pittling #5

Robby’s in his briefs, and Dennis is in his boxers with one of Robby’s shirts hanging off his shoulder. He’s so fucking hard, and he’s trying so hard not to hump against Daddy’s leg or the couch. Robby’s only half hard, but Dennis doesn’t care. He loves his Daddy in any way he can get him. Robby just sits, watching the Patriots game half heartedly. He’ll run his fingers through his boy’s hair, thinking about how lucky he is. When he was younger he would get so jealous of the doms who had permanent subs, kept boys who looked so sweet kneeling for their Daddies and Masters and Sirs. Now look how far he’s come.

“You okay there, kiddo?”

“YYYeah, ‘s so good. So big, Dad.” Neither of them miss the way Robby’s cock twitches as the name. Fuck, he’s a perv. They both are. Dennis’s words are slurred and low, he’s so deep in his own headspace.

Like Dennis has gone on a few dates with this guy now, he comes by The Pitt to pick up Dennis for a date. Everyone is joking around and teasing Dennis but Robby starts feeling irritated seeing them together. Robby telling Dennis The Pitt isn't a date night spot and that he shouldn't be bringing people who aren't patients into the ED. Dennis immediately apologizing and Robby in turn immediately feeling bad, waving him off and telling him to leave for his date.

The next time the guy swings by to pick up Dennis for another date he waits at the ambulance bay. Robby runs into him while trying to get some air, he still kinda hates the guy and watching him and Whitaker walk off together irritates him even more now. After he can no longer see them he stops to think about why he hates seeing them together and can only come to one conclusion, he is homophobic.

"You smoke, kid?"

Robby's voice from behind made him flinch as his lighter fell from his hand before he could even lit his cigarette.

"I didn't mean to scare you." Robby picked up the lighter even with how he felt his back groan in a silent crack after another grueling shift in the Pitt.

"It's fine Dr. Robby. Just thought you were still in hand-off with Dr. Abbot." The light that came from his lighter caught him off guard as Robby took the initiative to lit Dennis' cigarette on which the younger thanked him for hoping that the dim lighting from the ambulance bay can cover the sudden redness of his cheeks.

"We've finished, Jack can handle the reigns from here." Robby handed back the lighter to Dennis, now leaning on the wall hoping it was enough to support his aching muscle as he watched the smoke blow out of Dennis' lips.

"You know that those are bad for you, right?" Dennis only chuckled as he watched some of the ash from the cigarette drop on the cement, now with nicotine on his lungs he found the courage to look at Robby who had been staring at him for quite some time.

"I know, but they take the edge off just for a bit. I don't smoke that often but it had been a rough shift to be honest. I almost ordered the wrong panel, if it wasn't for your help Dr. Robby I could've seriously made things worse for the guy." Dennis doesn't know why he's telling him this, perhaps it was the exhaustion or the cigarette on his hand, or maybe because it was Robby. A man he sees as a mentor but also someone who made his heart race unexpectedly.

"We all make mistakes, Dennis. It is the nature of our job, but from what I've seen so far you're adjusting really well here. This place will let you experience the worst and the best of humanity, it's up to you whether it'll motivate or cause you to give up. But we're all trying our best to help people, you're doing just fine, kid."

Its as if Dennis had forgotten to breathe, he darted his eyes away in fear that Robby might notice the evident adoration that Dennis had for him. That Robby's words caused his heart to pound so fast he could hear it from his ears. He took another drag from the cigarette watching the smoke disappear on the cold breeze of the night.

"Thanks, Dr. Robby. That really means a lot coming from you." Robby wanted to reach his hand and taste the shy smile from Dennis' lips and he'd blame his exhaustion for thinking that way about the resident yet he knew that it would be inappropriate. Instead he opted for a safer alternative.

"Can I take a drag from your cigarette?" Dennis' stomach should not have flipped from excitement, sharing a cigarette was normal especially when he was still living in Nebraska and sharing a cigarette with his brothers back in high school was a norm.

