my cat had no teeth (sort of)

“The new intern claims Barbie’s been doodling your name with little hearts all over her forms. Somebody’s got it bad.”

Mateo’s statement floats over the nurses’ station diver.

It manages to slam straight into your self-image. Delicate tissue at the best of times, wedged between your left ventricle and the tiny circuit that compels you to adopt every sad house-plant at Trader Joe’s.

Yes it’s true, you do, for the record, employ thematic embellishments. A heart here. A flourish there. (Morale matters; medicine is bleak). That is not the same thing as ‘having it bad’. 

But the problem is apparently people can’t make that distinction, and now you can see it too clearly, a pack of first-years huddled together, snickering over your smittenness, spider-webbing a hairline crack right through the high-gloss competence you spent seventy-eight paychecks shellacking.

It’s that eighth-grade deja vu: the day Jack Harrison caught you tracing Mrs. Jack Harrison in bubble letters on your planner and passed the page down the row like contraband. 

The heat that bursts behind your ears now is the exact temperature of that day, when the whole cafeteria seemed to sync with your cardiac rhythm — thump, she likes him, thump. 

You straighten behind the med cart, ready to emerge and correct the narrative before it mutates any further, when Frank speaks first. “Ignore it. It’s just noise — I’m sure she’ll lose interest soon enough.”

Oh.

Something clamps shut inside you so abruptly it almost audibly clicks.

Like you’ve been fizzing under pressure all shift and someone, somewhere, has just screwed the cap on tight. The carbonation tears around blind, frantic for an exit.

Noise. The word expands until it feels the whole corridor. Noise, as in background nuisance, as in easily tuned out, as in the thin electrical whine of a dying bulb that nobody bothers fixing until someone from maintenance finally rips it out and tosses it. 

So that’s what he hears when you talk? A squeaky hindrance he tolerates out of courtesy? 

The lively back-and-forth you stored under maybe someday morphs, in one breath, into you pawing at a deadbolt while he waits for the scratching to stop. 

You pivot on silent flats, slip down the side corridor before Mateo or Frank registers movement. 

Three steps in, a shoulder clips yours — McKay, clutching a stack of imaging requests. Clipboards explode across linoleum. 

“Whoa, road-runner much?” she laughs, stooping. Her grin falters when she meets your deer-in-the-headlights stare. “Hey, you good? You’re kind of… vibrating.”

There’s no better word for it. Your fingers keep sparking against each other, your chin keeps twitching toward the main hall, and every nerve ending chants the same directive: bolt, wounded-fawn style, into the nearest underbrush before the hunter looks up. 

You drop to your knees, paper edges nicking your skin as you herd the spill into something vaguely stack-shaped.

Out of the corner of your eye, Frank and Mateo both turn at the clatter. Frank’s brows notch, mouth already forming the silent You okay?

You slap the stack into McKay’s hands.

“Peachy!” you babble, already sidestepping to block Frank’s sight-line. “Totally good. Very busy. High-priority sticker emergency. Life or death if you’re, like, six and waiting for discharge.”

Your shoes squeak as you bolt. 

There are several indicators, in Frank’s opinion, that suggest you’ve come down with something terminal, and the first arrives in the form of his inbox. 

Or rather, the absence of its usual infestation. 

When he finally gets ten uninterrupted minutes to wade through his overnight emails, there is only one from you.

A curt administrative note about revised intake-labeling protocol, plus an attached spreadsheet for the week’s front-desk coverage.

It is concise. Properly punctuated. Horrifyingly lucid. 

Frank stares at it a full second longer than necessary, as if more of you might reveal itself under scrutiny.

Because, usually, by this point, there are at least twelve.

They arrive in glitter-bomb bursts throughout the day. A few carry actionable intel. Most are digital magpies’ nests: random URLs, blurry memes, rogue exclamation points, and the kind of half-formed shower-thought nonsense you apparently consider too important to trust to your own mind.

He spends longer than he’s willing to admit at the computer waiting for more emails to come in.

They never do.

The second indicator presents itself when he swipes into radiology and, for the first time in recent memory, does so alone. 

No sudden apparition at his elbow, no imploring eyes, no breathless little “oops, forgot mine again,” delivered as though this is an unforeseeable act of the gods rather than a behavior pattern.

He tends to just hand the badge over without questions. 

There is no point doing otherwise. If not him, you’ll simply latch onto the next available soft touch with security clearance, and Frank would rather it be him. 

He frowns when the reader spits its green light at an empty hallway.

The third, and by far the most worrying, indicator arrives in the break room.

Frank boxes himself into a stolen minute, pours a cup, looks up too late, and finds you standing at the same counter. 

Usually this is your opening. Your preferred habitat. 

You’d reach across his body for sugar you absolutely do not need (you’re sweet enough as it is), clip his front with your ass, crowd his elbow while stirring, then look up like none of it was intentional, like he’s just a piece of furniture placed unfortunately in your path. 

He braces for impact. Nothing happens.

Instead you give a brisk nod, measure out a generous amount of creamer into your cup, and keep your radius fanatically intact. 

You leave before he can tally the damage.

The space beside him turns freezer-aisle cold. Frank’s fingers blanch on the mug handle. He blames the overzealous hospital ventilation for about half a second, then hears the excuse rattle around his own head and die there. 

He has half a mind to go after you. Catch you by the wrist before you get too far, steer you into a vacant bay, and do the whole thing properly since apparently no one else is treating this personality drop as emergent. 

History, exam, differential. What’s been siphoned out of you, and can he replace it?

