a sharpie that fucking works

he's not like this with samira, you've noticed, or anyone for that matter. rather, they work like two well oiled parts of a machine. they're seamless in the same way that dr. robby and dr. abbot are, or the way langdon is with dr. garcia. they work like they were meant to be a duo.

you work well with everyone else, as difficult as it is for you to feel appreciated among your coworkers. you're as bright as samira is, quick on your feet and whip-smart. not long into your residency at the pitt, robby had told you that he thought you'd fit in well. you work fast, he'd said. though the faster than your sister went unsaid, you'd heard it anyway because you'd heard the whispers of slow-mo already. it's the one thing that distinguishes you from her.

she, who now stands in front of you, her jaw set tightly, her gaze cool and distant. she's hardly even been annoyed at you before and now you're at each other's throats, a far cry from the lighthearted back and forth bickering you have every once in a while. this territory is unexplored and uncertain, and it feels like cave spelunking without the right gear, no flashlight to cut through pitch black.

part of you knows that maybe you did overstep a little. you'd steamrolled your way onto her case and instead of yielding to her care plan, you'd thrown out your own differentials and ideas on what to do because you were tired of the rivalry, of never being seen as incapable when the two of you were in the same room. in that moment, you weren't her little sister but an insubordinate, someone to know when to back off and listen and follow the lead of someone more experienced.

her last sentence echoes in the still, empty room of south nineteen. i never wanted you here in the first place. the rest of the emergency department carries on beyond the curtains pulled tight, blissfully unaware of the fracture splitting between two sisters. the silence is thick and fragile, like a rubber band pulled too tight, the both of you waiting for the other to break first.

in the end, you do. you're shooting back something equally as mean, something about how you hate that she's such a know-it-all and that she expects you to just fall in line, when a door slides open. the curtain goes next, metal dragging against metal, and the words die in your throat when you whip your head around and see frank langdon standing there, bright blue eyes hot and his own square jaw flexing.

just my fucking luck, you think, breathing out sharply. you lean back, straightening your spine pointedly and swallowing hard.

he studies you and you feel the urge to smack the shit out of him. all he ever does is look at you that way, like he's waiting to catch you up in something, to find a reason to get you in trouble. you watch him back with narrowed eyes, trying to pin down whatever it is about him that gets under your skin the way you do him.

he's always been strange, jumpy, off-kilter. there's no doubt that he's smart and has the makings of a good doctor, but there's something about him that just doesn't sit right with you and hasn't since you started. you just can't figure it out and the longer you've worked with him, the more accustomed you've become to his erratic behavior. to you, this is just who he is.

"everything okay in here?" he asks, finally breaking that taut silence. the annoyance in his voice is thinly veiled and it makes something prickle beneath your skin.

"it's fine. family business," you bite out involuntarily, hackles raised like a cat. this whole situation has you pissed off. sure, you could have had this conversation outside away from patients, but samira was the one who dragged you in here like an unwilling child being sent to time-out.

frank's own body goes rigid and his expression shifts from stern to downright irate. "you don't ever speak to a resident like that. if doctor mohan is offering you advice, you take it." he steps forward, counting off on his fingers. "you don't overstep, you don't talk back, you don't raise your voice, especially not where your patients can hear you."

"but she—"

"i didn't ask what she did." he cuts you off without missing a beat and you stiffen, lips pursing tightly. "there is a hierarchy. you answer to her, whether she's your sister or not. either leave that family shit at the door or take it outside. the faster you learn that, the better, otherwise you won't last here—or anywhere for that matter."

you glance at samira, hoping for something, anything. she's your older sister, she's defended you against bullies and your own demons. she's always had your back, but when you look at her, she looks as taken as aback as you feel. her lips are parted and the anger that was burning in those deep brown eyes of hers a few minutes ago has simply vanished. part of you wants to get angry at her for not standing up for you against her friend, but another part can't blame her for freezing. it's clear she's never seen him like this before.

frustrated, angry tears sting the backs of your eyes and you go ice cold, muscles in your jaw twitching as you stare langdon down. he meets your gaze without an ounce of regret, sweat beading along his hairline. again, it feels like a standoff, like you're both waiting for the other to break first, and again, you're the one to do it.

