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quarterly reminder that if i reblog something ai-generated it is 110% and always an accident and for the love of god please tell me so i can delete it from my blog
Absolutely infuriating that people keep trashing on R.F. Kuang for âbeing pretentiousâ when they knowingly pick up a novel in a genre KNOWN for using academic language. Like please donât read dark academia if youâre not prepared for references to classic lit, footnotes, or elevated language like babe those are genre staples.
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If you ever see someone make smut art of my characters, your first job is to send me the link so I can check that shit out. If you ever see someone make whitewashed art of my characters, your first job is to kill them immediately.
you donât realize how important lunch is until youâre wandering around thinking about how unloveable and untalented and uniquely cursed you are and then itâs 4pm and you finally eat lunch and you go Oh. oh right.
when i was a kid i decided that killing people was bad therefore war was bad therefore the military was evil. and adults would tell me it's more nuanced than that and i would understand when i grew up. well i'm a grown up now and idk i still think that killing people is bad and war is bad and the military is evil
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Please keep interacting with this post because when I come to tumblr to procrastinate, this shows up again in my notifications and guilts me into writing again
summary: after a bad call in trauma, you donât get the chance to process it before robby decides youâre too emotional to be there. you end up on the roof trying to pull yourself together instead, and of course jackâs the one who finds you there, like he always does when youâre at your worst. (5.4k+)
pairing: jack abbot x fem!reader
content: hurt/comfort, angst, workplace tension, protective!jack, robby is kinda a asshole, established relationship, emotional repression vs feeling to much, confrontation. cw for: patient death, medical trauma, resuscitation, grief, blood, medical inaccuracies.
âEnough.â
You barely hear him.
Your palms are slick inside your gloves. The heel of one hand is planted firm against the womanâs sternum while the other braces over it, shoulders burning from the force of it, every push jarring up your arms and into your chest.
Your count has long since stopped being something youâre aware of. It is only pressure now. Down, release. Down, release. The monitor had dissolved into noise so long ago that you canât separate one sound from another anymore. The room is all movement and blood and clipped voices and the relentless rush of trying.
You donât stop.
You adjust the angle of your hands instead, shifting slightly over bone and cartilage, trying to find some better position, some better leverage, like maybe all that stands between this woman and another few minutes of life is a matter of inches.
âCall it,â Robby says.
âOne more round.â
You are already pressing down again when you say it. Your voice comes out breathless, raw around the edges. Somebody at the head of the bed is squeezing another bag of fluid. Someone else is reciting numbers you are no longer taking in. The nurse nearest the cart glances toward Robby and then away just as quickly.
âWeâve been at this for thirty minutes.â
âI know.â
The words leave you sharper than you mean them to. You still donât look at him. You are staring at your hands like if you focus hard enough, if you do not let your eyes leave the task in front of you, then nobody can make you quit yet.
âJust one more. Her rhythm was changing.â
âHer rhythm was V-fib for twenty minutes before it went flat.â
That one lands. You hate that it does.
Your arms keep moving for another few compressions before the sentence catches up to you properly. Your elbows start to lock. Your shoulders ache from effort and from refusal. The womanâs skin is cool in a way that does not belong to somebody who had been talking less than an hour ago.
Robby steps around the table. You can feel him there even before you look. The shift in the room gives him away. It always does. Attention folds around him without anyone meaning it to. He stops across from you with his arms crossed and his expression already set in that closed-off, unmovable way that means he has made a decision and will not be moved from it.
âThe dissection was too extensive,â he says. âThe bleed was too fast. There was nothing more to do.â
âYou donât know that.â
His eyes lift to yours for the first time in the last minute. âStep back from the table.â
You keep your hands where they are.
There is blood on the sheet. Blood on your wrist. Blood drying dark at the edge of one glove. You can hear your own breathing under the monitor, under the suction, under the noise of the bay outside the curtain. Your chest feels too tight to hold all of it.
âRobbyââ
âStep back.â
The room stills around the order.
You donât know what finally does it. His tone, maybe. Or maybe it is the look on the nurseâs face when you glance up and find her standing there with the next thing already in her hands and nowhere to put it because there is no next thing anymore. Maybe it is the woman on the bed herself, who does not move beneath your hands no matter what you do.
Slowly, you let your arms fall.
The absence of motion feels obscene.
You step back from the table because he told you to, because someone had to be the one to stop, because your body has reached that ugly point between exhaustion and disbelief where following an order becomes easier than fighting it. Your hands hang uselessly at your sides.
She had been awake when they brought her in.
That is the part of this your mind keeps circling back to with a kind of sick insistence. Not the open cavity. Not the sound the monitor made when the rhythm changed shape and then lost it altogether. Not the smell of cautery and blood and antiseptic clinging to the trauma bay. Just her face. Pale and frightened and trying so hard not to show it. The way she had looked from the gurney to you as they rolled her through the doors, eyes glazed with pain and still searching for someone to answer her.
She had told you her name.
As if that mattered.
As if you could keep hold of it for her.
As if there was some dignity left in being known when your body had been torn open from the inside.
You had leaned down so she could hear you over the rush of the bay and said it back to her, and for half a second she had looked less afraid.
Then, just before they pushed the sedation, she had caught your wrist with surprising strength and asked if somebody would call her kids.
You had said yes without thinking.
Of course you had.
âTime of death,â Robby says, glancing toward the clock on the wall, â22:14.â
The monitor answers him with its long, unbroken tone.
Nobody says anything after that.
The room has that terrible, familiar quiet to it now. Not silence. It is never silence in the ED. There is always noise somewhere. Phones ringing at the desk. Shoes against linoleum. A paramedic giving report in the next bay. Someone laughing too loudly at something down the hall because life keeps happening even here. But inside the trauma room, there is that suspended sort of stillness that settles when a body becomes a body again and everyone standing around it has to remember what comes next.
One of the nurses lowers her eyes to the chart in her hand with far too much concentration. Another moves toward the back counter to busy herself with wrappers that do not need gathering yet. Nobody looks directly at you.
You tug your gloves off one finger at a time because your hands have started to shake.
âAre you crying?â
Your head comes up too fast.
Robby is looking straight at you, not cruelly, that would almost be easier to absorb. There is no contempt in his face, no overt softness either. Only hard steadiness that makes everything he says sound like fact whether you agree with it or not.
Your eyes sting all at once. You hadnât even realized it had gotten that far. Everything had felt too hot, too pressurized, too tight in your throat to separate one sensation from another, and now a tear slips over before you can stop it.
You wipe it away with the back of your wrist so quickly it smears.
âNo.â
His gaze drops briefly to your face again, then back up. âYouâre crying in my trauma bay.â
âIâm fine.â
âYou are standing in the middle of my trauma bay in tears,â he says, flat and matter-of-fact, âand you are not useful to me right now. Step out.â
Your mouth parts. Nothing useful comes out of it. You hear yourself say, âI just need a minute.â
âI donât have a minute.â His voice is not loud, but it sharpens enough to make you tense.
âThereâs a man in bay three who has been waiting twenty minutes. I need doctors who are present. Not standing over a body feeling sorry for themselves.â
Heat rushes through you so quickly it makes your face burn.
âIâm not feeling sorry for myself.â
âThen what would you call it.â
The answer swells up in you so fast it almost chokes you. You can feel every pair of ears in the room pretending not to listen. Your throat tightens until speaking hurts.
âI would call it that she came in conscious, Robby.â Your voice catches in the middle of his name and you hate yourself for that more than anything. âShe told me her name. She asked me to call her kids and I told her I would, and I think Iâm allowed a second toââ
âYouâre not.â The words are immediately thrown back.
You stare at him and he doesnât look away.
âIâve watched you do this since your first week here,â he says. âEvery bad outcome. Every patient that doesnât make it. Itâs all over your face. You carry it around the department for hours after the fact, and Iâve let it go because youâre a good resident. Technically, youâre very good.â
The bay feels colder all of a sudden.