In a better universe, that line of inquiry earns him one of your usual responses, “Should I unbutton for the stethoscope, Doctor?” 

But he can’t do that. Can’t go stalking after you like some lovesick asshole with a savior complex and a death wish. 

Especially not now when he is, at best, one bad headline away from vaporizing the fellowship he’s been clawing toward for years. He needs HR to stop looking at him like one more incident will finish the job rehab failed to. 

And beyond that, he’s been trying to starve the gossip before it gets any bigger. Partly for himself, sure. Mostly for you. 

This place has a long memory when it comes to his mistakes and a short one when it comes to anything decent he’s ever done. 

He’s not about to hand the hospital a fresh excuse to staple your name to his and let people act like you’re just another piece of collateral from the mess he made of himself. 

But shit he misses you. He wants your attention back on him. And the flirting and the smart mouth and the little collisions of your body with his like you’ve forgotten where one of you ends and the other begins. 

So if he can’t be obvious, he’ll be strategic. He’ll do what he does best. Lay the bait and wait for you to come to him. 

At two he messes with the thermostat. 

There’s a woman in Facilities who’ll adjust it for him without putting in a work order, no questions, an ongoing favor from the time she showed up in the ER with split knuckles and a story about slipping while replacing a vent cover. 

Frank stitched the cut closed in under six minutes, declined the point out that the wound looked a lot more like she’d punched through something than brushed against it, and earned himself a useful little pocket of goodwill in the process.

And, more often than not, Frank squanders that usefulness on you. 

A degree warmer in the mornings, sometimes two if the night crew has left the department with all the ambient warmth of a crypt, timed just before you blow in the front doors, already looking faintly wounded by the concept of central air.

It’s at sixty-six now. 

Low enough to summon you, high enough that no one can accuse him of weaponizing infrastructure for attention.

Although that is precisely what he’s doing. 

But it takes longer than expected for you to appear in his line of sight. And when you finally do, you pay him no mind.

You putter through the department in several layers: cardigan, coat, fleece, thermal tights, hands tucked into your sleeves.

You look pissed. You look adorable. Frank resents learning those two things can coexist so easily.

He tries to catch your eye but you just keep moving through the pit like an overdressed cumulonimbus radiating indignation at every ceiling vent, refusing to seek him out.

It makes no sense. You should have filed a verbal complaint with him by minute eight.

And at minute forty-five he watches (sourly) as Garcia slides up beside you, a still-steaming warmer blanket perfectly folded over her arm. 

“You look frostbitten,” she murmurs, settling the plush square around your shoulders. 

You exhale a blissed little thank-you and lean into her, soaking up the heat Frank had planned to supply by proxy.

Garcia lifts her gaze, finds him across the pit, and winks. Problem solved, ER Ken, she mouths, fluffing the blanket with exaggerated care just to make sure he clocks her fingerprints all over his failed experiment. 

Problem not solved. In fact, freshly enlarged. 

Frank later lumbers down the hallway toward your office like a kicked senior dog chasing the last scrap of affection from its owner. He clutches the print-outs in his hand so tight they rasp with every step. 

He finds you at your desk, hair fallen in stray ribbons across your face, mouth pulled down at the corners while the monitor paints you blue. Concentration or maybe displeasure. Hard to tell from this angle.

He hovers, suddenly unsure whether to knock on the actual door or just the wall of silence you’ve erected. 

He opts for the literal door, two knuckles, two quick knocks.

Your head lifts. Something bright like excitement sparks across your face then the expression collapses, shutters down to business. Like you remembered all at once the circumstances surrounding him and whatever stupid hope had leapt up before you could stop it. 

He hates that expression immediately. Hates that it exists. Hates even more that he can’t quite sort out why seeing it on your face feels like a personal failure. 

“Need this form revised,” he says, lifting the mangled stack. “Thought maybe you could escort me to radiology? Could use the company, and you terrify the techs less than I do.”

It’s needy and transparent and he knows. He doesn’t care how it sounds as long as you say yes.

“I’m, uh, really busy at the moment, Dr. Langdon. Pending labs, two admits… might be a while.” You rattle it off too fast, like reading a grocery list you just wrote in your head. He knows every item is invented on the spot. 

“Humor me, okay? I’ve had seven hours of people telling me to wait my turn. I need one cooperative face before I implode.”

You worry the inside of your lips, eyes flicking to the doorway.

Finally you nod. “Fine.”

One syllable, and it hits like epinephrine. He can’t stop the microscopic lift of his chin, lungs taking in a fuller breath as if permission itself has oxygenated the air. 

He angles toward the hallway, offering the smallest tilt of his shoulder so you can merge. 

“Thanks,” he says, voice pitched towards casual.

“Sure.”

He glances at you to his left. Goosebumps litter the expanse of your arms. He eases his stride so you’re shoulder-to-shoulder instead of half a step behind. “You cold?”

“Nope. Perfectly comfortable.” You answer while simultaneously yanking your sleeves down to your knuckles.

He snorts. “Yeah and I’m the post child for impulse control.”

You stop mid-stride, eyes narrowing. “That’s not funny, Frank.”

His first name. That’s progress, he thinks. Even laced with contempt, hearing it from you feels like an exhale after hours underwater.

He knew you wouldn’t like the joke. Made it anyway, cheap currency to buy a spark out of you. If spark equals fury, so be it. Fury beats indifference every time. 

“Yeah, poor taste. Reflex, I guess.” He winces, thumb rubbing the knot at his collar. 

You huff through your nose and pivot forward again, pace clipped. Frank falls in step a half-pace behind, then edges closer.