you don't speak this time though. instead, you exhale sharply, your chest tightening. with one last glance at samira, you shove past the both of them and out into the chaos of the pitt. there are a batch of new cases on the board that you could throw yourself into and forget about this whole argument, but you need to cool off and so you head for the ambulance bay.

the pittsburgh afternoon air is a breath of relief, the relative silence even better. for the first time in a few long minutes, you feel like you're actually able to hear yourself think. you lift your hands and rub at your face before sliding your fingers to the back of your neck. your eyes close and you let go of a long suffering exhale, leaning back against the wall. you remind yourself that realistically, you and samira will make up over dinner later because that's just who she is, but for now, you let the hurt fester a little bit.

your peace is short lived when you hear the telltale sound of footsteps. you're expecting samira or dana or another coworker coming to check on you, or maybe preemptively waiting outside for an incoming ambulance. your breath catches violently in your throat when you open your eyes and are instead met with the perpetually icy gaze of langdon.

"real mature," he remarks, staring you down, his arms crossing over his chest. "storming out of the room like that? really great way to raise patient satisfaction scores."

you scoff and shake your head, pointedly turning away from him. "oh, great. you didn't get enough of berating me inside, so now you're following me around to keep doing it. really fucking professional of you, since you're clearly such a paragon of the word."

"more so than you."

you bristle, a white-hot heat prickling under your skin and slipping through your veins like liquid fire. how dare he speak to you like this? this, of course, is not the first time he's gotten on your case—there are plenty of those instances—, but this is the first time he's really laid into you. he's dressing you down in ways you know aren't productive or educational or anything else positive.

you whip around unable to school any piece of yourself into something managable and professional. he wants a reaction? he'll get one. asshole.

"than me?" you ask incredulously, a mirthless laugh leaving you. "you intruded in on a conversation that had nothing to do with you—"

"you were yelling at doctor mohan and everyone could hear it—"

"—and took her side without knowing the full story. i get that hierarchy bullshit, but god, i'm so fucking sick and tired of the way you treat me. it would be one thing if you treated everyone like this, but you don't because you get on great with everyone else. i'm the only one you're constantly getting onto and the only one you watch over the shoulder of like you don't trust me to do even the simplest procedures."

he looks at a loss for words and you feel a sickening twist of triumph. this is cathartic, even if it will come back to bite you in the ass.

"you wanna talk about being professional and mature? let's start with you because this?" you pause to gesture at the ravine's worth of a distance between you. "this isn't fucking professional. since day one, you've been on my ass about everything. i'm a damn good doctor, but you've been undermining me at every given opportunity, which affects the quality of care i can give. i don't know what your fucking deal with me is, but you need to figure it out because i'll be damned if i let someone fuck up my career because they've got a personal bone to pick, even though i haven't done anything to them."

the words pour out of you like water through a broken faucet and when it finally stops, you feel lighter. it's something you've wanted to say for a long time and while you know this will probably end in a discussion with HR, you really can't care less. you should have said this forever ago and that's your only regret: letting this go on as long as it has.

frank stares, jaw flexing, muscle and bone shifting beneath pale while skin. his right hand twitches at his side, something he's always done since you started working with him. it struck you as weird at first, but it's just a thing you've chalked up as a habit, benign, simple. other than that, he is strangely still, watching you, seemingly cataloging every move you make and the expression on your face.

"are you done?" he finally asks, his voice strained and barely concealing an icy anger.

you straighten yourself up, chin lifting, and you nod once. "i am."

he goes quiet again and then takes a few steps toward you, not close enough to box you in against the wall but enough that sidestepping him would be difficult. he looks like he's sizing you up, trying to pick things apart and figure you out. you wonder what he sees and a nearly silent part of you hopes that his opinion has shifted into something favorable, though you know it probably hasn't.