âBut this is a problem.â
You do not move.
His eyes flick over your face in a way that makes you feel exposed in the ugliest way, not seen but rather assessed.
âYou are too emotional for this environment.â
There it is.
Not because the sentence is especially dramatic. It isnât. He says it as evenly as he says anything else. That is what makes it worse. It does not sound like anger or frustration or something thrown out in the heat of the moment. It sounds considered. It sounds like a thought he has had before and finally decided to voice.
The woman on the bed lies between you, silent and still and covered now to the chest.
You swallow around the ache in your throat. âThatâs not fair.â
âMaybe not.â
He reaches for the next chart from the rack beside the door.
âBut itâs true. You need to decide whether you can do this job or you canât, because I wonât have you falling apart every time we lose someone. Itâs not fair to the patients, and itâs not fair to my staff.â
âRobbyââ
âGet some air.â
He says it like an order, not a kindness.
âCome back when youâve got yourself together. I wonât have you in here like this.â
Then he turns and leaves.
The doors swing shut behind him with a soft mechanical hush.
For a moment, you canât move.
The room blurs strangely at the edges. Someone passes you on the way to the sink. Someone else starts quietly discussing postmortem tasks with one of the nurses. Life resumes in pieces around you, practical and necessary and horribly normal.
You pull the second glove off and let it drop. Then the first. You donât look to see where they land.
The walk out of trauma feels longer than it should.
The hallway beyond is all fluorescent light and polished floors and people moving too fast for your thoughts to keep pace with. You keep your chin up because there are only so many humiliations one person can survive in ten minutes and youâve already endured enough for the night.
Past the nursesâ station.
Past two med students huddled over a chart.
Past a family clustered near the vending machines with the same pinched look everybody gets when they have already been waiting too long and know they will be waiting longer.
Nobody stops you. Nobody says your name. If anyone notices your face, theyâre kind enough not to point it out.
âToo emotional for this environment.â
The sentence follows you all the way to the elevator.
You jab the call button and stare at the numbers above the doors with fixed intensity that comes from trying not to shatter in public. Your jaw aches from the force of holding it together. Your eyes burn. You can still feel the womanâs pulse under your fingers from earlier, back when there had still been one to feel, faint and racing and there.
You shut your eyes.
You need to decide whether you can do this job or you canât.
The elevator opens with a soft chime. You get in before anyone else can.
The ride up is mercifully empty.
You press the button for the roof and lean back against the wall, arms folded tight over yourself like you can hold your insides in place if you just press hard enough. The mirrored panel opposite catches your reflection and you have to look away. Your face is blotchy already. Your hair is half falling out of its tie. There is dried blood near your cuff. You look exactly how you feel, which is never a good sign.
By the time the doors open again, the pressure behind your eyes has turned blinding.
The roof is cold enough to make your lungs seize on the first breath.
The night air comes hard and sharp off the city, smelling faintly like rain on concrete and the exhaust from the streets below. Pittsburgh spreads out beneath you in layers of yellow-white lights and dark buildings and distant traffic.
Somewhere down there, people are ordering takeout, walking their dogs, kissing on couches, sleeping through the night. The thought makes something in your chest twist.
You walk to the ledge at the far end of the roof and brace your forearms against it.
The first sob catches so hard it hurts.
Then another one follows.
And another.
It all leaves you in one brutal rush, like your body had only been waiting for privacy before it gave up the effort of restraint altogether. You bend over the ledge with your face in your hands and cry with all the gracelessness grief ever demands from anyone. Your shoulders shake, your breath stutters, your nose starts running and you wipe at it angrily with your sleeve and only make yourself cry harder because what else is there to do.
She had asked about her kids.
That keeps returning, cruelly intact.
Not whether she was going to die. Not whether she would be okay. Not even whether she was in the right place. Her kids. She had been terrified and in agony and bleeding out from the inside, and she had still thought first of them.
You had said yes.
The city below you gleams wet and indifferent.
You stay there until the worst of it empties out. Long enough for the cold to creep in through your scrubs and settle against your skin. Long enough for your face to go numb beneath the sting. Long enough that your sobs lose force and degrade into those ugly, hitching breaths that never quite feel satisfying.
Eventually you straighten.
Your palms rest flat against the ledge. Your eyes are swollen and your throat feels scraped raw. You stare out at the skyline and try to match your breathing to something steady.
The door behind you opens.
âIâm fine,â you say immediately, voice rough. You donât turn around to see who it may be. âI just needed air. Iâll be back down in a minute.â
The footsteps that cross the roof are unhurried. There is a slight unevenness to them that your body recognizes before your mind does.
You close your eyes briefly. Of course.
âIâm serious,â you say, still facing forward. âYou donât have to stand here. Just tell whoever sent you Iâm coming back down. I just needed five minutes.â
âRobby told me,â Jack says, âthat a certain resident needed some air.â
His voice sits low in the night, roughened by sleep and age and that ever present rasp he seems to carry around even when heâs trying to be gentle. It lands somewhere under your ribs and stays there.
You laugh once, short and miserable. âThat sounds like him.â
Jack comes to stand beside you at the ledge.
He doesnât crowd you. He never really does. He just settles there near enough that the heat of him cuts through the cold a little, his forearms coming to rest against the ledge next to yours. You keep your face turned out toward the city because looking at him right now feels like a bad idea.
âIâm okay,â you say.
It sounds weak even to your own ears.
You try again. âSeriously. I just needed a minute.â
He is quiet for a beat. Then, âWhat did he say to you?â
Your throat tightens all over again.
âNothing.â
Jack turns his head. You can feel it without seeing it. âDonât do that.â
You let out a breath that almost shakes. âIâm not doing anything.â
âYeah, you are.â
His tone stays calm. That somehow makes it harder.
You keep your eyes fixed on the city. âHeâs tired. We all are. It was a bad case.â
âWhat did he say.â
When you still donât answer, Jack shifts closer and lifts a hand to your jaw.
The touch is gentle. Warm. Calloused in a way that feels grounding instead of rough. His fingers turn your face toward him with barely any pressure at all, but you follow it anyway because resisting takes more strength than you have left.
The look on his face nearly undoes you.
It is not pity. Thank God for that. You think pity from him would kill you outright.
It is concern. His brows have drawn together, as his eyes move slowly over your face, taking in the tear tracks, the red rimmed eyes, whatever else is left of your attempt to pretend you were coming back downstairs like nothing happened.
âWhat,â he says quietly, âdid he say?â
You hold his gaze for maybe two seconds before your chin starts to tremble.
âThat Iâm too emotional to be here.â
The sentence breaks in half on its way out.
Jack says nothing.
The silence gives you room to keep going and you almost wish it didnât.
âHe said he doesnât think I can do the job if I fall apart every time we lose someone.â Your laugh comes out wet and ugly. âWhich I wasnât even doing, not really, I justâŚâ You swallow hard. âShe came in awake.â
Jackâs hand stays at your jaw. His thumb shifts once against your cheek.
âShe told me her name,â you say, and now that youâve started, it all spills too fast to stop. âShe asked me if someone would call her kids before we sedated her, and I told her yes. I said yes like I could promise that, like I could promise anything, and then she was gone ten minutes later and he just called it and moved on and I know we have to move on, I know that, I know how this place works, but he looked at me like I was weak for even caring and Iââ
The rest crumples in your throat.
Jack doesnât let you finish.
âCâmere,â he murmurs, and he draws you into him before you can decide whether to resist.
You go without meaning to.
One second you are standing stiff and shaking beside him, and the next your face is buried against his chest and his arms are around you properly, one across your back and the other up at the base of your skull, broad palm resting there like he means to keep you together by sheer force of will.
The second his hand touches the back of your head, whatever was left of your composure gives out.