“Cardigan looks new,” he ventures. “Color suits you.”

“It’s old,” you say, eyes still on the hallway ahead. 

Frank smothers another wince. Stupid. By this point the day has offered him more than enough evidence that the usual methods are dead on arrival.

Compliments, bait, orchestrated coincidence, all of it useless now that you’ve apparently decided to treat him like a mildly inconvenient coworker.

That’s the part he likes least. The sudden sense that he can’t locate himself in relation to you anymore. 

The part he likes least changes when he finds you twenty minutes later, stationed beside some orthopedic meathead, looking luminously alive.

No longer wan or withdrawn or visibly dying of whatever new strain of virus you’ve contracted. But smiling. A laugh bubbling out, fingers corkscrewing a curl the way they do when you’re charmed.

Apparently you can still flirt. You can still sparkle. You just can’t seem to do it anywhere near him. 

Before his cortex can veto, he’s crossing the floor, stopping dead at your shoulder. 

“Just need a status update on Mrs. Carlson’s tib-fib before radiology locks the board.” 

Mrs. Carlson, insofar as he knows, is fictional, but her imaginary fracture buys him two startled glances and three precious seconds inhaling the vanilla-and-alcohol warmth of your laugh. 

Meathead flips through pages. “Um… we don’t have a Carlson today.”

Frank fakes a thoughtful frown. “Huh. Alias, then. Happens every weekend — patients think we’re the witness-protection program.” 

Ortho squints. “I can pull the day-sheet again —”

“Good idea,” Frank says, nodding like a supervising attending. “Check PACU and the boarding queue; wouldn’t want to miss an imaging window.” 

The guy mutters agreement and slinks off, shoulders hunched in duty. Frank turns to you, expression suddenly softer. 

Crossing your arms, you cock a hip where Ortho had been. “Impressive diversion tactic. Did Mrs. Carlson spring fully formed from your imagination, or is she a previous imaginary friend?” 

The fury’s back again. 

Frank scratches at his jaw. “Didn’t think it through.” 

“You think plenty. Maybe just tell me what you want instead of throwing Jason under a bus.” 

Jason. Stupid name for a stupid guy, he thinks.

What he wants is one honest conversation and maybe your ass back where it belongs — in his personal space. He can’t say that last part though, so he settles for the first in the only terms he knows how.

“What I want is a five-minute consult with you. Somewhere quieter.” He flicks a glance at the empty bay down the hall, then back to your crossed arms. “Please.” 

You study him for a moment, then nod once.

“Bay twelve’s open. Five minutes, then I’m due back at my desk.”

Frank files the claim under Questionable. You treat workstations like bar stools — occupied only until something shinier beckons. It’s not the desk ticking in your head; it’s the idea of being walled in with him past the half-life of your composure.

He watches tension climb your scapulae as you march ahead, timing yourself like a patient on a stress test. 

Bay 12 yawns open and swallows you both.

The instant the noise of the corridor seals off, Frank feels his pulse redeploy to places it has no business patrolling. Temples, wrists, the hollow just above his sternum.

For one beat you stand opposite like combatants in a children’s-duel-turned-board-meeting: arms folded, backs straight, pretending neither of you can feel the static in the air. 

“Right.” He claps once (why did he clap?) and immediately regrets it. “Consult.” 

Your brows tip up, perfectly polite, perfectly guarded. “On our imaginary tib-fib?” 

Frank’s ears go hot. 

“Yeah, about that. I might have — misallocated resources.” He forces a laugh that sounds like a cough that sounds like a car refusing to start. “Look, I just —” A breath, steady, like he tells interns before a lumbar puncture. “I’ve noticed you’ve been… different. Quieter. Less —” he gestures vaguely, like there’s a medical term for starlight. “I thought maybe I’d done something.” 

“Frank, I’ve been at this hospital for three years. You’ve existed in approximately one and a half of them. If I’m different and you assume it’s about you, that’s either breathtaking narcissism or —” a small, lethal smile “— maybe something else.” 

Something else. He recognizes your own bait and still lunges. 

“Yeah. Maybe.” Quiet. Direct. No place to hide in it. “Maybe I did assume it had something to do with me because I wanted it to.” His knuckles sweep his jaw. He never looks away from you. “Because if it’s not that, then I’m standing here making an ass out of myself for no reason, and I’d actually prefer the narcissism.” 

You hesitate. “I’m just… giving you a little breathing room, okay?”

“Breathing room?” He moves toward you impulsively before catching himself, eyes wide, almost pleading. “I don’t — fuck, I don’t want breathing room. What are you doing that for?”

“What do you think?” You laugh, but it’s hollowed out completely. He doesn’t like the sound. “I spend half my shift practically trailing after you. Everyone sees it. I just —,” you purse your lips. “I don’t want to embarrass myself any more than I already have.”

He frowns at that. You’ve never once moved through this place like someone worried about looking foolish. 

You flirt when you want to flirt, laugh when you want to laugh, and say things most people would bury alive before letting them leave their mouths. You leave little traces of yourself everywhere. Lip gloss prints on coffee lids. Heart-dotted notes. Sweaters draped over chairs that aren’t yours. There is nothing cautious about you, nothing particularly governed by social survival.

Even your embarrassment tends to be theatrical, temporary, burned through fast and replaced with another bad idea. He has never known you to care this much about the audience. 

“What are you talking about?”

He watches as your eyes break off and land somewhere past his shoulders, as if the answer might be stapled to the wall.

“I heard what you said earlier.”

Frank’s brow furrows harder, causing a headache. “What?”