"you ever speak to me like that again…" he murmurs, his gaze drifting down and down and down. you go stock still, pressing back against the wall a little, brick scraping at your palms. you have to school your expression into something neutral when his eyes find yours again. "see what happens."

for a moment, it feels like the tension might snap. he could lean in, close that distance. you wonder if he'd taste like the coffee he had this morning. but he doesn't and the illusion is broken. you're glad it is because sure, he's handsome (there's a reason garcia calls him ER ken), but he's married and you're not a homewrecker. in fact, his wife and kids are the only redeemable part of him.

he leans back, something guarded and unreadable in his eyes, and then he leaves. you're left in the ambulance bay alone, your head tipped back against the wall and your eyes closed, face turned to the sky.

you'll look back on this moment in a few months when a new batch of med students and residents start their rotation at the pitt, and you'll watch the cycle begin to repeat with one of them. this time though, she doesn't let it slide and then he'll be gone for ten months. it won't be for a while before you find out why—or an unsubstantiated version, at least: he was stealing medicine from the hospital and his behavior on nearly every shift was from withdrawals. the signs were there, but you'd been wearing rose tinted glasses. you hadn't recognized any of them. you'll wish you had, for your sake, for the sake of others.

he's not like this with samira, you've noticed, or anyone for that matter. rather, they work like two well oiled parts of a machine. they're seamless in the same way that dr. robby and dr. abbot are, or the way langdon is with dr. garcia. they work like they were meant to be a duo.

you work well with everyone else, as difficult as it is for you to feel appreciated among your coworkers. you're as bright as samira is, quick on your feet and whip-smart. not long into your residency at the pitt, robby had told you that he thought you'd fit in well. you work fast, he'd said. though the faster than your sister went unsaid, you'd heard it anyway because you'd heard the whispers of slow-mo already. it's the one thing that distinguishes you from her.

she, who now stands in front of you, her jaw set tightly, her gaze cool and distant. she's hardly even been annoyed at you before and now you're at each other's throats, a far cry from the lighthearted back and forth bickering you have every once in a while. this territory is unexplored and uncertain, and it feels like cave spelunking without the right gear, no flashlight to cut through pitch black.

part of you knows that maybe you did overstep a little. you'd steamrolled your way onto her case and instead of yielding to her care plan, you'd thrown out your own differentials and ideas on what to do because you were tired of the rivalry, of never being seen as incapable when the two of you were in the same room. in that moment, you weren't her little sister but an insubordinate, someone to know when to back off and listen and follow the lead of someone more experienced.

her last sentence echoes in the still, empty room of south nineteen. i never wanted you here in the first place. the rest of the emergency department carries on beyond the curtains pulled tight, blissfully unaware of the fracture splitting between two sisters. the silence is thick and fragile, like a rubber band pulled too tight, the both of you waiting for the other to break first.

in the end, you do. you're shooting back something equally as mean, something about how you hate that she's such a know-it-all and that she expects you to just fall in line, when a door slides open. the curtain goes next, metal dragging against metal, and the words die in your throat when you whip your head around and see frank langdon standing there, bright blue eyes hot and his own square jaw flexing.

just my fucking luck, you think, breathing out sharply. you lean back, straightening your spine pointedly and swallowing hard.

he studies you and you feel the urge to smack the shit out of him. all he ever does is look at you that way, like he's waiting to catch you up in something, to find a reason to get you in trouble. you watch him back with narrowed eyes, trying to pin down whatever it is about him that gets under your skin the way you do him.

he's always been strange, jumpy, off-kilter. there's no doubt that he's smart and has the makings of a good doctor, but there's something about him that just doesn't sit right with you and hasn't since you started. you just can't figure it out and the longer you've worked with him, the more accustomed you've become to his erratic behavior. to you, this is just who he is.

"everything okay in here?" he asks, finally breaking that taut silence. the annoyance in his voice is thinly veiled and it makes something prickle beneath your skin.

"it's fine. family business," you bite out involuntarily, hackles raised like a cat. this whole situation has you pissed off. sure, you could have had this conversation outside away from patients, but samira was the one who dragged you in here like an unwilling child being sent to time-out.

frank's own body goes rigid and his expression shifts from stern to downright irate. "you don't ever speak to a resident like that. if doctor mohan is offering you advice, you take it." he steps forward, counting off on his fingers. "you don't overstep, you don't talk back, you don't raise your voice, especially not where your patients can hear you."

