Perpetual Uncertainty

The stupidly handsome doctor you’ve just met smirks at you in the back of the ambulance. Truly, he has to be the most attractive man you’ve ever had the privilege to lay eyes on. 

Jack knows he’s literally just met you but there’s just something about you that has him already at ease with you. “That your professional medical opinion?” You watch his eyes flick up to the monitor and his smirk deepens when your heart rate increases a little. It would embarrass you a little more if you hadn’t seen Jack move a little to readjust himself where he’s sitting when you called him Dr. Abbot. “Call me Jack.”

Jack was walking to work when he saw you get hit as you were walking across the street on  a walk sign by someone turning right who hardly slowed, either assuming there wouldn’t be any pedestrian traffic or forgetting there could be. He’d run over to you of course, let someone else call 911 while he introduced himself and made you stay laying on the asphalt. Once the ambulance arrived he just jumped in the back with you since they were taking you to the Pitt.

“A C-collar and backboard, really?” you huff. “I have a broken wrist and my hip and side will have nasty bruises. The rest of me is fine. This is just embarrassing.” 

“I know it’s easy for me to say but you shouldn’t be embarrassed by some absolute fucking moron hitting you with his car.” He’s angry, it’s clear from his tone and the set of his jaw. Something about how he looks at you as he says it feels almost protective in a vaguely possessive way. Like he’s angry it was you they hit because it’s you. “And you’ll thank me if you have a spinal injury and I just preserved your ability to walk and use your arms.” 

You sigh at him. “I think you just like having me strapped down and being in control.” 

“It’s a nice bonus,” he teases.  

You’d tilt your head at him if you could but you’re forced to settle for smirking at him. “Kinky.” 

“Oh my god,” he mutters, rolling his eyes to try and pretend it didn’t affect him. But you can see the blush that tinges his cheeks an adorable shade of pink. “Morphine have you a little uninhibited?”

“It’s not the morphine” you laugh softly. 

He smiles at you and shakes his head as the ambulance slows to a stop and the back doors open. He can’t believe you’re actually interested in him and flirting with him. 

“Jack?” A different male voice calling his name has Jack breaking eye contact and helping get the gurney out of the ambulance. 

“Witnessed.” Jack explains to Robby as he hops out of the ambulance behind your gurney and walks in with you. “Pedestrian versus Honda-CRV, low velocity, maybe 5 miles per hour but accelerating. Vitals are stable at 100 over 70, pulse 90, resps 14, pulse ox 97, no LOC, no head injury, oriented times 4, obvious distal radius deformity. Five of morphine en route. Hit on the right side, lower abdomen and pelvis took the brunt of the impact. Pelvis is stable. Abdomen tender on exam but otherwise unremarkable. Sensation in all extremities intact.”

“Wow,” you hum. “If I wasn’t mad at you I’d tell you how impressive I find it that you remembered all of that without writing it down, Jack.”

Jack huffs a soft laugh and shakes his head as he looks down at you. “Collared and boarded her to be safe, much to the patient’s chagrin.” You don’t miss the looks between the two other men now walking with your gurney. They seem surprised by how Jack is with you and that you called him Jack. “Liter of NS going in due to significant dehydration.”

You scoff. “I resent that. Diet Dr Pepper has water in it.”

“I, no,” Jack shakes his head at you. “No. That’s not how that works.” 

“I’m Dr. Robinavitch. Everyone calls me Dr. Robby. And this is Mateo.” Robby looks between you and Jack. “Do you two know each other?” The amusement is clear in his voice, like he thinks he just caught Jack in something. 

“Hi Dr. Robby and Mateo.” You give them both a friendly smile but Jack notices it’s not the same smile you gave him and something about that pleases him. He’s really into you. Perhaps more than he wants to admit.

“No. We only met when I saw the accident and went over to help,” Jack explains. 

You raise your eyebrows at him. “Okay, I think you watching me get hit by a car, running to my aid, palpating my pelvis, riding in an ambulance with me and letting me call you by your first name qualify us as knowing each other.” 

“I think that just means I’m your doctor.”

“I think your reticence means you don’t want to know me.” Jack snorts a laugh. “Reticence?” He says it like he can’t believe you just used that word and gives you a look to silently communicate that what you said is the furthest thing from the truth.

“Chagrin?” Your tone matches his as you smile.

Jack shakes his head at you and looks up at Robby. “I’ll just stay with her. No point getting one of you guys involved just for you to leave in five minutes. Send in one of the nurses on with me once it hits seven, yeah?”

There’s a slight pause before Robby says a drawn out, “okay,” and smirks at Jack.

Jack gives Robby a look and already knows Robby will hound him with questions when they run the board. He can just tell Robby thinks there’s something going on. Maybe Robby is a little right.

Once you’re in a room they’re quick to transfer you and the paramedics leave, Robby and Mateo clearing out with them leaving just you and Jack in the room. You’re still in the c-collar and on a backboard and you still hate it and find it embarrassing.

Jack logs in on the computer that’s in the room and starts a chart on you, puts in your first and last name and date of birth for now before ordering a few different sets of x-rays. “Are you wearing a bra with a clasp?”

You laugh. “Wouldn’t you like to know, weather boy?”

He walks over to your bed and looks down at you. Jack is doing his best to keep it professional now that he’s officially your doctor. “It’ll make a difference on whether we have to cut your clothes off.” 

“Oh.” Your face sobers quickly and it makes Jack smile to himself. You’re adorable. “It does have a clasp, yes. Am I making you uncomfortable? Because I can cool it.” 

“You’re not.” He gives you a lopsided smile. Maybe he should tell you to cool it at least while he’s your doctor but Jack just can’t bring himself to. It’s not that big of a deal as long as it’s mostly one-sided for now and he stays professional, right? “And good. We won’t have to cut anything off.” Jack nods at you, looking away from you when the door opens. “This is Bridget, one of our nurses here.”

Bridget appears on the other side of your bed and smiles down at you. “Hi there.” 

“Hi,” you greet her with a smile and your name. “Thanks for helping take care of me.” 

“Bridget’s going to get you in a gown and they should be able to grab x-rays.” Jack turns his attention to Bridget. “Sweatpants are loose enough you should be able to get them down easily. Bra has a clasp so it can come off and her shirt can stay on for now and come off once her spine is clear. I ordered all the x-rays, portable, they should be in to do them all soon. I’m going to set my stuff down and run the board with Robby and will come back once the x-rays are in.”

You click your tongue at Jack’s words. “Oh so we get to work and you just abandon me like this, I see how it is.” 

Jack’s eyes find yours again and he gives you a small, amused smile. “I’m not abandoning you, I have other work I have to do, unfortunately. Somebody has to run this place. Don’t do anything funny like code when I’m gone, okay? I’ll be back.”

“I didn’t realize I was just work to you, I’m hurt.” You make sure the pout is clear in your voice since Jack is walking to the door and no longer looking at you. “And, sure you will.” You draw out the sure for a few seconds. “It was nice meeting you Dr. Abbot, maybe our paths will cross again.” You can hear him chuckling as he walks out of the room and smile to yourself at the sound.

When you look over at Bridget she’s waiting for you with raised eyebrows and an amused smile of her own. The two of you share a laugh before she throws a gown over you and starts getting your clothes off.  

Once your clothes are off and Bridget has a gown laying over your bottom half the x-ray techs come in with the portable machine and shoot images of your spine, neck, pelvis and wrist. You and Bridget chat idly while she cleans a few cuts and scrapes you got from the car and hitting the ground and you wait for the x-rays to come back and a doctor to come clear you. 

You hear the door open and you know it’s Jack even with your inability to see him. You can just feel his presence. “See, I’m back, just like I said.”

“No, actually, I can’t see. I’m still boarded and collared,” you deadpan.

Jack walks over and smiles down at you. He swallows down the flirtatious comment that immediately formed on his tongue. He’s your doctor. He has to be professional. But he can’t stop his eyes from sparkling mischievously. “Your spine’s clear.” 

You take in a quick breath and raise your eyebrows, mouth forming a small ‘o’ as you fake surprise. “I’m truly shocked at this news, Doctor.” 

Bridget and Jack help you out of the collar and off the board, rolling you towards Jack who very deliberately keeps his eyes on yours so that you don’t think he’s trying to check out your bare ass as much as he would like to. He steps over to the counter and turns his back to you while Bridget helps you get your shirt off and into the gown properly, starts reviewing your chart on the tablet he’s holding.

“Thanks, Bridget.” Your words and the absence of the sound of fabric shuffling tell Jack he can turn around again.

“Of course.” She gives you a smile and steps out of the room for a minute.  

“And thank you.” Your eyes find Jack’s. It’s a thank you for everything he’s done so far, coming over when he really could have just kept walking by, protecting your spine even if you bitched about it. For coming back. 

“You’re welcome. Anyone we can call for you? Significant other? Family?” Jack asks lightly, glancing up at you from the computer and trying to keep it casual and professional. But you both know what he’s fishing for and you’re happy to give him the answer. 

“Oh, no, but thank you. Bridget told me my phone survived luckily. If you don’t mind handing it to me? It’s in the bag.” Jack nods and hands you the bag, takes it back from you and sets it down again once you’ve gotten your phone out. “And I’m painfully single.” 

He’s looking back down at the tablet but you catch the way the corners of his lips quirk up just slightly for a couple of seconds. He clenches his jaw to avoid verbalizing the ‘good’ or ‘maybe not for long’ that want to slip out. Jack settles for nodding at you while he grabs the stool and rolls it over to the side of your bed and sits. 

“Obviously your wrist is broken,” he turns the tablet and holds it towards you so that you can see your x-ray, uses his pen to point to the very obvious line representing the break, but the move isn’t condescending. He’s just showing you. “Distal radius fracture, but it’s a pretty clean break so we just need to reduce it and get it casted, you won’t need surgery or anything.”

“Well thank fuck for that,” you huff. “Imagine me having to take time off for surgery a week into starting a new job.”

Jack chuckles. “Your pelvis looks fine on x-ray and you don’t have any symptoms of internal bleeding or other injury there, but I’d like to get a CT just to be sure, have Ortho review both sets of films.”

“This feels like even more expensive overkill now.”

“I know.” Jack nods slowly. “But that car hit you pretty good and pelvic injuries can be deceptive and life threatening. I promise you that I’m not one to order unnecessary tests because I know how expensive it gets. So humor me please.” Jack tilts his head at you for a second. “Also remember the insurance company of the guy who hit you or your underinsured motorist insurance is going to end up paying for this.”

“Fine,” you sigh dramatically. “I guess I can humor you yet again.” 

His eyebrows raise a little and he smirks. “Didn’t realize you’d humored me before.” “I could have refused the backboard and collar but I didn’t. And I could have refused even coming to the hospital but I didn’t.” 

“With that wrist?” He cocks his head at you.

You cock your head back at him. “We both know a walk to urgent care would’ve been astronomically cheaper.” 

He nods, moving the tablet so that one edge is pressed into his lower abdomen, his wrists crossing as both hands hold the opposite side of the tablet. He leans back a little. “So why didn’t you decline?”

You shrug. “This really attractive doctor persuaded me to humor him.” 

Jack feels his face heat up and glances away. You giggle at the blush that crawls up his neck to his cheeks and the tips of his ears. He knew some answer like that had to be coming but hearing it in your voice still throws him for a couple of seconds. “You should text or call a friend, ask them to spend the night with you. Maybe two depending on how you’re feeling tomorrow.”

“I don’t think that’s going to work,” you laugh softly. “I just moved here from California. I don’t know anyone here and I’m not about to ask someone back home to take a plane to come take care of me for 24 or 48 hours because I was bumped by a car.”

Jack rolls his eyes at you playfully and you have to bite your lip at it. “It was a little more than a bump.” He pauses and looks at you for a second. He believes you but it’s still hard to believe that you don’t know anyone here and that you’re this chill about being hit by a car in a city you just moved to and are essentially all alone in. “You really don’t know anybody here?”

You shake your head. “Nope. I haven’t started work yet. So actually, Dr. Abbot, Jack, you’re the first person I met and now know in this city. Oh, but wait,” you hum to yourself, “that’s right, we don’t know each other,” you tease. 

He laughs and shakes his head. “I’m honored to be the first person you know and to know you in this City.” 

“You shouldn’t be,” you laugh with him. 

He can hear how serious you are about the self-deprecation even as you laugh, can see it in your eyes and how you look away from him. Jack almost reaches out to squeeze your hand and get your attention back. Almost. He’s your doctor. He has to be professional. So he settles for growing a little more serious so that you know he’s happy to have met you. 

“And yet I still am.” You look back up at him and Jack offers you a small, knowing smile. “We’ll get you in a cast, get the CT and then watch you for a couple hours and have you on your way home, okay?”

“Alright,” you nod, “that sounds like a plan, thank you.” 

“How’s the pain? You need more meds?” Jack opens the tablet back up to put in the order for the CT of your pelvis. 

“Oh, I’m okay, but thank you for asking.” Something about the small smile you give him makes Jack’s heart ache in a way he can’t describe. He’s falling for you. Just you and your personality and the way being around you makes him feel because he really doesn’t know much about you. He knows more about your health history than he does about you as a person. He’s been a doctor for a long time now and this has never happened with a patient. 

“Alright, I’ll give you more before we reduce your wrist and cast it.” Jack forces himself to push up off the stool and stand. “Need anything before I go?” You shake your head at him. “Okay. Call button is there if you do need anything,” he points to it, “and we’ll get you casted and scanned here shortly.”

“Sounds good, thanks Jack.” You give him a little wave with your good hand as he turns to walk out. 

Not long after Jack leaves you’re taken to CT and then returned back to your room in the ED. A little over an hour later and you’re surprised when it’s Jack who walks in with all the reduction and casting supplies. 

“Hey. How are you doing?” he greets you as he steps back in the room and sets everything down. 

“Hi.” You can’t help but giggle and it makes you feel like a teenager in front of her crush all over again. “I’m okay. How are you? How’s the day?”

Jack laughs to himself as he starts getting things set up. “I have to tell you that you are the most polite patient I think I’ve ever had. You’ve thanked me more than I get thanked by all my patients combined in an entire shift most nights. And I genuinely can’t recall the last time I had a patient ask how I was and how my day was going.”

You give him a shy smile and shrug a little, look down at your good hand where it picks at a non-existent piece of fuzz on your blanket. 

“I’m alright. Haven’t been hit by a car today, so I’ve got that going for me,” he teases you with a small smirk.  You laugh. “Glad one of us can say that.” 

“And the day has been fine, so far. Can’t really complain.” Jack shrugs and gives you an easy smile as he wheels the tray with everything set up over by your bed and sits on the stool and rolls over to you.

“Especially because you have me as a patient,” you stage whisper and wink at him. 

He wants to say it back to you in confirmation, to tell you that you actually have no idea how much easier and better you’re making this shift for him. Instead he just nods at you. But you know. You know he’s confirming it. It’s obvious in how bright his eyes are. “I’m going to give you some more morphine, then reduce your wrist and have some post reduction films taken. Then I’m going to start casting you before the films even come back because I’m pretty confident it’ll be aligned since it’s a clean break. And if it’s not then I cut it off and we start over. Sound good?”

“Are you asking for my professional medical opinion again?” You smirk while nodding so that he knows you’re okay with it. 

Jack laughs as he pulls his gloves on because your answer was so unexpected and so you as he’s coming to learn. After prepping your IV Jack sticks the needle with morphine in and finds your eyes as he presses the plunger down. “I don’t think I asked for your professional medical opinion last time, I asked if it was your professional medical opinion.” 

“A trivial distinction.” You can feel the morphine hit your system and you let out a breath. “Hit harder that time, wow.” 

“Because you’ve already had some and that was a bigger dose,” Jack chuckles. “I need you nice and relaxed for this and don’t want it to hurt.” 

There’s so much you want to say to that last sentence but you don’t because words are a little hard as you adjust to the morphine. “Mission accomplished, Doc, thanks.” You breathe a laugh, acutely aware of how it feels like you’re floating. You’re momentarily wrapped up in the feeling enough that you miss the way Jack’s jaw clenches at you calling him Doc. 

Despite the morphine it still smarts pretty good when Jack reduces your wrist and palpates it after to check the alignment. It brings you right back to reality, the slight haze of the morphine clearing, though you’re still feeling good from it. 

“What color cast do you want?” Jack asks you as the techs wheel in the portable x-ray to shoot your post reduction films. It takes you a few seconds to answer because you become almost transfixed on watching his hands as he takes his gloves off. Something about it is stupidly hot. 

“Um,” you start, desperately trying to think about what color cast you want. You like red, but black makes the most sense because it matches everything. “Sorry, I’ll have black, please. Thank you.” 

Jack’s lips press together in a small smile as he nods at you and steps out of the room to grab the black fiberglass.You’re still so polite. He finds it so incredibly endearing. 

By the time Jack gets back to your room with the fiberglass they’ve just finished your x-rays and are wheeling the machine out. “Doing okay?” Jack checks with you again as he sits back on the stool and slides on another pair of gloves before starting on your cast.

“I’m good, yeah, thanks for asking.” You tilt your head as you watch Jack start. “Though this feels like a job for an intern if not a med student.”

Jack’s hands slow and he looks at you as he wraps the cotton around the stockinette on your arm. “You trying to get rid of me?” He smirks, letting his eyes linger on yours for a few seconds before looking back to your arm.

“No, no.” You shake your head. That is the absolute last thing you’re trying to do and you both know he knows it. “It was just an observation.”

“It’s good for me to do one every now and then.” He tilts his head and shrugs. “Keep up my skills.”

“Well I’m very glad I can provide this opportunity for you, Dr. Abbot.” You smile at him even though he’s not looking at you. But Jack knows you are. He can hear the smile in your voice and can just feel it radiating off you.

“Post reduction films are back,” Bridget lets Jack know as she walks in the room with a tablet. Jack rolls on the stool towards her and she flicks through the images for him so that Jack doesn’t have to take his gloves off. 

“Looks good, thanks Bridget.” Jack nods and smiles at her before starting to roll back over to you.

“Thanks Bridget!”

“You’re both welcome,” she chuckles to herself as she walks back out of the room. 

“So you run this place?” you ask Jack as he finishes with the cotton and starts getting some fiberglass strips ready. You remember Jack saying someone had to run the place when he was leaving you initially.

“At night, yeah.” Jack grabs one of the strips and starts wrapping your arm with it. “I’m the senior attending when I’m on.” 

“The man in charge.” He can already hear the smirk in your voice. “Hot.”

“You know, Robby is technically somewhat above me because I don’t want to deal with the admin side of things in any capacity.” He glances up at you for a second.

“Dr. Robby doesn’t have salt and pepper curls that threaten to put me into cardiac arrest.” You think that’s a thought you’re saying to yourself in your head until Jack stifles a laugh and glances at you again with slightly flushed cheeks this time. “Oh fuck I said that out loud.” 

“You did indeed,” Jack confirms amusedly.

You take in a breath and hold it for a second before letting it out. “I’m blaming that on the morphine this time.” 

Jack chuckles at you and shakes his head. “You’re too much,” he laughs under his breath.

You catch it. You know exactly what he means by too much, know that he means it in a good way. “Too much or a challenge?”

“A challenge, yeah. Fits better for some reason.” He nods as he puts another piece of fiberglass around your arm.

“And do you like a good challenge Dr. Abbot?” You’ve dropped your voice just a little.

He stills for a second and you’re ready to apologize for going too far but before you can he makes that intense eye contact he seems to have a proclivity for with you. He knows he should look away from you and back at your cast and make some casual comment to keep the conversation moving along, but he doesn’t want to. And telling you this is just telling you something about his personality that you asked about, right? 

Jack drops his voice a little too. “I love a good challenge.” 

You and Jack share an especially intense moment of eye contact before he turns back to your cast. It doesn’t take much longer for him to finish it up and leave you to rest, promising his return once your CT results were back and he had a chance to check them out. 

And Jack does return to check on you and let you know your CT looks fine. He lingers though, sitting on the stool by the edge of your bed just chatting with you until he knows he has to get back on the floor. An hour or so later he checks on you again, bringing you food this time. He brings some for himself too, says he figured he’d just multitask and check in on you while having lunch. You know it’s bullshit and an excuse to spend more time with you. Jack knows you know it’s bullshit. Both of you love it, the time together. 

He’s back in your room checking in on you for a third time now and after talking for a bit you finally can’t help but tease him about it a little. “You know, Jack, I’ve been watching you and you don’t seem to spend this much time checking in on your other patients.” 

“None of my other patients are as cute and funny as you.” The sentence slips off his tongue before Jack has any hope of stopping himself. 

You grin at him. “Is that why you’re keeping me here?” 

“No.” He trips on the word just a little, slightly flustered that he just said that to you at work while acting as your doctor. “I really did want to keep you under observation for a while since you’re going home alone. Getting to stop in and see and talk to you, that’s just…” He trails off as he searches for the right words. 

“A nice bonus?” you offer, repeating his words from earlier.

Jack smiles at you and nods slowly. “A nice bonus, yeah.”

“Hey Jack,” Bridget sticks her head in your room and you both look at her, “STEMI two minutes out.”

“I’ll be right there.” Bridget nods and walks off. Jack turns his attention back to you as he gets up and walks backwards towards the door of your room. “I’m discharging you. They’ll get the paperwork all ready and get you out of here, okay?”

He’s turned around and speed walking towards the ambulance bay before you can even respond. You feel so ridiculous with the way your heart sinks. You know it’s his job and it’s busy and shit happens and you don’t hold it against him of course, and you know that the two of you aren’t anything anyway and try to tell yourself that this was just some harmless flirting, but you thought you’d at least be able to say a real goodbye and give him a real thank you. And yeah, maybe get his number or give him yours. 

You guess it just wasn’t meant to be because you’re certain you’re not seeing Jack again today and you know he’s not the type to pull your number from your patient chart to text you. It surprises you a little because you really felt like there was something there for both of you. Your certainty grows when Dr. Shen swings by to review your discharge paperwork with you, telling you Jack is caught up in a trauma and they don’t know how long he’ll be and didn’t want to keep you waiting. You sign what you need to and Dr. Shen removes your IV before leaving you to get dressed and letting you know a nurse would be in to wheel you out soon. You get yourself dressed once he’s pulled the curtain and left, and you feel every single second of it already. You know tomorrow is going to be something. 

After thirty minutes or so Bridget comes into your room with a wheelchair and the two of you chat as she wheels you towards the street exit.

“Bridget!” You really want to hate the way you smile to yourself when you hear Jack’s voice, but you can’t. Bridget stops walking and you both look over at Jack who’s walking towards you briskly. 

“Yeah?” She smirks at him, clearly already knowing what’s coming. 

“Shen asked for you in north 2.” Jack notices the way you look kind of surprised to see him. “I can wheel her out.”

Her smirk grows and she glances down at you, shaking her head a little. “Okay, thanks.”

You smile at her. “Thank you Bridget, for everything.”

“Of course, Honey.” 

“My uber is picking me up at the designated spot out front,” you tell Jack as Bridget walks away.

“Okay.” Jack grabs the handles on your wheelchair and continues in the direction Bridget was taking you. “You didn’t really think I was going to let you leave without saying goodbye, did you?” He asks once you’re outside. 

You shrug. “Dr. Shen went over the discharge paperwork with me. You’re a busy doctor. You’d finished treating me. You’re the senior attending,” you sing that last part a little before growing a bit more serious. “You have much more important and better things to be doing with your time than saying goodbye to me.”

Jack wants to tell you that nothing could be more important than seeing you again, and that there is nothing better he could possibly be doing than spending time with you. But he’s pretty sure verbalizing that would make him sound way too intense at this point. 

“I’m not that busy.” It’s not really a lie in the scope of things but he’ll have to hustle to make up for spending this time outside with you. More than worth it to him though. He rolls you over towards a bench and positions you so that he can sit on the bench and the two of you can see each other. “And even if I was that busy, I would have made time to say goodbye to you.”