“With Mateo.” Your arms tighten across your middle. “About me being ‘just noise.’ About how I’d lose interest soon enough.” Your eyes flick up to his for a second. “So I thought maybe I should help you out with that.” 

Blood sluices out of his skull, then surges back so hard his vision pulses.

For a beat, Frank just stands there, knocked completely sideways by the realization that you heard that, heard those exact words with none of the context that had made them make sense in his head. Christ. 

No wonder you pulled back. No wonder you’ve been different. He’d been cornered by Mateo outside the med-supply cage, half-listening to him gleefully recycle some intern gossip thread like it was harmless entertainment, and all Frank had been trying to do was kill it fast.

Shut it down. Mateo was fishing for a reaction, for confirmation, for anything he could carry back into the staff room and let breed. 

Robby’s got a disciplinary file half built with his name on the tab. One more thing and he’ll be back in that carpeted purgatory explaining how “post-rehab Frank” was just a limited-time offer.

The only thought had been do not feed this. Do not let you become a bigger target than you already are. 

“No, that’s — fuck.” He breaks off, already hating how badly he’s said everything. “That’s not what I meant. I called the intern noise. The gossip. The whole stupid conversation. I meant she’d get bored and move on if I didn’t exacerbate it. I did not mean you.”

If anything, the entire point had been to avoid throwing you under the bus by acting like there was nothing there to poke at. And somehow that attempt has landed here, in front of him now, having done exactly the opposite. 

You look at him for a second like you’re trying to decide whether to believe him and coming up short. 

“I can handle it, you know. I’m a big girl. If I’m too much, or if I’ve been making you uncomfortable, you can just tell me.” The flat seam of your lips is more withering than any shout. “I’d rather hear it straight than keep walking around here feeling like some joke everybody else is already in on.” 

“I know you could,” he says, too fast, like he needs to get there before you decide otherwise. “I know you could handle it. And if that was what this was, I would’ve said it, yeah?” His chest keeps punching at the scrub top, lungs over-ventilating around the terror of being misunderstood.  “I don’t want you to stop flirting with me. I don’t want you to stop hovering or talking or… any of it. I — I fucking need it — You.” 

“Frank…”

His eyes flick down to your mouth, then up again, like he hates that you can see him thinking it.

“If I do something stupid right now,” he says, voice low, “are you gonna slap me?” 

He’s half begging for the hit, half begging on the green light. 

Your exhale stutters into a breathy laugh. “Depends how stupid.” 

Stupid wins. 

Frank closes the last inch and touches his mouth to yours.

Soft at first, like he’s half-afraid you’ll vanish. You don’t. You stay… then soften… then melt, and everything inside him rushes forward. The second your lips part, the kiss deepens. Hunger and apology braided tight.

His hand rises to the back of your neck, thumb stroking the hair there, and the kiss tips from cautious to greedy in a single heartbeat. 

He’s been starving himself on purpose, convincing the ache it was dietary. You don’t feed a craving that noble, he’d told himself in a dozen graveyard-shift pep talks. Now the craving is kissing back, and his resolve crumbles like a sugar packet. 

You curve forward, spine bowing until his shoulders hit the curtain and the metal rings screech on the rail, but the world past the vinyl may as well be orbiting another sun. You both break into breathless laughter, but neither of you stops.

They warned you about selfish addicts, a voice needles.

This is exactly what they meant: taking the one thing that makes the ward bearable and unintentionally hurting its feelings to keep it safe — then stealing it anyway.

He swallows the guilt, chases it with another taste of peppermint. 

Frank pulls back just far enough to speak, foreheads still touching. “No more breathing room, okay?” 

You pretend to ponder, then glance at the inch (maybe) separating your bodies. “Pretty sure you just repossessed every cubic inch of it.” 

“Good,” he says, thumb stroking the tendon at your nape like he’s checking his own pulse there. “I’m keeping it.” 

Selfish, a reprimand flickers, but he can’t imagine surrendering the warmth that’s finally tugged his chest open. 

Then the hallway pager shrieks, reminding you that the world still exists and someone probably needs a doctor who isn’t currently making out behind a curtain. 

You both straighten, slower than necessary, Smooth hair, reset badges. 

As you step through the divider he catches your hand, gives it a quick, secret squeeze.

You squeeze back, and the grin you trade in that split-second says everything the rumor mill never could: whatever this is, it’s no longer background noise.

MARIA NOTE hi hi hi thank you for reading and witnessing er barbie and franks FIRST KISS!!!!!!!!!! behind a questionably sanitary curtain, no less. may their pager batteries die forever so we get more smooch time. ₊ ⊹🪻 ✧˚. ᵎᵎ 🪴

Today you’re sunshine, butter yellow and cream stripes curving down a fitted cap sleeve number. Mother of pearl buttons and the tiniest hint of sugar-white lace, bridging the gap at your sternum where you stopped buttoning the shirt up. Frank wonders how many stylets they could’ve ordered with the amount of money you paid for this top. Then he wonders how long it took you to get your hair like that, with the tendrils curling just so, complimenting the soft line of your jaw and the shape of your mouth. The hair in question is pushed behind an ear as you look dutifully between your computer screen and a sour-faced man with a turgid beer belly, on whom your charms are entirely lost. He’s already taking up an attitude with you, at seven in the goddamn morning, and you’re utterly serene. That’s another thing you ought to work on—the way you look at these people, so openly, so receptively, as if it is your greatest, most earnest desire to get each and every one of them seen as quickly and attentively as possible. With your lips slightly parted, and your brows almost imperceptibly raised. It’s just a little too kind. You give these people an inch, and they’d be happy to use you as a rug between here and those all-powerful double doors. 