You grip the front of his shirt and cry into him like you have nowhere else to put it.
Jack just holds you.
He does not shush you. He does not tell you itâs okay when it very plainly isnât. He does not offer some empty reassurance about how you did your best and thatâs all anyone could have done. He seems to understand, maybe better than most people would, that the wrong words right now would make it worse. So he says nothing and lets you shake against him until the force of it starts to ease on its own.
His chest is warm beneath your cheek. You can smell soap and coffee and that faint musky cologne he wears too sparingly to ever name but that always somehow clings to him by the middle of a shift. His hand keeps moving once every so often against the back of your head, not enough to soothe in any obvious way, just enough that you know he is still there.
By the time your crying slows to uneven breaths, your fingers are bunched in his shirt.
You loosen them immediately, mortified. âSorry.â
Jack huffs softly above you. âNo.â
The one word is almost enough to make you laugh.
You pull back just far enough to look at him. His hands stay where they are for a moment, one at your back, one still cupping the base of your head. He studies your face with that same awful steadiness from before, except there is warmth in his eyes now that Robbyâs had lacked entirely. Anger, too, though it sits lower.
âShe had two kids,â you say, because it is somehow the only thing left that matters.
Jackâs expression shifts.
âBoth their names were on her intake form.â Your voice trembles again, quieter this time. âShe wrote them herself. She made a point to spell them out. Like she wanted to make sure nobody got it wrong.â
For a second, Jack doesnât say anything. He just looks at you.
Then his hand leaves the back of your head and comes up to brush beneath one of your eyes with his thumb, wiping away a damp line youâd missed. He does the same to the other side, slow and unhurried.
âIâll make sure somebody talks to her husband before the shift ends,â he says.
You blink. âOkay.â
âIâll do it myself if I have to.â
Something in your chest loosens a little at that. Not much. Just enough to hurt differently.
âOkay,â you say again.
Jack lets his hands settle fully around your face then, palms warm against your chilled skin, thumbs resting near your cheekbones. He tips your head back a fraction so you have to look at him properly.
âYou belong here.â
Your eyes sting all over again.
âI mean it,â he says. âDonât let him put that shit in your head.â
You try to laugh and only manage a watery sort of exhale. âIâm trying not to.â
âTry harder.â
That gets the ghost of something out of you. Not a full smile, but close enough that his mouth softens in answer.
âShe asked you to call her kids because she trusted you,â he says. âPatients know when somebody gives a damn. They know.â
His thumbs brush once more beneath your eyes.
âThat doesnât make you weak. It makes you the kind of doctor people remember when the rest of this place starts to blur together.â
You have to look away for a second because the alternative is crying all over again, and you are beginning to suspect you may never stop if given enough encouragement. Your gaze lifts to the dark stretch of sky above the hospital, then drops back to him.
âI donât know what to do with it,â you admit.
âWith what.â
âAll of it.â Your throat works. âThem, after. The ones we lose. The things they say before. The families. I donât know where Iâm supposed to put it.â
Jack is quiet for long enough that you think he might not answer.
Then, âYou donât put it anywhere.â
You look back at him.
His expression has gone older somehow. More tired. Like the answer costs something to say aloud.
âYou carry it,â he says simply. âThatâs the job.â
The cold wind curls over the roof and tugs at the ends of your hair. Somewhere below, a siren whines past the hospital and fades.
âI donât want to carry it like this.â
âNo one does.â
His hands slide from your face to your shoulders. He squeezes once.
âBut if you stop feeling it entirely, thatâs when Iâd worry.â
The words settle deep.
Not because they solve anything. They donât. The woman is still dead. Her kids are still about to learn something that will split their lives into before and after. Robby still said what he said. The shift still waits downstairs, unfinished and unforgiving.
But Jack says it like somebody who has learned to live with the weight rather than outrun it. Like somebody who knows exactly how much it costs and still thinks it is worth paying.
You draw in a slow breath.
The air still bites, but it fills your lungs a little easier this time.
Jack watches you do it. âThere you go.â
You roll your eyes weakly. âDonât.â
âWhat.â
âThat.â
A corner of his mouth turns. âYou want me to stop encouraging you to breathe now?â
You lean your forehead briefly against his chest again, more from embarrassment than despair this time. âI hate you.â
âSure you do.â
His chin dips to the top of your head for a moment. You feel the shape of a kiss there a second later, absentminded and so gentle it nearly hurts.
You stay like that longer than you mean to. The city stretching below. The roof cold underfoot. Jack standing steady in front of you like he has nowhere else he needs to be for these few minutes, even though you both know that isnât true.
Eventually he eases back enough to look down at you.
âYou coming back?â
You think about it honestly.
Your eyes still ache. Your face probably looks terrible. The thought of stepping into trauma again makes something inside you flinch. But beneath all of that, under the humiliation and the grief and the rawness of being spoken to like that in front of a full room, there is still the sharper thing that got you through med school and internship and every impossible shift before this one.
You are not done.
âYeah,â you say.
Jack studies your face like heâs checking the answer for cracks. Then he nods once.
âGood.â
He turns toward the door and holds it open for you.
The warmth of the stairwell meets you first, then the fluorescent light, then the familiar smell of hospital air. You step through and start down the stairs beside him, not saying much. There doesnât seem to be any need for it.
By the time you reach the floor again, the ED has swallowed up the roof and the quiet and those five stolen minutes like they never existed. The board is still full. Somebody is calling for respiratory. A child is crying somewhere near triage. Whitaker rushes past with a portable monitor tucked under one arm and barely spares you both a glance.
You fall back into step because there is nothing else to do.
At the desk, Jack peels off toward another bay with a brief hand at the back of your shoulder as he passes.
You make it three steps toward trauma before Robby appears at the end of the hall.
He is flipping through a chart as he walks, glasses low on his nose, expression as impassive as ever. If he is surprised to see you back, he does not show it. He comes to a stop in front of you and looks up.
âYou good to rejoin us?â
The question is so infuriatingly clinical that for a second you cannot answer.
Jack, who had gotten halfway down the corridor, stops.
You see the moment he decides to turn around.
You also see the moment Robby notices him doing it.
âIâm fine,â you say before either of them can speak.
Robby gives a short nod and starts to move past you.
âHey.â
Jackâs voice cuts through the hallway cleanly.
Robby stops.
A few heads lift at the station. Nothing dramatic. Just that subtle turning of attention that happens in a place where everyone is always listening for the next bad thing.
Jack comes back toward the two of you, slower this time. There is no rush in him at all. That should probably scare people more than shouting ever would.
âWhat,â Robby says, not looking especially bothered.
Jack stops beside you, close enough that the line of his shoulder almost touches yours. âYou wanna explain to me why she came upstairs crying?â
The air around the three of you changes, and you almost instantly regret telling Jack anything, you should have known he wouldnât have shame in telling him what he did was wrong.
Robbyâs eyes flick briefly to your face, then back to Jack. âBecause she got attached to a patient and picked the middle of my trauma bay to fall apart about it.â
You feel yourself go rigid.
Jackâs jaw tightens. âThat right.â
Robby closes the chart in his hands. âI donât have time for this.â
âMake time.â
The station has gone very still behind you.
Robby regards him for a moment. âI said what needed to be said. We were in the middle of a shift and she was no longer useful in the room.â
Jackâs laugh is short and humorless. âUseful.â
âThatâs the job.â
âNo,â Jack says. âThe job is keeping people alive when you can and treating them like human beings when you canât. That includes your residents.â
Robbyâs face does not change, but his eyes harden slightly. âIf she wants to be here, she needs to learn how to function.â
âShe was functioning.â
âShe was crying over a dead patient.â
âShe was crying over a dead mother who asked about her kids before you put her under.â Jack steps a little closer. âYou think thatâs a some flaw?â
A muscle shifts in Robbyâs jaw.
