby's knowing looks. Long shifts. Short breaks. Professional distance. Charts and traumas and grief and the kind of fatigue that made honest things hard to hold.

Jack's fingers tightened around yours. Not much. Enough. "I don't know," he said. The answer should have disappointed you. It did not. Because he did not pull away. Because he did not say nothing.

Because Jack Abbott admitting uncertainty while holding your hand felt more intimate than any clean promise would have. You nodded. "Okay." "That enough?" "For this minute?"

His eyes stayed on yours. "Yes." You looked down at your joined hands. "For this minute, yeah." Jack let out a slow breath. Then, after a long moment, he said, "When we get home, I'd like to take you to dinner."

You looked up so fast you nearly hurt your neck. "What?" His face shifted, some of the vulnerability closing under dry irritation. "You heard me." "I did. I'm just checking for carbon monoxide."

"The power's out, not the ventilation." "Could be subtle." "It's not carbon monoxide." "It might be concussion. Did you hit your head?" "You're making this difficult." "I'm panicking."

"That's obvious." You laughed, breathless and ridiculous and on the edge of something much softer. Jack's eyes warmed. There. No hiding it this time. Not entirely. "Dinner," he repeated.

Your smile settled. "Like a date?" His thumb moved once against yours. "Yes." One word. No flourish. No professional courtesy. Just yes. Your heart went very quiet. Then very loud.

"When we get home," you said. "When we get home." "And not at the hospital cafeteria." His eyebrows lifted. "You have standards." "I do." "Good." "Somewhere with actual food."

"Fine." "And no orthopedic surgeons." "That may be harder to guarantee." You smiled. He did too. Barely. Perfectly. The room hummed suddenly. You both looked up. The heater clicked.

The lamp beside the bed flickered once, then turned on, flooding the room with warm yellow light. The power was back. For some reason, neither of you moved for several seconds.

The return of normal things felt rude. The lamp. The heater. The faint buzz from the mini fridge. The hotel room snapping back into itself as if it had not spent the night holding you both outside of ordinary life.

Then your phone began charging again and immediately buzzed with a flood of notifications. Jack looked at it. "You're popular." "I'm monitored." "Accurate." The heat began to push through the room slowly. The window stayed pale and snow-blurred, but the worst of the storm seemed to have softened. Somewhere beyond the walls, the hotel came alive again — pipes shifting, voices rising, the distant chime of an elevator finding power.

The spell should have broken. Maybe it did. Maybe that was why you noticed, suddenly, that you were still holding Jack's hand. Maybe that was why Jack noticed too. Neither of you let go.

Not immediately. Then, carefully, like he did not want you to mistake the movement for regret, Jack released your hand and reached for his phone. "Flights," he said. "Right."

"Need to know if we're stuck another day." "Imagine." His eyes flicked to yours. You held his gaze. The joke did not quite land as a joke. A flush climbed your neck. Jack looked back at his phone.

His mouth twitched. "Airport's delayed," he said after a moment. "Cancelled?" "Not yet." You checked your own phone. It took a second to load, then the airline app opened with the kind of cheerful incompetence only travel software could manage.

"My flight's still showing delayed." "Mine too." "So we might get home." "Might." You sat there with him, both of you looking down at your screens and pretending the ordinary task was enough to steady the room.

It helped. A little. Then a notification from Dana appeared at the top of your phone. DANA: If he asks you to dinner, say yes. If he doesn't, tell him I'm disappointed but not surprised.

You stared at it. Jack glanced sideways. "What?" "Nothing." "Dana again?" "No." "Liar." You turned the phone screen down against the blanket. "She's invasive." "She's usually right."

You looked at him. Jack's eyes were on his phone, but his expression had gone deliberately neutral. A smile crept across your face. "She is, actually." He looked up then.

The warmth between you changed shape. Not less. Just steadier. A little less accidental. A little more chosen. You tucked the blanket around yourself and leaned back against the headboard, suddenly aware of how tired you still were. The night had not been restful, exactly, even if it had been something close. Your body felt warm now in the returning heat, heavy with interrupted sleep and emotional whiplash.

Jack noticed. Of course. "Sleep another hour," he said. You blinked. "What?" "Flights aren't going anywhere yet. Checkout's delayed because of the outage. Sleep." "You too?"

"I'm awake." "That is not an answer." "It was adjacent to one." You gave him a look. He sighed. "Fine." "Fine?" "I'll sleep." "Good." "But if you steal the blanket—" "I will."

His mouth twitched. "You admit it?" "I contain multitudes." "Mostly theft." "Mostly survival." He set his phone down and reached to turn off the lamp. Then he paused. The room was warm-lit now, no longer hidden in emergency glow. Morning had made everything more visible. More real.

He looked at the bed. Then at you. The pillow wall was still at the bottom of the mattress, defeated and crumpled beyond repair. You followed his gaze. A laugh threatened, but your throat felt too tight for it.

"Do we rebuild the border?" you asked. Jack looked at the pillow. Then at you. "No," he said. Soft. Certain. Your breath caught. He did not touch you. He did not make it bigger than that.

He just turned off the lamp, easing the room back into dim morning, and settled under the covers beside you. Not as far away as before. Not pressed close either. Just there.

Close enough that if either of you shifted in sleep, you might find each other again. Close enough that pretending would require more effort than honesty. You lay on your side facing him.

Jack lay on his back, eyes on the ceiling. For a minute, neither of you spoke. Then you said, very softly, "Dinner when we get home." His eyes closed. "Yes." "Not professional courtesy."

His mouth moved. "No." You smiled into the quiet. Outside, the snow kept falling. Inside, under the returning heat and the tired morning hush, Jack reached beneath the blanket and found your hand again.

This wasn’t random. Not by a long shot.

It was him. Your attending. The stubborn, overworked, infuriatingly competent man who makes unresolved emotional baggage look hot. The man you have to see in barely two hours.

A small, helpless sound escapes you as you roll onto your side again, squeezing your eyes shut.

This is a problem.

A very real, very immediate, absolutely unprofessional problem.

And yet, you still don’t move. You lie there too long, cheeks burning despite the fact that no one else can see what you’re replaying in your mind. Warmth lingers beneath your skin, pooling low in your belly as you let yourself remember every phantom touch. Every whispered word. The look in his eyes as he’d settled between your legs and—

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.

You bolt upright, your hand flying out to find your phone.

You’re still hot, still flushed and sticky. Still half-dreaming about Robby and his goddamn hands—but now? Now you’re late. Horribly late. Because that alarm isn’t your wake-up alarm—it’s your backup alarm. The one that goes off when it’s time for you to leave for work.

“Fuck!”

You throw the covers back and rush into the bathroom. You strip quickly out of your damp sleep shirt, tossing everything on the floor before stepping into the shower without even waiting for the water to warm. Which is exactly what you need, you remind yourself as you hiss beneath the cold spray.

Fifteen minutes later, you’re standing in front of the mirror in your black scrubs, trying to fix your hair and will the colour to drain from your cheeks. But it’s stubborn. Bright. Hot to the touch and utterly telling.

“Jesus Christ,” you sigh, squeezing your eyes shut for a second too long.

A second you don’t have.

With a deep breath, you turn, grab your bag, and sling it over your shoulder, wondering whether running to the hospital might actually be quicker than your usual commute at this time. Traffic is never great—you never truly know which route will get you there fastest—but now you’re about to hit peak hour.

You spend the entire drive trying to think about literally anything other than the dream—patient charts, upcoming shifts, whether your stethoscope is in your bag or your locker—but your thoughts keep slipping sideways, traitorous and vivid.

So vivid.

Stop thinking about his hands.

Stop thinking about his voice.

Stop—

You groan softly and turn the radio up louder.

It doesn’t help.

By the time you pull into the hospital parking lot, you’re almost twenty minutes late. You slam your car door shut, hike your bag higher on your shoulder, and practically run toward the ER doors.

“Woah,” Donnie says, quickly stepping out of your way. “Someone’s in a hurry.”

You don’t reply. You just keep going until you hit central, then slow to a hurried walk—head down, eyes fixed on your feet, praying everyone is already too busy to notice you.

“You’re late,” Dana says.

You stop mid-step, more out of habit than intention.

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I—”

“Shit, hon, you okay?” She steps around the desk, peering over her glasses. “You look like you’re burnin’ up.”

You step back before she can press a hand to your forehead.

“I’m fine, I swear.” You keep backing up. “Just my—my car’s A/C isn’t working and I’m a little warm. That’s all.”

You know she doesn’t believe you. This is Dana you’re talking to, not some brand-new, bright-eyed RN. Dana can see through any and all bullshit, and by the look on her face, she isn’t buying this at all.

“I’m fine,” you say again, forcing a smile before turning sharply on your heel.

Only to turn right into something solid.

Warm. Tall. Unmoving.

“Shit, I—”

You look up.

And your entire nervous system shuts down.

Dr. Robby.

“Sorry,” you blurt instantly, stepping back so fast you nearly trip over your own feet. “I didn’t see—I mean, I was looking, just not—”

His hand is still wrapped around your elbow, grounding you in place, and for one terrible second all you can think about is how close he is. How close he’d felt last night. How real it feels right now.

His eyebrows lift slightly, confusion flickering across his face. “You alright?”

“Yes,” you say too quickly. “Fine. Totally fine.”

You are not fine.

Your face feels nuclear, and you’re suddenly aware of everything at once—his height, his proximity, the way his sleeves are pushed up, the fact that he’s looking directly at you like he’s trying to figure something out.

His head tilts slightly.

“You’re late,” he says, not unkindly.

“I know.”

Neither of you move for a moment.

You can feel your pulse in your throat. Your chest. Lower.

“I—I’m gonna—”

You don’t even finish before you turn away, hurrying down the hall toward the lockers. Every inch of your skin feels like it’s on fire—and every thought in your head is so wildly inappropriate for where you are right now you feel like you might throw up.

“Damn.” Santos appears beside you, her eyes flicking between your face and the tablet in her hands. “Either you’re febrile or you just did something really embarrassing.” She tucks the tablet under her arm. “What gives?”

You shoot her a flat look as you key in the code to your locker. “Nothing gives. I’m fine.”

She snorts. “Sure. That tone is really selling it.”

You take a deep breath and turn toward your locker, shoving your bag inside before unzipping your jacket and shrugging off. You stuff that in too—then sling your stethoscope around your neck, shut the door, and turn back to your fellow R2.

She looks concerned now, brows drawn as her eyes track over your face and neck.

“You’re seriously flushed,” she says. “Are you sure you’re feeling okay?”

“I’m fine.” You turn and start walking back toward central. “Just running late, okay? Now can I start my shift before—” You stop yourself, his name catching somewhere in your chest. “Before I have an attending down my throat for slacking off?”

God. You could have chosen better words.

“Okay, whatever,” Santos mutters, holding her tablet out again. “Sorry for caring.”

She gives you a sarcastic little eye roll before veering off around the other side of the nurse’s station and ducking into one of the active patient rooms. You watch after her for a second before a voice across the room steals your attention.

He’s on the other side of central, nodding along while Mohan and Whitaker brief him on a patient—and looking entirely too hot for seven-thirty on a Monday morning beneath harsh fluorescent lights.

“Stop it,” you whisper to yourself, pausing at the nurse’s station to collect a tablet.

“Stop what?”

You startle, head snapping toward the man suddenly beside you.

“Jesus Christ, Dr. Abbot,” you sigh. “Are you trying to get me admitted for a heart attack?”

The corner of his mouth twitches. “You already look halfway there.”

You roll your eyes. “Okay, I get it. I’m red and I’m sweaty—can everyone please stop commenting on it now?”

He chuckles. “Sorry. Didn’t realise you’d already been bullied about it.”

You sigh again and turn your attention to the board, tipping your head back to read it.

“Why are you still here, anyway?” you ask.

“Wanted to see my favourite resident,” he says. “You sure you don’t want to come back to nights?”

You huff a laugh through your nose. “I love you, Abbot, but nights aren’t for me.” You glance across the nurse’s station, where Dana and Robby are now discussing the latest incoming trauma. “I just miss Dana too much.”

Abbot snorts. “Dana?”

You look back at him. “Yes. Dana.”

Amusement flickers across his face. “You sure?”

“Yes,” you say, too quickly. “I mean, who—what else would—”

“Doctors,” Javadi interrupts, stepping in front of you both. “Sorry to interrupt, but could I get a second opinion on a patient in South Twenty-One, please?”

Abbot nods, glancing at you. “I’ll go. You settle in.” The corner of his mouth lifts a little higher. “Maybe check in with your attending.”

Then he turns and walks away with Javadi at his side.

You stare after him—eyes wide, pulse racing, wondering what the fuck he meant by all that.

You’ve always suspected Abbot might be a mind reader, but that? That was something else. Too knowing. Too dangerous. And now you need to figure out what the hell he thinks he knows.

“Doctor,” Perlah calls from behind the desk. “Could you check on Central Twelve? She’s still complaining of pain after morphine and Zofran.”

You turn to her, shaking your head as if that might knock your thoughts back into place. “Uh—yeah. Of course. Central Twelve, heading there now.”

She gives you a curious look, brows drawn, but you turn away before she can ask any more questions.