You have to bite the inside of your lower lip and smile to yourself at that. “Because I’m the cutest and the funniest?” you tease him. 

Jack chuckles, his eyes glittering in this light. He nods. “Because you’re the cutest and the funniest,” he confirms.

The two of you share a laugh and you glance down at your phone, glad for once that your uber is taking a bit longer to get here. Your eyes catch on the silver sharpie in the pocket of Jack’s scrub top. 

You look back at him for a second. “You wanna sign my cast?” Your eyes flick down to his chest pocket and back up. 

Jack looks down and sees the sharpie. He’d used it earlier for a kid who wanted a black cast and all the doctors and nurses to sign it. He smiles as he pulls it out and uncaps it. “Sure.” 

You hold your casted arm out to him and Jack pauses for a second, trying to decide whether he should really do this or not. But you’re not his patient anymore technically and he knows you’re interested in him. He starts writing his name and then continues. 

“Taking an awfully long time to write Jack.” Just as you start teasing him Jack pulls away and caps the sharpie as you bring your arm back and look where he signed. He hasn’t just written Jack or even Dr. Abbot or Dr. Jack Abbot like you thought he might have. He’s written Jack followed by his phone number. 

“Oh,” you laugh breathily when you see it, “that was smooth, Dr. Abbot.” You look up at him with a wide smile, your eyes glittering just like his. “I’m impressed.”

Jack nods just a little, self-satisfied smirk decorating his face. “I figure you can black it out with sharpie once you’ve got it down.” You nod but hold your phone out for him to put his number into so that you know you have it correctly. He’s quick to type it in and give you your phone back, his eyes finding yours again. “And I just want you to know that I promise you’re the only patient or former patient I’ve ever… flirted like this with and given my number and that you’re the only one I’ve ever wanted to flirt like this with and give my number to.”

You can’t help what has to be the most love sick idiot screaming smile that pulls onto your face at his words. “I’m special?” 

“Very.” Jack’s smirk has morphed into a smile that matches your own.

You push your bottom lip out in a small, fake pout. “Because you feel bad for me not knowing anyone?” 

“No.” Jack doesn’t miss a beat. “Because there’s something about you. Something that makes me happy and want to be around you.” 

There’s a poignant pause and your soft smile of disbelief that melts into one of adoration makes Jack want to scream because you’re so precious. After a few seconds you find words. Not particularly good ones, but words nonetheless. “Yeah… I feel the same.” Your phone chiming interrupts the moment. “Oh, shit! That’s my ride.”

Jack stands and wheels you over to the car you point out, offers you his hand to help you out of it. “Let me know you make it home safely, yeah?” 

You take Jack’s hand and let him help you. Between the laying in the hospital bed and sitting in the wheelchair you’re pretty stiff. “I will.” 

“Thank you,” he murmurs, opening the door for you and helping you into the car.

“Jack.” He looks at you with slightly raised brows, hand on the door ready to close it. “Thank you for everything. I really appreciate your care and kindness.” 

He smiles and gives you a single nod. “You’re welcome. Get home safe, okay? Doctor’s orders.”

“Okay,” you giggle as Jack shuts the door. 

Less than ten minutes pass before Jack’s phone buzzes in his pocket. 

You - Made it home You - In one piece and everything

He smiles to himself.

J - Good. Get in bed and rest

You - Yes, Sir 🫡

Jack’s so fucking glad he’s in the breakroom alone and can adjust himself as he reads you calling him Sir over and over again. He swears it makes him a little lightheaded and he has to tell himself to pull it together.

J - Let me know if you need anything  J - I’m off at 7 (in theory) and will be asleep during the day since I’m back on tomorrow night, so you’ll probably have to call if you do need something

You smile to yourself now because he really is so sweet and caring, especially towards someone he barely knows and just met.

You - I will and good to know, thank you

J - Sleep well

For some reason your heart flutters at that. 

You - You too  You - Eventually 😅 You - And let me know you make it home safely

J - I will 

You’re asleep when Jack texts you around 8:30 in the morning. It’s not that he forgot to text you, he just got off late. 

J - Was there late but made it home. In one piece and everything ;)

Jack isn’t surprised when you don’t respond to his text. While he’d love to get to chat with you for a bit he’s glad you’re managing to get some sleep. 

You wake up around ten and smile when you see a message from Jack, bite your lip at the way he echoes your words. You’re both fond of doing that.

You - That’s what I like to hear

You spend the day lounging in bed, dozing on and off and watching your favorite show. You’re beyond sore. 

It’s around four when your phone chimes, your heart racing at the prospect of it being Jack. Jack smiles to himself when he wakes up to a message from you. He knows he’s so done for you with you. 

J - I’m awake. How are you feeling?

You - Like I got hit by a car

J - Not just bumped?

You roll your eyes and shake your head at him but are beaming because it’s him and he’s funny and he makes your heart race and butterflies flutter in your stomach.

You - 🙄 Rude of you to use my own words against me

He chuckles to himself, sitting up in bed and running a hand over his face.

J - You like it

You - Yeah, I do 😌 Bet I’ll end up giving you a lot of my own words to use against me 😏

Now that you’re not his patient, Jack can more openly flirt with you and he’s chomping at the bit for the opportunity. So when you give it to him he takes it. Again and again and again as it’ll turn out.

J - Oh, I expect nothing less, Sweetheart. You strike me as quite the brat  J - And yes, I do like it 😌 J - But only from you

Your eyebrows shoot up. He’s not wrong in the slightest, he was just so relatively reserved last night that his forwardness now is augmented. You greatly enjoy it. You can feel how much you enjoy it between your legs. 

You - 😳🥵 You - Kinky You - Your flirting game is joining your salt and pepper curls as something about you that threatens to send me into cardiac arrest You - And I’m down my dominant fingers. What’s a girl to do?

Jack swallows a groan. He can’t help the way his palm glides along himself over his boxers. He woke up hard and you’re just making it worse. The smile he wears is smug as he types out and sends his next two messages.

J - There’s my little challenge J - Is that your way of asking for help? Because if you want anything you’re going to have to ask properly Sweetheart, and I expect a please and Sir in there somewhere

Your heart races at the way he calls you his little challenge, but your jaw actually drops open a little at his second message. This man might actually be the death of you. He’ll absolutely be the little death of you because you just know his confidence is earned and that he has a big dick and knows how to use it. Knows how to fuck. 

You - JACK 

J - Yes?

You - You’re going to fucking kill me before you even get the chance You - You have no idea how serious I am, oh my god

He chuckles to himself.

J - Not god, just me J - And I would never let that happen J - I’m going to get spotty as I get ready for work, I promise I’m not ignoring you. You need anything? J - On a serious level

You swear you’re fucking vibrating over him. You might have to find a vibrator, or you would if you knew it wouldn’t just hurt and not in a fun way with how sore you are, especially in your pelvis since it took the brunt of the impact. But you’re also melting because the man can communicate and keep you from slipping into anxiety or even panic at the change in response time. It’s just as big of a turn on as the rest of his words and self. 

You - On a serious level I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you telling me that. And I think I’m okay for now, thank you for asking You - Though I was going to make a lot of good jokes about what I need

J - Why do you think I added the on a serious level? J - Let me know if that changes. My ability to look at my phone at work is inconsistent at best, but I’ll do my best to check

You - Because I’m special? 

Jack smiles, rolls his eyes at you affectionately even though you can’t see. 

J - Yes J - And the cutest and funniest

The man is so fucking sweet you could scream and you do actually kick your feet in bed a little before abruptly stopping and wincing. 

You - Baby 🥺🫠 I’m melting You - You are so unbelievably sweet, Jack

J - I aim to please

You - You succeed 

J - I know

You - Confident but not cocky. I like it  You - I might end up falling asleep, so if I don’t reply that’s why

Jack is equally as appreciative of you communicating and letting him know that you might stop responding so that he doesn’t worry about you in a physical sense since you’ve just been hit by a car, but also in the sense of wondering if he did something wrong or if you lost interest or if he made you mad. 

J - Good. Thank you for letting me know. As much as I’ll miss you the rest is good for you 🙂

When you don’t respond Jack figures you do end up falling asleep. It’s why he’s particularly concerned when Lupe comes and finds him at the hub talking with Robby around 6:45 and lets him know that you asked for him and are waiting in chairs, but that she can get rid of you if he wants.

“No, no.” His face clouds with concern. “I’ll get her.” Jack doesn’t even end his conversation with Robby, really. He just takes off. 

He walks over and opens the door to chairs, walking towards you quickly as you walk towards him once you see him. He hates how antalgic your gait is. Even though you’re smiling at him you look like you’re in a fair amount of pain. He can’t help how he goes straight to something being wrong. 

“Hey, you okay? What’s up?” He asks with deep furrowed brows and a slight frown as he rests his hand on the small of your back and guides you into the closest open exam room, leaving the door open but pulling the curtain so you have a little privacy.  

“Hey. Nothing is wrong, I didn’t mean to worry you.” You give him a reassuring smile and are relieved when his face smooths out and he smiles a bit. But you still feel a little bad now for making him worry at all. “My wrist has just really been hurting.” 

“Did you take your meds? Did you re-injure it somehow?” he queries, ready to go into doctor mode. 

“I don’t think so and yeah, I took them. They just don’t work well.” You shrug a little, a shy smirk pulling on your face. “I was thinking maybe you could just kiss it better.”

Jack lets out a relieved chuckle and rocks back for a second. “It’s casted. I’m afraid I can’t kiss it better Sweetheart.” 

“Hmmm,” you hum. “Well, I think kissing me elsewhere might make it feel better.” You take a step closer to him. 

“Oh yeah?” Jack closes the last of the distance between you, hands feather light at your waist so that he doesn’t hurt you. 

“Yeah,” you breathe out, resting your good hand on his chest and keeping the other off to the side. 

“Probably worth a try,” he murmurs as he leans his head down. Your lips meet in an achingly sweet kiss. You both pull away just slightly and open your eyes to take in the other’s, both sets of eyes hooded, with pupils that have blown wide. You’re quick to lean back in for another kiss, and then another, and another that gets a little more heated, lips moving against each other like satin. You nip at Jack’s bottom lip as he pulls away. “Feeling better?” 

“Oh, so much better,” you laugh breathily before leaning back into him and letting Jack kiss you again. You’d let this man do whatever the fuck he wanted with you, would hand yourself over to him, body, mind, and soul. You already know it. 

Jack knows this is really not the place to be doing this but he just can’t bring himself to care right now. He lets his tongue swipe along the seam of your lips and licks into your mouth when you open for him, groaning softly at the taste of you. He has to force himself to pull away and while you’re just as sad as he is about it, you understand and respect it. 

“How’d you know I’d be here early?” He takes your casted arm and brings your hand up so that he can gently kiss at your fingers.

“You just have that air about you. And you would’ve been early yesterday if you hadn’t gotten involved with me,” you giggle. 

“Observant,” he murmurs against your fingers before gently bringing your hands back down together. “Can I check out the bruise on your side while you’re here? Please.”

You fake a scandalized gasp. “Are you asking me to take my pants off for you? Because you got that for free yesterday, but now it’s going to require dinner first.”

“No,” he shakes his head at you with a knowing and slightly smirked smile, “I’m asking you to pull your shirt up a little and the waistband of your pants down just slightly so that I, as a medical doctor, can evaluate the bruise and make sure you’re okay.” 

“You’re not my doctor anymore,” you point out. “And yet you’re here asking me for pain relief,” he’s quick to fire back with a smirk. It’s hot how fast the words slipped off his tongue. “Which I happily gave you and will continue to give you.” 

You raise and eyebrow and smile at him, bob your head once. “Touché.” 

“I want to ask you out to dinner, believe me,” Jack sighs. His eyes are so earnest as he smiles at you, almost imploring you to believe him like you don’t already. “And I was planning on it tomorrow when I had a chance to call you, but right now in this conversation I don’t want you to think that you have to say yes or that I’m only asking you out to find out if you’re really okay or that I expect you to take your pants off for me at the end of the date.” 

You soften, your hand still on his chest rubbing at it softly in what you hope is reassurance. “Jack, please don’t worry about any of that. None of that ever occurred to me with you. I know you’re not like that.”

“Good.” Jack raises his eyebrows just a touch and widens his eyes a little, tilts his face. “Show me that bruise please,” he whispers.

You laugh softly and nod, adjust your purse and then pull down the waistband of your pants. Jack helps and lifts up your shirt just enough for him to see. He winces as the bruise comes into view. 

“You can see the grill marks, it’s kind of cool,” you laugh.

He grimaces as he looks up at you, unamused at the way the grill marks of a car are bruised into your skin and the thought of you hurting as much as you must be. “Pain hasn’t changed? No new symptoms or anything?”

“Nope.” Jack drops your shirt back down and you pull your waistband back up.

He’s in full Dr. Abbot mode now. “No abdominal tenderness or distention? You don’t feel bloated or anything? No blood in your urine?”

You give him what can probably only be described as a gooey smile. “No, Dr. Abbot,” you murmur.

“What?” The lightest blush colors his cheeks at the way you’re looking at him.

You shrug gently. “I just think you’re incredibly sweet. Worrying like this about me.” 

“I told you,” he cups your jaw in one of his large hands, thumb brushing over your cheek, “there’s something about you.”

“There’s something about you too, Jack.” You wrap your good hand around the wrist of his hand that cups your jaw, anchoring him there. He leans down and the two of you kiss again, slow and soft and achingly sweet. 

You’re both grinning like idiots at each other when you break apart.

“You really came here just to see if you could get a kiss?” Jack raises his eyebrows slightly and moves his hand back to your waist when you let go of his wrist, your hand settling on his chest again. “You have to be in a lot of pain. I know you are. I can see it in how you’re walking.” 

“I mean yeah, some. It’s not so bad though. Especially not after the kisses. I’m only two blocks away so it’s not like it was a ton of walking. And in addition to seeing if I could get a kiss, I also had a hunch getting to see me would help ease some of your worry and I don’t like you worrying.” That makes Jack’s heart melt. You don’t like him worrying. You care about him enough to walk the two blocks down here to see him just so he could lay eyes on you and reassure himself that you’re okay. He’s not sure if he deserves that. “Plus I forgot my insurance card last night. But I waited all day to come get it so that I could see you!”

Jack huffs with mock offense. “So it wasn’t even me!”

“No, that’s not true! It was you. I could’ve had them mail the insurance card back to me or picked it up during the day when you weren’t here. Getting to pick up my insurance card was just a nice bonus.” You wink at him.

Jack laughs and shakes his head. You have to laugh with him because his laugh is so infectious and hearing it makes you happy.

He smiles at you like you’re the only thing in the world that makes him happy as his laughter trails off. “So will you let me take you out on a date?”

“I thought you’d never ask Dr. Abbot.” You nod and bite your lip, thumb brushing across his chest. “I’d really like that.” 

“Good,” he gives you a quick kiss, “I can start showing you Pittsburgh’s best.”

“I think you already have,” you giggle. 

You and Jack both start laughing again. “That was terrible,” he teases. 

“Hey, it made you laugh.” You’re falling for the sound, chasing it already. “And it’s true.”

Jack shrugs and blushes again as he thinks about your words. “I’m the first person you’ve met here. You have nothing to compare me to. I could be Pittsburgh’s worst. Maybe you just think I’m the best because I’m the first.”

“I know you’re not the worst.” You shake your head. “You’re the best. Of everywhere. You’re just the best.” 

“I mean,” he draws the words out a little. “I’m this old and single. Could mean something.” 

“Yeah, it does,” you say simply. “It means you’re a doctor and a workaholic.” 

“That obvious, huh?” He cocks his head.

You cock yours back at him. “Maybe the universe kept you single because I hadn’t moved to Pittsburgh yet and it knew I’d be the one who could handle and be okay with you being an emergency room physician and workaholic.”

Jack grows a bit more serious. You can tell this is something that’s burned him before. “Could you? Handle it? The hours and… workaholic-ism? If this went somewhere? Because I’d really like it to.” 

“I could, yeah. We’ll work it out together. Promise.” This is something that’s burned you before too. “Could you?” you ask quietly, letting him know that you’re also somewhat of a workaholic with long hours. “Because I’d really like this to go somewhere too.”

“I could,” he nods, gives you a lopsided smile. “Like you said, we’ll work it out together.” Jack leans in and gives you another lingering kiss before murmuring against your lips. “Promise.”

I hope it was okay and silly and fluffy and a little hot! I really love hearing your thoughts and comments, they give me so much inspiration and liking, replies and reblogging are always so so appreciated! My inbox and DMs are always open for thoughts, comments, and general screaming, I'm always up to chat!

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Another tear lands on your phone's screen as your thumb hovers just above his name on your favorites. You hate doing this to him and it's so childish. You should be able to get it together, to just pull yourself together long enough to make the short drive home. But you've been trying to do that for ten minutes now and you just want to be with Jack and home and not here crying in your car alone.

You sniffle hard and pull yourself together enough so you're not actively sobbing when he answers the phone. Jack smiles when he sees your face light up his phone. You must be calling to let him know you're on your way home. He picks up on the first ring. "Hi Beautiful, you on your way home?"

"Jack." You don't have to say anything else. Jack already knows, is already sitting up on the couch and reaching for his prosthetic where it's resting by the side of the couch.

He needs to get to you. Now. Your pain is so clear in your voice, he can picture the tears he knows are streaming down your face silently for now.

His tone changes immediately, still soft but so concerned, so knowing. "What's wrong, Baby? Where are you?"

You can hear shuffling and you know he's getting his prosthetic on as he holds his phone to his ear with his shoulder. It's what makes you crack again because why are you doing this to him? Why can't you just be fucking normal?

"In my, my car," your voice gets a little higher pitched with every word as you lose your ability to regulate again, "at, at work. I can't stop, Jack, I can't stop crying enough to drive safely. I've been try, trying and I just can't."

"Okay, that's okay Sweetheart, I'm on my way." Jack shoves the key into the lock the second the door is closed and turns it to lock your place up, takes off at a fast walk towards his car. "Did something happen?" He's turned his voice into something lower now, something soothing that makes you feel not so alone.

"No," you sniffle, take in a slightly wracked breath, "just the w-week and, and…" You trail off into sobs you muffle with your hand, sobs Jack knows you're muffling.

He knows the kind of week it's been for you. A week where everything that could and should be relatively straightforward and smooth was a totally unnecessarily difficult clusterfuck deluxe. A week where anyone and everyone who could possibly try you did, that any issue or minor emergency that could happen, happened. A week where you stayed stupidly late and came home to sleep for a couple of hours just to turn around and go back in early.

You'd been so drained by the time you got home each night you just wanted to get straight into bed with him. He was more than happy to oblige after he coaxed you to eat a little dinner for him. You were both glad that Tuesday was his last shift for the rest of the week because with how late you stayed and how early you had to go in, you didn't see him Monday or Tuesday.

"I'm so-so-sorry." Getting out the last word is a struggle and your voice is so high-pitched it's almost inaudible.

"Don't be," Jack soothes you through the phone. "You have nothing to be sorry for, Baby. You can call me even earlier next time, okay? I'm going to stay on the phone but it's going to cut out for a second once I start the car while my phone connects."

"Okay." You choke on the word, end up coughing through full body sobs and god if you don't feel completely fucking ridiculous. There is absolutely no fucking reason for this.

Jack cringes at the sound because he hates hearing you this sad. Hates that he isn't already there with you, that he didn't think to drive you in and pick you up the last couple of days. "Alright, Sweetheart, I'm back and on my way."

"You have to drive safe," you whimper. "Don't wreck trying to, to get here fast because, because I won't survive you getting hurt or losing you, I sw-swear to god Jack," you choke on a sob, "I'm barely holding, holding on. I need you."

Jack's heart breaks even further at your love for him and at the palpable and encompassing sadness in your voice. "I won't, I promise. I'll be safe. You have your car doors locked?"

"Yeah," you whisper. And you genuinely do. A part of you wants to unlock them, hopes that someone will come and carjack you and kill you because then you won't have to go through this yourself or put Jack through it anymore.

You know that's not true, know that anything happening to you would devastate Jack the way something happening to him would devastate you, even if that's hard for you to believe at times because you can't wrap your mind around why he loves you. Why he put himself through this type of shit that you pull.

"Hey," he says softly. "I know it probably doesn't feel like it right now, but everything will be okay and you'll get through this. I'll make sure of it. That doesn't mean it won't suck and you won't feel like shit, I know, I just want you to know. We'll get you through this."

The sob you let out is muffled and Jack knows you probably moved your phone away from you and covered your mouth. "I," you try to start after a couple of seconds. You have to pause so that you can muffle another sob and try to pull yourself together so that you can actually talk. "I hate that you have to."

"I don't have to do anything, Baby. I choose to because I love you and choose to love you even with as natural and fated by the universe as loving you is. I don't feel forced and I'm not forced." Jack knows that your brain is manifesting your week through this and shifting to spiral over this because it's easier in a sense to deal with than everything that happened at work this week that you're trying to process through. This is something it's easy to get reassurance for and process through and is much, much more controllable. It doesn't hurt any less or make you any less sad or anxious or burnt out, and it's not any easier to go through, it's just more tangible almost.

He's never been more glad that you don't work too far away, that it's not like he has to drive an hour to get you. And he thanks whatever and whoever is out there that he's hitting every green light and that somehow traffic this Friday evening isn't bad.

There's silence on your end of the line for a moment and it would be eerie and unsettling if Jack wasn't sure you'd just muted yourself so that you could get out whatever sob and tears you needed to without him hearing. Jack clenches his jaw and rolls it. He hates whoever made you feel like you have to apologize for feeling your feelings and expressing them and for crying. He'd love to just have thirty seconds alone with them.

You want to tell Jack never mind. That he can turn around, you're fine and you'll see him at home soon, you were just being dramatic and having a moment and you're fine and everything is fine. But you can't bring yourself to say the words because as much as it's not a lie in a sense because you know he'll know it's not true, it's still not the truth. You're not fine and everything isn't fine. It doesn't feel like anything is fine.

It feels like you're going to lose Jack because you're so much fucking work and ridiculous and dramatic and why would he continue to put up with you? What do you really bring to the table and offer him? What do you do for him other than create more work?

Your engagement ring feels so heavy on your finger, not because it's perfect and sparkly and everything you ever wanted, though it absolutely is. It feels so heavy because you feel so undeserving of it, of Jack and his love and the way he knows you so well, better than you know yourself.

It doesn't occur to you that you know him just as well and that he feels this exact same way at times.

The sound of your ragged breathing becomes audible again and a few seconds later you're able to talk.

"I just can't Jack," you whisper through a sniffle.

You hate everything right now. Everything except Jack.

And you hate yourself the most.

Jack can tell. He can hear it in your voice, how much you're beating yourself up inside right now, how much you're beating yourself up, how hard you're trying not to tell him that you're fine and he can turn around. He can hear how much you hate yourself and it's like a knife slowly carving away at his heart.

"I know Baby," he murmurs just loud enough for you to hear as he pulls into the parking lot. "And it's okay that you can't." Jack pulls up beside you so that his passenger side door is next to your driver's side door, looks over at you and smiles as he puts it into park. "I'm hanging up now Baby, I'll see you in just a second."

Jack hangs up and leaves his car on so the AC stays running and gets out and over to your door. Some scared piece of you almost wants to fight it and not unlock your door, and tell him it's okay, you'll figure it out and pull yourself together and get home and you're sorry he drove here. But a bigger piece of you, the overwhelming majority of you, wants nothing more than to be wrapped up in and as close as physically possible to Jack as you can be, so when he gets close you unlock your doors for him.