Frank eyes the man, assessing for any hint of aggression in his body language, and then looks back to you. Only sets his eyes squarely ahead when he’s sure you’re not going to look away from your charge and in his direction—in which case he’d be forced to offer a flat little smile and an indifferent nod of greeting. That happens some mornings. Most, probably. Other than that, and some brief parlay when he’s needed in chairs and you have the relevant patient information, the two of you don’t often have occasion to speak. And so he doesn’t have occasion to think about you. Or how whoever hired you was practically setting you up to fail. To be emotionally scarred for life, at the very least, and to have your confidence slashed in a million different ways. Ward clerks don’t need to be especially kind, or accommodating or pretty, or make every patient feel singularly special with that solicitous look in a set of sparkling eyes. In fact, they should be more like drill sergeants. They should lay down the law, and never take any bullshit from anyone. Frank has seen what scorned patients do to even the most hardened hospital staff given the chance. Putting you in chairs and saying manage these lunatics is like setting up a lightning rod on a roof and expecting it to clear up a storm. 

It’s irresponsible. And, mostly, an egregious waste of money. But he clears the double doors, and the antiseptic fluorescents embrace him like a weary partner, and there is no more cause to think about you. 

Not for a while, anyway. 

Not for a few hours, until he’s peeling off a pair of soiled gloves and absently catching a handful of sanitizer, and someone opens the doors to the waiting room and someone else’s angry words slide through the gap. 

His feet are moving before his brain has made any logistical decrees. 

Instead of the double doors, Frank takes the direct route to your little box office. It feels smaller than he remembers, and smells a whole lot sweeter, which is very odd until he realizes that it’s you, and then he’s inexplicably embarrassed at having considered what you smell like. And by taking note of the fact that it is rich vanilla and an almost arresting hint of lavender. It gets worse when he leans over your shoulder—the scent gets warmer, and a little disarming, the way a good fragrance always does when it sits flush to the skin and invites you to come closer, to try and parse the difference between synthetic and organic. He braces a hand on the desk next to you. No way you should be allowed to wear such a distracting perfume to work. It’s out of place. It’s just not what a hospital is supposed to smell like. 

This whole thought process unfurls in a matter of about three seconds before he’s cutting off the man who’d been yelling at you—the same one from earlier, he realizes with distaste. 

“No yelling in the waiting room. It’s distressing to the patients.”

“I am fucking distressed. I am a distressed fucking patient!”

“Sir, lower your voice or you’ll be removed by security. We have a zero tolerance policy for aggressive behavior.”

For good measure, Frank points to the sign by the nearest pillar. You look in that direction too, like you hadn’t know it was there. Seriously, did nobody fucking train you? Did you wander in off the street? Or maybe out of a perfume commercial?

“Are you going to treat me or is she just going to keep giving me the same bullshit line?”

You begin: “Sir, there are people ahead of you who need—”

“I wasn’t fucking talking to you!” the man explodes, hitting the glass with a meaty palm. Frank looks around for security, but there’s nobody to be found. Fucking budget cuts. Fucking ward clerks. 

“Dr. Langdon doesn’t decide who goes back. I decide who goes back,” you shoot, and while it’s not entirely truthful, Frank is caught off guard (and a little impressed) by the quick, clean jab. “Have a seat or I’ll call security and you’ll have wasted everybody’s time here today.”

The man looks at you, dumb and red as a brick. Then, he chuffs under his breath. That laugh does little to set Frank at ease—in fact, it has him tensing up. It’s a reckless laugh. Like this guy might be about to do something stupid. 

But he just turns around, shaking his head as he walks down the aisle of chairs toward the exit. 

“Unbelievable,” he laughs again. Langdon is pretty sure he’s actually burning holes through the back of this guys jacket as he tracks his flight path, still not quite believing that he’ll leave so peaceably. 

He’s proved right, at the very last moment, when the man is at the threshold of the door. Clearly a coward who knows he’s on the precipice of escape, he looks over his shoulder and yells: “Dumb fucking bitch!”

Frank immediately straightens, rigid with an innate impulse to chase this fucking guy down—but ultimately, is bound in place. Just barely. Just by nature of knowing dealing with assholes is a part of your job, and beating them up is not a part of his. Violence is not exactly endorsed in the Hippocratic oath.

“Dr. Langdon?”

“Hm?” 

He’s aware that he sounds disinterested, that he hasn’t looked away from the rectangle of bright midday light which beckons him in search of retribution. He’s also aware that he might break off a piece of this desk with how hard he’s gripping it. 

“Should I call security?”

“Uh…” he’s drawn back to you, briefly distracted by your proximity when he looks down. You’re expectant looking, eyes clear and wide as usual, combing for information and ostensibly unrattled—but your lips are pressed together somberly. Like you’re keeping something in. “Uh, no. No, if we had security chase down every disgruntled patient there wouldn’t be any left. I’m sorry about that, though. Guy was an asshole. You okay?”

A little nod. One of your earrings catches a drop of light, twisting and arcing brilliantly. Distractingly. 

Jesus, he’s out of it today. 

“I’m good.”

Unconvinced, he does another quick scan of the room. 

“Are you sure? How about you take a break, where’s, uh…”

He draws a blank. 

“Honald? He’s on lunch, I think he’ll be back soon.”

“Okay, why don’t you take yours when he gets back? Just, you know, take a beat. Relax for a minute.”