"but she—"

"i didn't ask what she did." he cuts you off without missing a beat and you stiffen, lips pursing tightly. "there is a hierarchy. you answer to her, whether she's your sister or not. either leave that family shit at the door or take it outside. the faster you learn that, the better, otherwise you won't last here—or anywhere for that matter."

you glance at samira, hoping for something, anything. she's your older sister, she's defended you against bullies and your own demons. she's always had your back, but when you look at her, she looks as taken as aback as you feel. her lips are parted and the anger that was burning in those deep brown eyes of hers a few minutes ago has simply vanished. part of you wants to get angry at her for not standing up for you against her friend, but another part can't blame her for freezing. it's clear she's never seen him like this before.

frustrated, angry tears sting the backs of your eyes and you go ice cold, muscles in your jaw twitching as you stare langdon down. he meets your gaze without an ounce of regret, sweat beading along his hairline. again, it feels like a standoff, like you're both waiting for the other to break first, and again, you're the one to do it.

you don't speak this time though. instead, you exhale sharply, your chest tightening. with one last glance at samira, you shove past the both of them and out into the chaos of the pitt. there are a batch of new cases on the board that you could throw yourself into and forget about this whole argument, but you need to cool off and so you head for the ambulance bay.

the pittsburgh afternoon air is a breath of relief, the relative silence even better. for the first time in a few long minutes, you feel like you're actually able to hear yourself think. you lift your hands and rub at your face before sliding your fingers to the back of your neck. your eyes close and you let go of a long suffering exhale, leaning back against the wall. you remind yourself that realistically, you and samira will make up over dinner later because that's just who she is, but for now, you let the hurt fester a little bit.

your peace is short lived when you hear the telltale sound of footsteps. you're expecting samira or dana or another coworker coming to check on you, or maybe preemptively waiting outside for an incoming ambulance. your breath catches violently in your throat when you open your eyes and are instead met with the perpetually icy gaze of langdon.

"real mature," he remarks, staring you down, his arms crossing over his chest. "storming out of the room like that? really great way to raise patient satisfaction scores."

you scoff and shake your head, pointedly turning away from him. "oh, great. you didn't get enough of berating me inside, so now you're following me around to keep doing it. really fucking professional of you, since you're clearly such a paragon of the word."

"more so than you."

you bristle, a white-hot heat prickling under your skin and slipping through your veins like liquid fire. how dare he speak to you like this? this, of course, is not the first time he's gotten on your case—there are plenty of those instances—, but this is the first time he's really laid into you. he's dressing you down in ways you know aren't productive or educational or anything else positive.

you whip around unable to school any piece of yourself into something managable and professional. he wants a reaction? he'll get one. asshole.

"than me?" you ask incredulously, a mirthless laugh leaving you. "you intruded in on a conversation that had nothing to do with you—"

"you were yelling at doctor mohan and everyone could hear it—"

"—and took her side without knowing the full story. i get that hierarchy bullshit, but god, i'm so fucking sick and tired of the way you treat me. it would be one thing if you treated everyone like this, but you don't because you get on great with everyone else. i'm the only one you're constantly getting onto and the only one you watch over the shoulder of like you don't trust me to do even the simplest procedures."

he looks at a loss for words and you feel a sickening twist of triumph. this is cathartic, even if it will come back to bite you in the ass.

"you wanna talk about being professional and mature? let's start with you because this?" you pause to gesture at the ravine's worth of a distance between you. "this isn't fucking professional. since day one, you've been on my ass about everything. i'm a damn good doctor, but you've been undermining me at every given opportunity, which affects the quality of care i can give. i don't know what your fucking deal with me is, but you need to figure it out because i'll be damned if i let someone fuck up my career because they've got a personal bone to pick, even though i haven't done anything to them."

the words pour out of you like water through a broken faucet and when it finally stops, you feel lighter. it's something you've wanted to say for a long time and while you know this will probably end in a discussion with HR, you really can't care less. you should have said this forever ago and that's your only regret: letting this go on as long as it has.

frank stares, jaw flexing, muscle and bone shifting beneath pale while skin. his right hand twitches at his side, something he's always done since you started working with him. it struck you as weird at first, but it's just a thing you've chalked up as a habit, benign, simple. other than that, he is strangely still, watching you, seemingly cataloging every move you make and the expression on your face.

"are you done?" he finally asks, his voice strained and barely concealing an icy anger.

you straighten yourself up, chin lifting, and you nod once. "i am."

he goes quiet again and then takes a few steps toward you, not close enough to box you in against the wall but enough that sidestepping him would be difficult. he looks like he's sizing you up, trying to pick things apart and figure you out. you wonder what he sees and a nearly silent part of you hopes that his opinion has shifted into something favorable, though you know it probably hasn't.