On your way to C12, you pull up the patient’s chart—seen by Whitaker about half an hour ago—and double-check the morphine and Zofran doses she received. You pause just outside the room, drawing a deep breath and reminding yourself that you are at work. You don’t have time to be flustered. You don’t have time to worry about what Jack Abbot may or may not know. And you definitely don’t have time to obsess over the imaginary rasp of Robby’s beard against your thigh that you can somehow still feel.

When you push the door open and step inside, you’re the picture of professionalism. You offer the patient a polite smile, introduce yourself, and start the routine checks that feel more like second nature than work.

After the exam and a brief conversation, you order two more milligrams of morphine, review the labs Whitaker sent, and make a note to check back in fifteen minutes. Then, still intent on avoiding your attending, you bury your nose in your tablet and move on to the next patient waiting in South Sixteen.

Pressure-like chest pain. Diaphoretic, no shortness of breath. Initial ECG normal. Labs pending.

“Alright, Mr. Mullens,” you say, squirting a pump of sanitiser into your palm. “We’re going to get some scans done so we can get a better idea of what’s going on. If the pain gets worse before then, let us know.”

The man nods. “Thank you, Doc.”

You smile, stepping out into the hallway. “I’ll be back soon to check in.”

As soon as you turn around, you look for Robby, making sure you’re not about to run into him again. Literally.

You spot him all the way across central, walking with Santos toward the North hallway. Good. You’re safe. And if all goes well, maybe you’ll manage to avoid him for the entire day. Maybe you won’t have to come face to face with the face you can still see buried between your legs.

Fuck.

Your pulse kicks, heart beating too fast as you remember the way his eyes had watched you in your dream. It’s almost too much. Even the phantom memory of it is making you breathless.

God. If it ever actually happened, you might pass out.

“Why would you even think of that?” you mutter to yourself, stopping at the nurse’s station.

When you finally look up, Perlah and Princess are watching you closely, speculation sparkling in their eyes.

“Sobrang pula ng mukha niya,” Perlah murmurs.

Princess nods. “Hindi lagnat ’yan.”

Perlah lowers her voice even more. “Sa tingin mo ba may kinalaman ito sa crush niya?”

They both laugh quietly, turning away from you as if it isn’t you they’re gossiping about.

“Malinaw,” Princess says.

You give them both a tight smile before glancing up at the board, searching for something suitably distracting and far away from nosy nurses and unfairly attractive attendings.

You’re just about to head back toward the South hallway when a gurney crashes through the ambulance bay doors.

“Trauma Two!” Dana calls. “Robby!”

Abbot is already moving, meeting the paramedics halfway and guiding the gurney toward T2.

He points at you as he walks. “With me.”

“Shit,” you mutter, dropping your tablet on the desk and jogging over.

“Thirty-two-year-old male, MVC, restrained driver,” the paramedic says. “Front-end collision, airbags deployed. No LOC. Increasing shortness of breath during transport. Breath sounds decreased left side.”

“Let’s get him on monitor,” Abbot says, moving to stand opposite you at the head of the bed. “On my count.”

Robby steps in at your side, like he always does—close enough that you feel him before you see him.

His arm brushes yours.

Your stomach flips.

Focus.

“One. Two. Three,” Abbot counts.

You transfer the patient from gurney to trauma bed, and Santos starts cutting away clothes.

“Two large-bore IVs,” Abbot tells Jesse. “Trauma labs. Portable chest X-ray.” Then he looks at you, brows raised. “Breath sounds?”

“Oh—uh—” You fumble with your stethoscope, pressing it to each side of the patient’s chest. “Diminished on the left.”

You reach for the patient’s neck, fingers steady despite the noise around you.

“Trachea midline.”

Abbot nods, then turns to Santos. “Let’s get ultrasound.”

“BP holding?” Robby asks.

The sound of his voice sends goosebumps racing along your arms—and you shiver before you can stop yourself.

“Pressure’s 118 over 76,” Jesse replies. “Stable.”

Robby glances at you, brows drawn. “You okay?”

You nod quickly, without looking up. “Never better.”

“Absent lung sliding on the left,” Santos announces.

“Likely pneumothorax,” Abbot says, looking at Robby.

“Sats dropping,” Jesse calls. “Eighty-nine.”

Robby nods once. “Okay. We’re putting in a chest tube.”

“Chest tube tray. Twenty-eight French. Left side,” Abbot orders.

You try to move out of the way, but Robby’s hand catches your elbow—and you can’t help but look up. His dark eyes meet yours with an intensity you’ve never noticed before, and suddenly your lungs forget how to work.

“You’re up,” he says. “I’ll walk you through it.”

You know there’s no time to argue. You know you can’t. Shouldn’t. This is your job. And it’s not like you could say no to this man even if you wanted to.

You swallow. “Okay.”

Robby nods, then looks at Jesse. “Alright, let’s get some lido. Sutures ready. Hook up suction.”

You turn back to the patient, watching Abbot position the left arm above his head while Jesse preps the area—chlorhexidine swab, sterile drape. The rustle of sterile gowns and the snap of gloves fill the room as you pull on your own and push a pair of protective glasses up your nose. Then you grab the lidocaine from the tray and lean over the patient’s left side, steadying your hand as you guide the needle in.

The room is quieter now—save for the steady beeping of the monitors—chaos narrowing into focus as everyone watches you sink the needle into the patient’s skin.

“A little deeper,” Robby murmurs.

Your breath catches, but your hands stay steady.

You can feel him just behind you, leaning close, his warmth bleeding through your scrubs and setting your whole body on fire.

“Now find the rib,” he instructs. “Stay above it.”

You discard the needle onto the tray and start feeling ribs, counting down until you find the space.

“Scalpel,” you say, refusing to take your eyes off the spot your fingers found.

Jesse places the scalpel in your hand, and without hesitation, you cut a three-centimetre incision.

“Good,” Robby murmurs.

Your pulse thrums beneath your skin.

“Clamp,” you say, your voice almost breaking.

Jesse takes the scalpel from your hand, replacing it with a curved clamp.

You insert the clamp, pushing past muscle layers, and begin to spread. It feels forceful. Too much. Invasive, even though you know this is exactly what you’re supposed to do.

Robby steps closer. “Commit to it.”

His hand covers yours to adjust the angle, add pressure—until you feel the pop. And it takes every ounce of your self-control not to react. Not to whimper at the very normal, very professional way your attending is guiding you right now.

“Now sweep,” he says, so close you can feel the warmth of his breath against your cheek.

You insert your finger into the space, confirming entry into the pleural cavity and checking for adhesions—then nod. You don’t dare turn your head as you hold your hand out for the tube. He’s too close, too warm. You can smell the faint scent of soap on his skin even over the antiseptic and metallic tang in the air.

“Inserting tube,” you say, more to yourself than anyone else.

You start guiding the tube in—slow and controlled—feeling every millimetre of movement.

Until it stops.

Too much resistance.

“Up,” Robby says, his hand covering yours again. “Aim higher.”

He adjusts your wrist slightly, guiding the pressure.

You swallow hard and nod, hoping no one else can hear your uneven breathing—but knowing Robby definitely can.

He helps you apply more pressure, firmer now, angle corrected, and the tube starts moving again.

“That’s it,” he murmurs. “Good girl. Keep going.”

Your brain short-circuits.

Heat floods your face. Your chest. Lower.

His voice echoes from your dream. Breathless. Panting. Words whispered against your skin.

Fuck. Now is not the time.

You tighten your grip on the tube and push.

Then—

A rush of air.

“Air return,” Abbot says, a hint of pride in his tone. “Now secure it.”

Robby steps back, and you hear the snap of his gloves coming off.

“O2 sats climbing,” he announces.

“Cool,” Santos says, grinning at Abbot’s side. “I’m doing the next one.”

You barely look up. You can’t. Your whole face feels like it’s on fire. You've never blushed this hard before. You’ve never been this hot in your life. And you’ve definitely never been this horny in the goddamn trauma bay.

“You good to finish up?” Robby asks Abbot.

Abbot nods.

From the corner of your eye, you see Robby step toward the door, glancing over his shoulder with a small, impressed smile.

“Nice work, Doctor.”

You don’t reply. You just nod, lips twitching with a soft smile as you keep your eyes on the patient.

As soon as you finish suturing and securing the tube, you step back, tearing off your gown and gloves as if that’ll somehow give you a reprieve from the heat beneath your skin. Jesse takes your place beside the patient, nodding along to Abbot’s orders while he and Kim start cleaning up.

You shove your gown, gloves, and glasses into the biohazard bin and head for the door without looking back—which is exactly why you don’t notice Santos trailing you.

“That was so cool,” she says, startling you.

“Jesus,” you mutter. “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

She frowns. “Sneak? I was right behind you. It’s not my fault you’re all weird and jumpy today.”

“I’m not—” You glance across central to make sure Robby isn’t somewhere in your path to the ambulance bay. “I’m not weird and jumpy.”

Santos scoffs. “Right. And I’m not behind on my charting.”

You don’t bother arguing with her. You just keep walking—and she follows. All the way through the ER and out to the ambulance bay, where you stop just before the curb and draw a deep breath. It isn’t nearly as refreshing as you’d hoped, but a break from the fluorescents is always welcome.

“Okay,” she says, folding her arms. “What is with you today? You’re never this off. I’ve seen you perform procedures you’d only read about without a single assist from the attending. And I know you’ve done a chest tube before.”

You don’t answer. You don’t even look at her. You just tip your head back and stare at the roof of the ambulance bay, wondering whether it might collapse and save you from this conversation.

“And on that note,” she goes on, “Dr. Robby knows you’ve done a chest tube before, so why the hell was he being so patient? I swear he’s got a soft spot for you. Javadi pointed it out a few weeks ago and I honestly don’t know how I missed it. I mean—has he ever yelled at you?”

You finally look at her, brows drawn. “I—uh—no, I don’t think so.”

“Exactly,” she says, stepping closer. “And please tell me I heard wrong, but did he say good girl to you back there?”

As soon as she says it, your cheeks burn with renewed intensity. You can feel your heart in your throat, beating out of rhythm and way too fast for someone who is definitely not in a life-or-death situation.

And Santos notices—because of course she does.

Her eyes go wide. “Oh my God. This totally has something to do with Dr. Robby.”

“Shut up,” you mutter. “It’s not—”

You stop yourself, squeezing your eyes shut and pinching the bridge of your nose.

Santos isn’t going to let this go. You know her. She’s too inquisitive, too nosy, and there’s not nearly enough chaos today to distract her.

“Okay, fine,” you sigh, looking up, face burning. “I had a sex dream about him and now I can’t stop thinking about it.”

She stares at you for a second.

“A sex dream?”

You nod miserably.

Her mouth twitches—then she snorts.

Not a polite laugh. A full, startled snort she tries—and fails—to muffle behind her hand.

“Oh my God,” she says. “I knew you had a thing for him, but a sex dream?”

“Would you stop saying it?” you hiss, glancing nervously around the empty ambulance bay.

She laughs a little harder. “Was he good?”

“Oh my God,” you mutter, dropping your head into your hands. “I regret everything.”

“Hey,” she says, still laughing as she drops a hand on your shoulder. “For what it’s worth, I’m pretty sure he’d go there if you asked.”

Your head snaps up. “If I asked?”

She shrugs. “Why not shoot your shot?”

“Because he’s my boss!”

“He’s your attending,” she says. “Technically, Dr. Underwood is your boss. Dr. Robby just supervises you.”

You shut your eyes again and draw a deep breath, trying to steady your pulse.

“Okay,” you say, squaring your shoulders. “I’m done with this conversation. I’m going back to work, and you’re not telling anyone what I just told you. Okay?”

She mimes zipping her lips. “I’m a vault, I swear.”

You nod. “Good.”

Then you turn and start walking back inside, trying not to conspicuously check for Robby on your way to the nurse’s station. Santos is still at your heels, still wearing an amused grin as if your humiliation is her exact brand of humour.

“One more question,” she says, stopping beside you as you grab another tablet from the rack.

You sigh. “What?”

She leans in. “Did he say ‘good girl’ in the dream too?”

Your pulse jumps.

“Goodbye, Dr. Santos,” you say, turning quickly on your heel.

“I’m taking that as a yes,” she calls after you.

You ignore her, turning toward S16 to check on your chest pain patient.

“Hey, Mr. Mullens,” you say as you push back the curtain. “How are you feeling?”

The older man sits up a little. “I’m okay.”

“Good.” You pull up his chart on your tablet. “The pain hasn’t gotten any worse?”

He shakes his head. “No.”

“That’s good to hear,” you say, quickly flicking through his lab results. “Your first labs look reassuring, but we’ll repeat them in a couple of hours just to be safe.”

You glance up, and he nods.

“Thank you, Doctor.”

You smile softly. “If the pain gets worse, or if you start having trouble breathing, press the call button.”

“Will do.”

You offer him one last nod before tucking your tablet under your arm and squirting a pump of sanitiser into your palm as you exit the room.

The second you step into the hall, you take a deep breath, finally feeling like your lungs remember how to work. Like your pulse might finally be settling into something resembling a normal rhythm. Like maybe—just maybe—you can survive the day if you stay distracted with work long enough not to think about last night.

About his voice—low and rough in your ear, whispering something you can’t quite remember.

Except the way it made your spine arch.

Or the moment he’d braced his hands on either side of you, his head dipping just enough that you could feel the warmth of his breath before he—

“Doctor.”

You jerk slightly, heat rushing straight back into your face as the memory evaporates.