"Sure." Dennis passed his cigarette towards Robby who took quite a long drag, Dennis' throat felt dry as Robby's lips claimed the same spot where his own lips had been. It took a moment for Dennis to snap out of his fantasies as Robby handed his cigarette back to him.

"You alright, kid?" Robby looked at him too intently that he almost forgot what he was doing.

he collapses and sobs until he gags, he cries and he hits things, denting the wall in places and smashing a glass all over the kitchen tile. he sees dennis there, standing close and looking upset, in the corner of his eye as he falls to pieces. if he had the capacity, he'd feel remorseful that he's putting his favourite intern through this, that such a kind and pretty boy was having to see him crash and burn in the worst way possible. but he doesn't have the strength.

he mourns the fact that dennis will surely run, take his leave, report his lack of stability to the hospital. his grief at losing this young man in his life only adds to his cries and his anger and his upset, and he ends up curled in a ball and catatonic, gasping for air as he spasms from all the crying. it's left him dehydrated and with a migraine, and eventually he passes out on the hardwood floor. he can see a blurry image of dennis's feet in his vision as he blacks out, and he hates that that's the last he'll ever see of the boy. he's ruined every last thing.

he wakes up fourteen hours later, confused and weak. he's exhausted from the sobs and his hands ache from the bruises from his destruction of the wall. he doesn't understand how he's in his bed or how his jacket is gone, or how his knuckles have been cleaned and bandaged. there's water and painkillers on the side table, and the mess has been cleared up.

there's a knock on the door after a while, and robby's eyes widen and he's frozen when dennis walks through the door. he looks a little tired, but he's dressed comfortably and holds warm toast and soup on a tray. he smiles at robby, and its a sad smile.

robby can't help but feel tears blur his eyes again, reasoning with the fact that dennis saw it all- saw him screaming and swearing and punching, saw him sobbing until he couldn't breathe and passed out, saw him so unbearably ugly, and stayed. he didn't run and tell or judge. he tucked robby into bed, treated his wounds, and cooked him warm food.

He knows it’s wrong, they both know it’s wrong, but there’s something about how quick and dirty and unspoken it is that leaves a burning need in Dennis’ chest — specifically when he makes the right call in Trauma 2 that saves a patient’s life under Robby’s watch.

He still gets a little shaky with adrenaline when that happens, so before his next patient he slips into the break room to lean against the counter with a steadying little breath, closing his eyes to focus on slowing his racing heart before allowing a tiny smile to grace his face. He did it.

He hears the door open and close, doesn’t need to open his eyes to know who it is, not when he feels a warm and tall body suddenly pressing against his back. Robby can’t wear cologne at work, he doesn’t even know if Robby wears any at all, but Dennis still knows the scent of him, especially this close.

“Good call, Whitaker,” Robby murmurs, his voice so soft and deep, so full of pride it makes Dennis melt a little. Or a lot.

But, the hands on his waist made his cheeks turn pink, especially when they squeeze the small of it before sliding up, hot palms pressing through his scrubs like a brand, the touch so quick yet lingering as Robby grabs both of his pecs in his hands and gives them a slow squeeze.

Dennis swallows down a moan, his throat thick and slow, keeping his eyes closed as he feels those hands slide down, back to his waist, squeezing his hips, leaving a trail of warmth and pride before Robby’s grabbing his ass, digging his fingertips into the fatty muscle there with both hands.

“You did so good,” Robby hums his praise, his lips brushing Dennis’ ear, makes heat pool low in his gut as Robby reaches one hand around, cups his dick and balls and squeezes both, like he can’t help it.

Dennis breathes out slow, the sound bordering on a whine, wanting to press back against Robby—

But, as always, it’s over before Dennis wants it to be. Those large hands are suddenly gone and then Robby is, too, slipping out of the break room with the softest click of the door.

Dennis opens his eyes, the want in his body throbbing so hard that his eyes line with tears, still feeling the warm trails those hands had made across his body as he wonders if Robby is torturing him on purpose. Maybe he’ll never know.