"you ever speak to me like that again…" he murmurs, his gaze drifting down and down and down. you go stock still, pressing back against the wall a little, brick scraping at your palms. you have to school your expression into something neutral when his eyes find yours again. "see what happens."

for a moment, it feels like the tension might snap. he could lean in, close that distance. you wonder if he'd taste like the coffee he had this morning. but he doesn't and the illusion is broken. you're glad it is because sure, he's handsome (there's a reason garcia calls him ER ken), but he's married and you're not a homewrecker. in fact, his wife and kids are the only redeemable part of him.

he leans back, something guarded and unreadable in his eyes, and then he leaves. you're left in the ambulance bay alone, your head tipped back against the wall and your eyes closed, face turned to the sky.

you'll look back on this moment in a few months when a new batch of med students and residents start their rotation at the pitt, and you'll watch the cycle begin to repeat with one of them. this time though, she doesn't let it slide and then he'll be gone for ten months. it won't be for a while before you find out why—or an unsubstantiated version, at least: he was stealing medicine from the hospital and his behavior on nearly every shift was from withdrawals. the signs were there, but you'd been wearing rose tinted glasses. you hadn't recognized any of them. you'll wish you had, for your sake, for the sake of others.

he's not like this with samira, you've noticed, or anyone for that matter. rather, they work like two well oiled parts of a machine. they're seamless in the same way that dr. robby and dr. abbot are, or the way langdon is with dr. garcia. they work like they were meant to be a duo.

you work well with everyone else, as difficult as it is for you to feel appreciated among your coworkers. you're as bright as samira is, quick on your feet and whip-smart. not long into your residency at the pitt, robby had told you that he thought you'd fit in well. you work fast, he'd said. though the faster than your sister went unsaid, you'd heard it anyway because you'd heard the whispers of slow-mo already. it's the one thing that distinguishes you from her.

she, who now stands in front of you, her jaw set tightly, her gaze cool and distant. she's hardly even been annoyed at you before and now you're at each other's throats, a far cry from the lighthearted back and forth bickering you have every once in a while. this territory is unexplored and uncertain, and it feels like cave spelunking without the right gear, no flashlight to cut through pitch black.

part of you knows that maybe you did overstep a little. you'd steamrolled your way onto her case and instead of yielding to her care plan, you'd thrown out your own differentials and ideas on what to do because you were tired of the rivalry, of never being seen as incapable when the two of you were in the same room. in that moment, you weren't her little sister but an insubordinate, someone to know when to back off and listen and follow the lead of someone more experienced.

her last sentence echoes in the still, empty room of south nineteen. i never wanted you here in the first place. the rest of the emergency department carries on beyond the curtains pulled tight, blissfully unaware of the fracture splitting between two sisters. the silence is thick and fragile, like a rubber band pulled too tight, the both of you waiting for the other to break first.

in the end, you do. you're shooting back something equally as mean, something about how you hate that she's such a know-it-all and that she expects you to just fall in line, when a door slides open. the curtain goes next, metal dragging against metal, and the words die in your throat when you whip your head around and see frank langdon standing there, bright blue eyes hot and his own square jaw flexing.

just my fucking luck, you think, breathing out sharply. you lean back, straightening your spine pointedly and swallowing hard.

he studies you and you feel the urge to smack the shit out of him. all he ever does is look at you that way, like he's waiting to catch you up in something, to find a reason to get you in trouble. you watch him back with narrowed eyes, trying to pin down whatever it is about him that gets under your skin the way you do him.

he's always been strange, jumpy, off-kilter. there's no doubt that he's smart and has the makings of a good doctor, but there's something about him that just doesn't sit right with you and hasn't since you started. you just can't figure it out and the longer you've worked with him, the more accustomed you've become to his erratic behavior. to you, this is just who he is.

"everything okay in here?" he asks, finally breaking that taut silence. the annoyance in his voice is thinly veiled and it makes something prickle beneath your skin.

"it's fine. family business," you bite out involuntarily, hackles raised like a cat. this whole situation has you pissed off. sure, you could have had this conversation outside away from patients, but samira was the one who dragged you in here like an unwilling child being sent to time-out.

frank's own body goes rigid and his expression shifts from stern to downright irate. "you don't ever speak to a resident like that. if doctor mohan is offering you advice, you take it." he steps forward, counting off on his fingers. "you don't overstep, you don't talk back, you don't raise your voice, especially not where your patients can hear you."