It’s ridiculous for him to be telling you how to take your break, and he has no idea why he’s doing it, but you nod. 

“Yeah, okay. I will.”

“Good.” Frank straightens fully, pats your shoulder even as he’s already turning around to leave and immediately wonders if that’s something he usually does with his coworkers. “You’re doing great.”

The door is closing behind him before he has a chance to hear your reply. 

Frank is visibly shaking his head and muttering to himself as he walks past central, where Robby is consulting over some files with Dana. He feels Robby’s eyes catch on him and follow his path for a moment before calling out, “Alright?”

“Alright,” Frank mutters uselessly, and goes to make himself useful. Hopefully someone is on the precipice of death via massive internal bleed. That, at least, would make sense to him. There’s an area in which he can demonstrate absolutely competence. 

-

No internal bleeding, but a couple of burns and concussions need dealing with. He handles them quickly and is sauntering up to Dana for something a little more challenging when the door opens again—and there you stand, cradling one limp arm against your chest, and Frank can’t quite make sense of what he’s seeing at first, but he’s aware that Dana is exclaiming in that jaded way of hers, already making her way toward you. 

You—looking out of place as you blink against the white light, dazed, glancing around furtively, uncertainly. 

Blood, oozing from your cheek and arm, matting your carefully styled hair to your face and ruining your brand new sunshine-yellow shirt. Frank is in action, beats Dana to you, calling over his shoulder for assistance as he takes you by the shoulders and guides you to a nearby chair before kneeling in front of you. 

“I don’t need—I can walk,” you insist, a little breathless. He sees your gaze drop to the floor as you speak, and your brows furrow a little—surprised by your own pain. 

“What happened?”

“Um, that guy—” you wince as Mattheo, who  seems to have materialized out of nowhere, dabs at your bloody cheek with gauze. 

“Hey, woah, no,” Frank interrupts. “Don’t touch her face. Look at the arm, I got her cheek. Which guy?”

“The guy who was yelling at me earlier, I guess he waited in the staff parking lot, and, um, I went out to grab my lunch from my car, and I saw the tires were slashed, and then, like, he just—I don’t know, someone just grabbed me, I don’t even know what he was holding—”

“He attacked you with a blade? Did you call—”

Frank is forgoing his own sentence, rising up and shoring in a sturdy breath to yell for security, but your hand catches on his forearm and it jars him enough to stop him clean in his tracks. 

“It’s fine, Orlando was right around the corner smoking. I think he got the guy, I don’t know, I just turned around and came right here, I didn’t know—I wasn’t sure what I supposed to do.”

“No, you did great. You did good, you did the right thing. Did you at any point hit your head?” He takes your face in his hands and turns you this way and that, searching for any signs of head trauma. 

“No. I don’t think. I mean, I staid on my feet.”

“Ooh, making me look bad,” Dana mutters, fussing in her way as she sets up makeshift first aid station. 

“What?” you ask.

“Nothing,” Frank insists as he very carefully slides your sticky hair off your cheek and smooths it out of your face. “You didn’t see what he used?”

“Uh-uh.”

“Woah, ward clerk,” Robby says, and Frank is inexplicably annoyed by his presence. “What we got?”

“A low patient satisfaction score, I guess.” You wince even as you say it, and Frank grimaces in sympathetic pain, hand darting back from where he’d been trying to assess the wound. 

Any humor melts from Robby’s voice. “Are you serious? Where the fuck is security?”

“I’m wondering the same thing,” Frank murmurs to himself, impossibly gentler this time as he dabs away the blood. 

“They got him. Right away. It was my fault, I—”

Frank cuts you off. “No it wasn’t. That’s all on me. I should have taken that asshole seriously.”

“Arm lac is superficial and clotting,” Mattheo reports. “How’s the cheek?”

“Ah… can’t tell. We need a bed.”

“What? No, we don’t, I’m genuinely fine.”

“South 15 is open,” Dana barks. “You’re gonna want that bed, Scarface.”

Robby slams a folder on the counter. “I’m going to find Gloria.”

“Gloria?” You frown, twisting to look at him. 

Frank gently redirects your head and puts a square of gauze in your palm. “Right here, just look forward. Can you hold this to the wound?”

“What does he need Gloria for?”

He’s up and wheeling you with purpose toward the south wing. “How’s the pain?”

“It’s fine. It’s not a big deal.”

“When was the last time you received a tetanus shot?”

“Uh… I don’t… remember?”

“Okay, we’re going to need to administer one just in case. Mattheo—”

“I’ll put in the order. Analgesics, too. Any allergies?”

“Not to medicine.” You slump fractionally in your chair, still holding the gauze dutifully to your head. “Fuck.”

“Still doing okay?”

“Yeah. Pretty embarrassed.”

“Don’t be. This happens all the time.”

“What—patients attacking staff?”

“Absolutely.”

“Shouldn’t we have more security, then?”

We should, Frank thinks as he wheels you into South 15 and cranks the bed up to 45 degrees before guiding you to lie down. But we have you instead. 

“I think Dr. Robby is on his way to make that case as we speak. Can I see?”

Carefully Frank pulls your hand from your face, taking the bloodied gauze with it and does a quick visual examination. The bleeding has stopped and all signs point to a shallow wound. He begins configuring the setup for a quick irrigation and primary closure. Realistically, he doesn’t need to be the one handling such a simple case—in fact it would be a better utilization of resources to have a nurse handle the whole thing so he remains free if he’s needed—but Frank can’t help but feel a little responsible for the whole thing. It was him who said you didn’t need to call security, he who sent you on your ill-fated lunch. 

“Fairly clean job,” he mutters as he irrigates the wound. “Almost incised.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means the wound edges are straight enough that we can use glue instead of staples or sutures. Better outlook in terms of scarring, too.”

“Oh, god. I didn’t even think of that. Is that gonna happen?”

“No damage to the dermis, and it’s a low tension area. I can’t make any promises, but scarring should be minimal.”He sets the irrigation tub and syringe on the cart before patting your cheek dry with sterile gauze. “No foreign material in the wound. Cut and dry.”

“Is that a joke?”

“Only if it was funny.”

Frank allows himself to examine the rest of your face for any cue that he might’ve offended you, just in time to watch as you huff a quiet laugh. The corner of his own mouth tugs in response and he focuses on the cut once more—setting aside the shimmer on your eyelids, and the way you haven’t totally eliminated all the stray hairs around your brows. He wonders for no particular reason if you matched your blush and lipgloss on purpose.

Up close and personal, he finds himself searching for indicators of age. Crow’s feet? Smile lines? The working theory is late twenties. Not that it matters. But it could clue him into how much work experience you might have. If you’re in school, and this is just a job to pay for ramen, or if you’re an over-qualified graduate trying to afford downtown rent.

Probably he could just ask, he realizes as he breaks open an ampoule of skin glue. It might even be appreciated—the silence is getting increasingly sticky. 

“Alright, we’re gonna do three coats of Dermabond with thirty second intervals for drying. It may tickle a little, but no glue is getting in the wound itself. This method should minimize scarring. Sound good?”

Frank has the applicator poised above the cut and is about to begin before he realizes you haven’t responded. He leans back to catch your eye, and notes the vacant gaze, set astray at a waxed tile floor. 

“You okay?”

Finally you stir, eyes widening as they meet his and you realize you’d tuned out. “Sorry. Yeah, that sounds great. All good.”

“You heard what I said?”

“Yes. Three layers and it’s gonna tickle.”

“More or less.” Satisfied, he straightens once more, and very carefully, begins applying a thin layer of adhesive over where he’s pinched the wound shut. 

More silence. Adrenaline crash, probably. Someone will have to bring you a juice box. 

“Remind me. How long have you been here?” Frank asks, more in an attempt to make sure you’re not internally spiraling over the moral failure of humanity than because he wants to know. 

“About a month.”

Frank whistles. “Didn’t make it very long, did you?”

“Yeah. Wasn’t really expecting to be attacked, period.”

His hand pauses, and it’s good a time as any to let the first layer dry. Most normal people are pretty upset by witnessing violence, let alone experiencing it. Especially ones who haven’t worked in the field long enough to anticipate the accrual of a few battle scars. 

“I’m sorry this happened to you. For what it’s worth, I can guarantee that guy is already on his way to jail if Orlando caught him at the scene like you said.”

You pick at your white nail polish without moving the injured arm. “Mhm.”

Another silent beat. Frank is about to apologize for not doing more to prevent the whole thing when there’s a knock at the open door. Without looking, he’s sure it’s Dana. 

“How you doing, Doll? Langdon’s taking good care of that pretty face?”

“Yeah, thanks. We’re all good.”

It could be his imagination, but he’s pretty sure he feels your cheek heat under his gloved hand. 

Probably a physiological reaction to pain. 

He swallows. “Where’s Mattheo, Dana? We need those painkillers.”

“Backup at the ADC. Shouldn’t be much longer. The cops want to talk to you.”

You hesitate. Langdon chances a peek at the rest of your face as he brushes on the second layer of glue. 

“Do I have to do it right now?”

“No,” Frank interjects, though he doubts Dana would’ve pushed you on it either. “We need to finish this, get to your arm, and then administer your tetanus shot. After that you’ll need at least fifteen minutes of observation in case of any adverse reactions. Dana, can you get someone to bring her a drink?”

“You got it.” Then, very obviously aimed toward you: “Do you need anything else?”

“I’m okay. Thank you.”

“Of course. Keep me posted.”

“Always,” Frank assures, and Dana moves along. 

A quiet moment. 

“Does this actually happen all the time?” you ask without warning. “You guys seem really chill about it.”

“Not really, no. But pretty much everyone has a story.”

You hum absently, and Frank senses something about his answer needs amending. 

“It’s rare for clerks. You guys get that fancy plexiglass.”

“Have you been attacked?”

Memories stir loose, and Frank huffs a quiet laugh. No sense in scaring you with horror stories involving scalpels. 

“It’s pretty easy to win a fight when you have a syringe full of heavy duty sedatives.”

“Maybe I should keep one of those up front.”

“You won’t need it. Today was…” he swallows back ‘my fault’. “Atypical. Lupe’s been here longer than I have and I’ve never seen her get hurt like that. It won’t happen to you again.”

Because I will personally start beating asses if these people want to keep it up, is what he doesn’t say. Anyone who picks on the twenty-something glorified secretary at the front desk is a bully, and there’s no room for that in an ER. 

Frank carefully, unblinkingly watches the final layer of glue set. Wonders what would drive anyone to attack you. You, with your cheerful yellow shirt and that delicate necklace—the dragonfly pendant that dips into the hollow of your throat. The way your hair curls at the ends and dances when you move. Everything about you seems engineered to elicit positive reaction. No, not engineered—that connotes some sort of farce, or mistruth. The pleasantry that you inspire is one hundred percent you. All the pretty trappings just signal your expectations for how you’ll be treated, and consequentially, your inherent nature. 

Or—he assumes. He doesn’t actually know you. 