âNo,â he says. âI think dragging that kind of emotion through every bay in the department is a liability.â
âBullshit.â The word drops bluntly between them.
You glance at Jack despite yourself. He is looking at Robby now with of cold clarity you donât often see from him unless something has truly gotten under his skin.
âYou donât get to talk to her like that because youâre tired,â Jack says. âAnd you sure as hell donât get to decide she doesnât belong here because she still has a pulse.â
Robbyâs expression shutters further. âThis is between me and my resident.â
Jack does not even blink. âNot if youâre saying shit like that to her, it isnât.â
Somewhere behind the desk, someone pointedly starts typing very loudly.
Robby looks past Jack to you then, as though you are suddenly the only person in the conversation worth addressing.
âAre you able to continue your shift?â
The professionalism of it is almost funny.
You square your shoulders. âYes.â
âGood.â
He turns to leave again.
Jack lets him get two steps this time.
Then, âYou owe her an apology.â
That finally makes Robby stop in earnest.
He turns back more slowly than before. âExcuse me?â
âYou heard me.â
Robbyâs mouth flattens. âI am not doing this in the middle of the department.â
Jack folds his arms. âShould we go somewhere quieter, would that suit you?â
For one absurd second, you think Robby might actually laugh. He doesnât. But something unreadable flickers across his face.
He looks at you. Really looks this time, something more difficult to parse. You donât know what he sees there. You donât know if he sees anything at all besides another problem waiting to be solved badly.
When he speaks, his voice is lower.
âI shouldnât have said it like that.â
It is not much. It is nowhere near enough. But it is also probably the closest anyone in this hospital will ever get to hearing Robby say he was wrong.
The words catch you off guard anyway.
He adjusts his hold on the chart. âTake five more minutes if you need them. Then I want you back in three.â
You nod once.
Robby leaves before either of you can answer.
The tension goes with him in increments.
Jack exhales through his nose and looks down the hall after him like he is still considering whether to follow. Then he glances at you.
âYou okay?â
You let out a tired breath that almost resembles a laugh. âI think so.â
âThat was a terrible apology.â
âIt was,â you agree.
âBut?â
You look toward trauma, where the doors are swinging open and shut around the blur of another incoming patient. âBut I heard it.â
Jack watches your face for a second, then nods.
âAlright.â
He gives your shoulder one last squeeze before stepping away. âGo be too emotional somewhere productive.â
This time you actually laugh, small and startled and real.
Jackâs mouth tips faintly at one corner like heâd been aiming for exactly that. Then he turns and heads back into the noise.
You stand there for one more second in the middle of the corridor, breathing.
Then you straighten your scrub top, wipe once under your eyes in case there is anything left there to betray you, and push back through the trauma doors.
The shift is still waiting.
So are the patients.
So are all the impossible, unfinished things that will remain impossible and unfinished long after tonight is over.
You go anyway.
Because the truth, ugly and inconvenient and still intact beneath everything Robby said, is that he was wrong about the part that mattered.
summary: on your very first day as an attending at the ptmc, you're forced to navigate the chaos of the night shift, a code silver, and the fact that jack abbot would (and did) take a bullet for you. (7k)
characters: jack abbot / fem!reader, samira mohan, john shen, crus henderson, princess de la cruz, michael robinavitch, jack's dead wife also gets a wee mention
contents: friends to lovers, hurt/comfort, angst with a happy ending, heavily inspired by greys anatomy s6ep24, not proofread soz cw for so many medical inaccuracies (like so many), hostage situations, heavy mentions of blood and gore, mentions of trauma and grief
( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )
It was your first day as an attending, and almost your very last.
Other than your newfound position, there was little else different about this night compared to all the others. The late evening was filled with all the usual chaos that youâve come to find a strange sort of refuge within. Your first patient of the day was a woman in a pretty sequined dress, whoâd sustained a collapsed lung after screaming a little too hard to âBohemian Rhapsodyâ during karaoke â something youâd only find while working the night shift.
âFirst needle aspiration as an attendingâŚâ Jack Abbot said with a nod of approval when the procedure was done. âHowâs it feel?â
The simple question made you dizzy. It was as much of a reminder of your new ranking as the foil balloons in the break room, bobbing lazily against the ceiling tiles. Or the crooked banner strung above the coffee maker, reading CONGRATS in cheap gold letters. Or the plastic container of store-bought cupcakes someone definitely bought last-minute, with neon-colored frosting smeared slightly on the lid.
But what really sent you reeling, though, was the inadvertent acknowledgment of the simmering tension between you and Jack â which had always been there in some ways, but was much easier to ignore before now.
The constant will-they-wonât-they between you was buried under layers of hierarchy, rules, and morals â under the unsaid understanding that whatever this thing between you was could never be acted upon. Not while you were his resident, anyway.Â
The obvious power imbalance was a line Jack Abbot would not let himself cross, no matter how desperately he wanted to.
Only now, that wretched line isnât there anymore. For the first time since he met you, youâre both on even ground. The world is your oyster, as it were; all the opportunities lie now at your feet. You need only to reach out and take it.
âFirst intubation as an attending,â Jack hums from the opposite side of the hospital bed, eyes glittering with amusement behind his safety glasses. âHowâs it feel?â
You scoff a quiet laugh and shake your head. âThat question got old about the fourth time you asked it, Dr. AbbotâŚâ you deadpan, sewing the trachael to the unconscious patientâs neck.
Reggie Brice; thirty-two-year-old male; exhibiting crush injuries to the chest and pelvis from a gnarly car pile-up. Seven people, including this one, were rushed in requiring immediate assistance. The rest were brought in with sustained head injuries, concussions, or minor fractures that needed tending to. You know that there has been at least one confirmed death.
âWell, itâs a big deal,â the man scoffs. âWhy do you think we all chipped in two dollars to decorate the break room? Those grocery store cupcakes actually mean something, you know?â
âWell, I am honoredâŚâ you sigh in a distracted monotone.
Jack squints. âYeah, I can tell. You look downright emotionalââ
You take a step back to assess, gaze flickering to the monitor at your side. You find the manâs blood pressure continuing to climb, which is less than ideal for the injuries heâs sporting now.
âPressureâs too high. We gotta fix that, or heâs gonna crash,â Jack announces in a sharper tone, though it never quite loses its laid-back edge. He always works best under pressure, in truth. âWe could always crack the chest, cross-clamp the aortaâ buy him some time till we get him a room.â
âWhat about preperitoneal packing?â you suggest, gesturing over the patientâs lean stomach with gloved hands. âWe do a simple midline incision below the umbilicus, pack like hell around the bladder, keep the bleeding in check until we get him upstairs.â
Jackâs silence is less than reassuring.
You peer at him behind the glasses sitting low on your nose, stumbling over yourself as you brace for an inevitable rejection. âI know itâs more of an OR procedure, and Iâve only done it once, butââ
âHeyâŚâ Jack cuts in softly, brows raised to his hairline. âYouâre the boss here, kid. Remember? Weâll do whatever you wanna do.â
Your eyes narrow, despite the funny feeling flaring in your chest. His voice, all deep and gravelly and gentle, has always had a way of piercing right through you.
âIâm not a kid anymore, Abbot,â you remind him.Â
So thereâs nothing standing in your way anymore, old man, youâre really saying.
Jack grins wide, like he can hear it in your silence.
âForce of habit,â he shrugs. âNow, câmon. Letâs do it your way, boss.â
Youâre wrists-deep in the conscious manâs pelvis, packing the blood clot around his bladder while Jack holds the Deaver retractor in a steady head. You fall into a strange sort of rhythm together, the way you always do, moving with each other without ever having to speak. Though, for some reason, you canât seem to stop your hands from shaking.
âThis is good, right?â you murmur behind your mask, shoving more gauze beneath the manâs sliced skin.