"Hi Beautiful," Jack greets you once he has the door open. As much as he hates hearing you sad and being away from you when you are, he hates hearing you sad and being right next to you and seeing how sad you are just as much. Tears stain your face, your eyes bloodshot and swollen, your lips and nose swollen too. He means it as more than a pet name though. You're still nothing short of beautiful to him right now, even if there's an aching sadness with it.

You shake your head at him because he's so wrong. You're not remotely beautiful right now, inside or out. You shouldn't be like this, shouldn't be complaining about your job and your week to him of all people. You know Jack doesn't think about it like that and would hate to find out that you do, but you can't help it. You should be better. You shouldn't have needed him to put his prosthetic back on when he was having a nice day at home chilling without it and drive down here just to hold you while you cry.

It's pathetic. You're pathetic.

Somewhere deep down you know Jack would hate to find out that you think it and you are pathetic.

"Yes, Baby," Jack murmurs in response to you shaking your head. He leans in and presses a soft kiss to your lips, doesn't force too much of his affection on you when you're crying and struggling and he can tell you feel like you don't deserve it, just enough for you to know he wants to kiss you and that he means it and that he loves you.

As Jack leans back you follow him, let your feet hit the ground and push you up into his arms that automatically open to catch you. You need just need to be close to him. Now that you've had him close, any distance between you feels unbearable.

You all but collapse into his arms, your tears starting up again just as hard as they were before you call him. They're for everything. For the way Jack calls you beautiful like it's your name and means it. For the way you feel anything but beautiful right now. For this man who keeps you standing literally and metaphorically. For this week that's done it's best to level you. For how perfectly Jack treats you and takes care of you, and how much he loves you. For how pathetic and unworthy of that treatment you feel, and how you don't understand why he loves you when you're so difficult and so much work.

"Alright, Sweetheart, I've got you," Jack whispers. He wraps his arms around you tightly and helps hold you up as you melt into him. He kisses the top of your head as you bury your face in his chest and lose it.

Jack holds you like that for a minute before he starts to rock you and slowly shuffle the two of you so that you change spots and he can reach into the car and grab your purse. Once he has it he walks you backwards slowly and shuts your door and locks your car.

He walks you both a little further so that he can open the back door to his Range Rover. "Come on, Baby," he presses a kiss to the top of your head again and rubs your back, "get in the back for me, yeah?"

You cling to him as he tries to pull away, terrified of there being more than an inch between the two of you right now. "Why?" you sniffle, momentarily not completely sobbing.

Jack brings a hand down and hooks his index finger under your chin and gently tilts your face up to look at him. He gives you a reassuring smile. "Because I can hold you better back there and it's private."

You look at him for a moment and your bottom lip and chin tremble so hard as tears line your eyes that it makes his heart ache. You look so terribly and sadly adorable and it just makes how much he loves you hit him even harder and makes him more determined to get you feeling better and make you happy. He doesn't realize that even though you're crying, he's already made you feel better and happier just by being here and coming to you without you having to ask and giving you a safe space to let yourself give into how shitty you feel in every sense.

Jack's sweetness and thoughtfulness make you start to cry even harder as you climb in the back like he asked. You sit awkwardly in the middle seat as he gets in and shuts the door, sets your purse down and gets himself comfortable.

"Alright, you, come here." He reaches out and hooks an arm around your waist and starts to pull you closer to him.

You don't need asked twice, move over to him and crawl onto his lap so quickly his arm barely touches you and he smiles to himself. As Jack reclines the seat so that you can fall into him a bit more you spread your legs out across the seats and snuggle into him as close as you can, your sobs getting harder when he wraps his arms around you and holds you tightly, helps you settle in perfectly to your favorite place in the whole world where you feel safe in every sense of the word and loved and like you could probably survive just about anything as long as you had Jack and his arms and neck and chest and lap to hide from the world in.

"Okay Baby," Jack murmurs once you're settled in his lap and clinging to his shirt as you sob into his neck with your head tucked under the corner of his jaw. "I'm here. It's okay, it's all going to be okay, I promise."

You shake your head against him because as much as you know Jack would never lie to you, it doesn't feel like it in this moment, it doesn't feel like anything will ever be okay again. And Jack knows. He knows it doesn't feel like it. So he doesn't push it, doesn't try to talk you into believing him. He just lets you be. Lets you exist just as you are. Lets you feel what you're feeling without any pushback.

Even though you've been together years, it still always surprises you, the way he lets you just feel and holds you close as you do.

You let yourself give in for thirty seconds or so and then you start to fight your sobs so that you can explain yourself to him even though you know you don't have to, that you never have to explain yourself to Jack.

"I," you hiccup out, trying so hard to get yourself together so you can explain and stop crying and stop making Jack deal with you. "I, I'm, I…" You choke over the simple words, coughing and struggling to breathe

"Shh," Jack soothes you, moves one of his hands so it can rub up and down your back. "You don't have to talk about it right now, okay? We can talk later if and when you're ready and doing a little better. Just let it all out, I've got you. I've got you."

You want to fight it, want to keep pushing yourself to talk and explain and apologize because even though Jack has never asked you to, never told you that you needed to or made you feel like you needed to, even though he's never gotten mad or upset at you when you get like this, you still feel the urge to. The scars left by those who came before him are still there. It's a testament to just how much Jack has healed you that you cry in front of him, that you let yourself get like this in front of him, that you call him when you're like this and let yourself seek out his comfort and trust and know that he won't turn you away or yell at you or make fun of you or use it against you down the road.

Eventually your tears stop. You're pretty sure it's less that you've cried yourself out and are in a better headspace and more that you just physically ran out of tears and exhausted out. Jack's pretty sure that's the case too because your tears don't trail off how they usually do when you've had the cry you needed. This is far more abrupt, closer to a flip of a switch.

Jack doesn't rush you to be ready to talk or get out of his lap so he can drive you guys home or to do anything. He just keeps holding you and continues to rub your back while you sniffle and try to compose yourself. And even once your sniffling has stopped and you're just resting in his arms against him he doesn't rush you. He never would. If he had it his way you'd never have to leave his arms.

After a few moments of sitting in Jack's lap quietly you find it within you to pull your head back and look at him sheepishly.

Jack melts even more somehow, smiles at you softly and presses a kiss to your forehead. "Hi, pretty girl," he murmurs.

You can't bring yourself to even shake your head to argue with him. You don't want to put him through more than you already have tonight and don't want it to seem like you're doing this deliberately for attention or compliments.

"Hi handsome," you whisper back. It takes everything in you to keep yourself looking at him and not immediately nuzzle your face back into his neck to hide.

"Can I have a kiss?"

You swallow hard and give him a short nod, not because you want to say no, it's the exact opposite, you want to scream yes and let the man kiss you until everything makes sense and feels okay again. You just don't feel like you deserve it. "If you want."

"I always want kisses from you and to kiss you." Jack gives you a lopsided smile. He doesn't ask if you want kisses because he knows that you do, knows that what could be perceived as a lack of enthusiasm is actually just you feeling like you don't deserve him or his love or affection.

Jack slides his hand up to the back of your neck and gently pulls your face to his, kisses you so softly to start to help you ease into accepting his affection right now that if you had any tears left you know you'd be crying again. The more you relax into him and let yourself accept Jack's affection as you pour it back into him, the deeper Jack kisses you.

He nuzzles his nose into yours for a second when you break apart and rubs his thumb just below your ear as you pull your face back to look at him, cheeks tear stained and eyes and nose and lips still so adorably swollen. "Thank you for calling me and not trying to drive while crying like that." He raises his eyebrows at you gently, his other hand giving your hip an affectionate and reassuring squeeze before he reference what you said earlier while he was driving here. "I need you too."

You shrug shallowly because you weren't even thinking about it like that when you called.

"I do," he whispers, nodding at you. "More than you'll ever know and just as much as you need me. Promise." Jack leans up and gives you a quick kiss. "How about we head home? We'll come back and get it tomorrow, okay? It won't get towed with your permit."

"Okay," you whisper back, nodding.

Jack puts the seat back up and you shift off his lap so that he can get out of the car. Once he's out He holds his hand out for you even though you don't really need it or his help getting out of the car. You take it anyway, let him help you out and close the door behind you before you both take a few steps up and Jack opens the passenger side door for you like he always does.

Even though there's silence as Jack holds your hand and helps you into the passenger seat it's still meaningful, he still has this way of silently almost speaking with his body and how he looks at you that makes you feel wrapped in his love the way you would if he was verbally professing it to you over and over. Before he shuts the door he leans in and presses the sweetest kiss to your forehead, gives you a small smile that reassures you everything will be okay, that you'll be able to undo the knots your mind has gotten itself into.

Jack carefully shuts the door and you pull your seatbelt on as he walks around to the driver's side. Before he buckles himself in he reaches back and grabs your purse, pulls out a couple of tissues and hands you them. He sets your purse down, buckles his seatbelt and then puts it in reverse and starts the drive home.

He doesn't make you talk about it as he drives, knows it's not the time or the place. It's one of those small things that means the world to you and it reminds you how well he knows you and how much he loves you. Instead of making you talk about it, Jack chatters to you like he normally will when you guys are driving, but this time he doesn't expect you to chat back. His hand stays on your thigh or holding your hand and bringing it up to his lips to presses kisses to the entire drive home.

The entire thing is so normal and it helps more than you think Jack could ever truly understand. Nothing feels forced or like he's making these huge gestures or going out of his way which is exactly what you need. Because you don't feel like you deserve any of that and so him doing those kinds of things would almost make things harder for you in a way. You don't really even feel like you deserve normalcy, but you're at least able to accept it without panicking.

Once Jack's parket he walks around and opens your door for you, grabs your purse and helps you out of the car. You feel a little zombie-like walking into your shared apartment. You're not sure what you want or need and are too tired and fuzzy brained from all the crying to even try to figure it out.

But Jack, Jack knows exactly what you want and what you need.

He could just give it to you. You wouldn't necessarily mind if he did. But Jack knows that part of what you need right now is control without having to really make any decisions. So he makes the decisions and offers them to you so that you feel like you're in control without the agony of having to make any choices or real decisions that will just make you feel worse and exacerbate the decision fatigue already plaguing you after this week.

"You wanna chill on the couch for a bit?" Jack asks as you both finish getting your shoes off.

You take a couple of steps into the living room and stop to look at the couch. You want to be close to Jack as selfish as it feels, as undeserving as you feel. "Yeah, I guess," you murmur.

Jack walks up behind you and snakes his arms around your tummy, pulls you back into him and hunches and rests his chin on your shoulder. He presses a few kisses to the side of your neck, lets his lips linger on the last one almost like he's feeling your pulse under his lips. "I'm going to go get you some water first." He presses a kiss to your cheek as he squeezes you a little in a tight hug. "I love you so much Baby, no matter how you're feeling and whether you feel like you deserve it. I love you."

Your chin trembles a little and you take in a deep shaky breath. You bring your hand up and cup the side of Jack's face. "I love you so much too. Thank you."

"Of course," he murmurs. Jack presses another kiss to your cheek and then turns his head to press one into the palm of your hand. He's quick to make his way to your kitchen and grab you a glass of water.

You try to get yourself to go sit on the couch but you can't seem to for some reason, end up just standing there almost awkwardly in your own space as you wait for Jack to return. When he returns you take a few sips for him, always surprised at how much better those few sips make you feel. You set the glass on a coaster on the coffee table once you've had enough.

Jack is waiting for you with a smile when you turn back to face him. His hands find the hem of your shirt and start to pull it off you and you raise your arms to help, trusting whatever his plan is. Once he has your shirt off he sits down on the edge of the couch and you watch as he takes his prosthetic off before beckoning you to him with a finger.

You step between his legs and like with your shirt, you trust him when he pulls your pants down and step out of them and kick them to side where he tossed your shirt. Jack grabs a blanket and holds it open for you and your chin trembles again because he knows just what you need and gives it to you so freely and without you having to ask.

Neither you nor Jack say a word as you help him get you wrapped up in a blanket burrito and gets you situated to that you're on your side on the couch, your back to the cushions. He lays on his side next to you and pulls your bundled form against him, holds you tight. You wiggle to get comfortable and bury your face into his chest breathing getting heavier as you feel the tears coming again.

Jack knows it. He's known this is what would happen the entire time and as much as he doesn't want you to cry and be upset, it's what he wants to happen. He wants you to cry again, let yourself come all the way apart in his arms so that he can help put you back together again. He knows you won't be able to move past it all and start to heal and recover from the week until you get it all out of your system.

"I'm here, Baby. Let yourself cry, try not to fight it," he murmurs. "It's okay, I promise it's okay." He brings his chin to his neck so that he can nuzzle his nose into your hair and give you kisses there.

It works. By the third or so kiss you're fully sobbing into him again and it drives you insane because as much as you know why in a sense, you also feel like you have no idea why you're like this and needing to cry so much.

After a couple of minutes you have to just say it, acknowledge the truth, or at least what feels like the truth. "This is, this is so dumb, Jack," you choke out between sobs. "It's so dumb, and, and stupid," you take in a huge breath of air that makes you cough on top of the sobs, "and, and ridiculous and I know it, know it and still can't stop."

"I know it feels like that's true and that's valid, but it's not any of those things, Baby, I promise," he soothes you, runs a hand up and down your back over the blanket while the other keeps you held tightly to him. "It's human."

You shake your head against him but don't verbally argue with him, just go back to the tears you can't seem to stop, the tears that feel so incredibly unfair to Jack. He should be relaxing while he's off, and you guys should be starting your weekend together doing something fun, go on a date or something like you talked about last week. But instead he's having to work essentially, having to take care of you, and the two of you aren't going out and you're making your weekend off together start in one of the shittiest ways.

Your tears do eventually start to trail off. Neither you nor Jack know how long it's taken to get here and it doesn't really matter in the end. It took as long as it did and you're here now, your body and mind working to regulate as opposed to a fairly abrupt stop like in the car where your body just gave out. Jack knows it means you've finally gotten it all out, have shed all the tears you need to right now.

He knows it means you're feeling broken right now and that you're not sure how to even start picking up the pieces. But the thing is you do know how to start. Before Jack you had to do this alone, had to sob on your couch alone and then figure out how to make yourself better. The difference is that now you don't need to know. You don't need to figure it out. Because Jack knows and he'll help you, take care of you and give you what you want and what you need and help put you back together again and get back to feeling normal.

The two of you sit lay in silence for a bit once you've gotten your breathing under control, the only sounds the occasional sniffle from you or soft popping of Jack's lips as he presses more kisses to the top of your head. You take in and let out a deep breath before pulling your head back so that you can see him.

"Hi again, Beautiful," Jack smiles at you.

You want to argue but don't have the energy to. "Hi," you whisper, voice raw and nasally.

Jack doesn't say anything for a minute, just looks at you and strokes your hair. The look he gives you speaks volumes though, is so clearly him telling you that if and when you're ready to talk, he's hear to listen.

You give him one of the smallest, saddest smiles Jack's ever seen from you. "I love you," you murmur to him, lean your head up and push your lips out.

"I love you too." Jack smiles even brighter as he moves his head down to give you the kisses you seek.

"How about we order some food and then go shower the week off you? We can eat dinner in bed once it's here and then cuddle and watch something or talk if you want, get you off to dreamland to help you catch up on some sleep," Jack suggests once you've had your fill of kisses.

"Okay," you murmur with a small nod, still sounding so achingly forlorn and sad that it kills him. You're not sure you agree with that last part of his suggestion. You don't want to sleep any time soon. You want to be awake with him, spending time with him and enjoying him. You've missed him.

Jack grabs his phone out of his pocket and rests his hand on your side as he orders. After he finishes ordering he slips his phone back in his pocket and gives you one last lingering kiss. He pulls his one arm from under you and sits up, helps get you out of the blanket burrito he put you in.

The two of you head into your room and Jack crutches into the bathroom to turn the shower on. You pad into the bathroom behind him, don't want to be away from him really. You cringe internally at how clingy that is, wonder if that's what will push it over and make it all too much for him. Make you too much for him.

But all that happens when Jack turns around and sees you is a smile breaking over his face. You can't help but smile a little at it because he just looks so god damned happy to see you. Even when you're like this, being like this for him.

You walk closer to him and let your fingers play with the hem of his shirt. "Can I?"

"I'd love that," he nods, gives you a little, playful smirk.

You take your time stripping him, take such care like you always do when you strip him while he's standing with his crutches. Once you've got him fully stripped Jack takes your bra off, dips his thumbs under the waistband of your underwear and starts pushing them down, your clothes a heap off to the side of the bathroom where they won't get wet.

There's something about the way you look when your eyes roam his body that makes Jack frown to himself. There's an air of unworthiness about it, something that couldn't be further from the truth in his mind.

"You okay, Baby?" he asks quietly.

You press your lips together and out to one side and nod. "I just wish I wasn't like this for you," you whisper, stepping closer to him and resting your head against his chest as you stand outside the shower.

"You're not like anything," he murmurs. "You're just you. My girl. All I need to live."

You let out a shaky breath and then turn and press a kiss to his chest. His words are so very hard to accept but you know he truly means them the same way you mean them when you tell him the same.

You both get in the shower and Jack holds you on his lap while you soak in near scalding water for a bit. Eventually he washes you, takes his time with your hair and then your body, lets you do the same to him because he knows you need it and want it.

It doesn't take too long for the food Jack had ordered to arrive once you're out of the shower and in bed, dressed in one of Jack's old shirts and nothing else. Jack's in just a pair of sweatpants but throws a shirt on when the knock on the door signals the food has arrived. He crutches out and grabs the bag while you grab an old towel and spread it out on the bed.

You almost start crying again when you see what Jack ordered. Your favorite comfort meal. And you know the smaller box he sets off to the side is your favorite dessert.

"Jack…." you whisper, looking at him almost helplessly but with the same love in your eyes that he recognizes as the love in his when he looks at you.

He just smiles at you, leans over and gives you a kiss. "I love you."

"I know." You reach out and squeeze his thigh. "You make sure I know. And I love you too."

Jack grins at you and winks. "I know."

You watch TV and chat about whatever happens to come up as you eat, make Jack let you help clean up once you've both finished. You both strip again once you're back in your room and crawl into bed under the covers together on your sides.

Your legs tangle together and torsos press together as you settle, TV off because Jack can feel that you want to talk now and he's hoping after you do he can get you to sleep early to help you recover.

There's silence for a few minutes as you just look at each other, Jack's hand running up and down your side and yours playing with the fingers of his bottom hand.

"I don't know Jack," you finally whisper, trying to sort through your mind and figure out where to even start. "It was just a long week and I've been walling it off the whole time because I had to keep it together. But then today, when it was finally over at least somewhat, I got in the car and just…. fell apart. It's just so much, work, this job is just so much. It's so fucking much sometimes. And I know yours is too, I know that, I do. I know yours can be so so fucking much sometimes."

Jack knows you're about so start comparing your jobs, about to start writing yours off as not as bad and easier and less to deal with and less traumatic. And that's just not true. Your job can be just like his. You see different things most of the time, sure, but that's exactly why it's impossible to compare the two.

Honestly sometimes Jack thinks your job is more than his, is worse and harder and far more to deal with and more traumatic. Most of the time he's not sure how you deal with it which is kind of ironic because him and his love are the vast majority of how you're able to deal with it and cope and keep going.

In any event, he's not going to let you compare and minimize your job and its stressors and trauma and how fucking hard and how fucking much it can be. It deserves to be recognized. You deserve to be recognized for surviving it. You deserve to let out the bad week however you need to. He's not going to let you try to wipe it away and apologize for being affected by it.

"Yeah," he nods. "And that's why you take care of me and hold me like I held you in the car and am holding you now when it's too much for me and I need to let some of it out. Your job is just as much, it's just a different kind of much. My job can be a lot and so much and so can yours. I can need to have a breakdown sometimes and so can you. My job being a lot sometimes doesn't means yours isn't or can't be. My job isn't worse or harder than yours. They both have their moments and weeks and times when we don't know why we're doing them and times where it just all makes so much fucking sense. They're both jobs of high highs and low lows."

"Yeah…." You chew on the inside of your cheek and look at his chest. You know he's right but in the moment it's hard to accept. It makes sense why Jack's work gets to him like this sometimes. It doesn't feel like it makes sense why yours gets to you like this. Objectively and logically you can see it, you understand why it does, and if Jack had your job you'd say it makes sense why it gets to him like this sometimes. But emotionally your brain doesn't let you accept it. It's different. You should be able to handle it, especially in the shadow of Jack's job. You know he'd hate hearing that if you ever said it out loud, and would disagree vehemently. It's just hard to think otherwise. "I don't know," you sigh. "I'm being dramatic and I hate it."

Jack pushes his bottom lip out slightly and shakes his head. "No you're not. You're feeling your feelings. Please don't self-invalidate, Baby. You're allowed to feel what you feel at the intensity you're feeling it at. I want you to, especially right here with me so I can take care of you and keep you safe and help keep you as grounded as possible and as comforted as possible."

You shrug. "It's still being dramatic. It's dramatic and it's unfair to you. When I was in the car and you asked if I had the doors locked, I did, I promise I did, I just thought about how I'd like to unlock them and hope…" You let out a breath and shake your head slightly. You know how much this will hurt him. "And hope someone came along and car jacked me and killed me because then I wouldn't have to put either of us through this ever again, and that's dramatic, Jack. That's dramatic. Because I know what that would do to you. I know. I know because I think about the reverse with you dying and I, I can't Jack, I can't, and so yes. Yes, I'm being dramatic."

"You're not, Sweetheart." Jack swallows hard as your words sink in and his mind goes there. It's hard to hear of course, harder to think about really happening. He can't imagine getting that phone call or driving up to that scene and having to try to save you, having to get covered in your blood. Well. Maybe it's not that he can't imagine but that he can and it's unspeakably awful and horrific and makes him nauseous. "You're just feeling what you feel. That's valid. You're allowed to feel it all.

"It's dumb Jack," you huff a laugh at yourself and shake your head. "There's no reason for me to feel like this.

"Sweetheart," Jack runs his hand up your side to cup your face. "Yes there is. And even if there wasn't, that's okay too. You're allowed to feel like this or however you feel for any reason or no reason." He looks away from you for a second as he gathers his thoughts, in one of those ways that tells you he's thinking of how to phrase something incredibly serious to him. He looks back at you. "You deal with a lot at work, you see a lot. You do so much. You take on so much and you do things for other people even when you're slammed yourself. You're incredibly empathetic and an emotional sponge and so giving and I love that about you, I love that about you so much. But that's hard at the best of times, and with your job it's…." he trails off, unable to find the word he wants that conveys the right gravity. "You give so much, so so much of yourself to everyone and everything you do because it matters to you and you care and you'd rather run yourself into the ground than watch someone else struggle or have to work hard enough to run themselves into the ground."

You shrug again. You're trying to take his words to heart and you know you are, even if your brain can't consciously process it right now. You want to say something in response but you're not sure what. What do you say to that? To all those compliments it feels like you don't deserve, to the way this man loves you so fucking much at your worst.

Jack gives you a moment to respond and then continues when you don't, doesn't want you to feel pressured to come up with something to say. "Part of it is that you're exhausted, Sweetheart. You're running on empty, in every way, physically and emotionally and spiritually. You haven't gotten much sleep this week and I'm sure what you have gotten hasn't been the best quality with all the stress."

"I mean I let myself give into it, Jack," you admit. "I let myself give into the feelings and lean into them and let myself cry and be miserable and do all this shit because I know you're here and will take care of me and that's unfair. It's totally unfair and it's, it's… gross of me."

"Baby," Jack gives you a small, knowing smile, "that's the whole point. That's what I want you to do, my silly, silly girl."

"It's unfair to you!"

"No, Baby, it's not. Just like it isn't unfair when I give into my feelings and lean into them because I know you're here to take care of me. I do the same." Jack squeezes the side of your face softly and starts running his hand up and down your side again. "That's what you should do. That's part of what a relationship is, being able to just give into it all and have those feelings because you know your partner's got you. I think that's healthy."