"but she—"

"i didn't ask what she did." he cuts you off without missing a beat and you stiffen, lips pursing tightly. "there is a hierarchy. you answer to her, whether she's your sister or not. either leave that family shit at the door or take it outside. the faster you learn that, the better, otherwise you won't last here—or anywhere for that matter."

you glance at samira, hoping for something, anything. she's your older sister, she's defended you against bullies and your own demons. she's always had your back, but when you look at her, she looks as taken as aback as you feel. her lips are parted and the anger that was burning in those deep brown eyes of hers a few minutes ago has simply vanished. part of you wants to get angry at her for not standing up for you against her friend, but another part can't blame her for freezing. it's clear she's never seen him like this before.

frustrated, angry tears sting the backs of your eyes and you go ice cold, muscles in your jaw twitching as you stare langdon down. he meets your gaze without an ounce of regret, sweat beading along his hairline. again, it feels like a standoff, like you're both waiting for the other to break first, and again, you're the one to do it.

you don't speak this time though. instead, you exhale sharply, your chest tightening. with one last glance at samira, you shove past the both of them and out into the chaos of the pitt. there are a batch of new cases on the board that you could throw yourself into and forget about this whole argument, but you need to cool off and so you head for the ambulance bay.

the pittsburgh afternoon air is a breath of relief, the relative silence even better. for the first time in a few long minutes, you feel like you're actually able to hear yourself think. you lift your hands and rub at your face before sliding your fingers to the back of your neck. your eyes close and you let go of a long suffering exhale, leaning back against the wall. you remind yourself that realistically, you and samira will make up over dinner later because that's just who she is, but for now, you let the hurt fester a little bit.

your peace is short lived when you hear the telltale sound of footsteps. you're expecting samira or dana or another coworker coming to check on you, or maybe preemptively waiting outside for an incoming ambulance. your breath catches violently in your throat when you open your eyes and are instead met with the perpetually icy gaze of langdon.

"real mature," he remarks, staring you down, his arms crossing over his chest. "storming out of the room like that? really great way to raise patient satisfaction scores."

you scoff and shake your head, pointedly turning away from him. "oh, great. you didn't get enough of berating me inside, so now you're following me around to keep doing it. really fucking professional of you, since you're clearly such a paragon of the word."

"more so than you."

you bristle, a white-hot heat prickling under your skin and slipping through your veins like liquid fire. how dare he speak to you like this? this, of course, is not the first time he's gotten on your case—there are plenty of those instances—, but this is the first time he's really laid into you. he's dressing you down in ways you know aren't productive or educational or anything else positive.

you whip around unable to school any piece of yourself into something managable and professional. he wants a reaction? he'll get one. asshole.

"than me?" you ask incredulously, a mirthless laugh leaving you. "you intruded in on a conversation that had nothing to do with you—"

"you were yelling at doctor mohan and everyone could hear it—"

"—and took her side without knowing the full story. i get that hierarchy bullshit, but god, i'm so fucking sick and tired of the way you treat me. it would be one thing if you treated everyone like this, but you don't because you get on great with everyone else. i'm the only one you're constantly getting onto and the only one you watch over the shoulder of like you don't trust me to do even the simplest procedures."

he looks at a loss for words and you feel a sickening twist of triumph. this is cathartic, even if it will come back to bite you in the ass.

"you wanna talk about being professional and mature? let's start with you because this?" you pause to gesture at the ravine's worth of a distance between you. "this isn't fucking professional. since day one, you've been on my ass about everything. i'm a damn good doctor, but you've been undermining me at every given opportunity, which affects the quality of care i can give. i don't know what your fucking deal with me is, but you need to figure it out because i'll be damned if i let someone fuck up my career because they've got a personal bone to pick, even though i haven't done anything to them."

the words pour out of you like water through a broken faucet and when it finally stops, you feel lighter. it's something you've wanted to say for a long time and while you know this will probably end in a discussion with HR, you really can't care less. you should have said this forever ago and that's your only regret: letting this go on as long as it has.

frank stares, jaw flexing, muscle and bone shifting beneath pale while skin. his right hand twitches at his side, something he's always done since you started working with him. it struck you as weird at first, but it's just a thing you've chalked up as a habit, benign, simple. other than that, he is strangely still, watching you, seemingly cataloging every move you make and the expression on your face.