âYouâre doing great,â Jack praises muffedly, without missing a beat, though he flashes you a stern look behind his glasses a second later. âYouâre an attending nowâ You know what youâre doing.â
You swallow hard with an unsure nod. âRight⌠YeahâŚâ
Jack smiles at your sheepishness â a stark contrast to how methodically your hands move â though the expression gets hidden behind his blue surgical mask. âDonât worry. Itâs always a little weird at first. Youâll settle in in no time.â
You scoff a harsh breath through your nose. âYouâve been uncharacteristically sweet to me today. You know that?â
âIâm always sweet,â Jack squints. âBut I can always get meaner, if you want. You know, if my kindness isnât impressing you.â
âHm,â you shrug and swipe your gloved fingers under the fatty tissue of the fleshy linea alba. âJuryâs still out.â
âWell,â his brows bounce. âI guess Iâm just gonna have to try a little harder, then, arenât I?â
âWhat can I say? I have high standards, Dr. Abbot.â
Your concentrated gaze flickers from the incision to the man standing across from you. Something mischievous glimmers in your eyes, crinkling at the edges with a smile he canât see behind your mask. The air between you charges in a flicker.
âYou doinâ anything after this shift?â the man wonders suddenly, passing you another stack of gauze with his free hand. âYou know, to celebrate?â
âI donât knowâŚâ you sigh and turn away again. âI guess it depends.â
âOn?â
âWhether someone can give me something better to do than collapsing face-first into my bed.â
âI think I could make a pretty strong case,â Jack quips.
âOohâŚâ you hum. âDo tell.â
âSomething involving food. Definitely,â he starts. âMaybe something a lot more filling than two-dollar vending machine snacks.â
âVery compelling start, Dr. AbbotâŚâ
âAnd maybeâ if youâre so inclined,â he croons drily. âSomething where we donât talk about work for an hour. At least.â
You flash him a deadpanned stare. âWell, now, thatâs just way too far.â
âHm. It was worth a shot,â he shrugs.
âI guess weâll just have to see how the rest of your performance goes...â
His eyes widen in amusement at your sudden teasing, not nearly as shy as heâs grown accustomed to. âOh, so Iâm the one being evaluated now?â
âYep,â you nod once, popping the p.
âAnd what happens if I pass?â
You meet his gaze once more, with something a little shier around the edges. âThen Iâll⌠let me take you somewhere for breakfast in the morning,â you shrug, trying to be casual, though your wavering voice gives you instantly away.
A smile curls slow at Jackâs mouth behind his surgical mask. You can see it squinting the very edges of his light eyes as he nods in response. âLooking forward to itââ
The glass door across the room swings open without warning.Â
Your heads whip simultaneously, half-expecting to find a grey-scrubbed nurse standing there, hopefully with some information about the state of the suddenly flooded OR. You find a strange man there instead â late fifties, bearded, tall but with a beer gut that hangs over the top of his baggy jeans. Thereâs dark blood on his t-shirt and the collar of his beige jacket, dripping from a cut on his temple.
His narrow face is strikingly hollow; his eyes are painfully empty. You figure he must be one of the victims from the pile-up. He wears the shock of it all over, no doubt.
âThis is a sterile room, sir,â Jack tells him, authoritative but never unkind. âIf youâre family, Iâm gonna need you to wait outside. Iâll have a nurse give you the detailsâ and maybe take a look at the cut of yours.â
âIâm not his family,â the man says in an even monotone, with a gritty drawl that insists heâs from somewhere further south. There is little inflection in his voice, the same way there is little emotion on his bearded face. He just lingers there in the doorway, frozen still in a way that feels almost uncanny.
Your wide eyes flit to Jack, glimmering with apprehension. Your stomach twists with it, too.
Jackâs firm gaze never wavers from the stranger across the room. âEither way, sir, you canât be in hereââ
The older manâs weathered right hand reaches slowly for the inside pocket of his jacket. Something silver glints beneath the bright white fluorescents overhead. It takes you a second too long to realize what it is â a gun.
The world narrows in an instant. The oxygen gets sucked out of the room all at once. Your chest hitches for a breath it cannot take.
You donât realize until then that youâve never seen a pistol this close before â or at all. Your brain detaches in an instant accordingly, protects you now by convincing you that this is no longer your reality. That youâre only dreaming. That everything around you is just a movie youâre watching from faraway.
âHey, hey, heyâŚâ Jack cautions on bated breath, bloodied hands raised in surrender.Â
His wide eyes dart between the man and the glass door, where the stranger is just out of view of the hallway. He swallows hard, adamâs apple bobbing in his throat, as he takes slow steps towards the assailant.Â
âLetâs justâ Letâs just take a breath here, alright, man?â
The monitor beside you begins to beep wildly when your hands freeze. Your body jerks when the sound fills the silent room.Â
Your gloved hands move on autopilot, adjusting the Deaver retractor in Jackâs absence and continuing to pack the bladder with the remaining gauze. The work is the only thing anchoring you now â the glaring acknowledgment that, if you donât finish up here, the man in the bed will die before he makes it to the OR.
âThat man thereâŚâ the stranger says in a distant voice, like heâs not all the way here either. âHe was driving the car that hit my wife⌠Blew a red light⌠Came out of nowhereâŚâ
Jackâs expression shifts. He reaches for his jaw with slow hands, plucking the surgical mask from his right ear, and letting the left side hang by his chin â allowing the man to see his face.Â
âIâm sorry to hear that, sir.â
âHe killed her⌠On the sceneâŚâ the man continues, gravelly voice tighter now. âI was trying to scoop her brains back into her skullâ Do you have any idea what the kinda shit does to a person?â
âThatâs hard, man,â Jack nods sympathetically but stands his ground at the head of the hospital bed all the same, planting himself firmly between you and the stranger across the room. âI get it.â
âYou donâtââ the man snaps, harsher now.
You flinch when his voice rings suddenly through the room, trying to pack the wound tight with half-numb fingers.
âYou donât just get toâ to fix him like nothing happened. Like her life didnât matterââ
âIt does matter,â Jack assures with a rapid nod. âYour wife matters, I promise.â
âThen let me do something about itââ
Jackâs chest tightens when the manâs knuckles turn white around the gun. He holds it steady despite his troubled state, like he knows exactly what heâs doing with it. Jack understands, then, that if he lets that gun off, itâll hit exactly whatever this man wants it to â wherever he wants it to.
âThere are two other people in this room who had nothing to do with what happened to your wife, man,â Jack tells him. âAnd I know you donât want anyone else to get hurt. I know that.â
âYouâre right⌠I donât want anyone else to get hurtâŚâ the man nods, voice heavy and trembling. âSo tell her to stopââ
The gun shifts over Jackâs shoulder, aiming right for your head.
A pained whimper sounds in the pit of your tightening throat. You can hardly see the incision below you as burning tears gather at your waterline. Your shaking fingers scramble for the sutures to stitch him back up again.
âHey, hey, hey!â Jack blurts, stepping in front of the gun again without a second thought. He keeps his gloved hands raised, but his sympathetic stare turns stern in a flicker. âYouâre talking to me right now, alright? So put the gun back on meâ Weâre gonna figure this out together.â
âI saidâ tell herâ to stop!â
His thumb flicks the hammer of the gun with a daunting click.Â
âI know, kidâŚâ he says without looking back at you, with a voice much more even compared to yours. âI know. Just keep going.â
âStop!â the man bellows. âOr I swear to god, Iâll shoot you both in the goddamn head!â
Jack is not perturbed by his yelling. He wants him to yell, wants him to cause a scene so that someoneâll check in and call in a Code Silver. He just doesnât want that gun to go off. So he keeps his voice calm as he counters gently, âAnd what happens next? If you kill usâ If you kill him. What are you gonna do after?â
The man hesitates for a moment. His grip falters on the gun, as if he hadnât considered the question until that very moment.