“Sorry—what?”

Whitaker, now standing in front of you, clears his throat. “Nothing. I just—you looked a little out of it.”

You shake your head and turn toward central. “Yeah. Sorry. I’m a little off today.”

He nods, falling into step beside you. “Santos mentioned.”

Your head snaps toward him. “Santos mentioned what?”

“Just that you were out of it today,” he says quietly, staring at the floor.

You stare at him. “And?”

He shrugs, but it’s stiff. “And nothing.”

You stop at the nurse’s station and drop your tablet on the desk.

“I swear to God, Whitaker, if she told you—”

“She didn’t tell me anything,” he says, clearly panicked now. “I—I’ve got to go check on a patient.”

Then he’s gone, hurrying off toward the South hallway.

Fuck.

You told Santos barely ten minutes ago and she’s already told Whitaker?

So much for being a vault.

“What’d I tell you about swearin’ on God, little lady?” Dana asks, peering over her glasses from the other side of the desk.

You sigh, resting both forearms on the counter. “Sorry. Rough morning.”

“Tell me about it,” she says, glancing down at her tablet. “Sprained ankle in North Four wants an MRI and a wheelchair escort to the parking lot. Psych hold in B2 tried to climb out the bathroom window. Ogilvie ordered the wrong labs and blamed the computer. And someone—” she pauses, squinting toward where McKay is assessing a patient, “—keeps leaving half-empty coffee cups everywhere like we’re running a café instead of an emergency department.”

You huff a quiet laugh.

“And we’re only on hour two,” she adds, looking back up at you.

“Lucky us,” you mutter.

She sets her tablet down and slides her glasses off, folding them into the breast pocket of her scrubs.

“What’s with you, hm?” She leans in. “First you’re late, then you run out of trauma like you’re about to pass out. That’s not like you, kid.”

You shrug. “Just a little off today.”

She watches you for a second, her eyes narrowing just a fraction. She’s not stupid. She knows there’s more to it than that—but Dana isn’t the type to push.

She hums quietly.

“Alright,” she says. “I’ll pretend I believe that.”

You give her a small, appreciative smile as you push off the counter. “Love you, Dana.”

She just shakes her head, the corner of her mouth lifting as she glances back down at her tablet. “Yeah? Then check on North Four for me and see if you can get ‘em discharged.”

You nod. “North Four, on it.”

You start to turn away, then stop yourself and swivel back toward her.

“Hey—uh—is Abbot still here?” you ask.

“No, he left right after the MVC trauma,” she replies without looking up.

“Oh.”

“Why? You need him?” she asks. “I’m sure whatever you need, Dr. Robby can—”

“No,” you say quickly. “Nope. I’m good. Totally fine. Don’t need anything at all.”

You hug your tablet to your chest and start turning away again.

“Everything’s fine!”

You don’t dare look back. You just keep walking toward the North hall, completely missing the sceptical look Dana sends after you—and the confused look on Robby’s face as he glances between the two of you.

On your way to N4, you pull your phone out of your pocket and tap on Dr. Abbot’s contact, typing quickly.

So much for saying goodbye to your favourite resident.

Then you hit send and tuck your phone back into your pocket.

You’re not actually offended. Not really. This is the ER. People barely have time to finish a sentence, let alone say goodbye.

You’re just… nervous.

Nervous because Abbot thinks he knows something—and you need to figure out what that is before he decides to say something to Robby and make this whole situation infinitely worse.

You stop outside N4 and take a deep breath—your hundredth deep breath of the morning. You can do this. This is the easy part. The patients. The work. The familiarity of what you do every day. You just need to focus on this for the next twelve hours and definitely not the way you can still feel the weight of his hand on your hip, steady and certain, holding you exactly where he wanted you as he—

“Nope,” you tell yourself out loud. “Absolutely not. Focus.”

You shake your head as you step into the room and slide the curtain back, greeting the patient with your practiced mask of cool, calm, and collected. You manage to convince them they don’t need an MRI, since their ankle is only sprained, but you do get Ahmad to escort them out in a wheelchair—and now you owe him ten bucks and a bagel tomorrow morning.

Then you move on to the next patient. And the next.

The next few hours pass by in a blur of minor catastrophes. A migraine that melts away with the standard cocktail of Toradol, Reglan, and Benadryl. A Lego piece extracted from a three-year-old’s nose while Whitaker distracts the squirming patient. Three stitches in the eyebrow of a man who swears he doesn’t drink before 10AM—even though you can smell the alcohol on his breath. An overworked woman with chest pain that turns out to be a panic attack. A teenager with a swollen knee and a devastated look on his face when you suggest he might be benched for the rest of the season.

And at half past noon, you step into C9. Mid-thirties, right lower quadrant abdominal pain, nausea, mild fever—what you can already guess is appendicitis.

“Hi, Ms. Park, how are you feeling?” you ask, squirting a pump of sanitiser into your palm.

She winces. “Not so good.”

“It says here you’re having abdominal pain, nausea, and a bit of a fever,” you say. “When did that start?”

She nods. “Early this morning. Four, maybe.”

You set your tablet on the cart, grab a pair of gloves, and drag a stool beside the bed. “Mind if I take a look at your abdomen so I can get a better idea of what’s going on?”

She nods and tips her head back against the pillow, hands falling either side as you start palpating her lower abdomen. It doesn’t take more than a few presses for her to hiss and lift a hand, trying to push you away.

“Sorry,” she says, voice strained. “It hurts a lot.”

“That’s okay.” You scoot back and rise from the stool, peeling off your gloves. “I’m going to order a CT scan to take a better look, and we’ll give you something for the pain and something for the nausea in the meantime.”

You step around the bed and grab your tablet off the cart.

“A nurse will come in shortly to start fluids too,” you add. “You’re probably a little dehydrated if you haven’t been able to eat or drink much this morning.”

She looks at you with wide eyes. “I don’t know if I want a CT. Isn’t that a lot of radiation?”

“It’s a relatively small amount,” you reply evenly, “and it’s the best way for us to see what’s going on inside your abdomen. I can assure you, it’s very safe.”

“I try to avoid unnecessary radiation,” Ms. Park argues, shifting uncomfortably. “Is there another option?”

“Ultrasound can sometimes help, but it’s not always reliable in adults,” you say. “A CT scan will give us the clearest answer.”

She hesitates, eyes dropping to her lap. “Well—could I please speak to the doctor in charge?”

You open your mouth to reply when someone steps in beside you. Tall. Solid. Close enough to make your pulse skip and your stomach take a nosedive.

“You are,” Robby says, arms folded. “She’s the physician managing your care right now, so we’ll follow her recommendation.”

You step to the side, nearly tripping over nothing, clutching your tablet to your chest.

“Uh—Dr. Robby, this is Ms. Park,” you say quickly. “Thirty-five, right lower quadrant pain since early this morning. Nausea, no vomiting, low-grade fever at triage. Tenderness at McBurney’s point. I’ve ordered labs and a CT abdomen to rule out appendicitis.”

Robby nods once. “That sounds appropriate.”

Ms. Park sighs.

“Alright,” she says, a little more pleasantly now. “If that’s what you recommend.”

She doesn’t even look at you as she says it—her eyes stay fixed on Robby, softening in a way that makes you briefly consider poking her appendix again.

Not that you can blame her.

Your gaze flicks to Robby, wondering if he’s noticed the sudden change in demeanour—or the way she’s practically making heart eyes at him.

But he isn’t looking at Ms. Park.

He’s looking at you.

You clear your throat, quickly glancing back down at your tablet. “Uh—that’s good. Great. I’ll finish the orders now, and a nurse will be by shortly with some pain relief.”

Ms. Park gives you a brief nod before turning back to Robby with a smile that makes you want to roll your eyes. Robby just nods, squirts a pump of sanitiser into his hand, then steps out of the room—and you try not to follow too closely.

You slide the curtain shut before turning into the hall, half expecting Robby to be gone—but he isn’t. He’s still standing there, holding his tablet in one hand while the other scrubs at his jaw in that mildly anxious way it always does.

“Nice work in there,” he says without looking up.

Heat floods your face.

“Thanks,” you say with a tight smile. “And thanks for backing me up.”

He glances at you over the top of his glasses.

“You had it handled.”

You clutch your tablet to your chest. “Well—uh—thanks anyway.”

Then, before you completely lose the ability to function, you turn on your heel and start down the hall—but not fast enough to miss Dana’s voice.

“Careful, Robinavitch,” she says dryly. “You’re hovering.”

“I supervise,” Robby mutters.

Dana hums.

“Uh-huh. I’ll pretend I believe that.”

Hovering?

You tighten your grip on your tablet as you hurry down the South hall, pretending you know where you’re headed.

Robby wasn’t hovering. He was just doing his job. Right?

He hovers around every resident and med student.

It’s not like he was—

You shake your head.

No—Dana’s just teasing. It’s her thing. It’s practically her love language.

You stop short when you reach the end of the hall. Elevator ahead. Restrooms to your right.

Nowhere else to go.

“You okay, Doctor?” McKay asks, stepping out of the ladies’ room.

You blink. “Uh—yeah, I just—”

You’re not sure what excuse to use now—standing in the middle of the hall, staring at the elevator, white-knuckling your tablet like you’re one bad patient away from a psychotic break.

“You look like you’re buffering,” she says, the corner of her mouth twitching. “Why don’t you take a break?”

You shake your head. “I don’t need a break.”

Her brows lift as she gently places a hand on each of your shoulders, turning you back the other way. “Alright. Well, why don’t you go sit down and catch up on your charting?”

She starts guiding you slowly back up the hall.

“Charting,” you echo, a faint frown forming between your brows. “Yeah. That’s a good idea, actually. I haven’t done much all day.”

She nods. “See? I’m full of good ideas. And you are seriously concerning me today.”

You give her a look. “I’m fine. Everyone is just being—”

“Caring?” she offers.

You roll your eyes. “Overbearing.”

She shakes her head, laughing quietly as she steers you toward the nurse’s station.

“Here,” she says, pulling out a chair in front of a vacant computer. “Sit.”

“Yes, ma’am,” you mutter, dropping down at the desk.

She steps behind you, pushes the chair in, then leans over your shoulder.

“Good girl,” she murmurs.

Your entire spine locks.

“What was that?”

McKay straightens, already grinning.

“Charting,” she says lightly, tapping the monitor. “Try it.”

“But—you just—”

She laughs under her breath, already backing away.

“Finish your notes, doctor. You don’t want to have to stay late.”

Then she’s gone, shaking her head again as she disappears back toward triage.

You sit there for a few seconds longer than you should, staring after her while your brain desperately tries to reboot.

“Fucking Santos,” you mutter, finally turning back to the computer.

“You called,” Santos says, appearing on the other side of the desk.

Your eyes snap up. “You.”

Her brows lift. “Me?”

“Yes,” you snap. “You’ve been telling people.”

She tries—and fails—to suppress a smile.

“Not technically.” She leans forward, resting both forearms on the counter. “I only told Huckleberry, but McKay overheard. Can you blame me, though? It’s the most interesting thing to happen around here today.”

“Yes,” you hiss. “I can blame you. And I will blame you if—”

You stop, your eyes flicking past her to where Robby has just stepped out of C8, chart in hand and head bowed. Santos frowns for a second before following your gaze over her shoulder.

She snorts. “Oh my God. You can’t even function.”

“Who can’t function?” Whitaker asks, stepping up beside Santos.

You drop your head into your hands and sigh. “Great. They’re multiplying.”

Santos leans closer. “Hey, what’s the song that plays in your head whenever he walks past? Is it, like, SexyBack, or more… Like a Prayer?”

Whitaker snorts softly, his cheeks turning pink.

You glare at Santos. “Neither.”

“You’re right.” She nods thoughtfully. “I can practically hear the Careless Whisper sax playing in your mind right now.”

Your eyes go wide as you snatch a pen off the desk and lob it straight at her—but she dodges it easily.

“Wow,” she says, still laughing. “I’m on fire today.”

“Is that so, Dr. Santos?”

You recognise the voice before you even see him—because of course you do. You dream about that voice.

“That would mean you’ve caught up on all your charting and discharged your patient in North One?” Robby asks as he steps up beside Santos.

Her grin drops. “Uh—yeah. Actually, I was just on my way to North One.”

Her eyes slide back to you as she pushes away from the desk, lips pressed tight to keep herself from laughing.

“Dr. Whitaker,” Robby says. “Are you hovering?”

Hovering?

Whitaker glances up. “Oh—uh—no. I was just finishing some orders.”

“Good. You can finish them on your way to discharging South Twenty.”

Whitaker nods, barely even glancing at you as he grabs his tablet off the desk and turns toward the South hall.

Then Robby looks at you, holding up the pen you threw at Santos.

Your pulse stutters.

“Think you lost this,” he says, leaning forward to drop it on the desk.

“I threw it,” you blurt.

He hesitates, the corner of his mouth twitching before he turns away.

“I know.”

You watch him go until he turns a corner and disappears—then you look down at the pen.

“Fuck,” you sigh, pinching the bridge of your nose. “I need today to end.”

You slide the pen aside and force your attention back to the computer—to the cursor blinking patiently beside the single word you’d managed to write since sitting down.

Right.

Charting.

You manage exactly four more words before you’re interrupted again—something about your abdominal pain patient in Central Nine.

With a sigh, you push away from the desk, grab your tablet, and head for C9.