Regardless, you didn’t deserve the attack. Nobody would’ve, of course. But seeing your shirt all ruined, and the even finish of your face contorted by this long cut, drains Frank of a little of his belief in the goodness of humanity. There wasn’t much to begin with. 

Somewhere in this wash of pointless musing, he’s begun work on your arm. He’s distantly aware of your watching this work, and that you’re holding yourself a little differently with the pain. If Mattheo doesn’t come back soon, he’s going to have to get to the cabinet himself and find you some acetaminophen. 

Suddenly, you’re speaking: “I don’t know if…”

And just as quickly, the sentence tapers off. Frank looks up at you as he works, and then back down. It’s pretty easy from the pensive look on your face to determine your train of thought. 

“I promise you it’s not going to happen again. You don’t have to worry about that.”

“Yeah, but… I don’t even like getting yelled at.”

“You are on the wrong career path, then.”

“I was waiting for it to get easier.”

He risks another glance. You’re fixedly watching rust-colored saline trickle from your arm into the collection tub. 

“It will. If you stick around.”One last push of saline gurgles from the syringe and into the tray. Clear, now. He sets the tools aside and finds more gauze to pat the wound dry. “Are you thinking of quitting?”

“Can’t afford to,” you say, all too quickly, like you had pursued the idea and run into this immovable wall minutes ago. “I’m very much in debt and looking to get into more.”

“Oh, yeah? Considering med school?”

“Maybe. Or a PhD. Not sure if I want to get into psychology or psychiatry. Now I’m wondering if this is, like… a healthy environment for me.”

Frank half-smiles. “Well, if you did go the med school route, you could probably avoid rotations in emergency medicine. Or—hey, you could come back here. Barring death, I’ll still be around in four years. It’d probably be less intimidating if you knew your attending.”

“Alternatively I’d be so preoccupied with trying not to look like an idiot that I’d accidentally kill a bunch of people.”

“I’m confident that you’re not an idiot. In practice or appearance.”Frank can hear you swallow as he dispenses a small amount of antibiotic ointment into his gloved hand and carefully goes about working it into your skin. “Sorry. Tender?”

“A little.”

“Mattheo should definitely be here by now. If he’s flirting with that intern again I’m going to kill him.”You laugh half-heartedly. Frank smooths a 4x4 over your arm, tapes it in place, and leans back, peeling off his gloves. “Should be good as new in a few weeks. When do you work next?”

“Monday.”

“I’ll find you Monday for a check-in. Until then keep it clean and dry. Princess or Perlah will put together a kit with everything you’ll need, and Mattheo will be here eventually with that other stuff. You’re not afraid of needles, are you?”

“Uh—”

An intern sticks his head through the door—evidently one who hasn’t made an impression on Langdon. 

“Code blue in chairs.”

“Then you should get to chairs.”

“Right.”

The intern disappears and Frank stands, taking longer than he should to walk to the door and grab some hand sanitizer.

“All good here?” he asks, giving you a once over as his hands rub together. With an air of self-consciousness you smooth your skirt. It’s a nice skirt. Untainted by blood, as far as he can tell. 

You nod once, decisively. “Yup.”

“Good. I’ll make sure someone calls a tow truck and a car so you can get home. But don’t leave until you get that tetanus shot, okay? I’m serious.”

“I won’t.”

Frank nods slowly, and feels like there’s something he should say. He skims his teeth with the tip of his tongue. Nothing comes to him. He knows he’s wasting time. And probably making you uncomfortable—you, just sitting there, back rod-straight and ankles crossed, hands folded politely in your lap. He’s been told he has a tendency to stare. 

In the end, all he can think to say is, “Take care of yourself.”

Again you nod, and Frank is pulled by duty down the hall, leaving you there in your ruined sunshiney shirt, and with your hair streaked in drying blood. 

A strange image threatens to stop him in his tracks—one he hadn’t thought about in the moment, but now sticks to the inside of his retinas at half-opacity. Blooms in full, violent color when he blinks. 

A drop of your blood, tracing its way down the dip in your cheek, clinging to the hollow beneath your jaw. Tracing slowly, all the way down your throat. Catching on the dragonfly pendant, as had the quick, covert trail of his gaze. 

That’s weird, he thinks. An odd image to fixate on. 

Frank shakes his head like he could dislodge the memory. Snaps the edge of a fresh glove extra hard against his skin as he comes up to the edge of the heart attack’s gurney and someone fills him in. 

Yeah—the last thing they needed was another ward clerk. Broader, wiser coverage could’ve stopped the events of the day. More nurses. More security. Shit, you wouldn’t have been attacked if you weren’t ever hired. 

The heart attack is caused by a complete blockage in the left anterior-descending artery. A widowmaker. They stabilize the man, and get him up to an OR without a hitch. 

Afterwards, Frank finds himself passing by South 15. Casts a quick look inside, and finds the room completely empty. 

Good—room for another patient. The whole thing shouldn’t have happened in the first place. Shouldn’t have taken up time and space. 

We don’t need an extra ward clerk, he thinks for the millionth time. 

Then remembers the way the dragonfly had collected blood and smeared it in impossibly fine lines across the expanse of your chest every time you moved, tracing linked and overlapping circles, like a Spirograph on your skin. The gentle rise and fall of you. 

He comes to a standstill in the empty hallway, an unwilling hostage as something else hijacks his brain and projects the image onto the sterile white wall. Baffled and fruitlessly willing himself to move on. Flexing his hands in time with his own breathing. 

They don’t need an extra ward clerk.