âI know you want your wife back⌠But this isnât gonna make it any better.â
âMaybe not,â the man says. âBut itâll make it stop.â
He doesnât elaborate on what âitâ exactly is, but Jack doesnât need him to. Heâs been where this man is standing â not physically, maybe, not with a gun in his hand; but in the deep, dark void reserved only for a special, gut-wrenching sort of grief.Â
âIt wonât. Trust me,â Jack says with a shake of his silver head. âI lost my wife ten years ago. Not like you did, but it still hurt like hell, man, I can tell you thatâŚâ
The man softens slightly. Itâs the first time since the crash that someoneâs tried to level with him, that someoneâs actually understood.Â
Jack takes a hesitant step forward when he catches the strangerâs resolve starting to slip.
âAnd I can tell you it doesnât stay that way foreverâŚâ he continues. âWhatever youâre feeling right now, I know you think itâs never gonna stop. But it will. You just have to let it.â
Another step forward.
âYou see the woman youâre pointing that gun at?â Jack wonders with raised brows, nodding his silver head in your direction. âI like her⌠I really like her. And I didnât think I was capable of feeling anything again.â
Your chest aches at his words. Your glasses fog from the warm tears clinging to your bottom lashes. Your clammy hands fumble with the surgical needle.
The manâs finger loosens slightly on the trigger, and Jack takes another cautious stop.Â
âAnd this is really bad timing, man, âcause I was gonna take her out after this,â he confesses with a not-quite smile. âBut for that to happen, I need us to walk out of here. All of us.â
The beat of silence thereafter feels borderline suffocating. It wraps its cold hands around your neck and strangles you.
Jack almost thinks heâs gotten through to the man. He can see the cracks starting to fissure throughout his hollow face; the flicker of hesitation, the realization of what heâs doing â where his dark mind has led him.
âSo youâre sayingâŚâ the man trails off and swallows hard. His drawl is much too soft for the words that spill from his mouth a second later. ââŚIf I shoot her, youâll understand how I feel?âÂ
Your blood runs ice cold in an instant.
Jackâs shoes squeak hard against the tile as he lunges for the man before you can blink. He pushes him into the wall with an aggressive thud and tries to shove his gun out of your direction. You bend over the bed on instinct, covering your patient without a second thought.
Two shots ring out.
You expect to feel both of them, or perhaps nothing at all, as your limp body hits the floor. You keep your eyes shut and your jaw clenched tight, bracing yourself for pain or certain death.
The harsh ringing in your ears is slow to fade. When your hearing finally returns to you, and your eyes peek slowly open, you find a sea of bodies crashing into the room like a tidal wave â and you, yourself, still standing.
Your head swivels on your shoulder, still half-hunched over your patient. Your gaze drags unwillingly past the blur of bodies and dark scrubs until it finds Jack, lying flat on the ground instead of you.
It takes your brain a long moment to make sense of it â the strangle ngle of his body, the stuttering of his chest, the tear in his shirt from the bullet, and the wet crimson darkening the tile beneath him. The sight doesnât fit, doesnât belong. Not to Jack, anyway; not to the man whoâs far too steady, too solid, to ever look like this.
And the worst part of it all â the part that will follow you long after this moment ends â is that that bullet was meant for you, and that Jack didnât even hesitate to take it instead.
The ED descends into a different sort of chaos than youâre used to. The PTMC fractures, splinters into something unrecognizable, as voices overlap and distort in your ears. âGunshot woundâ Attending down!â you hear someone shout, followed by a quieter, âHelp me get him up,â and a harsher, âSomeone get me a fucking line!âÂ
None of it feels all the way real.Â
Itâs like looking through the rest of the world through a fishbowl, where everything is blurred and warped and muffled. You can see armed guards detaining the crying gunman in the foreground of it all, along with Jackâs body being transferred to a stretcher, right before Samira ducks into your tunnel vision.
Her dark brown eyes are lined with exhaustion from her double shift as they dart attentively across your face â the first person to reach out for you in the midst of all the chaos.
âWhat do you need me to do?â is all she says.
Your voice comes out strangled. It sounds like itâs coming from somewhere else entirely as you choke through panted breaths, âF-Finish up hisâ his sutures, and⌠and get him to the OR... Walsh has a⌠has a room ready for him, I thinkââ
Your legs feel half-numb as you step back from the patient before you, left totally unaware of the chaos surrounding him. You stumble for the entrance, peeling off your stained gown and bloodied gloves as you go, and follow Jackâs body as they lead him out of the room.Â
You migrate to his side like itâs muscle memory to you, struggling to find your footing in the midst of the growing crowd as the doctors rush the gurney to the elevators. For every step you take, Shen and Crus seem to take three more. It makes it nearly impossible to keep up in your stupor.
You crane your head to catch a peek of the man from behind the towering bodies before you. âI-Is he okay?â you wonder breathlessly.
The gurney jerks too hard around the corner, scraping the side of the wall.
âMotherfucker!â Jack groans.
âWell, shitâ He definitely sounds the same,â Parker quips from beside you.
âHow are you feeling?â Crus calls from the manâs side. âTalk to me, Abbotâ Youâre still with us, right?â
âNot unless you two learn how to maneuver a goddamn gurney,â Jack jokes through gritted teeth.
âPage Walsh,â Shen tells Lena with a stern nod, pushing the button for the lift. âMake sure sheâs got a room open.â
The doors part with a ding. They wheel the stretcher inside, and you make sure to squeeze in with them, elbowing past the attendings and nurses to get to Jackâs side.
Heâs clammy and pale when he comes into view, writhing in place as he clutches at his ribs. His black scrubs are stained a darker color from the blood spilling from the wound, which turns the white towel pressed there a deeper shade of scarlet than you think youâve ever seen.
Your trembling hand reaches for him on instinct. You press your palm over his bloodied knuckles â keeping some pressure there, reminding him that youâre still here.
âJack?â you call to him in a voice taut, as your teary eyes dart wildly across his scruffy face. âJack? A-Are you okay?â
He swallows hard, adamâs apple bobbing in his throat. His head turns slowly, just enough to find you, and he blinks wildly to clear the blur in his vision. The corner of his mouth twitches in a faint hint of a smile when he spots you standing over him.
He clears his throat, but his words still come out a little gravelly as he arches an expectant brow and says, âTold yaâŚâ
You shake your head, features screwing in confusion. âTold me what?â
âThat Iâd make a good caseâŚâÂ
Your chest flares. Something wells suddenly in your throat, though you canât be sure if itâs a laugh or a sob. You just scold him instead. âItâs not funny, Jackââ
âHey. Youâre the one who said you had high standards, kidâŚâ he rasps.Â
His eyes fall over your form, trying to assess you despite his dwindling vision. You watch his scruffy features twist with concern a second later. His chest stutters as he questions breathlessly, âWhoaâ Is that⌠Is that my blood? Or yours?â
You tilt your chin to follow his gaze. Only then do you feel the warm blood trickling down to your elbow; only then do you feel the white-hot, searing pain of the bullet that had grazed your shoulder.Â
You feel very suddenly like the world is spinning around you.Â
The stares you get return, as everyone else seems to notice too, only adds to the dizziness.Â
âYouâre bleeding,â Shen observes sharply. âWhy didnât you tell anyone you got hit?â
âI-Iâm fine,â you insist despite the waver in your voice, shaking your head to fight the lightheadedness away. âI canâtâ I canât even feel it, okay? I swear.â
âGet someone to take a look at that when we get upstairs, alright?â Shen commands with a stern glare. âI mean it.â
Your wet eyes harden in an instant. âIâm not leavingââ
Jackâs hand, still weak on his side, twists over the damp towel to grab yours. His bloody fingers are cold and trembling as they struggle to find purchase on your smaller ones. You hold him with enough strength for the both of you.