<- previous part next part ->

the next day they decide to visit the country. they pass the whitaker’s former farm, noticing a freshly painted barn and a coop that dennis knows his father and brothers didn’t build. they stop at the edge of a forest they used to go to for mushrooms and saunter down well-trodden paths, thermoses of coffee in hand. it’s peaceful and quiet except for chirping birds that didn’t fly away to warm countries and shallow crackles of snow under their boots. they talk about everything and nothing, and it feels like the good old days. he always liked to talk to uncle robby, who never seemed irritated by his childish rumblings or judgemental when he complained about his parents hounding him for this or that. these considerate and edifying conversations were how dennis knew he could confide in him about being trans and not be called a devil’s spawn or a lunatic. and also a story about a doctor uncle robby used to date in new orleans. a male one.

on their way back, they come across a small local fair that sells homemade food and various trinkets. hence, his tight budget and short time dennis hasn’t bought any present for uncle robby, so he decides to try and find something suitable in here. strolling down the stalls, dennis finds wooden carved keychains in the form of animals, and his eyes immediately lock on a bear one, which is kind of banal, but he always feels himself grounded and calm in uncle robby’s presence, and his brain, languid from coffee, can’t draw better analogies, so he smiles at a sweet elderly lady and buys the keychain. and it has nothing to do with hair or particular categories on particular websites. nah-ah.

he gives it to uncle robby when they are back in his truck. he chuckles softly (“i see the resemblance”) and clips it on the car keys. he tucks his hand in his coat pocket and pulls out a bead bracelet. they are small and made of black oak and look too much like a rosary he has had since he was a kid. he couldn’t make himself throw it away the moment he left home because no matter what, at the times when panic and anxiety seem to overflow him, the methodical counting of the beads helps to bring him back. dennis doesn’t know if it was intentional or uncle robby completely forgot about the rosary, but he totally notices the hesitation dennis had before taking the bracelet. he puts it on the left wrist and looks up with a sincere and content smile, and uncle robby smiles back and fires the engine.

back at the townhouse, eating leftover takeout, uncle robby starts talking about med schools and enrolling in upsom and as smoothly as possible ends it with an offer for dennis to live with him while he’s in school, and dennis wonders how he missed what it all led to in the first place. he wants to decline, to argue, to say that it would be too much and he doesn’t want to impose or be an unnecessary burden when uncle robby already has a lot on his plate.

“you’re not a burden, mouse. please, never say that about yourself. i love having you around, truly, and unless you simply don’t favour staying with an old grumpy man who practically lives at his work, then don’t say no.” someone once said that dennis has eyes like that cat from shrek and could easily get whatever he wanted with just a glance. dennis apparently found a competitor because if uncle robby looked at him with these eyes and asked him to jump from a roof, he would ask which one. there is the same nervousness and self-consciousness, but also a sliver of pleading. and dennis is just a weak man.

“that’s not the issue, i assure you. i just—i don’t have a job, uncle robby, and i totally won’t when i’m at school, so i won’t be able to pay rent or for groceries, or pay you back with hundreds of grand of student loans on my back.”

“first of all, i would’ve never asked you that; i remember what being a med student was like. and studies should be your main concern, not money. and before you say anything, i have way too much money for just myself, so a few more expenses won’t strip me to the bone. speaking of loans—”

“don’t even start on that. i’m… not okay with staying here for free, but it’s not like i have any other option. but you won’t pay even a cent of my loans.”

“okay-okay.” uncle robby nods, holding his hands in surrender. “not a cent for loans, but i’ll pay for necessary stuff: bus, books, whatever you need, i can help you with that.”

dennis bites on the inside of his cheek, trying to stop his fingers from reaching for the bracelet. “i’m not your kid or your responsibility. i don’t want to make your life hard or become a liability. you don’t have to do any of this.”