After confirming Ms. Park does indeed need an appendectomy and contacting Garcia for a surgical consult, Dana stops you in the hall to ask if Mr. Mullens can be discharged from South Sixteen. Then Javadi grabs you to present a calf laceration that you end up supervising while she sutures it, and after that Whitaker calls you in for a second opinion on a dizziness patient in North Five.

The hours start to blur together. You bounce from one room to another, just barely finishing your notes in between patients and med students and reviewing labs. By the time you finally make it back to the desk again, you’ve almost—almost—forgotten about why your heart is still beating a little too fast.

“Back to charting?” Princess asks.

You nod. “The never-ending task.”

She gives you the same quiet, speculative smile she gave you this morning.

“You seem off today,” she says.

“I’m fine,” you mutter. “Just tired.”

“And red,” she adds before turning away.

You frown, pressing a hand to your ridiculously hot cheek as you turn back toward the computer. If this keeps up, you’re more likely to end the shift as a patient than a doctor.

With a small sigh, you scoot your chair closer to the desk and pull the chart back up. Your eyes flick to the corner of the screen, to the little clock telling you that you only have a few hours left. A few hours to finish your charting, discharge a couple more patients, and keep avoiding Dr. Robby. Then you’re free. Then you’ve got at least eight solid hours to sort yourself out before you’re back here tomorrow.

Just as you position your fingers over the keyboard to start typing, your phone vibrates in your pocket—and your pulse jumps.

Abbot.

You quickly pull it out, swipe up, and open the notification.

Sorry. Too busy mourning the loss of my status as your favourite attending.

Your stomach drops.

What the fuck is that supposed to mean?

You stare at the text for an unreasonable length of time—heart pounding, face burning, thoughts racing. Abbot definitely thinks he knows something. Something he shouldn’t know. Something he’s probably very wrong about. Something you need to figure out and shut down immediately.

Before he decides to say something to Robby about whatever it is he thinks he knows.

“Hey,” Dana says, stopping on the other side of the desk. “Thought you were working?”

You clear your throat. “Uh—yeah. Sorry. Got distracted.”

Her brows lift. “Distracted, huh? That’s exactly what we want in emergency medicine.”

Then she shakes her head and walks away.

You tuck your phone into your pocket and turn your attention back to the chart in front of you. The chart of exactly five words—the first of many unfinished charts standing in your way of going home on time.

And today is not a day you want to stay back.

Your fingers hover over the keyboard again, eyes flicking over the few words already written. It takes a minute—probably longer than it should—but eventually you remember how to do your job and start typing.

The ER fades into background noise—monitors beeping, nurses chatting, the rumble of beds rolling past—and for the first time all day, you feel focused. Steady. Until—

“Robby,” Dana calls, “can you come over here for a sec?”

Your fingers slow over the keys—and against your better judgment, you glance up.

“Mrs. Alvarez,” Robby says fondly. “What brings you here?”

Your brows draw together as you study the older woman sitting on the bed. She looks familiar, and Alvarez rings a bell, but you can’t quite place it.

“Perlah,” you say, without fully looking away from the woman. “Who’s Mrs. Alvarez?”

“She used to work here,” Perlah replies. “She was the night shift charge nurse before Lena. Partially retired a couple years ago, but she’s covered a shift or two since then.”

You tilt your head. “Oh.”

“She probably asked for Robby,” Princess chimes in. “She always had a soft spot for him.”

Perlah tries to muffle her laughter. “Katulad ng ibang kakilala natin.”

Princess laughs behind you, but the sound barely registers. You’re too captivated by the scene unfolding in front of you. The very normal, very professional interaction that is hardly out of place in an ER—yet for some reason, it feels like you’re watching an adult film made specifically for you.

Mrs. Alvarez’s bed is parked up against the wall—a sight that would normally remind you to look for patients to discharge, but right now that’s the furthest thing from your mind.

Robby has pulled a stool up beside her, leaning in while she talks, forearms resting loosely on the bed rail. He nods along as she explains what’s wrong, his expression soft, his posture relaxed. There’s absolutely nothing obscene about it—but your pulse is still racing.

There’s just something about the way he listens—really listens—that makes it difficult to look anywhere else. That makes it difficult not to envy Mrs. Alvarez right now.

“Let’s take a listen,” he says after a moment, voice low and steady.

Your stomach does a strange little flip.

It’s such a normal sentence. Completely harmless. Totally professional. You’ve probably said the same thing yourself at least three times today. But hearing it in that voice—calm, warm, just rough enough at the edges to carry across the department—does something deeply unhelpful to your concentration.

He slips the stethoscope from around his neck, the tubing sliding through his fingers with the kind of easy familiarity that only comes from years of doing the same motion over and over again. The movement is quick, practiced, almost absentminded.

Still, your eyes follow it.

They follow the way he leans forward, one hand bracing lightly against the mattress while the other presses the diaphragm of the stethoscope gently against Mrs. Alvarez’s chest.

“Deep breath for me.”

Your pulse stutters.

Because suddenly—unhelpfully, vividly—you remember exactly how those hands felt in the dream.

The same steady fingers. The same calm voice, dropped just a little lower when he leaned close enough that you could feel the warmth of his breath near your ear.

His hand had been wrapped around your wrist—firm but careful—guiding your hand above your head and pinning it against the pillow.

“Hold still,” he murmured.

The memory is sharp enough that for a second you can almost feel it again. The weight of his body pressing into the space between your knees, the quiet authority in his voice when he spoke, the way his fingers tightened against your skin just enough to keep you right where he wanted you.

Your hands had curled into the bed sheets as his lips traced the line of your jaw, his voice dropping again—softer now, almost thoughtful.

“Look at me.”

Your breath had caught in your throat when you did.

Because he was watching you the same way he watches patients—calm, focused, completely absorbed—except the attention felt different in the dream. Slower. Heavier. Like he was studying every reaction you gave him and deciding exactly how much more you could handle.

Your pulse had started racing the second his gaze dropped to your mouth.

It wasn’t subtle.

Just a brief shift of his eyes—thoughtful, almost curious—but the heat that followed it made your stomach tighten.

His thumb found its way back to your jaw, tracing slowly along the curve of it as if he were considering something. Following the line of your chin as he tipped your head back just slightly beneath his hand.

You hadn’t realised you’d stopped breathing until his fingers stilled.

“Breathe,” he said quietly.

The word brushed over your lips.

You remember the way your chest rose when you obeyed him—slow, unsteady—and the way his gaze followed the movement before drifting back to your mouth again.

God.

The corner of his mouth had lifted slightly then, like he’d noticed exactly what he was doing to you.

Like he wasn’t in any hurry to stop.

His hand slid from your jaw to the side of your throat, fingers warm against your skin, thumb resting just beneath your chin as if he were holding you there—not tightly, just enough that you stayed exactly where he wanted you.

And the entire time he watched you with that same quiet concentration.

Like this was just another thing he was very, very good at.

“Hey,” Santos says, appearing beside the desk. “Your abdominal pain in C9 just went upstairs.”

You blink at her. “Already?”

She shrugs. “Garcia signed off.”

You nod once, shifting awkwardly in your chair as you turn back toward the computer, trying very hard to ignore the heat pooling low in your belly.

“You good?” Santos asks, as if you haven’t been asked that enough today.

You clear your throat, eyes flicking briefly back to Robby and Mrs. Alvarez. “Yeah. Fine.”

She follows your gaze, the corner of her mouth twitching.

“Wow,” she says. “You’re down bad.”

You glare at her. “I’m charting.”

“You’re drooling.”

You quickly lift a hand to your mouth, swiping at the corner.

Santos smirks. “Metaphorically.”

“Fuck you,” you mutter.

“Fuck who?” Whitaker asks, appearing beside Santos.

Santos grins. “Well, it depends who you’re asking, because if you ask—”

“Santos,” you warn.

She laughs. “Come on. It’s just a joke.”

“Isang biro?” Princess says, smiling. “Walang nakakatawa sa paraan ng pagtitig niya kay Robby.”

Your stomach drops.

You might not understand Tagalog, but you sure as hell know what that last word was.

“Santos,” you say, slowly rising from your chair. “How many people have you told?”

She presses her lips together sheepishly. “Again, technically? Just Huckleberry.”

“And—and I haven’t told anyone,” Whitaker adds quickly.

“Ano ang pinag-uusapan nila?” Perlah says behind you.

Princess shrugs. “May alam lang na sikreto si Santos.”

Your eyes widen. “Santos, I swear—”

“Relax,” she says. “They’re not talking about the dream. They were talking about your staring.”

Princess steps forward. “A dream? What dream?”

You bury your face in your hands. “Oh my God.”

“Wait,” Perlah says. “Did she have a dream about—”

Santos smirks. “Yep.”

“Oh,” Princess gasps. “That’s why she’s been so weird today.”

Perlah snorts.

Princess mutters something else in Tagalog that makes them all laugh again.

“Oh my God, Santos!” you say again, louder this time. “I’m just trying to get through the day without my attending finding out I had a sex dream about him and you’re telling the entire emergency department?”

Silence.

Perlah is staring at you.

Princess is staring at you.

Whitaker looks like someone has just pulled the fire alarm inside his head.

And Santos—

Santos is very carefully not looking at you anymore.

“What?” you snap. “No more jokes?”

No one answers.

Instead, Princess’s eyes flick slowly past your shoulder.

Whitaker clears his throat.

Santos presses her lips together, the corners twitching like she’s fighting for her life not to laugh.

“What?” you repeat, glancing over your shoulder.

And there he is.

Your attending—standing just a few feet from the nurse’s station, tablet still in one hand, glasses sliding slightly down his nose as he looks at you over the top of them.

Your stomach drops so violently it feels like all your organs have fallen out of your body.

He clears his throat.

Once.

“Alright,” he says evenly. “Back to work.”

That’s all it takes.

Perlah and Princess busy themselves on the other side of the nurse’s station.

Whitaker rushes off toward triage.

Santos lingers just long enough to give you a look that promises she will never let this go before she slips away too.

And then it’s just you.

And him.

He doesn’t say anything for a moment. Just adjusts the tablet in his hand, pulls his glasses off, folds them into the pocket of his scrubs, and turns away.

And as he steps away, you could almost swear you see the faintest twitch at the corner of his mouth.

Almost as if he’s fighting a smile.

But that would be ridiculous, right?

It takes an embarrassingly long time for you to remember how to move.

How to function.

You can feel Perlah and Princess watching you. Waiting for you to do something other than stare at the spot your attending had been standing when you announced your sex dream about him to the entire department.

God.

This has to be some kind of HR violation.

Robby is probably on his way to find Dana right now so she can tell you to go upstairs and talk to someone about misconduct. If you’re not fired, you’ll be transferred.

Or worse—night shift.

You gasp and fumble for your phone, pulling it out of your pocket.

Abbot's message thread is already open when you swipe up and start typing.

What’s that supposed to mean?

Then you hit send and tuck your phone away again.

It’s a ridiculous thought, but maybe if you can talk to Abbot and explain that this was all just one giant misunderstanding, maybe he can convince Robby not to hate you for it. Maybe he can convince Robby to let you finish your residency at PTMC without it being painfully awkward for both of you.

Because as funny as this is to Santos and the nurses, you’re not so sure Robby will see it that way.

Not when you’ve let it affect your work.

Not when you just embarrassed him—and yourself—in front of the entire emergency department.

You draw in a slow breath and grab your tablet off the desk.

All you can do now is your job.

All you can do for the next hour is avoid Robby and pray Abbot will hear you out when he comes back on shift.

You turn deliberately toward the North hallway and pull up the lab results for Whitaker’s dizziness patient, keeping your eyes fixed on your tablet as you walk.

The department hums around you like it always does—monitors beeping, beds rolling past, nurses calling out vitals—but you can still feel eyes on you. Whether it’s the nurses or the med students, or even a patient who overheard your outburst, you know you’re being watched.

Whispered about, probably.

But if you don’t look up, it doesn’t count. Right?

By the time you circle back to central, Mrs. Alvarez has already been discharged, which you take as a small mercy. Then you duck into South Fifteen to check on a teenager with a sprained ankle who is mostly interested in whether he can still play soccer this weekend. After that it’s a quick review of labs for a chest pain patient in Central Ten—normal troponins, thank God—and a brief stop at the nurse’s station to sign off on discharge instructions Dana has already printed.

None of it requires you to look up very much.

Which is ideal.

You spend the next half hour moving steadily from room to room—listening to a set of lungs for a persistent cough in North Three, answering a worried daughter’s questions about her father’s blood pressure in South Twenty-Two, and checking a set of repeat vitals on a dehydration case Princess flagged earlier. Every task is perfectly ordinary. Completely routine.

And through all of it, you make a very conscious effort not to look for your attending.

Not that you’re avoiding him.

Obviously.

You’re just… busy.

You still see him, though—across the hall, talking to patients, nodding along while med students present. He doesn’t look up. Never looks at you. Just keeps walking, keeps working, keeps nodding.

Like nothing happened.

And somehow, that’s worse.

You’re on your way back from dropping discharge paperwork at the front desk—walking a little slower than you should as you wonder how long until the end of your shift—when McKay calls out from triage.

“Hey, you busy?”

You stop mid-step. “Always. What’s up?”

“Can you grab me a suture kit?” she asks. “I’m out in here.”