"How much longer can you keep doing this, Jack? Just like realistically. How many times can I ask you to do this before it's too much." You look away from him and down at your hand that you pull from his. "Before I'm too much."

"I don't feel like I'm doing anything, Sweetheart. But I guess to the extent I am, I can keep doing it for you until I die. You're never going to become too much for me." Jack desperately wants to ask you to look at him but he knows it's not what you need right now as much as he's itching for eye contact. "You haven't asked me to do anything. You didn't even ask me to come get you. I just did. I could've tried to talk you down over the phone. I wanted to come. I chose to. You didn't ask. And even if you had asked, that would be more than okay."

You look back up at him and some part of Jack melts in relief. "I mean I knew you would come, so it was kind of me asking even if not explicitly."

"I know it's upsetting to you, Beautiful, and I'm not making light of it or trying to wipe your feelings away but to me, it's like… good. I'm glad you knew. I'm so fucking glad you knew. You genuinely have no fucking idea how happy that makes me." Jack seems to grow almost teary as he speaks, his voice wet with emotion that matches the glass to his eyes. You bring your hand up and rest it on the side of his neck, brush your thumb along his jawline comfortingly.

"I know your past has taught you differently but you're allowed to feel and you're allowed to need me and to need to fall into me and need all the help in the world. It doesn't make you too much and it never will. Obviously I don't like you feeling like this, I hate it and I wish I could take it away and feel it for you, god knows I would in a second if I could. But you picking up the phone and calling me, you crying into me and letting yourself come completely apart in my arms and turning to me for comfort, it makes me so incredibly happy and content to know that you feel safe enough and loved enough to do that." Jack smiles at you, looks at you like he can't believe you're real and his. "And everything that you're worried makes or will make you too much and will make me get tired and be done with you and leave one day, it's the opposite for me. Your vulnerability and your humanness and your trust, and you giving me the privilege of getting to love you and hold you through your worst moments and days, that just makes me love you all the more, even when it feels like there's no possible way I could love you more. You always surprise me."

"Jack," you swallow down his name in a whisper. You struggle to come up with something to say to that because it's so beautiful and he loves you so much and your brain is processing so much under the surface and he's right. You're exhausted and feeling it far more acutely.

"You don't have to say anything," he whispers back with a nod. "Just know that this is all okay and we're okay and I'm not going anywhere."

"I know." You give him a flash of a genuine smile, about all you can manage at this point. "Thank you. I love you."

"I love you too." Jack leans forward and seals his words with a lingering kiss.

"Hey Jack?" It seems silly to start that way as you break apart given that you're both looking at each other and have been talking and to say this all again like you haven't before given how long you've been together. But then you suppose Jack has said everything he's said to you today multiple times over the years.

He raises his eyebrows at you in acknowledgment. "Thank you for… just taking care of me the best you could during the week. I really appreciate you not trying to like interfere with work or tell me I can't do this or go on about how unhealthy it is because that just makes me feel worse. And thank you for not accusing me of cheating or something because I had to stay late at work. You were just supportive and made sure I ate and got as much sleep as I could and did whatever you could for me and you have no idea how much I appreciate that."

"You're welcome. I never want you to feel worse. I know it's not something you're doing out of choice and that it's just reality and what has to happen. Even if I hate it like you do too." He leans in for another kiss. He can tell it's time to move the conversation along a bit, that your brain has more or less reached its maximum capacity for this kind of talk tonight. "You should get some sleep. I can see you're sleepy," he smirks playfully.

You grumble a little as you pout, giving into the sleepiness and the relative relaxation that's taken over you since your talk. "I don't wanna sleep. I miss you and I've missed you all week. I'm sorry I was away so much."

"Don't apologize, Baby, it's not your fault. You didn't do it deliberately." Jack's hand that's been running up and down your side continues too but moves a little toward the center of you so that his fingers trail along the edge of your breast and brush teasingly at the crease of your hip. "We have all weekend together. You'll enjoy our time together so much more when you're not exhausted. And I'll still be here. You can sleep in my arms and I'm sure I'll fall asleep soon too. That's still spending time together to me."

"Yeah," you draw the word out. "But it's not the same."

Jack nods slowly, a mischievous and playful smirk pulling onto his face. He leans back in and kisses you again, rolls you onto your back slowly as his tongue dips into your mouth and he groans, continues to make out with you, relishing in the way your hands feel roaming his body. "Well," he pants softly when you break apart for air, "what if we spent some more time together while I put us both to sleep?"

You bite your lip and smile. "And what would that look like?"

"Oh," he laughs under his breath, "I have an idea or two."

"Yeah?" Your chest heaves a little and Jack ducks his head down and takes one of your nipples into his mouth and teases it as you moan softly for him before kissing up your chest and neck to your lips where he makes out with you again.

"Yeah," he mumbles against your lips, rolls his hips into yours so you can feel how hard he is for you. "Could look like this." He adjusts his hips and runs his cock through you, lets his head bump against your clit and pull sounds of pleasure from both of you.

"Or," he stills his hips, "like this."

Jack dives backward under the comforter, large hands holding onto your thighs and keeping them spread for him as he kisses you cunt to clit. "Yeah," his voice is muffled by the comforter that's over him, "I think I'd like it to look like this. I really think," he presses another kiss to your clit, "I'd like it to look like this."

"Jack!" you giggle, the speed and suddenness of the movement almost meerkat like in the most adorable, Jack way. Only he could make you laugh coming off of feeling how you were at the same time he's winding you toward an orgasm you know is likely to hit you so hard you'll be half asleep by the time he gets to fucking you, something you're more than okay with. "Part of being together is seeing you!"

You push the comforter back until silver curls come into view and Jack looks up at you. That giggle is everything to him. He got you to laugh.

"Seeing me or seeing my curls between your legs?" he smirks up at you.

"Same thing, isn't it? Your curls are you." Your breathing picks up as Jack lowers his mouth back down, the stubble on his jaw brushing over your clit and sending sparks of pleasure shivering up your spine.

He shrugs in feigned nonchalance, knows exactly what he's doing to you. "I think me suggests my eyes."

"Then look at me while you start putting us to sleep," you breathe.

Jack's eyes darken. "Kinky," he murmurs. "I like it. Just remember," he finally gives your clit a proper suck and swirl of his tongue, making you moan so beautifully for him, "you suggested it. And since you did I expect you to keep your eyes open and on mine the entire time, pretty girl."

I need him desperately. Jack Abbot where are you?! 😩😭 I hope it was okay and that you enjoyed! And we all deserve this kind of love. Thank you again for all of your support and for reading, I truly appreciate it and your notes!! ♥️

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Another tear lands on your phone's screen as your thumb hovers just above his name on your favorites. You hate doing this to him and it's so childish. You should be able to get it together, to just pull yourself together long enough to make the short drive home. But you've been trying to do that for ten minutes now and you just want to be with Jack and home and not here crying in your car alone.

You sniffle hard and pull yourself together enough so you're not actively sobbing when he answers the phone. Jack smiles when he sees your face light up his phone. You must be calling to let him know you're on your way home. He picks up on the first ring. "Hi Beautiful, you on your way home?"

"Jack." You don't have to say anything else. Jack already knows, is already sitting up on the couch and reaching for his prosthetic where it's resting by the side of the couch.

He needs to get to you. Now. Your pain is so clear in your voice, he can picture the tears he knows are streaming down your face silently for now.

His tone changes immediately, still soft but so concerned, so knowing. "What's wrong, Baby? Where are you?"

You can hear shuffling and you know he's getting his prosthetic on as he holds his phone to his ear with his shoulder. It's what makes you crack again because why are you doing this to him? Why can't you just be fucking normal?

"In my, my car," your voice gets a little higher pitched with every word as you lose your ability to regulate again, "at, at work. I can't stop, Jack, I can't stop crying enough to drive safely. I've been try, trying and I just can't."

"Okay, that's okay Sweetheart, I'm on my way." Jack shoves the key into the lock the second the door is closed and turns it to lock your place up, takes off at a fast walk towards his car. "Did something happen?" He's turned his voice into something lower now, something soothing that makes you feel not so alone.

"No," you sniffle, take in a slightly wracked breath, "just the w-week and, and…" You trail off into sobs you muffle with your hand, sobs Jack knows you're muffling.

He knows the kind of week it's been for you. A week where everything that could and should be relatively straightforward and smooth was a totally unnecessarily difficult clusterfuck deluxe. A week where anyone and everyone who could possibly try you did, that any issue or minor emergency that could happen, happened. A week where you stayed stupidly late and came home to sleep for a couple of hours just to turn around and go back in early.

You'd been so drained by the time you got home each night you just wanted to get straight into bed with him. He was more than happy to oblige after he coaxed you to eat a little dinner for him. You were both glad that Tuesday was his last shift for the rest of the week because with how late you stayed and how early you had to go in, you didn't see him Monday or Tuesday.

"I'm so-so-sorry." Getting out the last word is a struggle and your voice is so high-pitched it's almost inaudible.

"Don't be," Jack soothes you through the phone. "You have nothing to be sorry for, Baby. You can call me even earlier next time, okay? I'm going to stay on the phone but it's going to cut out for a second once I start the car while my phone connects."

"Okay." You choke on the word, end up coughing through full body sobs and god if you don't feel completely fucking ridiculous. There is absolutely no fucking reason for this.

Jack cringes at the sound because he hates hearing you this sad. Hates that he isn't already there with you, that he didn't think to drive you in and pick you up the last couple of days. "Alright, Sweetheart, I'm back and on my way."

"You have to drive safe," you whimper. "Don't wreck trying to, to get here fast because, because I won't survive you getting hurt or losing you, I sw-swear to god Jack," you choke on a sob, "I'm barely holding, holding on. I need you."

Jack's heart breaks even further at your love for him and at the palpable and encompassing sadness in your voice. "I won't, I promise. I'll be safe. You have your car doors locked?"

"Yeah," you whisper. And you genuinely do. A part of you wants to unlock them, hopes that someone will come and carjack you and kill you because then you won't have to go through this yourself or put Jack through it anymore.

You know that's not true, know that anything happening to you would devastate Jack the way something happening to him would devastate you, even if that's hard for you to believe at times because you can't wrap your mind around why he loves you. Why he put himself through this type of shit that you pull.

"Hey," he says softly. "I know it probably doesn't feel like it right now, but everything will be okay and you'll get through this. I'll make sure of it. That doesn't mean it won't suck and you won't feel like shit, I know, I just want you to know. We'll get you through this."

The sob you let out is muffled and Jack knows you probably moved your phone away from you and covered your mouth. "I," you try to start after a couple of seconds. You have to pause so that you can muffle another sob and try to pull yourself together so that you can actually talk. "I hate that you have to."

"I don't have to do anything, Baby. I choose to because I love you and choose to love you even with as natural and fated by the universe as loving you is. I don't feel forced and I'm not forced." Jack knows that your brain is manifesting your week through this and shifting to spiral over this because it's easier in a sense to deal with than everything that happened at work this week that you're trying to process through. This is something it's easy to get reassurance for and process through and is much, much more controllable. It doesn't hurt any less or make you any less sad or anxious or burnt out, and it's not any easier to go through, it's just more tangible almost.

He's never been more glad that you don't work too far away, that it's not like he has to drive an hour to get you. And he thanks whatever and whoever is out there that he's hitting every green light and that somehow traffic this Friday evening isn't bad.

There's silence on your end of the line for a moment and it would be eerie and unsettling if Jack wasn't sure you'd just muted yourself so that you could get out whatever sob and tears you needed to without him hearing. Jack clenches his jaw and rolls it. He hates whoever made you feel like you have to apologize for feeling your feelings and expressing them and for crying. He'd love to just have thirty seconds alone with them.

You want to tell Jack never mind. That he can turn around, you're fine and you'll see him at home soon, you were just being dramatic and having a moment and you're fine and everything is fine. But you can't bring yourself to say the words because as much as it's not a lie in a sense because you know he'll know it's not true, it's still not the truth. You're not fine and everything isn't fine. It doesn't feel like anything is fine.

It feels like you're going to lose Jack because you're so much fucking work and ridiculous and dramatic and why would he continue to put up with you? What do you really bring to the table and offer him? What do you do for him other than create more work?

Your engagement ring feels so heavy on your finger, not because it's perfect and sparkly and everything you ever wanted, though it absolutely is. It feels so heavy because you feel so undeserving of it, of Jack and his love and the way he knows you so well, better than you know yourself.

It doesn't occur to you that you know him just as well and that he feels this exact same way at times.

The sound of your ragged breathing becomes audible again and a few seconds later you're able to talk.

"I just can't Jack," you whisper through a sniffle.

You hate everything right now. Everything except Jack.

And you hate yourself the most.

Jack can tell. He can hear it in your voice, how much you're beating yourself up inside right now, how much you're beating yourself up, how hard you're trying not to tell him that you're fine and he can turn around. He can hear how much you hate yourself and it's like a knife slowly carving away at his heart.

"I know Baby," he murmurs just loud enough for you to hear as he pulls into the parking lot. "And it's okay that you can't." Jack pulls up beside you so that his passenger side door is next to your driver's side door, looks over at you and smiles as he puts it into park. "I'm hanging up now Baby, I'll see you in just a second."

Jack hangs up and leaves his car on so the AC stays running and gets out and over to your door. Some scared piece of you almost wants to fight it and not unlock your door, and tell him it's okay, you'll figure it out and pull yourself together and get home and you're sorry he drove here. But a bigger piece of you, the overwhelming majority of you, wants nothing more than to be wrapped up in and as close as physically possible to Jack as you can be, so when he gets close you unlock your doors for him.

"Hi Beautiful," Jack greets you once he has the door open. As much as he hates hearing you sad and being away from you when you are, he hates hearing you sad and being right next to you and seeing how sad you are just as much. Tears stain your face, your eyes bloodshot and swollen, your lips and nose swollen too. He means it as more than a pet name though. You're still nothing short of beautiful to him right now, even if there's an aching sadness with it.

You shake your head at him because he's so wrong. You're not remotely beautiful right now, inside or out. You shouldn't be like this, shouldn't be complaining about your job and your week to him of all people. You know Jack doesn't think about it like that and would hate to find out that you do, but you can't help it. You should be better. You shouldn't have needed him to put his prosthetic back on when he was having a nice day at home chilling without it and drive down here just to hold you while you cry.

It's pathetic. You're pathetic.

Somewhere deep down you know Jack would hate to find out that you think it and you are pathetic.

"Yes, Baby," Jack murmurs in response to you shaking your head. He leans in and presses a soft kiss to your lips, doesn't force too much of his affection on you when you're crying and struggling and he can tell you feel like you don't deserve it, just enough for you to know he wants to kiss you and that he means it and that he loves you.

As Jack leans back you follow him, let your feet hit the ground and push you up into his arms that automatically open to catch you. You need just need to be close to him. Now that you've had him close, any distance between you feels unbearable.

You all but collapse into his arms, your tears starting up again just as hard as they were before you call him. They're for everything. For the way Jack calls you beautiful like it's your name and means it. For the way you feel anything but beautiful right now. For this man who keeps you standing literally and metaphorically. For this week that's done it's best to level you. For how perfectly Jack treats you and takes care of you, and how much he loves you. For how pathetic and unworthy of that treatment you feel, and how you don't understand why he loves you when you're so difficult and so much work.

"Alright, Sweetheart, I've got you," Jack whispers. He wraps his arms around you tightly and helps hold you up as you melt into him. He kisses the top of your head as you bury your face in his chest and lose it.

Jack holds you like that for a minute before he starts to rock you and slowly shuffle the two of you so that you change spots and he can reach into the car and grab your purse. Once he has it he walks you backwards slowly and shuts your door and locks your car.

He walks you both a little further so that he can open the back door to his Range Rover. "Come on, Baby," he presses a kiss to the top of your head again and rubs your back, "get in the back for me, yeah?"

You cling to him as he tries to pull away, terrified of there being more than an inch between the two of you right now. "Why?" you sniffle, momentarily not completely sobbing.

Jack brings a hand down and hooks his index finger under your chin and gently tilts your face up to look at him. He gives you a reassuring smile. "Because I can hold you better back there and it's private."

You look at him for a moment and your bottom lip and chin tremble so hard as tears line your eyes that it makes his heart ache. You look so terribly and sadly adorable and it just makes how much he loves you hit him even harder and makes him more determined to get you feeling better and make you happy. He doesn't realize that even though you're crying, he's already made you feel better and happier just by being here and coming to you without you having to ask and giving you a safe space to let yourself give into how shitty you feel in every sense.

Jack's sweetness and thoughtfulness make you start to cry even harder as you climb in the back like he asked. You sit awkwardly in the middle seat as he gets in and shuts the door, sets your purse down and gets himself comfortable.

"Alright, you, come here." He reaches out and hooks an arm around your waist and starts to pull you closer to him.

You don't need asked twice, move over to him and crawl onto his lap so quickly his arm barely touches you and he smiles to himself. As Jack reclines the seat so that you can fall into him a bit more you spread your legs out across the seats and snuggle into him as close as you can, your sobs getting harder when he wraps his arms around you and holds you tightly, helps you settle in perfectly to your favorite place in the whole world where you feel safe in every sense of the word and loved and like you could probably survive just about anything as long as you had Jack and his arms and neck and chest and lap to hide from the world in.

"Okay Baby," Jack murmurs once you're settled in his lap and clinging to his shirt as you sob into his neck with your head tucked under the corner of his jaw. "I'm here. It's okay, it's all going to be okay, I promise."

You shake your head against him because as much as you know Jack would never lie to you, it doesn't feel like it in this moment, it doesn't feel like anything will ever be okay again. And Jack knows. He knows it doesn't feel like it. So he doesn't push it, doesn't try to talk you into believing him. He just lets you be. Lets you exist just as you are. Lets you feel what you're feeling without any pushback.

Even though you've been together years, it still always surprises you, the way he lets you just feel and holds you close as you do.

You let yourself give in for thirty seconds or so and then you start to fight your sobs so that you can explain yourself to him even though you know you don't have to, that you never have to explain yourself to Jack.

"I," you hiccup out, trying so hard to get yourself together so you can explain and stop crying and stop making Jack deal with you. "I, I'm, I…" You choke over the simple words, coughing and struggling to breathe

"Shh," Jack soothes you, moves one of his hands so it can rub up and down your back. "You don't have to talk about it right now, okay? We can talk later if and when you're ready and doing a little better. Just let it all out, I've got you. I've got you."

You want to fight it, want to keep pushing yourself to talk and explain and apologize because even though Jack has never asked you to, never told you that you needed to or made you feel like you needed to, even though he's never gotten mad or upset at you when you get like this, you still feel the urge to. The scars left by those who came before him are still there. It's a testament to just how much Jack has healed you that you cry in front of him, that you let yourself get like this in front of him, that you call him when you're like this and let yourself seek out his comfort and trust and know that he won't turn you away or yell at you or make fun of you or use it against you down the road.

Eventually your tears stop. You're pretty sure it's less that you've cried yourself out and are in a better headspace and more that you just physically ran out of tears and exhausted out. Jack's pretty sure that's the case too because your tears don't trail off how they usually do when you've had the cry you needed. This is far more abrupt, closer to a flip of a switch.

Jack doesn't rush you to be ready to talk or get out of his lap so he can drive you guys home or to do anything. He just keeps holding you and continues to rub your back while you sniffle and try to compose yourself. And even once your sniffling has stopped and you're just resting in his arms against him he doesn't rush you. He never would. If he had it his way you'd never have to leave his arms.

After a few moments of sitting in Jack's lap quietly you find it within you to pull your head back and look at him sheepishly.

Jack melts even more somehow, smiles at you softly and presses a kiss to your forehead. "Hi, pretty girl," he murmurs.

You can't bring yourself to even shake your head to argue with him. You don't want to put him through more than you already have tonight and don't want it to seem like you're doing this deliberately for attention or compliments.

"Hi handsome," you whisper back. It takes everything in you to keep yourself looking at him and not immediately nuzzle your face back into his neck to hide.

"Can I have a kiss?"

You swallow hard and give him a short nod, not because you want to say no, it's the exact opposite, you want to scream yes and let the man kiss you until everything makes sense and feels okay again. You just don't feel like you deserve it. "If you want."

"I always want kisses from you and to kiss you." Jack gives you a lopsided smile. He doesn't ask if you want kisses because he knows that you do, knows that what could be perceived as a lack of enthusiasm is actually just you feeling like you don't deserve him or his love or affection.

Jack slides his hand up to the back of your neck and gently pulls your face to his, kisses you so softly to start to help you ease into accepting his affection right now that if you had any tears left you know you'd be crying again. The more you relax into him and let yourself accept Jack's affection as you pour it back into him, the deeper Jack kisses you.

He nuzzles his nose into yours for a second when you break apart and rubs his thumb just below your ear as you pull your face back to look at him, cheeks tear stained and eyes and nose and lips still so adorably swollen. "Thank you for calling me and not trying to drive while crying like that." He raises his eyebrows at you gently, his other hand giving your hip an affectionate and reassuring squeeze before he reference what you said earlier while he was driving here. "I need you too."

You shrug shallowly because you weren't even thinking about it like that when you called.

"I do," he whispers, nodding at you. "More than you'll ever know and just as much as you need me. Promise." Jack leans up and gives you a quick kiss. "How about we head home? We'll come back and get it tomorrow, okay? It won't get towed with your permit."

"Okay," you whisper back, nodding.

Jack puts the seat back up and you shift off his lap so that he can get out of the car. Once he's out He holds his hand out for you even though you don't really need it or his help getting out of the car. You take it anyway, let him help you out and close the door behind you before you both take a few steps up and Jack opens the passenger side door for you like he always does.

Even though there's silence as Jack holds your hand and helps you into the passenger seat it's still meaningful, he still has this way of silently almost speaking with his body and how he looks at you that makes you feel wrapped in his love the way you would if he was verbally professing it to you over and over. Before he shuts the door he leans in and presses the sweetest kiss to your forehead, gives you a small smile that reassures you everything will be okay, that you'll be able to undo the knots your mind has gotten itself into.

Jack carefully shuts the door and you pull your seatbelt on as he walks around to the driver's side. Before he buckles himself in he reaches back and grabs your purse, pulls out a couple of tissues and hands you them. He sets your purse down, buckles his seatbelt and then puts it in reverse and starts the drive home.

He doesn't make you talk about it as he drives, knows it's not the time or the place. It's one of those small things that means the world to you and it reminds you how well he knows you and how much he loves you. Instead of making you talk about it, Jack chatters to you like he normally will when you guys are driving, but this time he doesn't expect you to chat back. His hand stays on your thigh or holding your hand and bringing it up to his lips to presses kisses to the entire drive home.

The entire thing is so normal and it helps more than you think Jack could ever truly understand. Nothing feels forced or like he's making these huge gestures or going out of his way which is exactly what you need. Because you don't feel like you deserve any of that and so him doing those kinds of things would almost make things harder for you in a way. You don't really even feel like you deserve normalcy, but you're at least able to accept it without panicking.

Once Jack's parket he walks around and opens your door for you, grabs your purse and helps you out of the car. You feel a little zombie-like walking into your shared apartment. You're not sure what you want or need and are too tired and fuzzy brained from all the crying to even try to figure it out.

But Jack, Jack knows exactly what you want and what you need.

He could just give it to you. You wouldn't necessarily mind if he did. But Jack knows that part of what you need right now is control without having to really make any decisions. So he makes the decisions and offers them to you so that you feel like you're in control without the agony of having to make any choices or real decisions that will just make you feel worse and exacerbate the decision fatigue already plaguing you after this week.

"You wanna chill on the couch for a bit?" Jack asks as you both finish getting your shoes off.

You take a couple of steps into the living room and stop to look at the couch. You want to be close to Jack as selfish as it feels, as undeserving as you feel. "Yeah, I guess," you murmur.

Jack walks up behind you and snakes his arms around your tummy, pulls you back into him and hunches and rests his chin on your shoulder. He presses a few kisses to the side of your neck, lets his lips linger on the last one almost like he's feeling your pulse under his lips. "I'm going to go get you some water first." He presses a kiss to your cheek as he squeezes you a little in a tight hug. "I love you so much Baby, no matter how you're feeling and whether you feel like you deserve it. I love you."

Your chin trembles a little and you take in a deep shaky breath. You bring your hand up and cup the side of Jack's face. "I love you so much too. Thank you."

"Of course," he murmurs. Jack presses another kiss to your cheek and then turns his head to press one into the palm of your hand. He's quick to make his way to your kitchen and grab you a glass of water.

You try to get yourself to go sit on the couch but you can't seem to for some reason, end up just standing there almost awkwardly in your own space as you wait for Jack to return. When he returns you take a few sips for him, always surprised at how much better those few sips make you feel. You set the glass on a coaster on the coffee table once you've had enough.

Jack is waiting for you with a smile when you turn back to face him. His hands find the hem of your shirt and start to pull it off you and you raise your arms to help, trusting whatever his plan is. Once he has your shirt off he sits down on the edge of the couch and you watch as he takes his prosthetic off before beckoning you to him with a finger.

You step between his legs and like with your shirt, you trust him when he pulls your pants down and step out of them and kick them to side where he tossed your shirt. Jack grabs a blanket and holds it open for you and your chin trembles again because he knows just what you need and gives it to you so freely and without you having to ask.

Neither you nor Jack say a word as you help him get you wrapped up in a blanket burrito and gets you situated to that you're on your side on the couch, your back to the cushions. He lays on his side next to you and pulls your bundled form against him, holds you tight. You wiggle to get comfortable and bury your face into his chest breathing getting heavier as you feel the tears coming again.

Jack knows it. He's known this is what would happen the entire time and as much as he doesn't want you to cry and be upset, it's what he wants to happen. He wants you to cry again, let yourself come all the way apart in his arms so that he can help put you back together again. He knows you won't be able to move past it all and start to heal and recover from the week until you get it all out of your system.

"I'm here, Baby. Let yourself cry, try not to fight it," he murmurs. "It's okay, I promise it's okay." He brings his chin to his neck so that he can nuzzle his nose into your hair and give you kisses there.

It works. By the third or so kiss you're fully sobbing into him again and it drives you insane because as much as you know why in a sense, you also feel like you have no idea why you're like this and needing to cry so much.

After a couple of minutes you have to just say it, acknowledge the truth, or at least what feels like the truth. "This is, this is so dumb, Jack," you choke out between sobs. "It's so dumb, and, and stupid," you take in a huge breath of air that makes you cough on top of the sobs, "and, and ridiculous and I know it, know it and still can't stop."

"I know it feels like that's true and that's valid, but it's not any of those things, Baby, I promise," he soothes you, runs a hand up and down your back over the blanket while the other keeps you held tightly to him. "It's human."

You shake your head against him but don't verbally argue with him, just go back to the tears you can't seem to stop, the tears that feel so incredibly unfair to Jack. He should be relaxing while he's off, and you guys should be starting your weekend together doing something fun, go on a date or something like you talked about last week. But instead he's having to work essentially, having to take care of you, and the two of you aren't going out and you're making your weekend off together start in one of the shittiest ways.

Your tears do eventually start to trail off. Neither you nor Jack know how long it's taken to get here and it doesn't really matter in the end. It took as long as it did and you're here now, your body and mind working to regulate as opposed to a fairly abrupt stop like in the car where your body just gave out. Jack knows it means you've finally gotten it all out, have shed all the tears you need to right now.

He knows it means you're feeling broken right now and that you're not sure how to even start picking up the pieces. But the thing is you do know how to start. Before Jack you had to do this alone, had to sob on your couch alone and then figure out how to make yourself better. The difference is that now you don't need to know. You don't need to figure it out. Because Jack knows and he'll help you, take care of you and give you what you want and what you need and help put you back together again and get back to feeling normal.

The two of you sit lay in silence for a bit once you've gotten your breathing under control, the only sounds the occasional sniffle from you or soft popping of Jack's lips as he presses more kisses to the top of your head. You take in and let out a deep breath before pulling your head back so that you can see him.

"Hi again, Beautiful," Jack smiles at you.

You want to argue but don't have the energy to. "Hi," you whisper, voice raw and nasally.

Jack doesn't say anything for a minute, just looks at you and strokes your hair. The look he gives you speaks volumes though, is so clearly him telling you that if and when you're ready to talk, he's hear to listen.

You give him one of the smallest, saddest smiles Jack's ever seen from you. "I love you," you murmur to him, lean your head up and push your lips out.

"I love you too." Jack smiles even brighter as he moves his head down to give you the kisses you seek.

"How about we order some food and then go shower the week off you? We can eat dinner in bed once it's here and then cuddle and watch something or talk if you want, get you off to dreamland to help you catch up on some sleep," Jack suggests once you've had your fill of kisses.

"Okay," you murmur with a small nod, still sounding so achingly forlorn and sad that it kills him. You're not sure you agree with that last part of his suggestion. You don't want to sleep any time soon. You want to be awake with him, spending time with him and enjoying him. You've missed him.

Jack grabs his phone out of his pocket and rests his hand on your side as he orders. After he finishes ordering he slips his phone back in his pocket and gives you one last lingering kiss. He pulls his one arm from under you and sits up, helps get you out of the blanket burrito he put you in.

The two of you head into your room and Jack crutches into the bathroom to turn the shower on. You pad into the bathroom behind him, don't want to be away from him really. You cringe internally at how clingy that is, wonder if that's what will push it over and make it all too much for him. Make you too much for him.

But all that happens when Jack turns around and sees you is a smile breaking over his face. You can't help but smile a little at it because he just looks so god damned happy to see you. Even when you're like this, being like this for him.

You walk closer to him and let your fingers play with the hem of his shirt. "Can I?"

"I'd love that," he nods, gives you a little, playful smirk.

You take your time stripping him, take such care like you always do when you strip him while he's standing with his crutches. Once you've got him fully stripped Jack takes your bra off, dips his thumbs under the waistband of your underwear and starts pushing them down, your clothes a heap off to the side of the bathroom where they won't get wet.

There's something about the way you look when your eyes roam his body that makes Jack frown to himself. There's an air of unworthiness about it, something that couldn't be further from the truth in his mind.

"You okay, Baby?" he asks quietly.

You press your lips together and out to one side and nod. "I just wish I wasn't like this for you," you whisper, stepping closer to him and resting your head against his chest as you stand outside the shower.

"You're not like anything," he murmurs. "You're just you. My girl. All I need to live."

You let out a shaky breath and then turn and press a kiss to his chest. His words are so very hard to accept but you know he truly means them the same way you mean them when you tell him the same.

You both get in the shower and Jack holds you on his lap while you soak in near scalding water for a bit. Eventually he washes you, takes his time with your hair and then your body, lets you do the same to him because he knows you need it and want it.

It doesn't take too long for the food Jack had ordered to arrive once you're out of the shower and in bed, dressed in one of Jack's old shirts and nothing else. Jack's in just a pair of sweatpants but throws a shirt on when the knock on the door signals the food has arrived. He crutches out and grabs the bag while you grab an old towel and spread it out on the bed.

You almost start crying again when you see what Jack ordered. Your favorite comfort meal. And you know the smaller box he sets off to the side is your favorite dessert.

"Jack…." you whisper, looking at him almost helplessly but with the same love in your eyes that he recognizes as the love in his when he looks at you.

He just smiles at you, leans over and gives you a kiss. "I love you."

"I know." You reach out and squeeze his thigh. "You make sure I know. And I love you too."

Jack grins at you and winks. "I know."

You watch TV and chat about whatever happens to come up as you eat, make Jack let you help clean up once you've both finished. You both strip again once you're back in your room and crawl into bed under the covers together on your sides.

Your legs tangle together and torsos press together as you settle, TV off because Jack can feel that you want to talk now and he's hoping after you do he can get you to sleep early to help you recover.

There's silence for a few minutes as you just look at each other, Jack's hand running up and down your side and yours playing with the fingers of his bottom hand.

"I don't know Jack," you finally whisper, trying to sort through your mind and figure out where to even start. "It was just a long week and I've been walling it off the whole time because I had to keep it together. But then today, when it was finally over at least somewhat, I got in the car and just…. fell apart. It's just so much, work, this job is just so much. It's so fucking much sometimes. And I know yours is too, I know that, I do. I know yours can be so so fucking much sometimes."

Jack knows you're about so start comparing your jobs, about to start writing yours off as not as bad and easier and less to deal with and less traumatic. And that's just not true. Your job can be just like his. You see different things most of the time, sure, but that's exactly why it's impossible to compare the two.

Honestly sometimes Jack thinks your job is more than his, is worse and harder and far more to deal with and more traumatic. Most of the time he's not sure how you deal with it which is kind of ironic because him and his love are the vast majority of how you're able to deal with it and cope and keep going.

In any event, he's not going to let you compare and minimize your job and its stressors and trauma and how fucking hard and how fucking much it can be. It deserves to be recognized. You deserve to be recognized for surviving it. You deserve to let out the bad week however you need to. He's not going to let you try to wipe it away and apologize for being affected by it.

"Yeah," he nods. "And that's why you take care of me and hold me like I held you in the car and am holding you now when it's too much for me and I need to let some of it out. Your job is just as much, it's just a different kind of much. My job can be a lot and so much and so can yours. I can need to have a breakdown sometimes and so can you. My job being a lot sometimes doesn't means yours isn't or can't be. My job isn't worse or harder than yours. They both have their moments and weeks and times when we don't know why we're doing them and times where it just all makes so much fucking sense. They're both jobs of high highs and low lows."

"Yeah…." You chew on the inside of your cheek and look at his chest. You know he's right but in the moment it's hard to accept. It makes sense why Jack's work gets to him like this sometimes. It doesn't feel like it makes sense why yours gets to you like this. Objectively and logically you can see it, you understand why it does, and if Jack had your job you'd say it makes sense why it gets to him like this sometimes. But emotionally your brain doesn't let you accept it. It's different. You should be able to handle it, especially in the shadow of Jack's job. You know he'd hate hearing that if you ever said it out loud, and would disagree vehemently. It's just hard to think otherwise. "I don't know," you sigh. "I'm being dramatic and I hate it."

Jack pushes his bottom lip out slightly and shakes his head. "No you're not. You're feeling your feelings. Please don't self-invalidate, Baby. You're allowed to feel what you feel at the intensity you're feeling it at. I want you to, especially right here with me so I can take care of you and keep you safe and help keep you as grounded as possible and as comforted as possible."

You shrug. "It's still being dramatic. It's dramatic and it's unfair to you. When I was in the car and you asked if I had the doors locked, I did, I promise I did, I just thought about how I'd like to unlock them and hope…" You let out a breath and shake your head slightly. You know how much this will hurt him. "And hope someone came along and car jacked me and killed me because then I wouldn't have to put either of us through this ever again, and that's dramatic, Jack. That's dramatic. Because I know what that would do to you. I know. I know because I think about the reverse with you dying and I, I can't Jack, I can't, and so yes. Yes, I'm being dramatic."

"You're not, Sweetheart." Jack swallows hard as your words sink in and his mind goes there. It's hard to hear of course, harder to think about really happening. He can't imagine getting that phone call or driving up to that scene and having to try to save you, having to get covered in your blood. Well. Maybe it's not that he can't imagine but that he can and it's unspeakably awful and horrific and makes him nauseous. "You're just feeling what you feel. That's valid. You're allowed to feel it all.

"It's dumb Jack," you huff a laugh at yourself and shake your head. "There's no reason for me to feel like this.

"Sweetheart," Jack runs his hand up your side to cup your face. "Yes there is. And even if there wasn't, that's okay too. You're allowed to feel like this or however you feel for any reason or no reason." He looks away from you for a second as he gathers his thoughts, in one of those ways that tells you he's thinking of how to phrase something incredibly serious to him. He looks back at you. "You deal with a lot at work, you see a lot. You do so much. You take on so much and you do things for other people even when you're slammed yourself. You're incredibly empathetic and an emotional sponge and so giving and I love that about you, I love that about you so much. But that's hard at the best of times, and with your job it's…." he trails off, unable to find the word he wants that conveys the right gravity. "You give so much, so so much of yourself to everyone and everything you do because it matters to you and you care and you'd rather run yourself into the ground than watch someone else struggle or have to work hard enough to run themselves into the ground."

You shrug again. You're trying to take his words to heart and you know you are, even if your brain can't consciously process it right now. You want to say something in response but you're not sure what. What do you say to that? To all those compliments it feels like you don't deserve, to the way this man loves you so fucking much at your worst.

Jack gives you a moment to respond and then continues when you don't, doesn't want you to feel pressured to come up with something to say. "Part of it is that you're exhausted, Sweetheart. You're running on empty, in every way, physically and emotionally and spiritually. You haven't gotten much sleep this week and I'm sure what you have gotten hasn't been the best quality with all the stress."

"I mean I let myself give into it, Jack," you admit. "I let myself give into the feelings and lean into them and let myself cry and be miserable and do all this shit because I know you're here and will take care of me and that's unfair. It's totally unfair and it's, it's… gross of me."

"Baby," Jack gives you a small, knowing smile, "that's the whole point. That's what I want you to do, my silly, silly girl."

"It's unfair to you!"

"No, Baby, it's not. Just like it isn't unfair when I give into my feelings and lean into them because I know you're here to take care of me. I do the same." Jack squeezes the side of your face softly and starts running his hand up and down your side again. "That's what you should do. That's part of what a relationship is, being able to just give into it all and have those feelings because you know your partner's got you. I think that's healthy."

"How much longer can you keep doing this, Jack? Just like realistically. How many times can I ask you to do this before it's too much." You look away from him and down at your hand that you pull from his. "Before I'm too much."

"I don't feel like I'm doing anything, Sweetheart. But I guess to the extent I am, I can keep doing it for you until I die. You're never going to become too much for me." Jack desperately wants to ask you to look at him but he knows it's not what you need right now as much as he's itching for eye contact. "You haven't asked me to do anything. You didn't even ask me to come get you. I just did. I could've tried to talk you down over the phone. I wanted to come. I chose to. You didn't ask. And even if you had asked, that would be more than okay."

You look back up at him and some part of Jack melts in relief. "I mean I knew you would come, so it was kind of me asking even if not explicitly."

"I know it's upsetting to you, Beautiful, and I'm not making light of it or trying to wipe your feelings away but to me, it's like… good. I'm glad you knew. I'm so fucking glad you knew. You genuinely have no fucking idea how happy that makes me." Jack seems to grow almost teary as he speaks, his voice wet with emotion that matches the glass to his eyes. You bring your hand up and rest it on the side of his neck, brush your thumb along his jawline comfortingly.

"I know your past has taught you differently but you're allowed to feel and you're allowed to need me and to need to fall into me and need all the help in the world. It doesn't make you too much and it never will. Obviously I don't like you feeling like this, I hate it and I wish I could take it away and feel it for you, god knows I would in a second if I could. But you picking up the phone and calling me, you crying into me and letting yourself come completely apart in my arms and turning to me for comfort, it makes me so incredibly happy and content to know that you feel safe enough and loved enough to do that." Jack smiles at you, looks at you like he can't believe you're real and his. "And everything that you're worried makes or will make you too much and will make me get tired and be done with you and leave one day, it's the opposite for me. Your vulnerability and your humanness and your trust, and you giving me the privilege of getting to love you and hold you through your worst moments and days, that just makes me love you all the more, even when it feels like there's no possible way I could love you more. You always surprise me."

"Jack," you swallow down his name in a whisper. You struggle to come up with something to say to that because it's so beautiful and he loves you so much and your brain is processing so much under the surface and he's right. You're exhausted and feeling it far more acutely.

"You don't have to say anything," he whispers back with a nod. "Just know that this is all okay and we're okay and I'm not going anywhere."

"I know." You give him a flash of a genuine smile, about all you can manage at this point. "Thank you. I love you."

"I love you too." Jack leans forward and seals his words with a lingering kiss.

"Hey Jack?" It seems silly to start that way as you break apart given that you're both looking at each other and have been talking and to say this all again like you haven't before given how long you've been together. But then you suppose Jack has said everything he's said to you today multiple times over the years.

He raises his eyebrows at you in acknowledgment. "Thank you for… just taking care of me the best you could during the week. I really appreciate you not trying to like interfere with work or tell me I can't do this or go on about how unhealthy it is because that just makes me feel worse. And thank you for not accusing me of cheating or something because I had to stay late at work. You were just supportive and made sure I ate and got as much sleep as I could and did whatever you could for me and you have no idea how much I appreciate that."

"You're welcome. I never want you to feel worse. I know it's not something you're doing out of choice and that it's just reality and what has to happen. Even if I hate it like you do too." He leans in for another kiss. He can tell it's time to move the conversation along a bit, that your brain has more or less reached its maximum capacity for this kind of talk tonight. "You should get some sleep. I can see you're sleepy," he smirks playfully.

You grumble a little as you pout, giving into the sleepiness and the relative relaxation that's taken over you since your talk. "I don't wanna sleep. I miss you and I've missed you all week. I'm sorry I was away so much."

"Don't apologize, Baby, it's not your fault. You didn't do it deliberately." Jack's hand that's been running up and down your side continues too but moves a little toward the center of you so that his fingers trail along the edge of your breast and brush teasingly at the crease of your hip. "We have all weekend together. You'll enjoy our time together so much more when you're not exhausted. And I'll still be here. You can sleep in my arms and I'm sure I'll fall asleep soon too. That's still spending time together to me."

"Yeah," you draw the word out. "But it's not the same."

Jack nods slowly, a mischievous and playful smirk pulling onto his face. He leans back in and kisses you again, rolls you onto your back slowly as his tongue dips into your mouth and he groans, continues to make out with you, relishing in the way your hands feel roaming his body. "Well," he pants softly when you break apart for air, "what if we spent some more time together while I put us both to sleep?"

You bite your lip and smile. "And what would that look like?"

"Oh," he laughs under his breath, "I have an idea or two."

"Yeah?" Your chest heaves a little and Jack ducks his head down and takes one of your nipples into his mouth and teases it as you moan softly for him before kissing up your chest and neck to your lips where he makes out with you again.

"Yeah," he mumbles against your lips, rolls his hips into yours so you can feel how hard he is for you. "Could look like this." He adjusts his hips and runs his cock through you, lets his head bump against your clit and pull sounds of pleasure from both of you.

"Or," he stills his hips, "like this."

Jack dives backward under the comforter, large hands holding onto your thighs and keeping them spread for him as he kisses you cunt to clit. "Yeah," his voice is muffled by the comforter that's over him, "I think I'd like it to look like this. I really think," he presses another kiss to your clit, "I'd like it to look like this."

"Jack!" you giggle, the speed and suddenness of the movement almost meerkat like in the most adorable, Jack way. Only he could make you laugh coming off of feeling how you were at the same time he's winding you toward an orgasm you know is likely to hit you so hard you'll be half asleep by the time he gets to fucking you, something you're more than okay with. "Part of being together is seeing you!"

You push the comforter back until silver curls come into view and Jack looks up at you. That giggle is everything to him. He got you to laugh.

"Seeing me or seeing my curls between your legs?" he smirks up at you.

"Same thing, isn't it? Your curls are you." Your breathing picks up as Jack lowers his mouth back down, the stubble on his jaw brushing over your clit and sending sparks of pleasure shivering up your spine.

He shrugs in feigned nonchalance, knows exactly what he's doing to you. "I think me suggests my eyes."

"Then look at me while you start putting us to sleep," you breathe.

Jack's eyes darken. "Kinky," he murmurs. "I like it. Just remember," he finally gives your clit a proper suck and swirl of his tongue, making you moan so beautifully for him, "you suggested it. And since you did I expect you to keep your eyes open and on mine the entire time, pretty girl."

I need him desperately. Jack Abbot where are you?! 😩😭 I hope it was okay and that you enjoyed! And we all deserve this kind of love. Thank you again for all of your support and for reading, I truly appreciate it and your notes!! ♥️

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Another tear lands on your phone's screen as your thumb hovers just above his name on your favorites. You hate doing this to him and it's so childish. You should be able to get it together, to just pull yourself together long enough to make the short drive home. But you've been trying to do that for ten minutes now and you just want to be with Jack and home and not here crying in your car alone.

You sniffle hard and pull yourself together enough so you're not actively sobbing when he answers the phone. Jack smiles when he sees your face light up his phone. You must be calling to let him know you're on your way home. He picks up on the first ring. "Hi Beautiful, you on your way home?"

"Jack." You don't have to say anything else. Jack already knows, is already sitting up on the couch and reaching for his prosthetic where it's resting by the side of the couch.

He needs to get to you. Now. Your pain is so clear in your voice, he can picture the tears he knows are streaming down your face silently for now.

His tone changes immediately, still soft but so concerned, so knowing. "What's wrong, Baby? Where are you?"

You can hear shuffling and you know he's getting his prosthetic on as he holds his phone to his ear with his shoulder. It's what makes you crack again because why are you doing this to him? Why can't you just be fucking normal?

"In my, my car," your voice gets a little higher pitched with every word as you lose your ability to regulate again, "at, at work. I can't stop, Jack, I can't stop crying enough to drive safely. I've been try, trying and I just can't."

"Okay, that's okay Sweetheart, I'm on my way." Jack shoves the key into the lock the second the door is closed and turns it to lock your place up, takes off at a fast walk towards his car. "Did something happen?" He's turned his voice into something lower now, something soothing that makes you feel not so alone.

"No," you sniffle, take in a slightly wracked breath, "just the w-week and, and…" You trail off into sobs you muffle with your hand, sobs Jack knows you're muffling.

He knows the kind of week it's been for you. A week where everything that could and should be relatively straightforward and smooth was a totally unnecessarily difficult clusterfuck deluxe. A week where anyone and everyone who could possibly try you did, that any issue or minor emergency that could happen, happened. A week where you stayed stupidly late and came home to sleep for a couple of hours just to turn around and go back in early.

You'd been so drained by the time you got home each night you just wanted to get straight into bed with him. He was more than happy to oblige after he coaxed you to eat a little dinner for him. You were both glad that Tuesday was his last shift for the rest of the week because with how late you stayed and how early you had to go in, you didn't see him Monday or Tuesday.

"I'm so-so-sorry." Getting out the last word is a struggle and your voice is so high-pitched it's almost inaudible.

"Don't be," Jack soothes you through the phone. "You have nothing to be sorry for, Baby. You can call me even earlier next time, okay? I'm going to stay on the phone but it's going to cut out for a second once I start the car while my phone connects."

"Okay." You choke on the word, end up coughing through full body sobs and god if you don't feel completely fucking ridiculous. There is absolutely no fucking reason for this.

Jack cringes at the sound because he hates hearing you this sad. Hates that he isn't already there with you, that he didn't think to drive you in and pick you up the last couple of days. "Alright, Sweetheart, I'm back and on my way."

"You have to drive safe," you whimper. "Don't wreck trying to, to get here fast because, because I won't survive you getting hurt or losing you, I sw-swear to god Jack," you choke on a sob, "I'm barely holding, holding on. I need you."

Jack's heart breaks even further at your love for him and at the palpable and encompassing sadness in your voice. "I won't, I promise. I'll be safe. You have your car doors locked?"

"Yeah," you whisper. And you genuinely do. A part of you wants to unlock them, hopes that someone will come and carjack you and kill you because then you won't have to go through this yourself or put Jack through it anymore.

You know that's not true, know that anything happening to you would devastate Jack the way something happening to him would devastate you, even if that's hard for you to believe at times because you can't wrap your mind around why he loves you. Why he put himself through this type of shit that you pull.

"Hey," he says softly. "I know it probably doesn't feel like it right now, but everything will be okay and you'll get through this. I'll make sure of it. That doesn't mean it won't suck and you won't feel like shit, I know, I just want you to know. We'll get you through this."

The sob you let out is muffled and Jack knows you probably moved your phone away from you and covered your mouth. "I," you try to start after a couple of seconds. You have to pause so that you can muffle another sob and try to pull yourself together so that you can actually talk. "I hate that you have to."

"I don't have to do anything, Baby. I choose to because I love you and choose to love you even with as natural and fated by the universe as loving you is. I don't feel forced and I'm not forced." Jack knows that your brain is manifesting your week through this and shifting to spiral over this because it's easier in a sense to deal with than everything that happened at work this week that you're trying to process through. This is something it's easy to get reassurance for and process through and is much, much more controllable. It doesn't hurt any less or make you any less sad or anxious or burnt out, and it's not any easier to go through, it's just more tangible almost.

He's never been more glad that you don't work too far away, that it's not like he has to drive an hour to get you. And he thanks whatever and whoever is out there that he's hitting every green light and that somehow traffic this Friday evening isn't bad.

There's silence on your end of the line for a moment and it would be eerie and unsettling if Jack wasn't sure you'd just muted yourself so that you could get out whatever sob and tears you needed to without him hearing. Jack clenches his jaw and rolls it. He hates whoever made you feel like you have to apologize for feeling your feelings and expressing them and for crying. He'd love to just have thirty seconds alone with them.

You want to tell Jack never mind. That he can turn around, you're fine and you'll see him at home soon, you were just being dramatic and having a moment and you're fine and everything is fine. But you can't bring yourself to say the words because as much as it's not a lie in a sense because you know he'll know it's not true, it's still not the truth. You're not fine and everything isn't fine. It doesn't feel like anything is fine.

It feels like you're going to lose Jack because you're so much fucking work and ridiculous and dramatic and why would he continue to put up with you? What do you really bring to the table and offer him? What do you do for him other than create more work?

Your engagement ring feels so heavy on your finger, not because it's perfect and sparkly and everything you ever wanted, though it absolutely is. It feels so heavy because you feel so undeserving of it, of Jack and his love and the way he knows you so well, better than you know yourself.

It doesn't occur to you that you know him just as well and that he feels this exact same way at times.

The sound of your ragged breathing becomes audible again and a few seconds later you're able to talk.

"I just can't Jack," you whisper through a sniffle.

You hate everything right now. Everything except Jack.

And you hate yourself the most.

Jack can tell. He can hear it in your voice, how much you're beating yourself up inside right now, how much you're beating yourself up, how hard you're trying not to tell him that you're fine and he can turn around. He can hear how much you hate yourself and it's like a knife slowly carving away at his heart.

"I know Baby," he murmurs just loud enough for you to hear as he pulls into the parking lot. "And it's okay that you can't." Jack pulls up beside you so that his passenger side door is next to your driver's side door, looks over at you and smiles as he puts it into park. "I'm hanging up now Baby, I'll see you in just a second."

Jack hangs up and leaves his car on so the AC stays running and gets out and over to your door. Some scared piece of you almost wants to fight it and not unlock your door, and tell him it's okay, you'll figure it out and pull yourself together and get home and you're sorry he drove here. But a bigger piece of you, the overwhelming majority of you, wants nothing more than to be wrapped up in and as close as physically possible to Jack as you can be, so when he gets close you unlock your doors for him.

"Hi Beautiful," Jack greets you once he has the door open. As much as he hates hearing you sad and being away from you when you are, he hates hearing you sad and being right next to you and seeing how sad you are just as much. Tears stain your face, your eyes bloodshot and swollen, your lips and nose swollen too. He means it as more than a pet name though. You're still nothing short of beautiful to him right now, even if there's an aching sadness with it.

You shake your head at him because he's so wrong. You're not remotely beautiful right now, inside or out. You shouldn't be like this, shouldn't be complaining about your job and your week to him of all people. You know Jack doesn't think about it like that and would hate to find out that you do, but you can't help it. You should be better. You shouldn't have needed him to put his prosthetic back on when he was having a nice day at home chilling without it and drive down here just to hold you while you cry.

It's pathetic. You're pathetic.

Somewhere deep down you know Jack would hate to find out that you think it and you are pathetic.

"Yes, Baby," Jack murmurs in response to you shaking your head. He leans in and presses a soft kiss to your lips, doesn't force too much of his affection on you when you're crying and struggling and he can tell you feel like you don't deserve it, just enough for you to know he wants to kiss you and that he means it and that he loves you.

As Jack leans back you follow him, let your feet hit the ground and push you up into his arms that automatically open to catch you. You need just need to be close to him. Now that you've had him close, any distance between you feels unbearable.

You all but collapse into his arms, your tears starting up again just as hard as they were before you call him. They're for everything. For the way Jack calls you beautiful like it's your name and means it. For the way you feel anything but beautiful right now. For this man who keeps you standing literally and metaphorically. For this week that's done it's best to level you. For how perfectly Jack treats you and takes care of you, and how much he loves you. For how pathetic and unworthy of that treatment you feel, and how you don't understand why he loves you when you're so difficult and so much work.

"Alright, Sweetheart, I've got you," Jack whispers. He wraps his arms around you tightly and helps hold you up as you melt into him. He kisses the top of your head as you bury your face in his chest and lose it.

Jack holds you like that for a minute before he starts to rock you and slowly shuffle the two of you so that you change spots and he can reach into the car and grab your purse. Once he has it he walks you backwards slowly and shuts your door and locks your car.

He walks you both a little further so that he can open the back door to his Range Rover. "Come on, Baby," he presses a kiss to the top of your head again and rubs your back, "get in the back for me, yeah?"

You cling to him as he tries to pull away, terrified of there being more than an inch between the two of you right now. "Why?" you sniffle, momentarily not completely sobbing.

Jack brings a hand down and hooks his index finger under your chin and gently tilts your face up to look at him. He gives you a reassuring smile. "Because I can hold you better back there and it's private."

You look at him for a moment and your bottom lip and chin tremble so hard as tears line your eyes that it makes his heart ache. You look so terribly and sadly adorable and it just makes how much he loves you hit him even harder and makes him more determined to get you feeling better and make you happy. He doesn't realize that even though you're crying, he's already made you feel better and happier just by being here and coming to you without you having to ask and giving you a safe space to let yourself give into how shitty you feel in every sense.

Jack's sweetness and thoughtfulness make you start to cry even harder as you climb in the back like he asked. You sit awkwardly in the middle seat as he gets in and shuts the door, sets your purse down and gets himself comfortable.

"Alright, you, come here." He reaches out and hooks an arm around your waist and starts to pull you closer to him.

You don't need asked twice, move over to him and crawl onto his lap so quickly his arm barely touches you and he smiles to himself. As Jack reclines the seat so that you can fall into him a bit more you spread your legs out across the seats and snuggle into him as close as you can, your sobs getting harder when he wraps his arms around you and holds you tightly, helps you settle in perfectly to your favorite place in the whole world where you feel safe in every sense of the word and loved and like you could probably survive just about anything as long as you had Jack and his arms and neck and chest and lap to hide from the world in.

"Okay Baby," Jack murmurs once you're settled in his lap and clinging to his shirt as you sob into his neck with your head tucked under the corner of his jaw. "I'm here. It's okay, it's all going to be okay, I promise."

You shake your head against him because as much as you know Jack would never lie to you, it doesn't feel like it in this moment, it doesn't feel like anything will ever be okay again. And Jack knows. He knows it doesn't feel like it. So he doesn't push it, doesn't try to talk you into believing him. He just lets you be. Lets you exist just as you are. Lets you feel what you're feeling without any pushback.

Even though you've been together years, it still always surprises you, the way he lets you just feel and holds you close as you do.

You let yourself give in for thirty seconds or so and then you start to fight your sobs so that you can explain yourself to him even though you know you don't have to, that you never have to explain yourself to Jack.

"I," you hiccup out, trying so hard to get yourself together so you can explain and stop crying and stop making Jack deal with you. "I, I'm, I…" You choke over the simple words, coughing and struggling to breathe

"Shh," Jack soothes you, moves one of his hands so it can rub up and down your back. "You don't have to talk about it right now, okay? We can talk later if and when you're ready and doing a little better. Just let it all out, I've got you. I've got you."

You want to fight it, want to keep pushing yourself to talk and explain and apologize because even though Jack has never asked you to, never told you that you needed to or made you feel like you needed to, even though he's never gotten mad or upset at you when you get like this, you still feel the urge to. The scars left by those who came before him are still there. It's a testament to just how much Jack has healed you that you cry in front of him, that you let yourself get like this in front of him, that you call him when you're like this and let yourself seek out his comfort and trust and know that he won't turn you away or yell at you or make fun of you or use it against you down the road.

Eventually your tears stop. You're pretty sure it's less that you've cried yourself out and are in a better headspace and more that you just physically ran out of tears and exhausted out. Jack's pretty sure that's the case too because your tears don't trail off how they usually do when you've had the cry you needed. This is far more abrupt, closer to a flip of a switch.

Jack doesn't rush you to be ready to talk or get out of his lap so he can drive you guys home or to do anything. He just keeps holding you and continues to rub your back while you sniffle and try to compose yourself. And even once your sniffling has stopped and you're just resting in his arms against him he doesn't rush you. He never would. If he had it his way you'd never have to leave his arms.

After a few moments of sitting in Jack's lap quietly you find it within you to pull your head back and look at him sheepishly.

Jack melts even more somehow, smiles at you softly and presses a kiss to your forehead. "Hi, pretty girl," he murmurs.

You can't bring yourself to even shake your head to argue with him. You don't want to put him through more than you already have tonight and don't want it to seem like you're doing this deliberately for attention or compliments.

"Hi handsome," you whisper back. It takes everything in you to keep yourself looking at him and not immediately nuzzle your face back into his neck to hide.

"Can I have a kiss?"

You swallow hard and give him a short nod, not because you want to say no, it's the exact opposite, you want to scream yes and let the man kiss you until everything makes sense and feels okay again. You just don't feel like you deserve it. "If you want."

"I always want kisses from you and to kiss you." Jack gives you a lopsided smile. He doesn't ask if you want kisses because he knows that you do, knows that what could be perceived as a lack of enthusiasm is actually just you feeling like you don't deserve him or his love or affection.

Jack slides his hand up to the back of your neck and gently pulls your face to his, kisses you so softly to start to help you ease into accepting his affection right now that if you had any tears left you know you'd be crying again. The more you relax into him and let yourself accept Jack's affection as you pour it back into him, the deeper Jack kisses you.

He nuzzles his nose into yours for a second when you break apart and rubs his thumb just below your ear as you pull your face back to look at him, cheeks tear stained and eyes and nose and lips still so adorably swollen. "Thank you for calling me and not trying to drive while crying like that." He raises his eyebrows at you gently, his other hand giving your hip an affectionate and reassuring squeeze before he reference what you said earlier while he was driving here. "I need you too."

You shrug shallowly because you weren't even thinking about it like that when you called.

"I do," he whispers, nodding at you. "More than you'll ever know and just as much as you need me. Promise." Jack leans up and gives you a quick kiss. "How about we head home? We'll come back and get it tomorrow, okay? It won't get towed with your permit."

"Okay," you whisper back, nodding.

Jack puts the seat back up and you shift off his lap so that he can get out of the car. Once he's out He holds his hand out for you even though you don't really need it or his help getting out of the car. You take it anyway, let him help you out and close the door behind you before you both take a few steps up and Jack opens the passenger side door for you like he always does.

Even though there's silence as Jack holds your hand and helps you into the passenger seat it's still meaningful, he still has this way of silently almost speaking with his body and how he looks at you that makes you feel wrapped in his love the way you would if he was verbally professing it to you over and over. Before he shuts the door he leans in and presses the sweetest kiss to your forehead, gives you a small smile that reassures you everything will be okay, that you'll be able to undo the knots your mind has gotten itself into.

Jack carefully shuts the door and you pull your seatbelt on as he walks around to the driver's side. Before he buckles himself in he reaches back and grabs your purse, pulls out a couple of tissues and hands you them. He sets your purse down, buckles his seatbelt and then puts it in reverse and starts the drive home.

He doesn't make you talk about it as he drives, knows it's not the time or the place. It's one of those small things that means the world to you and it reminds you how well he knows you and how much he loves you. Instead of making you talk about it, Jack chatters to you like he normally will when you guys are driving, but this time he doesn't expect you to chat back. His hand stays on your thigh or holding your hand and bringing it up to his lips to presses kisses to the entire drive home.

The entire thing is so normal and it helps more than you think Jack could ever truly understand. Nothing feels forced or like he's making these huge gestures or going out of his way which is exactly what you need. Because you don't feel like you deserve any of that and so him doing those kinds of things would almost make things harder for you in a way. You don't really even feel like you deserve normalcy, but you're at least able to accept it without panicking.

Once Jack's parket he walks around and opens your door for you, grabs your purse and helps you out of the car. You feel a little zombie-like walking into your shared apartment. You're not sure what you want or need and are too tired and fuzzy brained from all the crying to even try to figure it out.

But Jack, Jack knows exactly what you want and what you need.

He could just give it to you. You wouldn't necessarily mind if he did. But Jack knows that part of what you need right now is control without having to really make any decisions. So he makes the decisions and offers them to you so that you feel like you're in control without the agony of having to make any choices or real decisions that will just make you feel worse and exacerbate the decision fatigue already plaguing you after this week.

"You wanna chill on the couch for a bit?" Jack asks as you both finish getting your shoes off.

You take a couple of steps into the living room and stop to look at the couch. You want to be close to Jack as selfish as it feels, as undeserving as you feel. "Yeah, I guess," you murmur.

Jack walks up behind you and snakes his arms around your tummy, pulls you back into him and hunches and rests his chin on your shoulder. He presses a few kisses to the side of your neck, lets his lips linger on the last one almost like he's feeling your pulse under his lips. "I'm going to go get you some water first." He presses a kiss to your cheek as he squeezes you a little in a tight hug. "I love you so much Baby, no matter how you're feeling and whether you feel like you deserve it. I love you."

Your chin trembles a little and you take in a deep shaky breath. You bring your hand up and cup the side of Jack's face. "I love you so much too. Thank you."

"Of course," he murmurs. Jack presses another kiss to your cheek and then turns his head to press one into the palm of your hand. He's quick to make his way to your kitchen and grab you a glass of water.

You try to get yourself to go sit on the couch but you can't seem to for some reason, end up just standing there almost awkwardly in your own space as you wait for Jack to return. When he returns you take a few sips for him, always surprised at how much better those few sips make you feel. You set the glass on a coaster on the coffee table once you've had enough.

Jack is waiting for you with a smile when you turn back to face him. His hands find the hem of your shirt and start to pull it off you and you raise your arms to help, trusting whatever his plan is. Once he has your shirt off he sits down on the edge of the couch and you watch as he takes his prosthetic off before beckoning you to him with a finger.

You step between his legs and like with your shirt, you trust him when he pulls your pants down and step out of them and kick them to side where he tossed your shirt. Jack grabs a blanket and holds it open for you and your chin trembles again because he knows just what you need and gives it to you so freely and without you having to ask.

Neither you nor Jack say a word as you help him get you wrapped up in a blanket burrito and gets you situated to that you're on your side on the couch, your back to the cushions. He lays on his side next to you and pulls your bundled form against him, holds you tight. You wiggle to get comfortable and bury your face into his chest breathing getting heavier as you feel the tears coming again.

Jack knows it. He's known this is what would happen the entire time and as much as he doesn't want you to cry and be upset, it's what he wants to happen. He wants you to cry again, let yourself come all the way apart in his arms so that he can help put you back together again. He knows you won't be able to move past it all and start to heal and recover from the week until you get it all out of your system.

"I'm here, Baby. Let yourself cry, try not to fight it," he murmurs. "It's okay, I promise it's okay." He brings his chin to his neck so that he can nuzzle his nose into your hair and give you kisses there.

It works. By the third or so kiss you're fully sobbing into him again and it drives you insane because as much as you know why in a sense, you also feel like you have no idea why you're like this and needing to cry so much.

After a couple of minutes you have to just say it, acknowledge the truth, or at least what feels like the truth. "This is, this is so dumb, Jack," you choke out between sobs. "It's so dumb, and, and stupid," you take in a huge breath of air that makes you cough on top of the sobs, "and, and ridiculous and I know it, know it and still can't stop."

"I know it feels like that's true and that's valid, but it's not any of those things, Baby, I promise," he soothes you, runs a hand up and down your back over the blanket while the other keeps you held tightly to him. "It's human."

You shake your head against him but don't verbally argue with him, just go back to the tears you can't seem to stop, the tears that feel so incredibly unfair to Jack. He should be relaxing while he's off, and you guys should be starting your weekend together doing something fun, go on a date or something like you talked about last week. But instead he's having to work essentially, having to take care of you, and the two of you aren't going out and you're making your weekend off together start in one of the shittiest ways.

Your tears do eventually start to trail off. Neither you nor Jack know how long it's taken to get here and it doesn't really matter in the end. It took as long as it did and you're here now, your body and mind working to regulate as opposed to a fairly abrupt stop like in the car where your body just gave out. Jack knows it means you've finally gotten it all out, have shed all the tears you need to right now.

He knows it means you're feeling broken right now and that you're not sure how to even start picking up the pieces. But the thing is you do know how to start. Before Jack you had to do this alone, had to sob on your couch alone and then figure out how to make yourself better. The difference is that now you don't need to know. You don't need to figure it out. Because Jack knows and he'll help you, take care of you and give you what you want and what you need and help put you back together again and get back to feeling normal.

The two of you sit lay in silence for a bit once you've gotten your breathing under control, the only sounds the occasional sniffle from you or soft popping of Jack's lips as he presses more kisses to the top of your head. You take in and let out a deep breath before pulling your head back so that you can see him.

"Hi again, Beautiful," Jack smiles at you.

You want to argue but don't have the energy to. "Hi," you whisper, voice raw and nasally.

Jack doesn't say anything for a minute, just looks at you and strokes your hair. The look he gives you speaks volumes though, is so clearly him telling you that if and when you're ready to talk, he's hear to listen.

You give him one of the smallest, saddest smiles Jack's ever seen from you. "I love you," you murmur to him, lean your head up and push your lips out.

"I love you too." Jack smiles even brighter as he moves his head down to give you the kisses you seek.

"How about we order some food and then go shower the week off you? We can eat dinner in bed once it's here and then cuddle and watch something or talk if you want, get you off to dreamland to help you catch up on some sleep," Jack suggests once you've had your fill of kisses.

"Okay," you murmur with a small nod, still sounding so achingly forlorn and sad that it kills him. You're not sure you agree with that last part of his suggestion. You don't want to sleep any time soon. You want to be awake with him, spending time with him and enjoying him. You've missed him.

Jack grabs his phone out of his pocket and rests his hand on your side as he orders. After he finishes ordering he slips his phone back in his pocket and gives you one last lingering kiss. He pulls his one arm from under you and sits up, helps get you out of the blanket burrito he put you in.

The two of you head into your room and Jack crutches into the bathroom to turn the shower on. You pad into the bathroom behind him, don't want to be away from him really. You cringe internally at how clingy that is, wonder if that's what will push it over and make it all too much for him. Make you too much for him.

But all that happens when Jack turns around and sees you is a smile breaking over his face. You can't help but smile a little at it because he just looks so god damned happy to see you. Even when you're like this, being like this for him.

You walk closer to him and let your fingers play with the hem of his shirt. "Can I?"

"I'd love that," he nods, gives you a little, playful smirk.

You take your time stripping him, take such care like you always do when you strip him while he's standing with his crutches. Once you've got him fully stripped Jack takes your bra off, dips his thumbs under the waistband of your underwear and starts pushing them down, your clothes a heap off to the side of the bathroom where they won't get wet.

There's something about the way you look when your eyes roam his body that makes Jack frown to himself. There's an air of unworthiness about it, something that couldn't be further from the truth in his mind.

"You okay, Baby?" he asks quietly.

You press your lips together and out to one side and nod. "I just wish I wasn't like this for you," you whisper, stepping closer to him and resting your head against his chest as you stand outside the shower.

"You're not like anything," he murmurs. "You're just you. My girl. All I need to live."

You let out a shaky breath and then turn and press a kiss to his chest. His words are so very hard to accept but you know he truly means them the same way you mean them when you tell him the same.

You both get in the shower and Jack holds you on his lap while you soak in near scalding water for a bit. Eventually he washes you, takes his time with your hair and then your body, lets you do the same to him because he knows you need it and want it.

It doesn't take too long for the food Jack had ordered to arrive once you're out of the shower and in bed, dressed in one of Jack's old shirts and nothing else. Jack's in just a pair of sweatpants but throws a shirt on when the knock on the door signals the food has arrived. He crutches out and grabs the bag while you grab an old towel and spread it out on the bed.

You almost start crying again when you see what Jack ordered. Your favorite comfort meal. And you know the smaller box he sets off to the side is your favorite dessert.

"Jack…." you whisper, looking at him almost helplessly but with the same love in your eyes that he recognizes as the love in his when he looks at you.

He just smiles at you, leans over and gives you a kiss. "I love you."

"I know." You reach out and squeeze his thigh. "You make sure I know. And I love you too."

Jack grins at you and winks. "I know."

You watch TV and chat about whatever happens to come up as you eat, make Jack let you help clean up once you've both finished. You both strip again once you're back in your room and crawl into bed under the covers together on your sides.

Your legs tangle together and torsos press together as you settle, TV off because Jack can feel that you want to talk now and he's hoping after you do he can get you to sleep early to help you recover.

There's silence for a few minutes as you just look at each other, Jack's hand running up and down your side and yours playing with the fingers of his bottom hand.

"I don't know Jack," you finally whisper, trying to sort through your mind and figure out where to even start. "It was just a long week and I've been walling it off the whole time because I had to keep it together. But then today, when it was finally over at least somewhat, I got in the car and just…. fell apart. It's just so much, work, this job is just so much. It's so fucking much sometimes. And I know yours is too, I know that, I do. I know yours can be so so fucking much sometimes."

Jack knows you're about so start comparing your jobs, about to start writing yours off as not as bad and easier and less to deal with and less traumatic. And that's just not true. Your job can be just like his. You see different things most of the time, sure, but that's exactly why it's impossible to compare the two.

Honestly sometimes Jack thinks your job is more than his, is worse and harder and far more to deal with and more traumatic. Most of the time he's not sure how you deal with it which is kind of ironic because him and his love are the vast majority of how you're able to deal with it and cope and keep going.

In any event, he's not going to let you compare and minimize your job and its stressors and trauma and how fucking hard and how fucking much it can be. It deserves to be recognized. You deserve to be recognized for surviving it. You deserve to let out the bad week however you need to. He's not going to let you try to wipe it away and apologize for being affected by it.

"Yeah," he nods. "And that's why you take care of me and hold me like I held you in the car and am holding you now when it's too much for me and I need to let some of it out. Your job is just as much, it's just a different kind of much. My job can be a lot and so much and so can yours. I can need to have a breakdown sometimes and so can you. My job being a lot sometimes doesn't means yours isn't or can't be. My job isn't worse or harder than yours. They both have their moments and weeks and times when we don't know why we're doing them and times where it just all makes so much fucking sense. They're both jobs of high highs and low lows."

"Yeah…." You chew on the inside of your cheek and look at his chest. You know he's right but in the moment it's hard to accept. It makes sense why Jack's work gets to him like this sometimes. It doesn't feel like it makes sense why yours gets to you like this. Objectively and logically you can see it, you understand why it does, and if Jack had your job you'd say it makes sense why it gets to him like this sometimes. But emotionally your brain doesn't let you accept it. It's different. You should be able to handle it, especially in the shadow of Jack's job. You know he'd hate hearing that if you ever said it out loud, and would disagree vehemently. It's just hard to think otherwise. "I don't know," you sigh. "I'm being dramatic and I hate it."

Jack pushes his bottom lip out slightly and shakes his head. "No you're not. You're feeling your feelings. Please don't self-invalidate, Baby. You're allowed to feel what you feel at the intensity you're feeling it at. I want you to, especially right here with me so I can take care of you and keep you safe and help keep you as grounded as possible and as comforted as possible."

You shrug. "It's still being dramatic. It's dramatic and it's unfair to you. When I was in the car and you asked if I had the doors locked, I did, I promise I did, I just thought about how I'd like to unlock them and hope…" You let out a breath and shake your head slightly. You know how much this will hurt him. "And hope someone came along and car jacked me and killed me because then I wouldn't have to put either of us through this ever again, and that's dramatic, Jack. That's dramatic. Because I know what that would do to you. I know. I know because I think about the reverse with you dying and I, I can't Jack, I can't, and so yes. Yes, I'm being dramatic."

"You're not, Sweetheart." Jack swallows hard as your words sink in and his mind goes there. It's hard to hear of course, harder to think about really happening. He can't imagine getting that phone call or driving up to that scene and having to try to save you, having to get covered in your blood. Well. Maybe it's not that he can't imagine but that he can and it's unspeakably awful and horrific and makes him nauseous. "You're just feeling what you feel. That's valid. You're allowed to feel it all.

"It's dumb Jack," you huff a laugh at yourself and shake your head. "There's no reason for me to feel like this.

"Sweetheart," Jack runs his hand up your side to cup your face. "Yes there is. And even if there wasn't, that's okay too. You're allowed to feel like this or however you feel for any reason or no reason." He looks away from you for a second as he gathers his thoughts, in one of those ways that tells you he's thinking of how to phrase something incredibly serious to him. He looks back at you. "You deal with a lot at work, you see a lot. You do so much. You take on so much and you do things for other people even when you're slammed yourself. You're incredibly empathetic and an emotional sponge and so giving and I love that about you, I love that about you so much. But that's hard at the best of times, and with your job it's…." he trails off, unable to find the word he wants that conveys the right gravity. "You give so much, so so much of yourself to everyone and everything you do because it matters to you and you care and you'd rather run yourself into the ground than watch someone else struggle or have to work hard enough to run themselves into the ground."

You shrug again. You're trying to take his words to heart and you know you are, even if your brain can't consciously process it right now. You want to say something in response but you're not sure what. What do you say to that? To all those compliments it feels like you don't deserve, to the way this man loves you so fucking much at your worst.

Jack gives you a moment to respond and then continues when you don't, doesn't want you to feel pressured to come up with something to say. "Part of it is that you're exhausted, Sweetheart. You're running on empty, in every way, physically and emotionally and spiritually. You haven't gotten much sleep this week and I'm sure what you have gotten hasn't been the best quality with all the stress."

"I mean I let myself give into it, Jack," you admit. "I let myself give into the feelings and lean into them and let myself cry and be miserable and do all this shit because I know you're here and will take care of me and that's unfair. It's totally unfair and it's, it's… gross of me."

"Baby," Jack gives you a small, knowing smile, "that's the whole point. That's what I want you to do, my silly, silly girl."

"It's unfair to you!"

"No, Baby, it's not. Just like it isn't unfair when I give into my feelings and lean into them because I know you're here to take care of me. I do the same." Jack squeezes the side of your face softly and starts running his hand up and down your side again. "That's what you should do. That's part of what a relationship is, being able to just give into it all and have those feelings because you know your partner's got you. I think that's healthy."

"How much longer can you keep doing this, Jack? Just like realistically. How many times can I ask you to do this before it's too much." You look away from him and down at your hand that you pull from his. "Before I'm too much."

"I don't feel like I'm doing anything, Sweetheart. But I guess to the extent I am, I can keep doing it for you until I die. You're never going to become too much for me." Jack desperately wants to ask you to look at him but he knows it's not what you need right now as much as he's itching for eye contact. "You haven't asked me to do anything. You didn't even ask me to come get you. I just did. I could've tried to talk you down over the phone. I wanted to come. I chose to. You didn't ask. And even if you had asked, that would be more than okay."

You look back up at him and some part of Jack melts in relief. "I mean I knew you would come, so it was kind of me asking even if not explicitly."

"I know it's upsetting to you, Beautiful, and I'm not making light of it or trying to wipe your feelings away but to me, it's like… good. I'm glad you knew. I'm so fucking glad you knew. You genuinely have no fucking idea how happy that makes me." Jack seems to grow almost teary as he speaks, his voice wet with emotion that matches the glass to his eyes. You bring your hand up and rest it on the side of his neck, brush your thumb along his jawline comfortingly.

"I know your past has taught you differently but you're allowed to feel and you're allowed to need me and to need to fall into me and need all the help in the world. It doesn't make you too much and it never will. Obviously I don't like you feeling like this, I hate it and I wish I could take it away and feel it for you, god knows I would in a second if I could. But you picking up the phone and calling me, you crying into me and letting yourself come completely apart in my arms and turning to me for comfort, it makes me so incredibly happy and content to know that you feel safe enough and loved enough to do that." Jack smiles at you, looks at you like he can't believe you're real and his. "And everything that you're worried makes or will make you too much and will make me get tired and be done with you and leave one day, it's the opposite for me. Your vulnerability and your humanness and your trust, and you giving me the privilege of getting to love you and hold you through your worst moments and days, that just makes me love you all the more, even when it feels like there's no possible way I could love you more. You always surprise me."

"Jack," you swallow down his name in a whisper. You struggle to come up with something to say to that because it's so beautiful and he loves you so much and your brain is processing so much under the surface and he's right. You're exhausted and feeling it far more acutely.

"You don't have to say anything," he whispers back with a nod. "Just know that this is all okay and we're okay and I'm not going anywhere."

"I know." You give him a flash of a genuine smile, about all you can manage at this point. "Thank you. I love you."

"I love you too." Jack leans forward and seals his words with a lingering kiss.

"Hey Jack?" It seems silly to start that way as you break apart given that you're both looking at each other and have been talking and to say this all again like you haven't before given how long you've been together. But then you suppose Jack has said everything he's said to you today multiple times over the years.

He raises his eyebrows at you in acknowledgment. "Thank you for… just taking care of me the best you could during the week. I really appreciate you not trying to like interfere with work or tell me I can't do this or go on about how unhealthy it is because that just makes me feel worse. And thank you for not accusing me of cheating or something because I had to stay late at work. You were just supportive and made sure I ate and got as much sleep as I could and did whatever you could for me and you have no idea how much I appreciate that."

"You're welcome. I never want you to feel worse. I know it's not something you're doing out of choice and that it's just reality and what has to happen. Even if I hate it like you do too." He leans in for another kiss. He can tell it's time to move the conversation along a bit, that your brain has more or less reached its maximum capacity for this kind of talk tonight. "You should get some sleep. I can see you're sleepy," he smirks playfully.

You grumble a little as you pout, giving into the sleepiness and the relative relaxation that's taken over you since your talk. "I don't wanna sleep. I miss you and I've missed you all week. I'm sorry I was away so much."

"Don't apologize, Baby, it's not your fault. You didn't do it deliberately." Jack's hand that's been running up and down your side continues too but moves a little toward the center of you so that his fingers trail along the edge of your breast and brush teasingly at the crease of your hip. "We have all weekend together. You'll enjoy our time together so much more when you're not exhausted. And I'll still be here. You can sleep in my arms and I'm sure I'll fall asleep soon too. That's still spending time together to me."

"Yeah," you draw the word out. "But it's not the same."

Jack nods slowly, a mischievous and playful smirk pulling onto his face. He leans back in and kisses you again, rolls you onto your back slowly as his tongue dips into your mouth and he groans, continues to make out with you, relishing in the way your hands feel roaming his body. "Well," he pants softly when you break apart for air, "what if we spent some more time together while I put us both to sleep?"

You bite your lip and smile. "And what would that look like?"

"Oh," he laughs under his breath, "I have an idea or two."

"Yeah?" Your chest heaves a little and Jack ducks his head down and takes one of your nipples into his mouth and teases it as you moan softly for him before kissing up your chest and neck to your lips where he makes out with you again.

"Yeah," he mumbles against your lips, rolls his hips into yours so you can feel how hard he is for you. "Could look like this." He adjusts his hips and runs his cock through you, lets his head bump against your clit and pull sounds of pleasure from both of you.

"Or," he stills his hips, "like this."

Jack dives backward under the comforter, large hands holding onto your thighs and keeping them spread for him as he kisses you cunt to clit. "Yeah," his voice is muffled by the comforter that's over him, "I think I'd like it to look like this. I really think," he presses another kiss to your clit, "I'd like it to look like this."

"Jack!" you giggle, the speed and suddenness of the movement almost meerkat like in the most adorable, Jack way. Only he could make you laugh coming off of feeling how you were at the same time he's winding you toward an orgasm you know is likely to hit you so hard you'll be half asleep by the time he gets to fucking you, something you're more than okay with. "Part of being together is seeing you!"

You push the comforter back until silver curls come into view and Jack looks up at you. That giggle is everything to him. He got you to laugh.

"Seeing me or seeing my curls between your legs?" he smirks up at you.

"Same thing, isn't it? Your curls are you." Your breathing picks up as Jack lowers his mouth back down, the stubble on his jaw brushing over your clit and sending sparks of pleasure shivering up your spine.

He shrugs in feigned nonchalance, knows exactly what he's doing to you. "I think me suggests my eyes."

"Then look at me while you start putting us to sleep," you breathe.

Jack's eyes darken. "Kinky," he murmurs. "I like it. Just remember," he finally gives your clit a proper suck and swirl of his tongue, making you moan so beautifully for him, "you suggested it. And since you did I expect you to keep your eyes open and on mine the entire time, pretty girl."

I need him desperately. Jack Abbot where are you?! 😩😭 I hope it was okay and that you enjoyed! And we all deserve this kind of love. Thank you again for all of your support and for reading, I truly appreciate it and your notes!! ♥️

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Another tear lands on your phone's screen as your thumb hovers just above his name on your favorites. You hate doing this to him and it's so childish. You should be able to get it together, to just pull yourself together long enough to make the short drive home. But you've been trying to do that for ten minutes now and you just want to be with Jack and home and not here crying in your car alone.

You sniffle hard and pull yourself together enough so you're not actively sobbing when he answers the phone. Jack smiles when he sees your face light up his phone. You must be calling to let him know you're on your way home. He picks up on the first ring. "Hi Beautiful, you on your way home?"

"Jack." You don't have to say anything else. Jack already knows, is already sitting up on the couch and reaching for his prosthetic where it's resting by the side of the couch.

He needs to get to you. Now. Your pain is so clear in your voice, he can picture the tears he knows are streaming down your face silently for now.

His tone changes immediately, still soft but so concerned, so knowing. "What's wrong, Baby? Where are you?"

You can hear shuffling and you know he's getting his prosthetic on as he holds his phone to his ear with his shoulder. It's what makes you crack again because why are you doing this to him? Why can't you just be fucking normal?

"In my, my car," your voice gets a little higher pitched with every word as you lose your ability to regulate again, "at, at work. I can't stop, Jack, I can't stop crying enough to drive safely. I've been try, trying and I just can't."

"Okay, that's okay Sweetheart, I'm on my way." Jack shoves the key into the lock the second the door is closed and turns it to lock your place up, takes off at a fast walk towards his car. "Did something happen?" He's turned his voice into something lower now, something soothing that makes you feel not so alone.

"No," you sniffle, take in a slightly wracked breath, "just the w-week and, and…" You trail off into sobs you muffle with your hand, sobs Jack knows you're muffling.

He knows the kind of week it's been for you. A week where everything that could and should be relatively straightforward and smooth was a totally unnecessarily difficult clusterfuck deluxe. A week where anyone and everyone who could possibly try you did, that any issue or minor emergency that could happen, happened. A week where you stayed stupidly late and came home to sleep for a couple of hours just to turn around and go back in early.

You'd been so drained by the time you got home each night you just wanted to get straight into bed with him. He was more than happy to oblige after he coaxed you to eat a little dinner for him. You were both glad that Tuesday was his last shift for the rest of the week because with how late you stayed and how early you had to go in, you didn't see him Monday or Tuesday.

"I'm so-so-sorry." Getting out the last word is a struggle and your voice is so high-pitched it's almost inaudible.

"Don't be," Jack soothes you through the phone. "You have nothing to be sorry for, Baby. You can call me even earlier next time, okay? I'm going to stay on the phone but it's going to cut out for a second once I start the car while my phone connects."

"Okay." You choke on the word, end up coughing through full body sobs and god if you don't feel completely fucking ridiculous. There is absolutely no fucking reason for this.

Jack cringes at the sound because he hates hearing you this sad. Hates that he isn't already there with you, that he didn't think to drive you in and pick you up the last couple of days. "Alright, Sweetheart, I'm back and on my way."

"You have to drive safe," you whimper. "Don't wreck trying to, to get here fast because, because I won't survive you getting hurt or losing you, I sw-swear to god Jack," you choke on a sob, "I'm barely holding, holding on. I need you."

Jack's heart breaks even further at your love for him and at the palpable and encompassing sadness in your voice. "I won't, I promise. I'll be safe. You have your car doors locked?"

"Yeah," you whisper. And you genuinely do. A part of you wants to unlock them, hopes that someone will come and carjack you and kill you because then you won't have to go through this yourself or put Jack through it anymore.

You know that's not true, know that anything happening to you would devastate Jack the way something happening to him would devastate you, even if that's hard for you to believe at times because you can't wrap your mind around why he loves you. Why he put himself through this type of shit that you pull.

"Hey," he says softly. "I know it probably doesn't feel like it right now, but everything will be okay and you'll get through this. I'll make sure of it. That doesn't mean it won't suck and you won't feel like shit, I know, I just want you to know. We'll get you through this."

The sob you let out is muffled and Jack knows you probably moved your phone away from you and covered your mouth. "I," you try to start after a couple of seconds. You have to pause so that you can muffle another sob and try to pull yourself together so that you can actually talk. "I hate that you have to."

"I don't have to do anything, Baby. I choose to because I love you and choose to love you even with as natural and fated by the universe as loving you is. I don't feel forced and I'm not forced." Jack knows that your brain is manifesting your week through this and shifting to spiral over this because it's easier in a sense to deal with than everything that happened at work this week that you're trying to process through. This is something it's easy to get reassurance for and process through and is much, much more controllable. It doesn't hurt any less or make you any less sad or anxious or burnt out, and it's not any easier to go through, it's just more tangible almost.

He's never been more glad that you don't work too far away, that it's not like he has to drive an hour to get you. And he thanks whatever and whoever is out there that he's hitting every green light and that somehow traffic this Friday evening isn't bad.

There's silence on your end of the line for a moment and it would be eerie and unsettling if Jack wasn't sure you'd just muted yourself so that you could get out whatever sob and tears you needed to without him hearing. Jack clenches his jaw and rolls it. He hates whoever made you feel like you have to apologize for feeling your feelings and expressing them and for crying. He'd love to just have thirty seconds alone with them.

You want to tell Jack never mind. That he can turn around, you're fine and you'll see him at home soon, you were just being dramatic and having a moment and you're fine and everything is fine. But you can't bring yourself to say the words because as much as it's not a lie in a sense because you know he'll know it's not true, it's still not the truth. You're not fine and everything isn't fine. It doesn't feel like anything is fine.

It feels like you're going to lose Jack because you're so much fucking work and ridiculous and dramatic and why would he continue to put up with you? What do you really bring to the table and offer him? What do you do for him other than create more work?

Your engagement ring feels so heavy on your finger, not because it's perfect and sparkly and everything you ever wanted, though it absolutely is. It feels so heavy because you feel so undeserving of it, of Jack and his love and the way he knows you so well, better than you know yourself.

It doesn't occur to you that you know him just as well and that he feels this exact same way at times.

The sound of your ragged breathing becomes audible again and a few seconds later you're able to talk.

"I just can't Jack," you whisper through a sniffle.

You hate everything right now. Everything except Jack.

And you hate yourself the most.

Jack can tell. He can hear it in your voice, how much you're beating yourself up inside right now, how much you're beating yourself up, how hard you're trying not to tell him that you're fine and he can turn around. He can hear how much you hate yourself and it's like a knife slowly carving away at his heart.

"I know Baby," he murmurs just loud enough for you to hear as he pulls into the parking lot. "And it's okay that you can't." Jack pulls up beside you so that his passenger side door is next to your driver's side door, looks over at you and smiles as he puts it into park. "I'm hanging up now Baby, I'll see you in just a second."

Jack hangs up and leaves his car on so the AC stays running and gets out and over to your door. Some scared piece of you almost wants to fight it and not unlock your door, and tell him it's okay, you'll figure it out and pull yourself together and get home and you're sorry he drove here. But a bigger piece of you, the overwhelming majority of you, wants nothing more than to be wrapped up in and as close as physically possible to Jack as you can be, so when he gets close you unlock your doors for him.

"Hi Beautiful," Jack greets you once he has the door open. As much as he hates hearing you sad and being away from you when you are, he hates hearing you sad and being right next to you and seeing how sad you are just as much. Tears stain your face, your eyes bloodshot and swollen, your lips and nose swollen too. He means it as more than a pet name though. You're still nothing short of beautiful to him right now, even if there's an aching sadness with it.

You shake your head at him because he's so wrong. You're not remotely beautiful right now, inside or out. You shouldn't be like this, shouldn't be complaining about your job and your week to him of all people. You know Jack doesn't think about it like that and would hate to find out that you do, but you can't help it. You should be better. You shouldn't have needed him to put his prosthetic back on when he was having a nice day at home chilling without it and drive down here just to hold you while you cry.

It's pathetic. You're pathetic.

Somewhere deep down you know Jack would hate to find out that you think it and you are pathetic.

"Yes, Baby," Jack murmurs in response to you shaking your head. He leans in and presses a soft kiss to your lips, doesn't force too much of his affection on you when you're crying and struggling and he can tell you feel like you don't deserve it, just enough for you to know he wants to kiss you and that he means it and that he loves you.

As Jack leans back you follow him, let your feet hit the ground and push you up into his arms that automatically open to catch you. You need just need to be close to him. Now that you've had him close, any distance between you feels unbearable.

You all but collapse into his arms, your tears starting up again just as hard as they were before you call him. They're for everything. For the way Jack calls you beautiful like it's your name and means it. For the way you feel anything but beautiful right now. For this man who keeps you standing literally and metaphorically. For this week that's done it's best to level you. For how perfectly Jack treats you and takes care of you, and how much he loves you. For how pathetic and unworthy of that treatment you feel, and how you don't understand why he loves you when you're so difficult and so much work.

"Alright, Sweetheart, I've got you," Jack whispers. He wraps his arms around you tightly and helps hold you up as you melt into him. He kisses the top of your head as you bury your face in his chest and lose it.

Jack holds you like that for a minute before he starts to rock you and slowly shuffle the two of you so that you change spots and he can reach into the car and grab your purse. Once he has it he walks you backwards slowly and shuts your door and locks your car.

He walks you both a little further so that he can open the back door to his Range Rover. "Come on, Baby," he presses a kiss to the top of your head again and rubs your back, "get in the back for me, yeah?"

You cling to him as he tries to pull away, terrified of there being more than an inch between the two of you right now. "Why?" you sniffle, momentarily not completely sobbing.

Jack brings a hand down and hooks his index finger under your chin and gently tilts your face up to look at him. He gives you a reassuring smile. "Because I can hold you better back there and it's private."

You look at him for a moment and your bottom lip and chin tremble so hard as tears line your eyes that it makes his heart ache. You look so terribly and sadly adorable and it just makes how much he loves you hit him even harder and makes him more determined to get you feeling better and make you happy. He doesn't realize that even though you're crying, he's already made you feel better and happier just by being here and coming to you without you having to ask and giving you a safe space to let yourself give into how shitty you feel in every sense.

Jack's sweetness and thoughtfulness make you start to cry even harder as you climb in the back like he asked. You sit awkwardly in the middle seat as he gets in and shuts the door, sets your purse down and gets himself comfortable.

"Alright, you, come here." He reaches out and hooks an arm around your waist and starts to pull you closer to him.

You don't need asked twice, move over to him and crawl onto his lap so quickly his arm barely touches you and he smiles to himself. As Jack reclines the seat so that you can fall into him a bit more you spread your legs out across the seats and snuggle into him as close as you can, your sobs getting harder when he wraps his arms around you and holds you tightly, helps you settle in perfectly to your favorite place in the whole world where you feel safe in every sense of the word and loved and like you could probably survive just about anything as long as you had Jack and his arms and neck and chest and lap to hide from the world in.

"Okay Baby," Jack murmurs once you're settled in his lap and clinging to his shirt as you sob into his neck with your head tucked under the corner of his jaw. "I'm here. It's okay, it's all going to be okay, I promise."

You shake your head against him because as much as you know Jack would never lie to you, it doesn't feel like it in this moment, it doesn't feel like anything will ever be okay again. And Jack knows. He knows it doesn't feel like it. So he doesn't push it, doesn't try to talk you into believing him. He just lets you be. Lets you exist just as you are. Lets you feel what you're feeling without any pushback.

Even though you've been together years, it still always surprises you, the way he lets you just feel and holds you close as you do.

You let yourself give in for thirty seconds or so and then you start to fight your sobs so that you can explain yourself to him even though you know you don't have to, that you never have to explain yourself to Jack.

"I," you hiccup out, trying so hard to get yourself together so you can explain and stop crying and stop making Jack deal with you. "I, I'm, I…" You choke over the simple words, coughing and struggling to breathe

"Shh," Jack soothes you, moves one of his hands so it can rub up and down your back. "You don't have to talk about it right now, okay? We can talk later if and when you're ready and doing a little better. Just let it all out, I've got you. I've got you."

You want to fight it, want to keep pushing yourself to talk and explain and apologize because even though Jack has never asked you to, never told you that you needed to or made you feel like you needed to, even though he's never gotten mad or upset at you when you get like this, you still feel the urge to. The scars left by those who came before him are still there. It's a testament to just how much Jack has healed you that you cry in front of him, that you let yourself get like this in front of him, that you call him when you're like this and let yourself seek out his comfort and trust and know that he won't turn you away or yell at you or make fun of you or use it against you down the road.

Eventually your tears stop. You're pretty sure it's less that you've cried yourself out and are in a better headspace and more that you just physically ran out of tears and exhausted out. Jack's pretty sure that's the case too because your tears don't trail off how they usually do when you've had the cry you needed. This is far more abrupt, closer to a flip of a switch.

Jack doesn't rush you to be ready to talk or get out of his lap so he can drive you guys home or to do anything. He just keeps holding you and continues to rub your back while you sniffle and try to compose yourself. And even once your sniffling has stopped and you're just resting in his arms against him he doesn't rush you. He never would. If he had it his way you'd never have to leave his arms.

After a few moments of sitting in Jack's lap quietly you find it within you to pull your head back and look at him sheepishly.

Jack melts even more somehow, smiles at you softly and presses a kiss to your forehead. "Hi, pretty girl," he murmurs.

You can't bring yourself to even shake your head to argue with him. You don't want to put him through more than you already have tonight and don't want it to seem like you're doing this deliberately for attention or compliments.

"Hi handsome," you whisper back. It takes everything in you to keep yourself looking at him and not immediately nuzzle your face back into his neck to hide.

"Can I have a kiss?"

You swallow hard and give him a short nod, not because you want to say no, it's the exact opposite, you want to scream yes and let the man kiss you until everything makes sense and feels okay again. You just don't feel like you deserve it. "If you want."