“i want to, or i wouldn’t have offered, you know me. your… you’re not supposed to go through this all by yourself, y’know that, right? not without friends or, especially, family, and i’m really sorry you had to. but i will always be grateful for that lucky coincidence so that now i can be here for you. only if you let me, of course.”

uncle robby’s looking at him expectedly, less pleading and more patient. dennis doesn’t know who he’s trying to deceive here because he’s already made up his mind. yet he can’t leave it just like that.

“fine, i agree, but i’ll be doing cooking and cleaning.”

the bewilderment passes on uncle robby’s face until he averts his eyes, a deep red flush spreading down his neck. as he’s trying to find his words, dennis’s brain short-circuits. he has never seen uncle robby flush.

“i—em… dennis, you don’t have to do anything, especially—” and that’s when it hits dennis.

“oh! i didn’t mean it that way. it’s just, judging by the state of your fridge, you’re not a big cook, and i can finally put to use all those recipes my mother made me memorise. and cleaning is just therapeutic for me. with music—even better.”

most of the flush went down, but the tips of uncle robby’s ears are still pink. “fyi, i can make a mean shakshuka. never heard a complaint.”

dennis arches his eyebrow with a slight tilt of his head. “we’ll see.”

they move around the kitchen in a comfortable silence, cleaning the surfaces and stacking up takeout boxes.

“you know this only works if i get into pittsburgh, right? i can still get into philly…”

“you little—”

the next morning uncle robby’s dropping him off at the airport, not in haste or in the dark of a winter morning because he’s on the swing shift today and the departure is only at 10 am. uncle robby pulls him in a hug when boarding for his flight is announced on the speaker, and dennis might’ve hallucinated a bit, constant college sleep deprivation catching up to him, but he felt uncle robby press a light kiss to his hair before stepping back. he hands dennis the bag, a bit heavier from a few books uncle robby lent him for mcat prep, and asks him to text during a layover. as dennis sits in his seat on a plane hundreds of miles above the surface, he fiddles with a bracelet uncle robby gave him, and besides retreating panic, there is something else, not the longing and craving that accompanied him the past years. that thing inside his chest is different now. it feels like a burning fire. it blooms.

the rest of january flies fast and unnoticed. dennis reads uncle robby’s textbooks over and over again until his eyes are heavy and a horrendous dose of energy drinks in his body toes the ‘lethal’ bar. he skips most of lectures, thanks to his gpa 4.0 and good relationship with the professors, and spends this time in the library until it’s closed, learning names of bones in a human wrist and similarities between rituals in hinduism and buddhism. his roommate tests him with a list of potential questions he found online until both of them can’t go on with chemical names and counts of molecules, and they smoke a pack of cigarettes together. on the day of his mcat he sleeps for eight consecutive hours, eats a one-dollar ramen with a red bull, receives a text from uncle robby wishing him good luck, puts on his bracelet, writes a test for seven and a half hours and gets a 511 score.

he’s talking to his ta about the thesis when his phone buzzes with a twitter notification. he decides to forgo it but catches the profile name and clicks on it. in the next moment his hands start shaking, and he can’t utter a word because he can’t believe what he’s seeing while the poor ta thinks he’s having a panic attack or a heart attack, or even both. when it’s determined that dennis is fine except for the shock, they hug for five seconds, and it’s the longest physical contact they’ve ever had. dennis messages uncle robby and almost immediately gets a reply with congratulations and a suggestion to celebrate this milestone. and that’s how he spends his night drinking a bottle of good whisky with his roommate and finding out that the guy has blocked him after he didn’t respond to him for the past two months. dennis deletes the contact and takes one more swig, thanking whatever is up in the sky that tomorrow is saturday.

the remaining months of the school year pass in a blur of classes that even professors aren’t interested in and final polishing of his thesis. when uncle robby asks him if he can read it, dennis explicitly tells him that he would need to commit a murder to obtain it and that he cannot sneak into the auditorium during his defence, or dennis would become a committer. he doesn’t because dennis asked, but dennis wishes he would because in that case, instead of his classmates with whom he went to celebrate their successful defences, uncle robby would have been the first to know that dennis got accepted in upsom. dennis won’t believe anyone who says he started jumping and yelling ‘yes’ when he got the letter, but, unfortunately, there is a whole video.