“Of course. What size?”

“Four-oh nylon. Whatever's closest.”

You nod. “On it.”

“And maybe send a med student to grab more from supply,” she calls as you walk away.

You don’t reply. You just duck into Trauma One—thankfully empty—grab a kit, then call out to Ogilvie on your way back, telling him to go get more suture kits for triage as soon as he’s free. You don’t even wait for him to answer, but you do hear him turn to a nurse and ask where supply is.

You wedge your tablet under one arm as you head back toward the triage bay. With the kit held against your chest, you start peeling back the sterile packaging—since you know McKay’s already halfway through cleaning whatever it is she needs to suture up.

You’re just being helpful.

But the plastic seam is stubborn, and just as you turn into the bay the wrapper gives with a jerked tear—and the scalpel slides free.

You shift to catch it, but the blade grazes the inside of your upper arm before you can pull away.

“Oh—shit.”

It’s not dramatic. Just a sharp sting at first, and for a second you assume it’s nothing more than a scratch.

Until the warmth starts to trickle down your arm and drip from your elbow.

“Damn,” you sigh, watching a small droplet of blood hit the floor.

McKay glances up, eyes going wide. “What the hell happened?”

She quickly takes everything out of your hands, and you lift your arm to inspect the damage.

“Scalpel slipped.”

McKay winces. “That’s going to need stitches.”

Ignoring the confused patient still sitting in the triage chair, she grabs a wad of gauze off the cart and presses it against your arm.

“Hold this,” she says. “I’ll go get someone to take over here, then we can—”

“It’s alright,” a familiar voice says from somewhere behind you. “I’ll deal with this.”

Your stomach drops.

“Oh.” McKay glances over your shoulder, the corner of her mouth twitching. “Thanks, Dr. Robby.”

Fuck.

You turn slowly, one hand still clamped over the gauze on your arm.

He’s already so close—barely half a step away—and you have to tip your head back to look up at him.

“Let me see,” he says, voice low.

You hold your arm out obediently.

His fingers brush yours as he peels back the gauze, and your pulse jumps.

“Alright.” He nods once, something indistinguishable flickering across his face. “That needs stitches.”

Before you can respond, his hand closes lightly around your wrist, guiding your arm back toward your side as he turns you with him.

“Come with me.”

The touch is brief, professional—but when his hand shifts to the small of your back to steer you out of triage, the warmth of it makes your heart stutter out of rhythm.

“Dana,” he calls, walking quickly through central. “What’s open?”

Dana looks up from the desk just as the two of you pass. Her gaze flicks from the gauze on your arm to Robby’s hand still resting lightly at your back, and something sharp and knowing slides into her expression immediately.

“Central Eleven just got cleaned,” she says.

Robby nods once. “Thanks.”

Dana’s brows lift just a fraction as she watches the two of you step into the room, like she’s just connected several very interesting dots.

You move automatically toward the bed, trying not to feel disappointed when Robby’s hand leaves your back. He shuts the doors on both sides of the room, then slides the curtain closed—and every move makes your heart rate climb higher.

“Lay back,” he says.

Your whole body flushes with heat as you adjust yourself on the exam bed, trying desperately not to think about the other circumstances in which he might give you that instruction.

He rolls the stool beside the bed and reaches for your arm, turning it out gently.

His fingers are warm as he removes the gauze.

You try not to think too hard about his fingers.

“It’s a clean cut, at least,” he says after a second.

You nod. “Sharp blade.”

Like he didn’t already know that.

He releases your arm long enough to pull on a pair of gloves and gather what he needs from the tray beside the bed. You watch him move around the room with that same quiet efficiency that has been ruining your concentration all day—steady hands, calm voice, not a hint of hurry even though the department outside the door is probably chaos.

“Come a little closer,” he says, almost absentmindedly—as if he doesn’t know what saying something like that is going to do to you.

You shift against the mattress while he lifts your arm again, angling it under the exam light.

He’s so close now you can hardly breathe. You can feel his breath against your cheek, his warmth bleeding through the thin fabric of your scrubs, every touch careful as he starts cleaning the cut.

The antiseptic stings enough to make you tense.

“Easy,” he murmurs, steadying your arm. “It’s not that bad.”

“I’m aware,” you say quickly. “I do actually work here.”

“Yes,” he says mildly. “I’m aware of that too.”

You risk a glance at him then—and immediately regret it.

He’s standing now, leaning close enough that you could count every fleck of grey in his beard. Close enough to notice the way his glasses have slid slightly down his nose while he concentrates on the wound. His fingers move with careful precision as he prepares the needle driver, completely focused.

Completely calm.

Completely unaware that your brain is still stuck somewhere between the nurse’s station and a very inappropriate dream.

“Hold still,” he murmurs.

Your stomach flips—and when you squeeze your eyes shut, that exact moment from your dream flashes through your mind again.

The lidocaine burns for a second when he injects it, and you suck in a breath before you can stop yourself.

“Breathe,” he says automatically.

God.

If he could stop with the direct quotes from your dream, maybe you would actually be able to breathe.

You clear your throat, staring stubbornly at the wall now while he begins the first stitch.

“Try to relax,” he adds quietly.

You let out a short, incredulous laugh. “I’m trying.”

His hands pause for the briefest moment.

Then he glances up at you over the rim of his glasses.

“You of all people should know better than to open a suture kit while walking.”

You let out a small, embarrassed breath and shift slightly on the bed while he works, trying not to react every time the needle passes neatly through the edge of the cut.

“Sorry,” you mutter. “It’s been a weird day.”

“Mhm.”

The sound is absentminded, the same one he makes when a patient is explaining symptoms he already understands. His attention stays on your arm while he ties the knot and reaches for the next stitch, movements calm and precise, like this is the most ordinary thing in the world.

“You seemed a little distracted earlier,” he adds after a moment.

Your stomach tightens.

“Busy department.”

He hums again as he adjusts your arm slightly.

“Not exactly what I meant.”

You stare at the ceiling again, your pulse racing dangerously fast.

“It’s not unusual, you know,” he says after a moment, his voice calm and thoughtful as he works. “There’s actually quite a lot of research on it. In high-stress environments people’s subconscious tends to latch onto someone they admire rather than… straightforward attraction. It’s a way of organizing all that pressure—long hours, constant adrenaline, the need to trust the people around you.”

He pauses briefly to adjust the stitch.

You feel like you’re about to throw up.

“Hospitals are particularly good at creating that kind of dynamic,” he goes on. “Everyone’s exhausted, everyone’s relying on each other, and if there happens to be someone who seems steady in the middle of all that—someone people look to when things go wrong—it’s very easy for admiration to blur into something else.”

Another small pause, the thread tightening neatly under his fingers.

“It’s rarely intentional,” he adds, quieter now. “Most of the time the person experiencing it doesn’t even realise what their brain is doing.”

You finally look at him. His face is barely inches from yours, close enough that you can see the faint crease between his brows while he concentrates on the last stitch, all of his attention focused on closing the cut.

“Wait,” you say slowly. “So… I—I’m not fired?”

His hands still for the briefest moment before he glances at you, genuine confusion flickering across his face.

“Fired?”

You swallow. “For… you know. The thing I said. Out there. To the entire department.”

He huffs a small laugh—barely a breath.

“Why would you be fired?” he says mildly. “Embarrassing yourself in front of the nurses isn’t exactly grounds for termination.”

Your face burns.

He sets the needle driver down and reaches for the scissors, his tone settling back into that same calm, matter-of-fact rhythm.

“You shouldn’t have let it distract you from your work, though,” he continues. “That’s the only part I was concerned about. But one off day doesn’t suddenly erase an otherwise solid record.”

You stare at him.

“Concerned?”

“Mhm.”

He snips the suture, then reaches to adjust your arm slightly under the light, examining his work.

“First you were late,” he says, almost absently. “You were flustered during the chest tube. You’ve been avoiding traumas all day—” His eyes meet yours briefly. “And your attending. You’ve barely caught up on your charting, and you’ve unintentionally encouraged the nurses’ gossiping.”

Your stomach drops.

“Not to mention,” he adds, just a little drier now, “the pen you threw at Dr. Santos for—what? Teasing you, I presume.”

Your brain short-circuits.

Because suddenly, Dana’s voice echoes through your mind.

Careful, Robinavitch. You’re hovering.

Hovering?

Like the way he’d stood so close while you placed that chest tube. The way his hand had settled at your back when he guided you out of triage.

Why was he even there to begin with?

Santos’ voice cuts through your mind next.

I swear he’s got a soft spot for you.

I’m pretty sure he’d go there if you asked.

And suddenly the entire day looks… different.

Not like an attending keeping an eye on his resident.

Like a man trying very hard not to make it obvious he was paying attention to you.

Robby smooths the edge of the dressing over the sutured cut, pressing it down carefully as he glances back up at you.

“Keep that dry for the next—”

And that’s the moment your brain finally catches up.

Before you can talk yourself out of it, your hand shoots out and grabs the front of his scrubs, fingers bunching the fabric at his chest as you pull him the few inches closer.

Then you kiss him.

It’s not graceful.

It’s barely even planned.

Just a quick, impulsive press of your mouth against his—warm and startled and over almost as soon as it begins.

For half a second, he doesn’t move at all.

“Oh—fuck. I—”

You drop his shirt like it’s suddenly on fire and lean back on the bed, horrified.

“I’m so sorry,” you blurt. “I don’t know why I just—”

The apology dies halfway through, because Robby hasn’t stepped away.

He hasn’t leapt back, shocked or offended. He’s just… there.

Where he was when you grabbed him—close enough that you can still feel his warmth, with one hand resting lightly near your arm where he’d been finishing the dressing. For a second he simply watches you, studying your face with the same quiet concentration he uses when he’s working through a diagnosis, like he’s trying to decide whether the last thirty seconds actually happened.

Your pulse is hammering.

“I shouldn’t have—” you try again.

His hand lifts.

The movement is slow, deliberate, and before you can finish your sentence his thumb and forefinger settle lightly around your chin, tilting your face upward just enough that you have to look at him.

Your breath catches.

He hesitates for the briefest moment, his gaze moving across your face as if he’s still weighing the decision.

Then he leans in.

The first contact is firmer than you expect—his mouth warm and solid against yours, the faint scrape of his beard against your skin as he adjusts the angle. His glasses are still on, the frame nudging the bridge of your nose when he shifts closer. His nose bumps yours before he tilts his head, finding a better position.

For a second it’s almost restrained.

Then it isn’t.

His grip on your chin tightens a fraction as he deepens the kiss, tipping your head back against the pillow while he leans over you. The change is sudden enough that your hands catch the front of his scrubs again without thinking. The fabric bunches in your fingers as he moves closer, the pressure of his mouth shifting—slower now but more certain, like he’s stopped pretending he’s about to pull away.

The beard you’d been trying not to notice all day brushes your cheek again when he moves, softer than you expected, and when his teeth graze your lower lip for half a second the sound that escapes you is embarrassingly honest.

He exhales quietly through his nose against your skin.

Not stopping.

If anything, the opposite.

His free hand comes down beside your shoulder on the mattress to brace himself as he leans over you, the movement tilting your head back further while his mouth finds yours again—deeper this time, the rhythm of it suddenly practiced enough to make your stomach flip.

Like this is something he hasn’t done in a while.

But definitely knows how to do.

And the entire time his thumb stays lightly under your chin, holding you exactly where he wants you while he kisses you like he’s still trying to decide whether this is a mistake—and losing that argument by the second.

You barely notice when he shifts closer again, the movement subtle but unmistakable, his hand tightening slightly against the mattress beside you as if he’s about to lean in further, about to let himself forget the door, the department, the fact that this is an exam room in the middle of a shift—

The curtain whips open.

“Been looking for you, Robinavitch—”

Abbot stops dead.

For half a second no one moves.

You’re still on the bed, Robby bent over you, your hands fisted in the front of his scrubs while his hand is still braced beside your shoulder.

Abbot’s gaze flicks from your grip on Robby’s shirt, to Robby’s face, to the dressing he’d just placed on your arm.

His eyebrows climb slowly toward his hairline.

“Well,” he says after a beat. “I wish I could say I'm surprised, but…”

Robby straightens immediately.

Not panicked. Not flustered.

Just very, very still for a second before he adjusts his glasses and steps back from the bed like he’d simply been finishing a routine procedure.

“Jack,” he says evenly.

Abbot folds his arms, the corner of his mouth already curling upward.

“Michael.”

The silence stretches just long enough for the humiliation to fully settle in.

Abbot glances at you again, then back at Robby.

“Should I come back later,” he asks mildly, “or are you two… just about done here?”

The heat that floods your face is instantaneous, and you slide off the bed so fast you nearly fall.

“Don’t get it wet for twenty-four hours, stitches out in a week unless there’s redness, swelling, drainage, fever—I know the drill,” you ramble, slowly backing toward the door.

Robby has already turned back to the tray, calmly disposing of the suture needle like none of this is remotely unusual. Only the faint redness creeping up the back of his neck gives him away.

Abbot doesn’t move. He just stands there, arms folded, with a look of deep theatrical satisfaction on his face.

“This,” he says pleasantly, “is exactly what I meant, by the way.”

Your stomach drops.

“What?”

His brows lift.

“Your text.”

Your eyes widen.

Abbot tilts his head, studying you for a moment before glancing toward Robby again.

“I mean, honestly,” he adds. “I leave you two alone for what—ten hours?”

“What day shift does is none of your business, Dr. Abbot,” you mutter, trying to slip past him.

Abbot’s mouth twitches.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” he says. “It seems very much like my business now.”

You snort, the sound escaping before you can stop it.

“Don’t be jealous,” you say, glancing over your shoulder as you step out the door. “He’s still your boyfriend.”

Behind him, Robby drops the gauze into the bin and gives a quiet shake of his head, laughing softly despite himself.

“That’s my girl,” he murmurs.

Abbot’s eyebrows shoot up.

“Your girl, huh?”

Robby scrubs a hand over his beard and turns away.

“Shut up.”

You’re not sure you were supposed to hear that last bit—but it makes your heart race anyway.

The second you step into the hallway, the emergency department crashes back in around you—monitors beeping, nurses calling for labs, a stretcher rattling past that you have to dodge. Almost like the last fifteen minutes never happened at all.

“Hey, Doc,” Princess calls from the nurse’s station. “North Five, dizziness patient’s daughter is looking for a doctor, but Whitaker’s stuck in chairs.”

“And Javadi needs you in South Seventeen,” Perlah adds. “Something about a rash.”

“Oh—and imaging’s back on your sprained ankle kid,” Santos says. “He’s asking when he can get out of here.”

You nod. “Uh—right. Okay, yeah. I’ll just—”

“Hey,” Dana cuts in, appearing beside you. “You okay? How’s the arm?”

You blink down at the fresh dressing like you’d almost forgotten about it.

“Oh. Yeah. It’s fine.”

She studies it for a second before her gaze drifts up to your face—and her brow lifts.

“Uh-huh,” she says slowly.

You frown. “What?”

“Nothing,” she says lightly, starting to walk away. “Just thought that looked like beard burn.”

She gives a small shrug, then glances back over the top of her glasses.

“But I know my doctors are far too professional for that.”

Your entire face goes hot.

You open your mouth—then close it again, because there is absolutely nothing you can say to that without making it worse.

Santos leans across the desk at the nurse’s station, squinting at your face.

“…Oh my God.”

Her eyes widen.

“Oh my God.”

Your stomach sinks.

Will this day ever end?

Or, in the case of the fourteen year old girl you have sitting in North-5, one lung breathing and one lung hypoventilating. You’re looking at her x-rays now, knowing you’re going to have to get her into surgery and bracing yourself to tell her parents. 

“They’re lungs.”

Robby is standing behind you, squinting down at you under the flickering hospital lights. He’s not wearing his glasses, so you almost want to hit him back with a quip about how does he know they’re lungs, old man. Your mouth is dry and you sit there for too long that it wouldn’t be witty if you did say it. 

“You okay, kid?” He presses when you don’t respond. 

You know you’re being strange, can’t help it when you feel like this (though exactly what this is, is up for debate. Amongst yourself), and you have to scramble to say something. “Yeah, hi. Sorry. Lungs.” Your voice sounds strange. Too soft. Inauthentic. 

“One’s got a pneumo?” He asks.

You nod, practically shoving the pictures into his hand. “Yeah, I’m getting her up to the OR now.” He examines the lungs for a moment, long enough that you think something must be wrong. Confidence in your diagnoses is something you struggle with - you assume (there’s still that voice in the back of your head that tells you confidence isn’t the problem, instead it’s the diagnoses that need working on). Every time Robby or Abbot or even Shen, who doesn’t really feel like your boss, checks over your work your pulse starts rushing like they’re going to decide you’re actually such a bad doctor that there’s no point in you even completing your residency so you might as well go home now. 

“Good, yeah, she needs it.” Robby nods affirmingly, passing you back the images. His eyes linger on you for a second longer than they should. You’re the one who has to break eye contact, not liking the way that his eyes seem to bare straight into you. 

You don’t like it when Robby looks at you, not like that anyway. Not in like, a HR violation way, just like he’s examining you in a way you aren’t ready to be seen in.

“We’re going to round for handoffs soon.” He speaks up again, softly. “You’re off the rest of the week aren’t you?” Robby’s voice goes high at the end of his sentence and he shoves his hands in his pockets. 

You really do like Robby, there’s a reason you turned down the night shift residency offer you got from Gloria. It had been a tempting offer too.

It’s a rare moment of quiet in the ER, and you’re hoping silently to yourself it stays that way. Not daring to actually utter the hope, not wanting to jinx it. You’re not necessarily superstitious, but you’re not going to utter the Q-word so close to the end of your shift.

“Yeah, three whole days off.” You try and say it casually, but the words don’t sound right coming out of your voice. You have a lot of different voices, a lot of pitches and tones. You genuinely have no clue which one is your natural state. 

Robby sounds even when he talks, a sound you could pick out with your eyes closed. “That’s good. You deserve it, you’ve been running on fumes.” There’s a tenderness that catches you off guard. Robby’s not a mean boss, he’s exceptionally kind. But he’s also not comforting if he doesn’t think you need it, not the type to throw out pleasantries for pleasantries sake. “Any good plans?”

It’s not something you’ve thought about, it feels kind of pathetic to admit. Like, having plans is actually something you haven’t considered. You work long hours, about sixty most weeks, so it makes sense that on your few precious days off you like to spend it resting and recuperating. Catching up on your laundry or your sleep, or even a TV show that everyone is talking about. Those things are just as important as going out and seeing friends. 

If they’re easier and more accessible, then that’s just an added bonus. 

“Uh,” you have never felt more unnatural than in this moment. You’re certain Robby can tell you’re not being entirely truthful, as if he has some sort of innate sense for when people are doing things for the first time. It’s the teacher in him. “Yeah, maybe. I’m not a hundred percent sure what I’m doing yet.”

You feel so transparent it’s as if he’s looking directly through you. Perhaps he is - already looking for ways out of the conversation, ways to speak to someone more interesting. Someone who isn’t pretending to maybe have plans. 

Someone who regularly had plans wouldn’t be embarrassed to admit they don’t have plans. It could be cool, casual: “No, not this weekend. I have a date with my couch and some take out.” Instead, you’d given what feels like the only wrong answer to a question about yourself. 

“I hope you have a good time,” Robby nods at you. 

The ER is cold, especially at night, especially in December. You’d discarded your jacket when you had entered, worried about being sweaty so early in your shift. Going to get it feels silly now, like you’d made the wrong choices. 

Most of your coworkers make something of their scrubs. Javadi has a collection of pastel hoodies she rotates between, jewellery more often than not sitting under the neckline of her top. Santos has tattoos and wears graphic tees under her scrubs rather than just the standard block colours. Mel doesn’t even usually wear scrubs, instead opting for one of her own shirts without the added layer. 

Your scrubs are standard, your undershirt is black, your winter coat is thrifted and warm but a neutral navy. You’d liked it when you bought it, but you feel silly whenever you wear it. 

You slip it on at the end of your shift, grabbing your backpack. You can hear Santos and Mateo chatting amicably about how a music artist they both listen to is coming to the city the week after next and how they both have tickets and are thinking of coordinating. 

You shut your locker, keenly aware of the other people in the room and even more astute to the fact that none of them are looking at you. 

You slip out the doors, not bothering to untangle your earbuds until you’re down the street. 

I’m not cold, I’m not cold. The woman singing has a lovely voice. It hits you like thorns down your ears, scratchy and uneven in a way that is only beautiful. The burn masks the sting of your eyes. Take my hand, take ahold. 

—

You take the train to and from work. The station is close enough to your house that the dishes in your kitchen cabinet rattle when a particularly zealous one goes past. You were told when you moved in that eventually you wouldn’t even notice the noise - it would become apart of you and you would absorb it and be able to go about your day.

You wake in the late hours of the night from the tremors, convinced you’re going to die. 

You’re not entirely sure what time the train stops running. You never check the time in the moment. 

The apartment you’ve lived in your entire residency has been good to you. You had applied for a lot of places, starting out in Allegheny west and eventually settling for Bethel Park. It’s nice and small, not too much to clean after a long week. You’re on the third floor so laundry is a bit of challenge lugging your basket to the basement but you also get a fire escape which is nice enough that you like being so high up. 

Days off have become a sort of anomaly in your life. You never quite know what to do with them. Your coworkers always have plans, both together and separately, you’ve noticed. Santos and Whitaker live together, the nurses all seem close, even Robby and Abbot talk about going to the Pirates games together.

You walked a lot when you first moved in. Pittsburgh has been your home for the last eight years - from student housing in Oakland during med school, then into your current place - but it hadn’t always been. 

There are lots of pretty places close to your apartment. Even more the further you walk, corner stores and community gardens. Sometimes you leave your phone at home and just wander, taking note of each and every street. Every facade, every storefront, every alley. It all stayed in your head. You could recreate the city in your sleep. Well, the city within an hour’s walk of your apartment.

The deli on Library road is open when you finish work. Sometimes you get off the Blue early and go sit in the stark white of the fluoros. The floor is linoleum, speckled with colours too small to identify but you know they’re there. 

You sit cross legged by the window at one of the two tables in the shop. It shakes under your elbow every time you shift, and the guy behind the counter, nametagged as Jeffrey, eyeballs you strangely every time it makes a noise. 

Your sandwich is misshapen in your hands. Red and white paper wrap up the second half, ready for you to stash it in the work fridge behind one of Langdon’s Redbulls. It’s printed real small on the bottom of the laminated menu they’ve taped to the table - $4.99 for a sandwich with a random assortment of ingredients on it. You’ve always been indecisive, this had felt like a nice way to make a choice without making a choice. 

They pick something different every time, condiments, vegetables, protein, even fruit sometimes. Once they’d given you one that included both mangoes and ranch. That hadn’t been your favourite. 

The one you have now is nice, though. Mozzarella, turkey, chips for some crunch, some other stuff you haven’t really cared to identify, all on pumpernickel. You’re not working tomorrow; you might eat both halves now. 

There’s an empty chair on the other side of your table that you’ve dumped your bag on. It’s meant for two people, and sometimes when it’s a bit busier than just you and Jeff you feel bad for taking it. You’ve got nowhere else to be though, and you’d like to sit and eat after twelve hours of not getting to do either. 

You don’t usually come on your off days, but you’d felt like you were going crazy holed up in your apartment all day. You’d done your laundry, washed all your matching scrubs and the few other clothes you wore. Tidied, caught up on your Instagram feed, and when you’d gotten to the bottom of the Hulu menu without anything jumping out at you you’d shoved on your shoes without another thought. 

It’s late, Friday night, and people are coming home from the clubs. You’re not particularly close to any, but the people who go there don’t seem to mind. Small gaggles stumble in every once in a while, giggle over the menu, and order an egg and cheese that they’ll probably barf up before they get home. 

God, you sound bitter. 

You gather your things when you finish the first half, can sense a group of drunk guys weighing up the effort of coming inside from where they hang out across the street. One of them is smoking a cigarette, and the other three seem to be caught up in a heated discussion.

It’s not snowing. You toss up taking the bus the rest of the way back. You’d walked here. 

You hear your last name, ‘doctor’ preceding it, and whirl around. On a very rare occasion you’ll get recognised on the street - people don’t tend to forget the person who saved their life, or their daughter’s or brother’s or cousin’s life. 

You’ve never seen Robby outside of work, not wearing the standard Pitt black scrubs. He looks nice in a collared plaid button down with a thick fleece over it and the top few buttons undone. You’ve never seen him wear jeans before. In your head Dr Robinavitch doesn’t exist in the same world where jeans also exist. 

You don’t know what to say to him. You end up saying nothing. Robby doesn’t even bat an eye at your silence - used to your oddness, the way it seeps into every interaction. 

“Thought that was you.” He’s smiling, wide and crooked like he does on the rare occasion he has a reason to. “What’re you doing out here so late by yourself? It’s almost midnight.”

“Dinner,” you say lamely, holding up your wrapped up sandwich. 

He looks at the checkered lump in your hand then back at your face. He looks different in the dark, the planes of his face look more severe in the light of the hospital. Maybe that’s why you like the harshness of the deli, so bright it brings you right back to work.

“You always eat so late?” He asks. You feel silly with your coat hitting your chin, your work shoes, and your sandwich in your hand. You look like a doctor - a med student. Robby looks like a man. 

The sensory feeling of the paper in your hand is suddenly too underwhelming and you can’t stop yourself from digging your nails in - needing a desperate anchor of your hand. You’ll regret that later when you go to eat it and it’s smushed, but later doesn’t matter more than the underwhelm in your palm. 

“I work in the ER,” you point out. His hands are in his jacket pockets but one of them is clutching an opaque white plastic bag with something heavy weighing it down. Robby laughs, crinkling the handle of the bag in his hand in his pocket. “What are you doing here? Didn’t you work today?”

He nods like he’d already forgotten about it. Like it did not matter to him in a moment he was not actively experiencing it. 

“Abbot’s sick- not bad, just all stuffed up.” He gestures vaguely with the hand not holding the bag at his nose/mouth area. “Only thing that ever makes him feel better is soup from PJ’s.” He nods down the street from the direction he’d just come where a neon sign is just being turned off.

“What a diva.”

Robby laughs again. “Yeah, he’d never admit it. Rather suffer in silence.”

It feels like the wrong thing to have said. You don’t know Dr Abbot well enough to make jabs at him, especially not to Robby. 