âYou got hurt âcause of me, kid. At least let someoneââ
âHey,â you snap, meaner than heâs ever seen you. âThat was not your fault.â
âLet âem take a look at you, alright?â
You shake your stubborn head. âI need you to focus on yourself right nowââ
âI am,â he insists. His gravelly voice never loses its humorous edge, and neither do his glassy eyes lose their tenderness as they flit back and forth between yours. âAnd Iâm not gonna be okay if you arenât, alright? So just⌠please.â
Your features crumple at the pleading look he gives you â with his eyes all squishy around the edges, and glazing over with unshed tears.
The elevator stills with a ding, shattering the tense moment. It jolts faintly, just enough to make your swimming stomach feel sicker. You catch yourself nodding despite your better judgment.Â
âFineâŚâ you tell him in a fragile voice.
Jack tries to smile but finds the strength to slowly leave him, a little like the blood trickling from his side.
âIâm in good hands,â he assures you, then turns to the attending on his left. âRight, Dr. Shen?â
The younger manâs brows lower. âDidnât you just call me a motherfucker?â he quips.
Jackâs weathered face twists as heâs wheeled out of the elevator. ââŚDid I?â
Your hand slips from his as you watch him go. Something about it feels wrong, though you canât exactly place why. You just know it feels like something ripping in two â like the torn skin of your bloody shoulder, times a thousand.
The room they put you in is achingly quiet; the kind of quiet that makes everything else seem ten times louder. The green-white fluorescent bulb clicks and buzzes mercilessly over your head, drilling straight into your skull. The AC hums gently alongside it in a mundane sort of symphony that matches the empty room youâre in â where only one hospital bed sits beside a shuttered window, in front of a porcelain sink and mirror.
Everything smells like stale air, sharp antiseptic, and metallic blood.
You stand before the cloudy mirror with your scrub sleeve pushed up your shoulder, kept awkwardly in place by your chin. You struggle to do your sutures with a hand that wonât stop trembling.Â
You donât realize how ardently youâre still shaking until the needle slips across your skin â not enough to do any real damage, but enough to make you hiss through your teeth when it stings. You clench your jaw and pull the thread through, until the raging skin around the laceration pinches together again. Your features flicker as you try and fail to ignore the dull burn that spreads up and down your arm a second later.
The fiery sensation is the only thing keeping your mind distracted from all the rest of it â the way the gunshot made your ears ring; the way Jackâs body jerked before it hit the ground; the way the man called out for his wife when security pinned him to the floor.
You tug the sutures harder, relishing in the sting. You push the needle through once more, harder than necessary, and let it slip a little sloppier than you should â anything to take your mind off of it.
âCarefulâŚâ a voice cautions from the doorway.
Your head whips over your shoulder. You blink rapidly as your brain struggles to catch up â like you half-expect to find yourself back in that room; like you half-expect to find the man from before standing there.
You feel a little like the ground has been pulled from underneath you when you find Robby there instead, rubbing disinfectant between his calloused palms.
Someone downstairs mustâve called him about Jack, and about the Code Silver currently turning the PTMC to shambles. And, based on the surgical mask sticking out of his jacket pocket, you figure he mustâve just gotten back from checking in on him in the OR.Â
His dark eyes flit from your face, to your shoulder, and to the supplies scattered across the sink before you.
âThey said you were supposed to be getting looked at,â he says. âNot playing DIY surgeon.â
You huff out a breath that wouldâve passed for a laugh any other time.Â
âEveryone else is busy⌠At least I can make myself useful this wayâŚâ
You canât bring yourself to meet his gaze. You canât stand the way heâs looking at you now. His gaze is too sharp, too focused. Itâs like heâs studying you, cataloging, assessing â the same way you do with your patients. The thought of being so helpless makes your stomach twist.Â
Robby doesnât argue, but instead lets his eyes linger on the slight tremor in your hands. The leftover adrenaline is likely buzzing like electricity in your veins just now. Youâre bound to crash at any second.
âI know you donât want my help,â he starts slowly, sauntering further in with his arms crossed over his chest. âBut at least lie and say I did your suturesâ so Jack doesnât try to kill me when he wakes up.â
âI think heâll know you didnât do âem when he sees how neat they are,â you joke drily.
âRudeâŚâ Robby scoffs, sneakers scuffing as he plants himself at your side. You can see the leftover slumber in his swollen eyes more clearly now, as he ducks down to look at you. âWant me to get you something for the pain, at least?â
You shake your head instantly, not trusting your voice enough to speak without wavering.
âYou sure?â he presses.
âIâm fine,â you snap. âIâm not the one in surgery.â
He is not dismayed by your anger. He knows itâs not meant for him.Â
âWell, Jackâs doing just fine. Walsh is finishing up with him now,â he tells you. âHonestly, I think the hardest part is gonna be keeping him off his feet for the next little whileâŚ. âCause thereâs about a hundred percent chance heâs gonna want to come back to work when heâs discharged.â
You exhale sharply through your nose in place of a laugh as you tie the sutures and cut the excess with a pair of small medical scissors.Â
You just barely catch sight of your delirious smile in the cloudy mirror before a chuckle sputters suddenly from your mouth. The sound of it fills the quiet room as you tumble into a fit of half-drunken giggles, bowing your head and propping your gloved hands on the porcelain sink.
Your shoulders shake as your laughter turns quickly into sobs.
âIâm fine,â you blurt once more and shake your head. Your voice is strangled through the tears in your throat, but you dismiss him anyway. âIâm fine. I-I donât even know why Iâm crying, so..â
âYou went through something traumatic tonight,â he coos. âEverything youâre feeling is completely normal.â
You shake your head again. âI shouldâve gone with himâ I should be helping in thereââ
âYouâd just be a liability,â Robby shrugs, a little blunt but not entirely unkind. âYouâre still in shock. Your hands are still shakingâ I wouldnât let you anywhere near an OR like this⌠Youâre better off here, and you know it.â
You turn your head to flash him a teary-eyed look. Your chin quivers as your taut voice trembles, âHe asked⌠He asked me if I wanted to go out with him when we got off,â you confess in a strangled whisper.
Robbyâs brows raise to his hairline. âDid he?â
You nod slowly. âAnd I was gonna say yesâŚâ
âGoodâŚâ the older man nods, lip flickering into a smile beneath his beard. âAbout timeâŚâ
âSo he canât⌠He doesnât get toâŚâ You stumble over yourself to get the words out. âHe doesnât get to not come back after that.âÂ
Robbyâs sympathetic grin widens at the stern, wet-eyed glare you give him. He takes a slow step closer and splays a warm, comforting hand along your back.
âJack Abbot is the most stubborn son of a bitch Iâve ever met,â he tells you. âIf thereâs even the slightest chance of him coming out of that OR just to take you out, then⌠Heâs gonna take it. Trust me.â
âYeah,â you quip drily. âHe betterâŚâÂ
Jack wakes after surgery to a tingling ache in his side and a heart monitor beeping faintly overhead, pervading the strange silence surrounding him â a silence he doesnât usually allow himself.
His eyes crack slowly open, dry and unfocused for several long moments. They dance across the ceiling tiles as he blinks the haze of sleep from his gaze. He struggles to recall how he got here â in this dim recovery room, which he had never seen as a patient until now. He remembers the stranger with the gun first, the warmth of the blood that came spilling from his side second, and the way you cried from him third.
Your name spills from his dry mouth like itâs the only word he remembers.