while he tries not to die from embarrassment and jokes his classmates can’t stop making, he’s thinking about how he should tell uncle robby. give him a call? but what if he’s in trauma and can’t take it? then via message, but how? send the letter itself or write in text or—

it’s the weirdest way to tell someone you got accepted into the medical school you wanted the most, but then he remembers their conversation, and he can’t find a better line.

i guess i’ll have to take you up on that shakshuka

one minute. two. five. so maybe dennis was right, and uncle robby is busy, and it was a good call to text. when he wants to turn off the screen, the message flags ‘read’, and nothing happens for one more minute, but dennis waits. then three floating bubbles appear, and if you look up just a little bit and see how uncle robby texts on a daily basis, you will understand why dennis almost fell out of his chair.

YOU GOT INTO PITT MED?!?!?

dennis just sends him a screenshot of the letter.

<- previous part next part ->

they return to the hotel so they could talk properly and warm dennis up because it was dumb and reckless to rush out into the cold night with just a thin shirt on, and he doesn’t need to catch pneumonia right before the holidays (not deniss’s words). they go up to uncle robby’s room, and his hand never leaves dennis’s shoulder as if he worries dennis would run away again. uncle robby tucks him into a big and warm blanket and makes him a cup of tea that’s too hot to drink and tastes like cheap shit no one should buy, so instead he warms hands on the cup. uncle robby’s eyes never leave his figure either.

he asks dennis what he is doing at the conference and in lincoln at all, and it feels like the dam has finally broken and he can’t stop talking. about moving to bumblefuck, nowhere, without any friends and to a new community. about the church that felt more like a religious cult from midsommar, and his parents and brothers playing along. about his new name and figuring out why he always felt so wrong when somebody called him by the other. about how he hasn’t been to the farm since the summer before his freshman year and if he went there now, he wouldn’t come back. about seeing the banner of the conference and hoping that they would meet here. about the medical books he still keeps in his dorm and sending applications to med schools. about how scary and exciting at the same time everything is because he doesn’t know what to do if he fails his mcat or his parents find out about it.

and uncle robby, attentive and caring and kind, hugs him tight and promises they will figure everything out together. for some time they just sit on the bed in each other’s arms, breathing steadying and hearts beating slowing, basking in the calm presence of one another. then dennis asks him about pittsburgh, about ptmc and dana, about a woman, janey, he started dating just before they moved out, about his motorcycle and if he still ‘sometimes forgets’ his helmet at home. uncle robby doesn’t want to talk about it, the stiffness dennis noticed still present, but he lifts up his head and looks in uncle robby’s tired, wary eyes and sees them soften at the edges. they move to the headboard and lie with dennis’s head on uncle robby’s chest and his fingers carding through dennis’s hair.

he tells dennis about covid and how it felt like the tenth circle of hell. about how it didn’t work out with janey, but they are still friends, and he plays basketball with jake on weekends. about one of the new med students he tried to date, but it didn’t work out either. about the department and new students that dana always keeps on their toes. about the motorcycle that collects dust in his garage and a second-hand truck he bought to go fishing with jack or on his own. about how he wanted to deliberately bail on the conference to piss gloria off after she refused to hire more staff, but both jack and dana locked him out of ed to take a break. and how happy he is that he eventually didn’t bail. when he talks about adamson, dennis feels his heart beating faster and his breath becoming more uneven. he tightens his arms around uncle robby’s torso and presses himself into his body as if to say, ‘i’m here. i’m with you.’