"are you done?" he finally asks, his voice strained and barely concealing an icy anger.

you straighten yourself up, chin lifting, and you nod once. "i am."

he goes quiet again and then takes a few steps toward you, not close enough to box you in against the wall but enough that sidestepping him would be difficult. he looks like he's sizing you up, trying to pick things apart and figure you out. you wonder what he sees and a nearly silent part of you hopes that his opinion has shifted into something favorable, though you know it probably hasn't.

"you ever speak to me like that again…" he murmurs, his gaze drifting down and down and down. you go stock still, pressing back against the wall a little, brick scraping at your palms. you have to school your expression into something neutral when his eyes find yours again. "see what happens."

for a moment, it feels like the tension might snap. he could lean in, close that distance. you wonder if he'd taste like the coffee he had this morning. but he doesn't and the illusion is broken. you're glad it is because sure, he's handsome (there's a reason garcia calls him ER ken), but he's married and you're not a homewrecker. in fact, his wife and kids are the only redeemable part of him.

he leans back, something guarded and unreadable in his eyes, and then he leaves. you're left in the ambulance bay alone, your head tipped back against the wall and your eyes closed, face turned to the sky.

you'll look back on this moment in a few months when a new batch of med students and residents start their rotation at the pitt, and you'll watch the cycle begin to repeat with one of them. this time though, she doesn't let it slide and then he'll be gone for ten months. it won't be for a while before you find out why—or an unsubstantiated version, at least: he was stealing medicine from the hospital and his behavior on nearly every shift was from withdrawals. the signs were there, but you'd been wearing rose tinted glasses. you hadn't recognized any of them. you'll wish you had, for your sake, for the sake of others.

Instead, there are warm hands on your shoulders and when you open your eyes, there is a crystal blue gaze there instead of muddy brown sandpaper shag.

"You alright?" Frank Langdon asks, his voice far more concerned than it ever was in that triage room at PTMC.

You straighten yourself, catching your breath and blinking quickly. In truth, this feels far more mortifying than the scene at the hospital. With a quick, steeling breath, you nod and meet his eyes for real this time. "Yeah, sorry. I wasn't—I didn't— Are you alright?"

He blinks too, an amused smile trying to take its rightful place on his features; he fights it and you're glad for it because you really don't think you'd survive such a devastating sight. "I'm fine." He glances down at your preoccupied hands and then gestures casually, reaching for the brown paper sack that's been giving you so much trouble. "Here, let me help."

You give in without much fight at all. This is what you wanted after all, right? For him to not be a stranger? This is what not strangers do for their neighbors. He takes it into his arms, cradling it from the bottom and steps aside to let you up the last step properly, following behind you to your door.

"You have any more groceries that need brought up?" he asks patiently while you fumble through your key ring and unlock your apartment door. It creaks open and he follows you once again, and you find yourself feeling not as alarmed about Frank Langdon existing inside of your personal space, about him seeing the way you live just fifty feet across the hall from him.

"Oh, no, but thank you," you answer, setting your tote bag down on the counter and turning, watching as he steps into the kitchen and glances around the rest of your place. "For the help and the… Um, the save. I swear I'm not usually that clumsy."

He laughs a little then and shakes his head, turning his attention back toward you. The milk settles onto the counter with a heavy thunk. "I didn't think you were. Accidents happen. It's no big deal."

You lift your uninjured hand to rub at your arm and you nod, appropriately mollified by his words. "Yeah…"

Silence settles in between the two of you and stretches for far longer than you'd usually be comfortable with, but something about Frank tempers the unease you usually feel. His eyes are on you, unwavering and ocean blue, and you wonder if he's comparing you now to the way you were when you were in his emergency room early this week. You wonder if his opinion is any different. You hope it has changed for the better.

He coughs a little and then steps backward toward the front door, left ajar, with his thumb over his shoulder. "I should… I should go. I have some errands I need to run."

"Oh, yeah, of course," you offer quickly, shaking your head. You gesture him in the same direction, shooing him gently out (though you hope it doesn't seem like you're eager to get rid of his presence in your apartment when it's all you really want). "Thanks again for your help with… With everything."

"Yeah, no problem," he says, sounding every bit as reluctant as you do. "I'll, um… I'll see you around."