You want to be out of this situation, it all crushes you at once. You’re in the dark, fifty minutes from your apartment, talking to somebody whom you intrinsically do not understand. You are a hollow body, your skin is translucent and you can see every organelle and every shift of the movement of your organs. You can see all the hallways and gears and caves in your anatomy. Every link in every chain that tugs on each and every thought that spins through your head. How your life started from birth to now and a timeline for why every facet of your personality and your soul has ended up the way that it is.

Robby is solid, and in front of you, and you will never understand him.

You’ve broken your nose trying to walk through him - he will remember this about you for as long as the two of you know each other. That you put your words where they do not belong, and that you think Jack Abbot is a diva. 

Robby opens his mouth to say something.

“I should head home,” you jab your thumb somewhere behind you. You live in the direction Robby is standing. You’ll loop around the block to avoid passing him. “I’ll see you at work, Robby. Hope Abbot feels better.”

When you circle the street, Robby’s gone. The walk home is long, the walk up the stairs to the third floor is longer. You arrive home a little before one in the morning. You don’t bother with the lights, coming to sit on the floor in the kitchen. The clock blinks on the oven with each passing minute. 

It lights your skin up red, and if you look close, you can see the flow of your blood.

You unwrap your sandwich.

—

Shen’s on the next time you work. He greets you casually, a “good morning” around a drink from his water bottle and barely gives you a second glance. Your shift passes without incident - the other doctors treat you normally, when you speak they listen. Javadi initiates small talk with you and you do your best to return the sentiment. 

At one point Santos reads a 9 as a 6 aloud to you and gives you a look. “Whoops,” she snickers, looking at you like the two of you share some sort of secret.

You like Santos. The two of you are about the same age, you’re only a few years older than her, the same number of years further into your residency. The two of you talk sometimes between patients, but that’s bound to happen when the two of you spend so much time in an enclosed space.

She has a way of making everything feel like an inside joke. You know she struggled a little when she first started, hitting the wall with the other doctors when she first started her residency. You wouldn’t know that now, seeing the way she interacts with the rest of the people here. Her and Whitaker are so close they’re practically in a sitcom, Shen’s taken a special liking to her, and you’ve even seen her and Mel giggling by the lockers after shifts.

The two of you barely speak about anything that isn’t work. Which is fine, she’s your coworker, you guys don’t have to be speaking about your personal lives. But she has this soft little spark about her like she’s created a world to be in and it’s the most important place to be. 

“That thing you did with the guy in Central 13?” She sidles up to you towards the end of your shift, hanging behind the monitor you’re using to finish up the chart for that very patient. She lets out a heavy breath. “Wow.”

You’d inserted a double lumen tube during an intubation. Nothing super fancy, but you know that Santos probably hasn’t done a whole lot of intubations in general. Shen had raised his eyebrows at your suggestion but hadn’t stopped you, and when you’d finished he’d grabbed your shoulder and squeezed, muttering a “sick, good job,” and then heading out. 

You look up, genuinely startled. “Thanks.”

“I’d never even heard of the thing you did,” she doesn’t let up. “I wouldn’t have thought to do it. That was really cool.” Her voice drops and she looks down at your hands. You’ve gotten compliments before, but all from people above you in the food chain, Langdon, Abbot, people who are kind of obligated as your educators to give you praise. Santos is a PGY-1, so unless she’s sucking up you’re not sure why she’s being so nice. You’re not high enough up that sucking up would be worth anything.

You have fifteen minutes of your shift, no incoming ambulances, nothing urgent in chairs, all your patients are stable. 

You feel sick - not the type of sick that would get you sent home, or even to the staff lounge. It’s normal at this point. You genuinely don’t remember a time you haven’t felt like this. 

“You’re only an intern,” you say, trying to be empathetic without sounding condescending. “You’ll get there.”

She nods, low and slow. She’s already got her jacket on, thick and leather and dark brown. Santos watches you finish up your chart and you try to shake the feeling of being observed. 

“I’m, uh, I think I might head down to the Hills,” she leans her elbow on your table. “There’s this bar on Liberty street. They do live music sometimes, they have a killer plate of nachos, some cool cocktails.”

You log out of the system and stand from your chair. You’re about to round and want to head to your locker first. “That sounds great.”

Santos smiles at you, shoving her hands in her pockets. She bounces when she walks and she follows you on your way to your locker. “Yeah, I found it right when I started here. I’ve been trying to get Samira to go with me but I don’t think she likes me much.”

You open your locker. Coat on, backpack on, shut locker, look back at her. You really like Dr Mohan; she’s kinder than most of the other doctors, and the two of you started on the exact same day so you’ve always felt like a special kinship with her.

“She does,” you tell her honestly. You think she does. You don’t know Samira very well - if she disliked Trinity she probably wouldn’t be telling you about it. “She just prefers to keep to herself I think.”

Santos nods, rocking on her heels and biting her top lip. “Yeah, maybe. I don’t know, I think there’s only so many times you can ask someone to hang out and have them say no before you gotta accept they’re just not into it.”

She’s not wrong. It’s very much something you have to play by ear, you’ve learned. Some people are busy, some people don’t know how to say no without worrying about sounding impolite. 

People are gathering for rounds, you can see at the end of the hallway. It’s the only thing standing in front of you and a huge nap. Santos is digging in her locker for something.

“I hope you have a good time,” you tell her earnestly. “Nachos sound great, I might have to get some on my way home.” You feel nauseous. The idea of eating anything, let alone a bunch of cheese and meat, makes your stomach turn. You just want to be home. You miss your couch. 

Santos doesn’t say anything as you walk out towards rounds. When she reenters the room, she doesn’t join you, she comes to stand shoulder to shoulder with Mel. 

—

The little girl in Trauma-2 is going to die. 

Today was meant to be a day off. Robby’d called you a little after five, apologising for waking you and asking if you could come in to cover. You’d said yes, sitting out on your fire escape and painting your nails. They’re clear - it stops you from biting them. 

It had been a fairly quiet morning. Most people won’t spend their Saturday in the ER waiting room unless they really have to so you have slightly less of the patient type that maybe didn’t have to come into the ER at all. 

Then the ambulance had dropped her off a little over a half hour ago, and you’ve been fairly convinced that she’s not going to make it since you’d seen her. 

You were the primary doctor on the case only because you were the only one around at the time. Now, Robby and Collins are there, and they’ve taken over. Robby practically shoved you out of the room and told you to take a break.

You’re sweaty. You’ve ducked into the bathroom to swap your long sleeves for a t-shirt under your scrub top and taken a well earned cry into the mirror. 

Robby’s standing outside Trauma-2 like he’s on guard. The girl’s parents are out in chairs, and you really don’t want to have to be the person to tell them. You know Robby will do it if you ask, but you don’t want to have to ask. Don’t want to have not yet asked, don’t want to ask, don’t want to have asked. 

The time will pass anyway. You just wish you didn’t have to get pushed along with it.

“Ah-ah,” Robby snaps as sharp as he can without any real bite. You’re hovering in the doorway to the room, watching as Collins works on her. “You’re not going back in there.”

You failed to save her. You are the reason that two parents have lost their only daughter. He’s not mad - can’t be mad that you did your best to save someone who couldn’t be saved. But sending you in there when you’d already done no good would be a waste of time. A change in tactic, a change in doctor, is probably necessary.

“Well where can I go?” you snap back, much harsher than he’d been. You want him to tell you, don’t want the mistake to be yours. Working in the ER and being mostly self guided you feel a lot of aimlessness. The pulling behind your navel that dulls to a low throb most of the time, signalling when you’re making a bad choice. Making Robby tell you what to do means that feeling goes away, just for a little.

Robby gets this look about him sometimes, when he’s tired and trying to brush someone off without them asking him what’s wrong. “You can get some air.” He raises his eyebrows, tone light and sarcastic. He lifts an arm to point out through the dark tunnel of night streaming through the open ambulance bay.

Your feet move on autopilot, taking you out into the cold. Your arms hurt from the change of temperature, but you made the choice to take your long-sleeves off, so you don’t complain about it even internally.

Robby follows behind you just close enough for you to hear him. “Are you okay?” He puts the emphasis in strange places in his sentences sometimes. In the middle instead of one of the edges.

You nod. “Yeah, Robby, I’m fine.”

It’s quiet in the way outside only is right when you step out into it. The noise from the ER bleeds into your veins and when the ambulance bay doors shut behind you it takes getting used to the difference. It almost feels like submerging yourself, for a brief second the world shifts, and then it goes back on kilter.

Robby looks at you for a long time. You still do not understand him, he’s impossible to get a read on. He could be waiting for you to say something.

“I’m parking you,” he says finally. 

Your mouth drops open. “P-parking me?”

“Doctor’s orders.” Robby nods with finality. “Stay here. I’ll come and get you.”

You want to shout something back at Robby as he goes inside - angry with him and grateful for him both at once. How dare he not think you’re up to doing your job? You’re not, but you don’t want him thinking that. 

You watch an ambulance pull up, both the paramedics ignoring you as they haul a gurney in through the doors. They know enough about the job that it’s clear you’re not waiting for them.

It was her birthday in three days. You’d seen it on her chart right when she first came in, the little girl who would be taking her final breaths inside the room you’d have to continue working in. Her life would end in that room. How many had? How many had died where you were standing?

Surely, with how long humans had been inhabiting the earth, someone had died on this spot. People had stood here and spoken. Perhaps a bed had been placed here, centuries before the hospital was even conceived of. A couple had laid in the grass, hand in hand, watching as the untouched space stretched on.

In a hundred years, would someone stand on this exact spot again and cry as you were trying not to?

She was seven years, eleven months and twenty-seven days old. You don’t even remember what you were doing that long ago. The thought dredges you up, lifts you like the moment right before the fall, when you’re anticipating. Awaiting another birthday.

The human body comes in a lot of pairs, a lot of symmetry, a lot of even numbers. And then suddenly it can be zero. Reduced to nothing but the meaning someone else gives it. A period, a full stop.

You take a shuddering breath in. It’s a morbid way to think of your own life, but you wonder sometimes what will continue to happen when you finally take your last breath. The last breath is usually out. An even way to close. Nothing remaining, no leftovers.

Robby’s hand finds your shoulder. “Hey, kid.”

You don’t know how long you’ve been out here. 

“I’m ready to go back in,” you say, because you feel like you’re meant to be. You’re not sure if you’ve ever been ready to go in.

Robby just shakes his head gravely. “It’s 7:03, you are officially relieved from duty.”

Relieved. It’s such a strange word. You feel like you’re bordering on pretentious. You wonder who the first person to ever say the phrase was, and how it got picked up enough that it’s commonplace now. If they had to explain themselves, or if the other person knew what they meant by it. 

Relieved implies a weight lifted from you. A lightness. Perhaps you left it in Trauma-2.

Robby follows you as you grab your stuff from your locker. You’re acting on autopilot. Tonight you will not get food on the way home. You will take the train, you will walk home, you will shower and change and climb into bed and you will wake up the next morning with your alarm. You do not have the capacity to make any more choices for yourself.

When you step back out through the ER doors, you can see Princess, Jesse, Whitaker and Santos sitting on the benches. You’ve never been to their after work wind-downs, but you’ve heard enough people usually go that it’s fair to assume there will be one after whatever shift you’re finishing. 

Robby is still behind you. “Hey,” he says. His backpack is slung over one shoulder. He’s wearing a thicker jacket than you’ve ever seen on him. It suits him. “Come on.”

You follow him. “Where are we going?”

“Dinner,” he says simply. “You haven’t eaten this afternoon, and I know how tempting it is to just want to go to sleep. You need food.” He walks like he expects you to follow behind him; you do without complaint. The sureness required to make an assumption about a coworkers needs and to be correct, you don’t think you could ever muster it. 

You walk for almost fifteen minutes, which is less than you usually walk, but by the end your cheeks are red and you’re trying to quiet your breathing. Robby walks faster than you, with a difference bounce, smoother and softer. You’re slower but it’s stilted. Unbalanced - sometimes your left knee behaves funny. He walks like where he’s going is the most important place to be, and you’d believe it. 

He stops in front of a place you’ve never seen before. A diner, real and busy, not an out of the way spot only he knows about from his wanderings. A staple; there are families here. 

“Hey,” you say as you reach the door. Interrupting the flow, trying to pause. A period, a moment, or whatever you’d been thinking less than half an hour earlier. Your feelings never make sense when you’re not actively experiencing them. It’s why you could never get into journaling. “You know you don’t have to-”

Robby doesn’t even let you get the words out. “I want to.”

Want is harder to argue with than obligation. It shuts you up in a way you’re not fond of. 

The lights are golden, warm in a way your eyes have to adjust to after the bright whites of the hospital, and there’s a handwritten sign taped to the inside of the window advertising that you can get four pierogies for a dollar. 

Robby leads you inside without another word. It smells like coffee and oil, and it’s louder than you’d expected. You’re not a huge fan of noise, but working in a hospital you’ve gotten used to it. You realise with a start that it has been so long since you’ve heard volume that stemmed from love. Parents chastising their kids for giggling too loud. a group of high schoolers that look like they’ve just come off stage from a school play - taking up two booths and beaming like they’ve just headlined the Tony’s, couples on dates.

“You come here a lot?” You ask as Robby sits down at a booth in the corner. 

He nods. “The food’s good, and they don’t look at you weird if you order something and can’t eat it.”

The vinyl squeaks with every shift of your legs, but it’s loud enough in here that it doesn’t make you feel self-conscious. Noise born from love, it wraps you in it. 

“Get whatever you want,” Robby says like it’s a no-brainer. You know instinctively that he’s not offering to pay for your dinner - though he probably would if he thought you’d want that. You don’t. Him paying obligates you to order, eat and enjoy something. He’s telling you to ignore the conscious thought, all the brain stems, all the lines shooting off in a mind map - focus on the core idea. The want. It gets clouded by the mind sometimes. 

“Soup is not a food,” he says helpfully. “Not right now at least.”

“I know that,” you say, defensively. You don’t want soup, and you know he’s suggesting you eat something solid, but it slips out before you can question why. The soup they have on the menu seems semi-clear, more like broth. Incorporeal, translucent. The essence of a food. Robby’s steering you away from it like he knows how you feel about things that are concrete. Your ego hasn’t quite recovered from trying to barrel through him with your assumptions the last time the two of you were alone together. 

“I’m sorry,” you say it because you are, not because you think you should be. The two feel indistinguishable sometimes. You should be sorry, so you are. You’re not sure where the line comes but it’s somewhere between you and Robby. “I’m not good at this.”

“Eating?” Robby asks. 

“Being a person after work.” Or before work, or during work. But admitting that means drawing attention to it, and you’d rather him think you’re oblivious. “I’m… sensitive.”

Robby doesn’t say any of the usual things; you’re not sensitive, it’s fine, don’t worry about it. You really like him for it. 

He leans forward, elbows on the table. He’s not looking at you like he’s your attending. He looks completely different in warm lighting; different in the way the noise is coated with affection. It suits him. “I like that about you. It’s not a character flaw, you know that right?”

You snort before you can stop yourself. “Yeah, okay, put it on my performance review.”

“I will,” he says dryly. When Robby laughs the sound feels like it’s had holes poked in it, gravelly and messy, the punctures letting something soulful out with the sound. “Second guesses her authority figures.”

You huff. “Wow.”

“I’m dedicated to accuracy,” he says seriously. 

The waitress understands you both immediately; the scrubs, how you’re kind of leaning on the table. Robby slaps down a ten and orders twenty pierogies and a cup of coffee. You flounder under her gaze, having not even looked at the menu, and Robby smiles at you in a way that feels conspiratorial and not polite.

“Can I get like, half of what he got?” You ask. “Is that a thing?”

She nods kindly and takes the menus from your table, ducking back into the kitchen.

With everything between you out of the way, Robby leans forward more. “One time, after a rough shift, I took apart my kitchen cabinets just so I could feel myself putting them back together. To prove I could.”

You mirror his posture. “This feels infinitely healthier.”

“Low bar, but I’ll take it.” You clasp your hands together to keep from picking at your nails. 

Robby gets you talking without you realising. First about work, then about not work. You’d read something, probably way back in college, about how some sculptors, instead of taking a block and adding their intricacies to it to make their art, they’d instead sculpt away from the finished product until all they had was art left. That’s how talking to Robby feels as you get your dinner. You talk about everything until all that is left is the little girl in Trauma-2.

“You did everything right,” he says, right when you need it. “No one could have saved her.”

“Doesn’t matter,” you shake your head. “I still didn’t.”

Robby looks at you very seriously. When he speaks, it is firm. Solid. “It mattered. It mattered that when she closed her eyes she wasn’t alone in that room. It mattered that her parents knew someone was fighting for her, that someone cared about someone that was theirs. The outcome isn’t the only metric that counts.”

You feel heat behind your eyes. “You really believe that?”

Robby nods, serious and stern, leaning forward to take your hand. “I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t believe it.”

The food arrives, sitting between you two like something to share instead of something to separate you both. 

Loneliness eats at you on your worst days. You thought you knew how it felt to be real and truly lonely, and then you moved to Pittsburgh. You’re not homesick, per se, more sick for a life you feel belongs to you. You miss being tied to places, no one here holds memories with you in them.

At home, you can walk down Main street and practically provide director’s commentary: There’s the cafe I lost my scarf in when I was a kid, there’s the movie theatre I saw that in, there’s the restaurant that didn’t hire me in high school. You miss being somewhere where you are as much a part of the place as the culture is a part of you. 

In Pittsburgh, you cease to exist the moment you leave a place. 

“I’m really glad that I got to steal you from Abbot,” Robby says through a mouthful of decaf. “I know you got offered a night shift spot, and I have to admit I was a little worried for a bit. I thought you would take it up.”

That had been a long time ago, back when you were just starting your second year of residency. It was a really tempting offer. You’d declined it because, at the end of the day, you really love the people you work with, even if they exist in the bubble of the ER. 

“I thought about it,” you admit, ripping apart a pierogi in your hand. “But, to be honest, I’ve been feeling kind of… isolated?” You muse over your word choice. “Sometimes I feel so small in this city, and I figured being asleep when most of the people who live here are awake would just take me out of it that much more.”

Robby chews slowly, using it to formulate a thought. “You leave a very strong first impression.”

You blink. If you were eating you probably would have choked. “Excuse me?”

“Abbot’s always talking about you whenever you work a night,” he says, like it’s something worth holding on to, not to keep but rather to let you follow him as he keeps going. He looks so tired, always older after a shift than before one. It looks good on him, he wears age handsomely, and you wonder - not for the first time - how he fares. It feels inappropriate to think of your boss that way, especially just because he’s being so nice to you. “You were the first one that really got through to Santos, you two are clearly close” Are you? That makes you sad, that you’ve missed a closeness that you haven’t understood. It feels like something you will never get back. You have missed it. You will miss it. 

She hit a bit of a wall when she started, you’d been able to see that. You wonder, for the first time, how many times she had broken her nose trying to walk through you. 

“And I…” he flushes, scratching the hair at the back of his neck. “I worry about you.” It lands, heavy and warm. 

He worries about you. That should make you feel worried - what have you been doing to worry him? Instead, it strikes you right in the heart. Worry, as gnawing of an emotion as it is, requires space to hold it in.

Space you take up in his chest when you are not in the room. 

“You don’t have to,” you say. “I’m a hard person to be around a lot of the time.”

Robby, to his credit, does not correct you. This whole conversation he has spent not saying the things you are ‘meant’ to say to someone confiding in you, and each time he has said exactly what has sparked something in your chest cavity. 

“You’re worth the effort, though.”

You laugh, startled and a little breathless. “You make it sound like I’m like, a piece of IKEA furniture or something.”

“A kitchen cabinet,” Robby jokes. 

Robby relaxes against the vinyl, and pushes one of the containers of pierogies towards you. It sits heavy inside you as you eat, and you feel like maybe it’s filling something inside you that you didn’t realise you didn’t have. Closer to whole than you have felt in a while - almost like you’ve forgotten. Further away from zero. 

He talks more than you do, and you believe it’s a kindness. He tells you a story of a med student he had years ago who insisted on calling him Dr Robinavitch - you never realised you didn’t know Robby’s first name until that very moment, and you can tell he also realised that. “One time he had a patient throw up on him and he threw up in response.”

You’re deadpan. “Probably picked the wrong career path, I won’t lie.”

He laughs over his coffee. There’s a pile of napkins between the two of you, helping with the oil of your hands as you eat with them, not even noticing it through the conversation. 

“I mean, I’ve been there,” you say, wiping your hands for the fifteenth time. 

You’ve been there for almost an hour, unworried. The sign above the counter says they’re open past midnight, so you don’t have to worry about them closing while you’re sitting here. Robby’s been looking at you with soft eyes and pink cheeks for the better part of thirty minutes. 

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he says. “Worst thing about you is your terrible self-esteem, you’re great, shut up.”

You laugh. “Bedside manner is dead,” you say, pushing your plate away from yourself, full and happy. “And we killed him.”

“Why is bedside manner a man?” Robby asks. “That feels unlikely.”

You leave a little after nine. Robby walks to the train with you and then gets on without saying anything. You have no idea where Robby lives, but you know he walks to work. The two of you share a bench, thigh to thigh. Neither one of you mention where you are at any point, how close your respective places are, where you both need to go. 

You probably do the less walking than any night in recent memory. The city has shaped itself around your solitude, your routines, almost crushing in the way it attempts to fold itself around you. 

When you stand on the T, he stands with you. He’s so close, he smells like something warm and heavy, and he seems to be drinking you in. He laughs at almost everything you say, even when you don’t mean for it to be funny. 

The conversation stays steady, it doesn’t lull like you’re always terrified of. They’re not your strong suit, speaking with people. It comes with a feeling of sparity, it’s easy to feel like you are the remaining essence. The human body is naturally paired, but your human experience is roughly singular. 

Robby walks with you like he wants to share the same space. 

You think a lot about numbers. Odd being defined almost lazily, as though no one could bother to think of a better descriptor, not being divisible by two. You wonder, in your quietest nights, if you were to be split open, would you be divisible by two? You feel often like a remainder, not to be dramatic. But everyone else seems to gravitate naturally to other people, snapping together like magnets. 

It’s something you’d always struggled with. You’re not sure what people clock about you that solidifies it. You don’t just feel uneven, you feel odd. It’s something that festered behind your ribs when you were a child and as you grew, so too did it. The version of the word lodged in your bones. Like there is a correct way to be a person, everyone else learned it - learned it enough to know which rules to follow and which to break. It takes a deep and intimate knowledge of how something works in order to go against the norms and have it still work, and it feels like everyone you’ve ever met is able to do that. 

And people notice. They’re not cruel, that’s almost worse. They’re not trying to judge, but pattern recognition dictates that it is human nature to notice when something is off. 

Robby’s arm brushes yours and he makes no effort to move away. Two feet on the pavement, two people walking together. Your footsteps are half a beat after his. 

You wonder how long until he sees the error. A small part of you hopes he has already - that this is him noticing. 

Robby says something—you don’t catch all of it—and you answer a second too late, your words stepping on the edge of his sentence. He doesn’t seem to mind. He never seems to mind. That almost makes it worse, how easily he accommodates you, like you are something fragile or precious instead of incorrect.

“This is me,” you say as you reach your apartment building. You have no idea how Robby is getting home. 

He sighs morosely. “Are you sure?”

You look up at your window, pretending to think. “Pretty sure.” He squeezes the top of your arm and in moving his hand down, almost touches your fingers. “I don’t think I’ve ever had someone walk me home before. It’s not something I usually do.”

“It doesn’t have to be a thing, if you don’t want?” His tone lightens at the end, and you’re high enough on the night air that you are determined to interpret it in good faith. Him prioritising your comfort. You become acutely aware of the space between you — not empty, exactly, but loaded. Charged. Like something left on overnight.

You shake your head. “No, I liked it. I just…” you’re going to end the night being vulnerable. Robby has done nothing to indicate he does not like you. You will not be the kind of pathetic person who argues with someone when they show they like them. “Is it selfish to say I want to matter to someone?”

Robby steps impossibly closer to you. “Not selfish at all. In fact, bare minimum.” His gaze drops to where his breath is fogging the air between the two of you. It’s freezing. You don’t feel so silly in your thrifted winter coat. “I would go as far to say you already do.”

Robby looks different under the glow of your street light - different than at work, different than at the diner. You think you might start to understand him. He is still direct in front of you, solid and unmoving. But he shifts in the light: kitchen cabinets with their doors taken off. 

There are so many things you could say to him. Thank you. I’m sorry. Please don’t forget me when the sun comes up and it’s loud again and I am still quiet. 

You think of all the times you have spent standing in this very spot, feeling temporary in your own life. 

Robby falters. You realise with a start it’s not the first time you’ve seen him do that. If anyone had asked three hours ago you probably would have answered as honestly as possible that you’d never seen it. How many times had it happened and you hadn’t seen it?

“Can I-” he stumbles over his words. Reconsiders. “Do you want me to kiss you?”

You feel rooted to place. The honesty of his voice hurts. “Are you asking permission or if I have the audacity?”

He laughs and you feel it against your face. “The first one.”

Robby smiles, warm and unmistakably fond. When he kisses you it’s soft and coursing with something you can’t name. He tastes like decaf coffee that you didn’t realise was shitty now you’re still tasting it almost two hours later. You can feel his beard against your face and the scratch is electrifying. You’re just two people. His hands settle into your waist, palms against your scrub top under your coat. It’s just the two of you and the quiet hum of the city you live in. 

“You should get some sleep,” he mumbles against your mouth. He lets you kiss him for another few minutes, seeming like he’s indulging himself more than letting you have what you want. It’s dizzying, the idea of being wanted, and by someone like Robby. 

The kind of guy you think might’ve liked you even if you didn’t like him back. 

You’re working tomorrow. You’re pretty sure he is too. You hope, as well, that Santos is and that she’s in a good mood. The seed of an idea plants itself within you hopefully, and you decide tomorrow will be the shift you ask if she maybe wants to get drinks after work. The thought of her saying no terrifies you, but the thought of her saying yes terrifies you a little less than you’d first thought. 

“I’ll see you soon,” he pulls back, flushed and seemingly just as enthralled as you. Soon. Continuously. “Text me when you get up there, need to make sure you’re awake enough to lock your door.” He doesn’t walk away until you’re up and locked away in your apartment. 

The oven clock blinks at you as you turn the overhead lamp on. You shoot him a door’s locked text that he heart-reacts to.