they don’t notice how they fall asleep, exhausted after the eventful day and the stories they shared. in the morning they order breakfast to the room and exchange numbers; uncle robby’s hasn’t changed. he asks dennis if he has any plans for holidays, and when he gets a negative response, he says that he’s working on christmas but is free for new year’s and invites dennis to spend it together in pittsburgh. when he wants to decline because he doesn’t have money for a ticket, uncle robby assures him that he will cover everything and dennis doesn’t need to worry about it. he wants to decline once again, but he catches something flashing in uncle robby’s eyes that makes that feeling in his chest claw at his insides and all the longing rush through his body at the opportunity to spend more time together. back at home. because pittsburgh was always home, and now he has one more reason to go back there.

he retrieves his jacket from the cloakroom and parts ways with uncle robby, whose flight is in a few hours, but only after a big hug and a promise to text him whenever he wants. dennis doesn’t think and clenches uncle robby’s coat with his fingers. he returns to the campus and visits his ta during office hours to negotiate about his schedule for the next semester, date for passing mcat and papers he needs to apply to med schools. dennis doesn’t know who is happier, him or his ta. after it, he sends a message to his mum that he’s too busy with a thesis to come for holidays and, by the end of the day, stays on just ‘read’.

a few days before new year’s eve he starts packing his worn but beloved bag, to the much surprise of his roommate, who has just returned from their parents’ and has never seen him going somewhere for the holidays. to the obvious question, he answers that he reconnected with a friend, and they decided to catch up. they repeat ‘friend’ like it’s in italics, and he flips them off with a chuckle. then his phone chimes with a text from the guy if he has any plans for the eve. he replies, and then does not to the question of if they are going to meet up during the semester.

on new year’s eve, after his first-ever flight that lasted almost nine hours with a layover in chicago he finally lands in pittsburgh and texts uncle robby as soon as connection bars appear. he is tired and hungry, and he has missed uncle robby like hell even though they’ve seen each other not more than two weeks ago. after about five years of zero contact, the distance and time apart strike him harder. the familiar feeling of anxiety fills his body as he strolls through the crowd, looking for uncle robby’s tall and broad figure clad in his soft warm coat. what if it was just a polite question and he didn’t really mean it? what if dennis is taking advantage of his hospitality and crashing his plans? what if he still sees him like a stupid kid and just took pity on him?

he catches uncle robby’s frame leaning on the pillar, gaze roaming around the crowd until stopping on dennis, and a warm and genuine smile blooms on his face. when dennis halts in front of him, uncle robby straightens and immediately envelops him in a big hug dennis can’t get enough of.

“hey, mouse. i missed you.” dennis only tucks his face against the collar and breathes in the scent of uncle robby’s cologne.

they spend the day walking around the city for dennis to catch up on what has changed since his leave. they visit the synagogue, although hanukkah has already ended and nothing special is happening. it’s different from what dennis remembers it from the one time he has been there, but maybe he was just young and didn’t notice stained glass windows and stucco on the walls. he can truly see it the way it is after all the books he read for his abrahamic religions class, and he loves to find that he knows what each ornament and image means. he asks uncle robby if he was there on hanukkah. he reveals that he hasn’t been since the time he brought dennis, and something pangs in dennis’s chest. he doesn’t pay attention to it.

they go to a rink, and dennis admits, embarrassed, that he doesn’t know how to skate. he tries to dissuade uncle robby from it, but all his arguments fall flat.

“mouse, you can ride a horse without reins and a saddle. after this, everything will feel like a cakewalk, so tie the laces tight and let’s go. you got this.”

he doesn’t. he falls on his ass many times, and uncle robby never laughs at him, just grins, amused and slightly condescending, and offers him a hand. and dennis, out of sheer stubbornness his mother berated him about, gets up and tries again and again until he manages to balance on the blades without holding onto something. when he pushes off and doesn’t fall down, sliding forward slowly, uncle robby glides closer and claps him on the shoulder with a proud and earnest ‘good job’. dennis doesn’t stop smiling till they get off the rink.