"I always want kisses from you and to kiss you." Jack gives you a lopsided smile. He doesn't ask if you want kisses because he knows that you do, knows that what could be perceived as a lack of enthusiasm is actually just you feeling like you don't deserve him or his love or affection.

Jack slides his hand up to the back of your neck and gently pulls your face to his, kisses you so softly to start to help you ease into accepting his affection right now that if you had any tears left you know you'd be crying again. The more you relax into him and let yourself accept Jack's affection as you pour it back into him, the deeper Jack kisses you.

He nuzzles his nose into yours for a second when you break apart and rubs his thumb just below your ear as you pull your face back to look at him, cheeks tear stained and eyes and nose and lips still so adorably swollen. "Thank you for calling me and not trying to drive while crying like that." He raises his eyebrows at you gently, his other hand giving your hip an affectionate and reassuring squeeze before he reference what you said earlier while he was driving here. "I need you too."

You shrug shallowly because you weren't even thinking about it like that when you called.

"I do," he whispers, nodding at you. "More than you'll ever know and just as much as you need me. Promise." Jack leans up and gives you a quick kiss. "How about we head home? We'll come back and get it tomorrow, okay? It won't get towed with your permit."

"Okay," you whisper back, nodding.

Jack puts the seat back up and you shift off his lap so that he can get out of the car. Once he's out He holds his hand out for you even though you don't really need it or his help getting out of the car. You take it anyway, let him help you out and close the door behind you before you both take a few steps up and Jack opens the passenger side door for you like he always does.

Even though there's silence as Jack holds your hand and helps you into the passenger seat it's still meaningful, he still has this way of silently almost speaking with his body and how he looks at you that makes you feel wrapped in his love the way you would if he was verbally professing it to you over and over. Before he shuts the door he leans in and presses the sweetest kiss to your forehead, gives you a small smile that reassures you everything will be okay, that you'll be able to undo the knots your mind has gotten itself into.

Jack carefully shuts the door and you pull your seatbelt on as he walks around to the driver's side. Before he buckles himself in he reaches back and grabs your purse, pulls out a couple of tissues and hands you them. He sets your purse down, buckles his seatbelt and then puts it in reverse and starts the drive home.

He doesn't make you talk about it as he drives, knows it's not the time or the place. It's one of those small things that means the world to you and it reminds you how well he knows you and how much he loves you. Instead of making you talk about it, Jack chatters to you like he normally will when you guys are driving, but this time he doesn't expect you to chat back. His hand stays on your thigh or holding your hand and bringing it up to his lips to presses kisses to the entire drive home.

The entire thing is so normal and it helps more than you think Jack could ever truly understand. Nothing feels forced or like he's making these huge gestures or going out of his way which is exactly what you need. Because you don't feel like you deserve any of that and so him doing those kinds of things would almost make things harder for you in a way. You don't really even feel like you deserve normalcy, but you're at least able to accept it without panicking.

Once Jack's parket he walks around and opens your door for you, grabs your purse and helps you out of the car. You feel a little zombie-like walking into your shared apartment. You're not sure what you want or need and are too tired and fuzzy brained from all the crying to even try to figure it out.

But Jack, Jack knows exactly what you want and what you need.

He could just give it to you. You wouldn't necessarily mind if he did. But Jack knows that part of what you need right now is control without having to really make any decisions. So he makes the decisions and offers them to you so that you feel like you're in control without the agony of having to make any choices or real decisions that will just make you feel worse and exacerbate the decision fatigue already plaguing you after this week.

"You wanna chill on the couch for a bit?" Jack asks as you both finish getting your shoes off.

You take a couple of steps into the living room and stop to look at the couch. You want to be close to Jack as selfish as it feels, as undeserving as you feel. "Yeah, I guess," you murmur.

Jack walks up behind you and snakes his arms around your tummy, pulls you back into him and hunches and rests his chin on your shoulder. He presses a few kisses to the side of your neck, lets his lips linger on the last one almost like he's feeling your pulse under his lips. "I'm going to go get you some water first." He presses a kiss to your cheek as he squeezes you a little in a tight hug. "I love you so much Baby, no matter how you're feeling and whether you feel like you deserve it. I love you."

Your chin trembles a little and you take in a deep shaky breath. You bring your hand up and cup the side of Jack's face. "I love you so much too. Thank you."

"Of course," he murmurs. Jack presses another kiss to your cheek and then turns his head to press one into the palm of your hand. He's quick to make his way to your kitchen and grab you a glass of water.

You try to get yourself to go sit on the couch but you can't seem to for some reason, end up just standing there almost awkwardly in your own space as you wait for Jack to return. When he returns you take a few sips for him, always surprised at how much better those few sips make you feel. You set the glass on a coaster on the coffee table once you've had enough.

Jack is waiting for you with a smile when you turn back to face him. His hands find the hem of your shirt and start to pull it off you and you raise your arms to help, trusting whatever his plan is. Once he has your shirt off he sits down on the edge of the couch and you watch as he takes his prosthetic off before beckoning you to him with a finger.

You step between his legs and like with your shirt, you trust him when he pulls your pants down and step out of them and kick them to side where he tossed your shirt. Jack grabs a blanket and holds it open for you and your chin trembles again because he knows just what you need and gives it to you so freely and without you having to ask.

Neither you nor Jack say a word as you help him get you wrapped up in a blanket burrito and gets you situated to that you're on your side on the couch, your back to the cushions. He lays on his side next to you and pulls your bundled form against him, holds you tight. You wiggle to get comfortable and bury your face into his chest breathing getting heavier as you feel the tears coming again.

Jack knows it. He's known this is what would happen the entire time and as much as he doesn't want you to cry and be upset, it's what he wants to happen. He wants you to cry again, let yourself come all the way apart in his arms so that he can help put you back together again. He knows you won't be able to move past it all and start to heal and recover from the week until you get it all out of your system.

"I'm here, Baby. Let yourself cry, try not to fight it," he murmurs. "It's okay, I promise it's okay." He brings his chin to his neck so that he can nuzzle his nose into your hair and give you kisses there.

It works. By the third or so kiss you're fully sobbing into him again and it drives you insane because as much as you know why in a sense, you also feel like you have no idea why you're like this and needing to cry so much.

After a couple of minutes you have to just say it, acknowledge the truth, or at least what feels like the truth. "This is, this is so dumb, Jack," you choke out between sobs. "It's so dumb, and, and stupid," you take in a huge breath of air that makes you cough on top of the sobs, "and, and ridiculous and I know it, know it and still can't stop."

"I know it feels like that's true and that's valid, but it's not any of those things, Baby, I promise," he soothes you, runs a hand up and down your back over the blanket while the other keeps you held tightly to him. "It's human."

You shake your head against him but don't verbally argue with him, just go back to the tears you can't seem to stop, the tears that feel so incredibly unfair to Jack. He should be relaxing while he's off, and you guys should be starting your weekend together doing something fun, go on a date or something like you talked about last week. But instead he's having to work essentially, having to take care of you, and the two of you aren't going out and you're making your weekend off together start in one of the shittiest ways.

Your tears do eventually start to trail off. Neither you nor Jack know how long it's taken to get here and it doesn't really matter in the end. It took as long as it did and you're here now, your body and mind working to regulate as opposed to a fairly abrupt stop like in the car where your body just gave out. Jack knows it means you've finally gotten it all out, have shed all the tears you need to right now.

He knows it means you're feeling broken right now and that you're not sure how to even start picking up the pieces. But the thing is you do know how to start. Before Jack you had to do this alone, had to sob on your couch alone and then figure out how to make yourself better. The difference is that now you don't need to know. You don't need to figure it out. Because Jack knows and he'll help you, take care of you and give you what you want and what you need and help put you back together again and get back to feeling normal.

The two of you sit lay in silence for a bit once you've gotten your breathing under control, the only sounds the occasional sniffle from you or soft popping of Jack's lips as he presses more kisses to the top of your head. You take in and let out a deep breath before pulling your head back so that you can see him.

"Hi again, Beautiful," Jack smiles at you.

You want to argue but don't have the energy to. "Hi," you whisper, voice raw and nasally.

Jack doesn't say anything for a minute, just looks at you and strokes your hair. The look he gives you speaks volumes though, is so clearly him telling you that if and when you're ready to talk, he's hear to listen.

You give him one of the smallest, saddest smiles Jack's ever seen from you. "I love you," you murmur to him, lean your head up and push your lips out.

"I love you too." Jack smiles even brighter as he moves his head down to give you the kisses you seek.

"How about we order some food and then go shower the week off you? We can eat dinner in bed once it's here and then cuddle and watch something or talk if you want, get you off to dreamland to help you catch up on some sleep," Jack suggests once you've had your fill of kisses.

"Okay," you murmur with a small nod, still sounding so achingly forlorn and sad that it kills him. You're not sure you agree with that last part of his suggestion. You don't want to sleep any time soon. You want to be awake with him, spending time with him and enjoying him. You've missed him.

Jack grabs his phone out of his pocket and rests his hand on your side as he orders. After he finishes ordering he slips his phone back in his pocket and gives you one last lingering kiss. He pulls his one arm from under you and sits up, helps get you out of the blanket burrito he put you in.

The two of you head into your room and Jack crutches into the bathroom to turn the shower on. You pad into the bathroom behind him, don't want to be away from him really. You cringe internally at how clingy that is, wonder if that's what will push it over and make it all too much for him. Make you too much for him.

But all that happens when Jack turns around and sees you is a smile breaking over his face. You can't help but smile a little at it because he just looks so god damned happy to see you. Even when you're like this, being like this for him.

You walk closer to him and let your fingers play with the hem of his shirt. "Can I?"

"I'd love that," he nods, gives you a little, playful smirk.

You take your time stripping him, take such care like you always do when you strip him while he's standing with his crutches. Once you've got him fully stripped Jack takes your bra off, dips his thumbs under the waistband of your underwear and starts pushing them down, your clothes a heap off to the side of the bathroom where they won't get wet.

There's something about the way you look when your eyes roam his body that makes Jack frown to himself. There's an air of unworthiness about it, something that couldn't be further from the truth in his mind.

"You okay, Baby?" he asks quietly.

You press your lips together and out to one side and nod. "I just wish I wasn't like this for you," you whisper, stepping closer to him and resting your head against his chest as you stand outside the shower.

"You're not like anything," he murmurs. "You're just you. My girl. All I need to live."

You let out a shaky breath and then turn and press a kiss to his chest. His words are so very hard to accept but you know he truly means them the same way you mean them when you tell him the same.

You both get in the shower and Jack holds you on his lap while you soak in near scalding water for a bit. Eventually he washes you, takes his time with your hair and then your body, lets you do the same to him because he knows you need it and want it.

It doesn't take too long for the food Jack had ordered to arrive once you're out of the shower and in bed, dressed in one of Jack's old shirts and nothing else. Jack's in just a pair of sweatpants but throws a shirt on when the knock on the door signals the food has arrived. He crutches out and grabs the bag while you grab an old towel and spread it out on the bed.

You almost start crying again when you see what Jack ordered. Your favorite comfort meal. And you know the smaller box he sets off to the side is your favorite dessert.

"Jack…." you whisper, looking at him almost helplessly but with the same love in your eyes that he recognizes as the love in his when he looks at you.

He just smiles at you, leans over and gives you a kiss. "I love you."

"I know." You reach out and squeeze his thigh. "You make sure I know. And I love you too."

Jack grins at you and winks. "I know."

You watch TV and chat about whatever happens to come up as you eat, make Jack let you help clean up once you've both finished. You both strip again once you're back in your room and crawl into bed under the covers together on your sides.

Your legs tangle together and torsos press together as you settle, TV off because Jack can feel that you want to talk now and he's hoping after you do he can get you to sleep early to help you recover.

There's silence for a few minutes as you just look at each other, Jack's hand running up and down your side and yours playing with the fingers of his bottom hand.

"I don't know Jack," you finally whisper, trying to sort through your mind and figure out where to even start. "It was just a long week and I've been walling it off the whole time because I had to keep it together. But then today, when it was finally over at least somewhat, I got in the car and just…. fell apart. It's just so much, work, this job is just so much. It's so fucking much sometimes. And I know yours is too, I know that, I do. I know yours can be so so fucking much sometimes."

Jack knows you're about so start comparing your jobs, about to start writing yours off as not as bad and easier and less to deal with and less traumatic. And that's just not true. Your job can be just like his. You see different things most of the time, sure, but that's exactly why it's impossible to compare the two.

Honestly sometimes Jack thinks your job is more than his, is worse and harder and far more to deal with and more traumatic. Most of the time he's not sure how you deal with it which is kind of ironic because him and his love are the vast majority of how you're able to deal with it and cope and keep going.

In any event, he's not going to let you compare and minimize your job and its stressors and trauma and how fucking hard and how fucking much it can be. It deserves to be recognized. You deserve to be recognized for surviving it. You deserve to let out the bad week however you need to. He's not going to let you try to wipe it away and apologize for being affected by it.

"Yeah," he nods. "And that's why you take care of me and hold me like I held you in the car and am holding you now when it's too much for me and I need to let some of it out. Your job is just as much, it's just a different kind of much. My job can be a lot and so much and so can yours. I can need to have a breakdown sometimes and so can you. My job being a lot sometimes doesn't means yours isn't or can't be. My job isn't worse or harder than yours. They both have their moments and weeks and times when we don't know why we're doing them and times where it just all makes so much fucking sense. They're both jobs of high highs and low lows."

"Yeah…." You chew on the inside of your cheek and look at his chest. You know he's right but in the moment it's hard to accept. It makes sense why Jack's work gets to him like this sometimes. It doesn't feel like it makes sense why yours gets to you like this. Objectively and logically you can see it, you understand why it does, and if Jack had your job you'd say it makes sense why it gets to him like this sometimes. But emotionally your brain doesn't let you accept it. It's different. You should be able to handle it, especially in the shadow of Jack's job. You know he'd hate hearing that if you ever said it out loud, and would disagree vehemently. It's just hard to think otherwise. "I don't know," you sigh. "I'm being dramatic and I hate it."

Jack pushes his bottom lip out slightly and shakes his head. "No you're not. You're feeling your feelings. Please don't self-invalidate, Baby. You're allowed to feel what you feel at the intensity you're feeling it at. I want you to, especially right here with me so I can take care of you and keep you safe and help keep you as grounded as possible and as comforted as possible."

You shrug. "It's still being dramatic. It's dramatic and it's unfair to you. When I was in the car and you asked if I had the doors locked, I did, I promise I did, I just thought about how I'd like to unlock them and hope…" You let out a breath and shake your head slightly. You know how much this will hurt him. "And hope someone came along and car jacked me and killed me because then I wouldn't have to put either of us through this ever again, and that's dramatic, Jack. That's dramatic. Because I know what that would do to you. I know. I know because I think about the reverse with you dying and I, I can't Jack, I can't, and so yes. Yes, I'm being dramatic."

"You're not, Sweetheart." Jack swallows hard as your words sink in and his mind goes there. It's hard to hear of course, harder to think about really happening. He can't imagine getting that phone call or driving up to that scene and having to try to save you, having to get covered in your blood. Well. Maybe it's not that he can't imagine but that he can and it's unspeakably awful and horrific and makes him nauseous. "You're just feeling what you feel. That's valid. You're allowed to feel it all.

"It's dumb Jack," you huff a laugh at yourself and shake your head. "There's no reason for me to feel like this.

"Sweetheart," Jack runs his hand up your side to cup your face. "Yes there is. And even if there wasn't, that's okay too. You're allowed to feel like this or however you feel for any reason or no reason." He looks away from you for a second as he gathers his thoughts, in one of those ways that tells you he's thinking of how to phrase something incredibly serious to him. He looks back at you. "You deal with a lot at work, you see a lot. You do so much. You take on so much and you do things for other people even when you're slammed yourself. You're incredibly empathetic and an emotional sponge and so giving and I love that about you, I love that about you so much. But that's hard at the best of times, and with your job it's…." he trails off, unable to find the word he wants that conveys the right gravity. "You give so much, so so much of yourself to everyone and everything you do because it matters to you and you care and you'd rather run yourself into the ground than watch someone else struggle or have to work hard enough to run themselves into the ground."

You shrug again. You're trying to take his words to heart and you know you are, even if your brain can't consciously process it right now. You want to say something in response but you're not sure what. What do you say to that? To all those compliments it feels like you don't deserve, to the way this man loves you so fucking much at your worst.

Jack gives you a moment to respond and then continues when you don't, doesn't want you to feel pressured to come up with something to say. "Part of it is that you're exhausted, Sweetheart. You're running on empty, in every way, physically and emotionally and spiritually. You haven't gotten much sleep this week and I'm sure what you have gotten hasn't been the best quality with all the stress."

"I mean I let myself give into it, Jack," you admit. "I let myself give into the feelings and lean into them and let myself cry and be miserable and do all this shit because I know you're here and will take care of me and that's unfair. It's totally unfair and it's, it's… gross of me."

"Baby," Jack gives you a small, knowing smile, "that's the whole point. That's what I want you to do, my silly, silly girl."

"It's unfair to you!"

"No, Baby, it's not. Just like it isn't unfair when I give into my feelings and lean into them because I know you're here to take care of me. I do the same." Jack squeezes the side of your face softly and starts running his hand up and down your side again. "That's what you should do. That's part of what a relationship is, being able to just give into it all and have those feelings because you know your partner's got you. I think that's healthy."

"How much longer can you keep doing this, Jack? Just like realistically. How many times can I ask you to do this before it's too much." You look away from him and down at your hand that you pull from his. "Before I'm too much."

"I don't feel like I'm doing anything, Sweetheart. But I guess to the extent I am, I can keep doing it for you until I die. You're never going to become too much for me." Jack desperately wants to ask you to look at him but he knows it's not what you need right now as much as he's itching for eye contact. "You haven't asked me to do anything. You didn't even ask me to come get you. I just did. I could've tried to talk you down over the phone. I wanted to come. I chose to. You didn't ask. And even if you had asked, that would be more than okay."

You look back up at him and some part of Jack melts in relief. "I mean I knew you would come, so it was kind of me asking even if not explicitly."

"I know it's upsetting to you, Beautiful, and I'm not making light of it or trying to wipe your feelings away but to me, it's like… good. I'm glad you knew. I'm so fucking glad you knew. You genuinely have no fucking idea how happy that makes me." Jack seems to grow almost teary as he speaks, his voice wet with emotion that matches the glass to his eyes. You bring your hand up and rest it on the side of his neck, brush your thumb along his jawline comfortingly.

"I know your past has taught you differently but you're allowed to feel and you're allowed to need me and to need to fall into me and need all the help in the world. It doesn't make you too much and it never will. Obviously I don't like you feeling like this, I hate it and I wish I could take it away and feel it for you, god knows I would in a second if I could. But you picking up the phone and calling me, you crying into me and letting yourself come completely apart in my arms and turning to me for comfort, it makes me so incredibly happy and content to know that you feel safe enough and loved enough to do that." Jack smiles at you, looks at you like he can't believe you're real and his. "And everything that you're worried makes or will make you too much and will make me get tired and be done with you and leave one day, it's the opposite for me. Your vulnerability and your humanness and your trust, and you giving me the privilege of getting to love you and hold you through your worst moments and days, that just makes me love you all the more, even when it feels like there's no possible way I could love you more. You always surprise me."

"Jack," you swallow down his name in a whisper. You struggle to come up with something to say to that because it's so beautiful and he loves you so much and your brain is processing so much under the surface and he's right. You're exhausted and feeling it far more acutely.

"You don't have to say anything," he whispers back with a nod. "Just know that this is all okay and we're okay and I'm not going anywhere."

"I know." You give him a flash of a genuine smile, about all you can manage at this point. "Thank you. I love you."

"I love you too." Jack leans forward and seals his words with a lingering kiss.

"Hey Jack?" It seems silly to start that way as you break apart given that you're both looking at each other and have been talking and to say this all again like you haven't before given how long you've been together. But then you suppose Jack has said everything he's said to you today multiple times over the years.

He raises his eyebrows at you in acknowledgment. "Thank you for… just taking care of me the best you could during the week. I really appreciate you not trying to like interfere with work or tell me I can't do this or go on about how unhealthy it is because that just makes me feel worse. And thank you for not accusing me of cheating or something because I had to stay late at work. You were just supportive and made sure I ate and got as much sleep as I could and did whatever you could for me and you have no idea how much I appreciate that."

"You're welcome. I never want you to feel worse. I know it's not something you're doing out of choice and that it's just reality and what has to happen. Even if I hate it like you do too." He leans in for another kiss. He can tell it's time to move the conversation along a bit, that your brain has more or less reached its maximum capacity for this kind of talk tonight. "You should get some sleep. I can see you're sleepy," he smirks playfully.

You grumble a little as you pout, giving into the sleepiness and the relative relaxation that's taken over you since your talk. "I don't wanna sleep. I miss you and I've missed you all week. I'm sorry I was away so much."

"Don't apologize, Baby, it's not your fault. You didn't do it deliberately." Jack's hand that's been running up and down your side continues too but moves a little toward the center of you so that his fingers trail along the edge of your breast and brush teasingly at the crease of your hip. "We have all weekend together. You'll enjoy our time together so much more when you're not exhausted. And I'll still be here. You can sleep in my arms and I'm sure I'll fall asleep soon too. That's still spending time together to me."

"Yeah," you draw the word out. "But it's not the same."

Jack nods slowly, a mischievous and playful smirk pulling onto his face. He leans back in and kisses you again, rolls you onto your back slowly as his tongue dips into your mouth and he groans, continues to make out with you, relishing in the way your hands feel roaming his body. "Well," he pants softly when you break apart for air, "what if we spent some more time together while I put us both to sleep?"

You bite your lip and smile. "And what would that look like?"

"Oh," he laughs under his breath, "I have an idea or two."

"Yeah?" Your chest heaves a little and Jack ducks his head down and takes one of your nipples into his mouth and teases it as you moan softly for him before kissing up your chest and neck to your lips where he makes out with you again.

"Yeah," he mumbles against your lips, rolls his hips into yours so you can feel how hard he is for you. "Could look like this." He adjusts his hips and runs his cock through you, lets his head bump against your clit and pull sounds of pleasure from both of you.

"Or," he stills his hips, "like this."

Jack dives backward under the comforter, large hands holding onto your thighs and keeping them spread for him as he kisses you cunt to clit. "Yeah," his voice is muffled by the comforter that's over him, "I think I'd like it to look like this. I really think," he presses another kiss to your clit, "I'd like it to look like this."

"Jack!" you giggle, the speed and suddenness of the movement almost meerkat like in the most adorable, Jack way. Only he could make you laugh coming off of feeling how you were at the same time he's winding you toward an orgasm you know is likely to hit you so hard you'll be half asleep by the time he gets to fucking you, something you're more than okay with. "Part of being together is seeing you!"

You push the comforter back until silver curls come into view and Jack looks up at you. That giggle is everything to him. He got you to laugh.

"Seeing me or seeing my curls between your legs?" he smirks up at you.

"Same thing, isn't it? Your curls are you." Your breathing picks up as Jack lowers his mouth back down, the stubble on his jaw brushing over your clit and sending sparks of pleasure shivering up your spine.

He shrugs in feigned nonchalance, knows exactly what he's doing to you. "I think me suggests my eyes."

"Then look at me while you start putting us to sleep," you breathe.

Jack's eyes darken. "Kinky," he murmurs. "I like it. Just remember," he finally gives your clit a proper suck and swirl of his tongue, making you moan so beautifully for him, "you suggested it. And since you did I expect you to keep your eyes open and on mine the entire time, pretty girl."

I need him desperately. Jack Abbot where are you?! 😩😭 I hope it was okay and that you enjoyed! And we all deserve this kind of love. Thank you again for all of your support and for reading, I truly appreciate it and your notes!! ♥️

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