âGreat. Now I owe Crus twenty dollars,â he hears a familiar voice joke from his side. Jackâs head swivels until he finds Princess standing there, checking the IV hanging by his bed. She smiles softly down at him and quips, âHe said the first thing youâd do is ask for her. I thought for sure youâd want a beer.â
âYeahâŚâ Jack rasps, then clears the gravel from his throat. âI could go for that, tooâŚâ
âWant me to go grab her for you?â
He hesitates. âIs she⌠Is she okay?â
âSheâs great. Last I heard, Robby was patching her up,â the woman grins. âAnd, for what itâs worth, she was asking about you, tooâŚâ
The anticipation of seeing you again was somehow worse than the pain, blooming something sharp in his abdomen, and only slightly ebbed by the morphine drip.Â
The minutes drag on. The heart monitor at his side counts the seconds instead of his pulse. His fists curl against the stiff hospital sheets when he remembers the sticky red blood that had dripped slowly down your arm â the way you so easily brushed it all off, the way you so desperately wanted to stay at his side.
The door creaks softly open.
Something tightens in his chest.
You linger in the doorway for several long moments, as if you arenât allowed to come any closer just yet. Youâre bathed in the shadow of the lamplit recovery room and backlit by the too-bright hallway outside. He can only vaguely see the outline of your features from here â weighed down with fear and exhaustion and relief.Â
The laceration on your arm has been cleaned and sewn. Itâs still raging a little around the marred edges, but will heal into a thin scar in a few weeksâ time â a story youâll tell for years to come.
Jack grunts as he struggles to sit further up on the raised bed, but hides it by clearing his throat. âYou look goodâŚâ he observes in a rasp.
âAre you flirting with me, Dr. Abbot?â you joke with narrowed eyes.
âI am,â he quips back. âThanks for finally noticing.â
You scoff a faint laugh and shut the door behind you with a quiet click. You canât help but feel a little like the air has thinned as you walk further inside. You focus on your wringing hands the entire way to his bedside. You donât have the strength to meet his unwavering stare, still puffy from a medically induced slumber, but never once straying from your face.
âYou okay?â he wonders aloud, shattering the silence between you.
You huff a weak laugh. âIâm not the one who just came out of surgery, JackâŚâ
âFair pointâŚâ he nods.
âBut yes⌠Iâm okay,â you add, if only to appease him. âWhat about you? How do you feel?â
Jack exhales a heavy breath, chest deflating behind his thin hospital gown. ââŚLike I got shot.â
That almost gets a real laugh out of you.Â
âYeah. Thatâ That makes senseâŚâ
You flounder in place for a moment, before reaching for the chair by the curtained window and dragging it closer to his bed. Jack is able to eye you more clearly when you settle into the cushioned seat by his side. He can see the redness in your eyes, the tension in your jaw, the way your clammy hands hover like youâre not quite sure what to do with them.Â
Whatever closeness you had before those shots rang out is long gone now. You orbit around him like heâs a stranger to you, like youâre not quite sure what to do with him, like youâre too scared to get any closer.
He bows his head, made of mussed silver curls, in a feeble attempt to meet your stare. He silently begs you to look back at him, but you never do.
âIâm okay, you know?â he coos to you, equal parts because itâs true and because he knows you need to hear it from him.
âNo, I know, I justââ You cut yourself off when your fragile voice finally breaks. You shake your head to yourself and swallow hard, picking at the skin of your thumb until it starts to bleed. The scratch there blurs as burning tears gather once more in your gaze. âI canât stop thinking about it, you know? If you wouldnât haveâ have gotten as hurt if⌠you know, if you werenât standing in front of me like thatââ
His chest twists at the thought of you blaming yourself for it. The burning sensation there hurts him far worse than the one at his side.
âYou wouldâve gotten it a lot worse if I hadnât.â
Your eyes snap finally to meet his gaze, though your stare is much more hardened than heâd like.
âBut what if something worse had happened to you? Huh? What if you died, Jack?â you scold in words that spill faster from your lips than you can stop them. âWere you even thinking about that?â
âNo.â
His honesty stops you cold as much as his lack of hesitation.
âI guess I was just thinking about youâŚâ
The room goes eerily quiet, saved only by the even beeping of the monitor at his side and the distant voices talking in the hall.Â
Jack holds your gaze even as it weakens around the edges, even as it glazes over with burning tears you canât seem to keep away. A rogue droplet clumps your bottom lashes together when your eyes flick down to his abdomen, to the place beneath the blanket where you know the damage lies.
âYouâre not supposed to do that to a person, you know?â you whimper. âItâs cruel.â
Jackâs brows furrow. âDo what?â
âMake someone like you, and thenâ And then get yourself shot,â you stammer, gesturing wildly with your anxious hands. âMake someone almost lose you beforeââ
Your breath hitches.
Jack leans further in. âBefore what?â he presses gently.
âBefore theyâve even gotten to have youâŚâ
His lip flickers with a weak smile. âYou do have me,â he assures. âYouâve had me way before I ever asked you outâ You know that.â
âYeah,â you scoff with a grin of your own, much sadder in comparison. âSo much for that date, huh?â
Jackâs eyes narrow in a challenging stare. âAnd what makes you think itâs not happening?âÂ
You blink owlishly back at him. âDo you want a list, orâŚ?â
That earns a weak chuckle from him, until he winces at the ache it puts in his side a moment later. He cradles the bandaged wound with a grimace, and your chair scrapes the tile when you stand. âIâll tell Princess you need more morphine,â he vaguely hears you say, though he reaches for your hand before you can stray too far.
You still in place. Your wide eyes fall to the fingers around your wrist, warm like a furnace, and calloused like softly textured velvet. Â
âIâm okay,â he tells you, then takes a wavering breath in before repeating more firmly. âIâm okayâ And youâre not going anywhereâ And Iâm not missing our date for the world, alright?â
Your features screw, hardly convinced.
âWeâll order something here,â he shrugs. âHell, we can eat the cafeteria food for all I care, just⌠Donât leave. I mean, I kinda got shot, soâŚThe least you could do is indulge me a littleâŚâ
You cave instantly under the weight of his light-eyed stare. Your chest hitches with a quiet laugh. âItâd be a pretty grim first dateâŚâ you quip.
âYeah, wellâŚâ he trails off, smoothing his thumb over your knuckles. âI plan on having plenty more, less grim ones with you, soâŚâ
Your eyes narrow in a cynical squint despite the smiling tugging at the edges of your mouth. âThatâs very presumptuous of you, Dr. AbbotâŚâ
âWell, you could always so no,â he croons drily.
âNot a chance,â you argue without pause, gripping his hand with great strength â an unsaid promise. âYouâre not getting rid of me that easily.â
âGetting rid of you?â Jack echoes with a scoff, wincing when it hurts him but smiling up at you anyway. âThat was never a part of the plan, kidâ I took a bullet trying to keep you, in case you forgot."
For all the shit people give price about being old, he's actually competent with technology.
Which is why this blunder is absolutely mortifying.
The imagine is bright and spread across the entire projector screen, leaving nothing to doubt. At the table, a row of shocked gasps that quickly mellow out into appreciative whispers to eachother. Meanwhile you are sinking low into your seat with a dreadful hum.
Because there, for your whole team to see, is a photo you know very well. Your favorite white lace lingerie front an center, pulled taught over your ass with johns thick cock resting between your cheeks like a promise.
It's gone not seconds after it was up, but everyone in the room is trained to take in information fast. Ghost glances between you and price, seeming split on which he wants to imagine more. Soap and gaz whisper to eachother, eyes half-lidded like they aren't in the middle of a briefing right now.
It's so obvious what they all want, looking to you and price. Fucking animals.
Well...it's not like you don't fantasize about the rest of the team, but the way they all turn to you looking starved is...a bit concerning for the state of your legs by the end of this.
Price sighs tiredly and closes the projector, knowing exactly zero planning will get done...then unzips his pants.
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Long time, no see, lovies! I just wanted to let everyone know that over the nest few weeks, I will be working on getting every fanfiction posted to this account updated to my AO3, now that I've figured out mmy formatting issue!
If you're interested in following me there, here is the link to my AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dixonspretty/works