on the way home they stop by a store to grab something to drink, and dennis votes for beer against champagne because it feels fancy and pretentious, so they end up with a six-pack and a bunch of snacks. he has been to uncle robby’s townhouse before; it’s two-storey and made of brown bricks with a garage and a small yard, just like the ones on the left and on the right. the suburban area around is quiet apart from children playing down the road and a rare car driving by. seems like the best place to build a family and raise your kids, and maybe uncle robby was buying it with that in mind, and it makes something in deniss’s chest pang again, but he shoves the feeling down. he’s good at that.

he doesn’t remember much of how the house looked on the inside, but he could easily guess with the line of work uncle robby has that he probably hasn’t done any renovations since moving in, except for a new tv or a coffee machine. apparently he forgot dennis already knows his way around and decides to give him a tour (“shoes off”), showing him a big living room that connects to the kitchen through the arch and leading him to the second floor. there are two guest bedrooms, one of which he accidentally turned into a storage for old and unused stuff that he can’t make himself throw away or go through and sort, so he shows dennis the second. it’s simple and without excessive decorum, very practical, but there is a pile of comics scattered on the desk and a basketball near the drawer. uncle robby explains that jake stays over from time to time in this room, but he could easily move his stuff out. dennis tells him not to bother, ignoring one more pang in his chest, drops his bag on the bed and asks him about a bathroom. uncle robby points at the door and then to another, saying it’s his bedroom if he ever needs anything, and then they go down to order a takeout.

they are on home alone 2 when it’s five minutes before midnight, so they shrug on their jackets, grab their drinks and walk out in the yard. they bend over the rail overlooking a small patch fully covered with snow and surrounded by a high fence on every side, though you can catch distant lights from the city over the river. dennis puts his phone with a countdown on the rail so they can see white numbers ticking down.

“i’m doing my mcat at the end of january so i can hop on the last train with applications for med schools.” that grabs uncle robby’s attention, returning him from somewhere far he’s gone into his head. “i’ll need to study my ass off when i get back to even pass it.”

“you will. i know that.” uncle robby nods, not in a ‘you must’ way, but in a ‘i believe in you’ way. “you’ve always been diligent and determined when it comes to your passion, and i am, personally, really happy that you’ve found it in medicine. i hope it stays that way.”

dennis doesn’t answer, hiding his face behind the bottle and hoping that his red cheeks could be blamed on the low temperature.

uncle robby takes a swig and turns his face, lowering his gaze at the bottle as if he’s shy about what he’s about to say. “have you… have you thought about a particular school you want to get into? maybe in omaha?”

he’s not shy, dennis understands. he’s nervous and maybe self-conscious about the answer and asking in the first place, and dennis mustn’t feel giddy, but he does.

“actually, i have. the first time i considered pursuing medicine, the only thing that came to my mind was that I wanted to do it here, in pittsburgh, and not anywhere else.” uncle robby turns his head at the last words, and now dennis is the one who stares at the bottle in his hands. “i was born here, and i grew up here. not in the city, but it’s still my home. i thought about returning after the graduation and doing it to also study something i always wanted—even better. and,” he looks up and finds that uncle robby is still watching him. “you’re here. one more reason to get back.”

he sees something flash in uncle robby’s eyes again, but it’s different, and he can’t yet decipher what it is. when uncle robby finally finds his words, his voice is a bit hoarse. “happy to help, i guess.” he clinks their bottles. “welcome home, mouse.”

he liked to think he was pretty good at it. no one could ever tell, or at least no one had ever called him out on it. he made the right noises, tensed the right body parts, held his mouth open in a particular way.

it was fine. it really didn’t bother him. it wasn’t anyone’s fault that he just never got there. he couldn’t even make himself finish, how was he supposed to expect other people to?

robby knew immediately.

it just felt…wrong. it wasn’t genuine. it was too conveniently timed and at a much too showy volume. robby let him get away with it a couple times, hoping as they became more familiar with each other, dennis would either start enjoying himself more or trust that he could be honest.

that didn’t happen.

after about two months of this, in the afterglow (well, robby’s afterglow), robby suggested, “you don’t have to fake it with me. you know that, right?”

Takes place post season 2.

I don’t know what I’m doing… enjoy <3

Chapter 1: