hello!!! omg it has been a WHILE since I have written a fic, probably around 5 years? But i have grown since then (kind of) and continued to read and repost fics on my blog. That goes to say that i do miss writing and have many wip’s that i have yet to finish lol. During that time i took a huge break, I went to college, received my undergrad degree and went straight into starting my graduate degree, in which i am in rn.
During the end of my first semester, I had a sudden manic night and decided to write again! I’ve been reading more about different fandoms such as batman (mainly jason todd & dick grayson) COD modern warfare, and some others that i would like to write about and explore.
With writing on this blog, I would like to write about the fandoms that interest me and when I could. I am currently doing classes and having therapy sessions with my client, so I would like to focus on that and post my writing whenever I could :). I also wouldn't be opposed to answering some asks and write little blurbs.
TBH I feel like burnout and stress from having to constantly write academic papers stunted me. But I would love to take submissions and fall in love with writing again!! I am currently working on a fic about jason todd that I would love to get out asap, so tbd about a release date. But for now, pls feel free about sending some requests about any of the following:
Jason Todd
Dick Grayson
Spencer Reid
Simon Riley (Ghost)
John Price
Johnny MacTavish
Joaquin Torres
some old fandoms lol (5sos, shawn mendes)
Hunger games characters! (it's making a comeback
Some shows that i am into! (the boys, gossip girl, b99, tsitp, bridgerton etc.) if you would like something in that universe
Again, I would like to give heads up and say I will try to post when I can, pls be patient lol.
To those few that stuck around, thank you <3. I've tried many times coming back to this app to write and I've been afraid. But I don't want that to be the reason that I stop.
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summary 𓂃 a bookkeeper hides in the basement while the Iceberg Lounge changes hands. jason todd finds her, keeps her because she's useful, and tells himself it's temporary. a month later, she's patching up his wounds and telling him about the years she spent being treated like shit—and he’s letting her.
tags 𓂃 prince of gotham!jason todd x ex penguin employee fem!reader , grumpy crimelord x tired bookkeeper , found family , rescued from a criminal enterprise , ocd implied!reader , slow burn-ish , forced proximity , blood and bandages , boss!jason todd , low angst , dry humor , domestic-ish , quiet intimacy , undefined feelings , jason’s POV , 2nd person , dialogue heavy , time-skips & fast forwards .
wc 𓂃 maybe 4-5k
✦ masterlist ╱ dc masterlist 𓏼 ͜͜
THE BASEMENT of the Iceberg Lounge smelled like mold and old cigar smoke, and Jason Todd was starting to regret every decision that had led him down here.
Not the takeover. That had gone smoother than Jason expected. Cobblepot was locked in a storage room on the third floor with a gag in his mouth and a shitload of opinions he couldn't express. The Sisters Su were patrolling the main floor with their usual unsettling grace. His men were counting the money. Everything was going according to plan.
Except for the woman hiding behind the wine racks.
He heard you before he saw you. A sharp inhale, quickly muffled—a shoe scuffing the concrete. You were trying to stay quiet and failing, which meant you weren’t trained for this: no tactical training, no weapon discipline, no idea how to vanish properly.
Jason rounded the corner slowly, his boots echoing on the stone floor. He wasn't concerned about a trap. If you’d been a threat, you would have acted by now. But he'd learned long ago that scared people do stupid things, and he didn't want to get hit with a wine bottle tonight. That would be embarrassing. He'd never hear the end of it from the Sisters.
You were crouched behind the last row of racks, pressed against the cold wall with your knees pulled up to your chest. Messy hair fell across your face in uneven waves, and you wore black slacks with a white button-down that had come untucked at some point, probably during the chaos of the takeover. Your flats were scuffed at the toes. You looked like you had been hiding for hours.
Your hands were shaking.
Jason stopped a few feet away and waited. He had learned that trick from Batman, though he would never admit it. Sometimes the silence was more effective than anything you could say. It made people talk. It made them fill the empty space with something, usually something true.
You looked up at him, and he watched the recognition hit you like a tangible force. Your shoulders pulled in tighter. Your breath caught and held. You knew who he was. Everyone in Cobblepot's organization knew the Red Hood by reputation, even if they had never seen his face. The helmet was off now, but the leather jacket, his build, and the way he carried himself told the story clearly.
He crouched down, not because he was trying to be kind, but because looming over you wasn't going to get him useful information. Also, his knees were tired. It had been a long night.
"You work here?" he asked.
You nodded, a quick jerky motion.
"What do you do?"
There was a pause as your throat moved with your swallow.
"Bookkeeping," you said, and your voice was steadier than he expected. "Payroll. Some bartending when they were short-staffed."
Jason looked at your hands again. No calluses. No scars. No signs of someone who had ever held a weapon for longer than it took to hand it off. These were the hands of someone who punched numbers into a calculator and maybe carried a tray of drinks when things got busy.
"You know how to use a gun?"
"No."
"A knife?"
"No."
"Anything that could hurt me?"
You looked at him then, really looked, and something in her expression shifted. Not defiance, exactly. More like resignation. Like you had already run the numbers and found the only answer that made sense.
"No," you said again. "I'm not a threat to you."
Jason believed you. He also believed that being harmless didn't mean being safe. The people who would come looking for Cobblepot's associates wouldn't care whether you had ever held a gun. They'd care about what you knew—names, accounts, payment schedules, the quiet links between the Penguin's operations and the rest of the city's underworld. You’d been here for two years. You knew things.
If you left here tonight, someone would find you. Not his people, probably. Someone worse — someone who wanted information and didn't care how they got it.
You wouldn't survive the week.
Jason had seen that movie before. He had been the kid in it, once, before Bruce found him. Hungry and cold and hiding in alleys, watching the bigger predators circle. He had made it out because someone had decided to keep him. Not everyone got that lucky.
He stood up and pulled out his phone.
"Get up," he said.
You flinched but got up. Your legs were unsteady, and you had to brace one hand against the wine rack to avoid falling. You didn't ask where you were going. You just followed him up the stairs, through the kitchen, and into the elevator that took you to the private floors above the casino.
On the way up, he typed out a quick text to one of his contacts: Run a background check on a woman. Bookkeeper. Cobblepot's organization. Everything by morning. He hit send and tucked the phone back into his pocket.
If you’re clean, you can be useful. If you weren't, he would deal with you then.
Either way, you’re not staying in the basement.
𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒
The office was a disaster area.
Cobblepot had been a meticulous monster, which meant his workspace used to look like the inside of a very expensive clock. Everything had its place, with pens aligned and files labeled. A humidor sat on the corner desk, probably costing more than Jason’s first car.
Then the takeover had happened, and Jason’s people had torn through the place looking for anything useful. Drawers were pulled open. Papers were scattered across the floor. A knife was still lodged in the wall above the safe, left there by one of the Sisters Su as a joke.
You stopped in the doorway and stared.
“You did this?” you asked.
“Some of it.”
“You have a filing system.”
“I have a system.”
You looked at him like he had just claimed the sky was green. Your eyes swept across the room, taking in the chaos, the scattered documents, the three empty coffee cups on the windowsill, the bullet holes in the ceiling.
“This is not a system,” you said. “This is a crime scene.”
Jason turned to look at you. You were still pale, still shaking a little, but something else was creeping into your voice. Exasperation. Like the state of his office was personally offensive to you. Like you were this close to grabbing a trash bag and fixing it yourself.
He almost chuckled. Almost.
“I didn’t bring you up here to critique my organization,” he said.
“Then why did you bring me up here?”
He didn’t have a good answer. He had a practical answer, which was that you knew Cobblepot’s operations and he needed someone to untangle the mess of shell companies and hidden accounts. That was true. That was useful. That was the kind of cold calculation he prided himself on.
But if he was being honest, which he rarely was, he had brought you up here because leaving you in the basement felt wrong.
Not wrong in a moral sense. He had done plenty of things that were wrong. Wrong in a personal sense. Like watching someone drown when he knew how to swim. Like walking past a hungry kid when he had food in his pocket.
He gestured to the chair across from his desk.
“Sit down.”
You sat.
“You’re staying here tonight,” he said. “Tomorrow, we’re going to talk about what you know. After that, we’ll figure out what to do with you.”
“What does that mean?”
He dropped into his own chair and kicked his boots up on the desk, scattering a stack of papers he hadn’t gotten around to reading yet. The chair creaked under his weight. He was tired. His shoulder ached where someone had landed a lucky hit during the takeover. His knuckles were split and starting to scab over.
“It means you’re not dead,” he said. “That’s more than most of Cobblepot’s people got tonight. You’re welcome.”
You looked at him for a long moment, and Jason saw something flicker across your face. Not gratitude. Not fear. Something closer to calculation. You were trying to figure out if he was lying, if this was some kind of trap, if he was going to hurt you after you gave him what he wanted.
He respected that. Trust is earned, not given. He had learned that lesson in a warehouse with a crowbar and a bomb. He wasn’t about to forget it.
“Okay,” you said finally. “I’ll stay.”
“The couch pulls out. There are blankets in the closet. Don’t touch the guns.”
“I don’t know how to use a gun.”
“You said that already.”
“I’m saying it again so you remember.”
Jason snorted. “Lady, I don’t forget anything.”
𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒
The background check came back clean at seven the next morning.
His contact had dug up everything. You had worked for Cobblepot for two years, started as a temp during tax season and somehow stuck around. Before that, you had done bookkeeping for a chain of restaurants in the Diamond District that had gone under during the recession. No criminal record. No outstanding warrants. No connections to any of the major players in the city.
You were exactly what you looked like. A civilian who had needed a job and ended up working for a monster because monsters paid well and didn’t ask questions.
Jason read the report twice, looking for the catch. There wasn’t a single one.
He wasn’t sure if he was relieved or annoyed.
𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒
The first few weeks were awkward.
You slept on the couch in his office because there weren’t any other rooms available and Jason wasn’t about to let you wander around the building unsupervised. The Lounge wasn’t exactly a hotel now, was it. It was a criminal enterprise with a casino attached, and letting a civilian roam the halls was a good way to get you killed or get him compromised.
You ate the food he brought you without complaint, even when it was cold and the coffee was shit. You didn’t ask for anything. You didn’t push. You just existed in his space like a presence he couldn’t get rid of. Stupidly polite and quiet like you were worried one slip up would get you a one way ticket to heaven.
It was annoying. He wasn’t sure why.
Jason told himself it was temporary. He had plans. Big plans. The Iceberg Lounge was just the beginning. He was going to clean up Crime Alley, take down the drug rings, starve out the human traffickers. He didn’t have time to babysit a bookkeeper who had gotten caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But you were useful. That was what he told himself when he handed you a stack of financial records and asked you to make sense of them. That was what he told himself when you found three shell companies Cobblepot had been using to launder money through a bakery in the Diamond District. That was what he told himself when you looked up from a spreadsheet with an expression of pure disgust and said, “He was hiding money in a frozen yogurt franchise. Who does that?”
Jason laughed before he could stop himself.
You looked at him like he had grown a second head.
“Did you just laugh?” you asked, eyebrows perked.
“No.”
“You definitely laughed.”
“I coughed.”
“That was not a cough.”
“The air in here is dry.”
You stared at him and he stared right back.
“You’re weird,” you said.
“You’re the one who worked for a guy who kept penguins in his office.”
“They were taxidermy.”
“That’s somehow worse.”
You almost smiled. Not quite. But almost. Jason picked up a pen from his desk, spun it between his fingers, and put it back down. He didn’t know why he was fidgeting. He just was.
𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒
She started organizing his office on the fourth day.
Jason walked in after a meeting with a weapons supplier and found his desk completely changed. The papers were stacked in neat piles, labeled by category and date. The guns had been moved to a locked drawer, and the keys were on his keychain, which meant she had gone through his stuff at some point. The coffee cups were gone, replaced by a single clean mug and a coaster he didn't remember buying.
He stood in the doorway and stared.
"What did you do?" he asked, eyes scanning the room before finally landing on you.
You didn't look up from the filing cabinet you was sorting through. You were wearing the same black slacks and white button down from the basement, though you’d rolled the sleeves up to your elbows at some point. Your hair was pulled back in a messy knot and there was a smear of dust on your cheek.
"I organized it," you answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world. He sighed.
"Why?"
You finally looked at him, and your expression was almost bewildered, like you couldn't understand why he was even asking such a dumb question. Not that you could say that out loud… not quite there yet.
"Because I sleep in here and looking at that desk was giving me a headache," you replied. "I couldn't focus on the ledgers with that much chaos in my peripheral vision.”
Jason just stared at you.
You stared back.
"I'm not going to apologize for it," you added, shrugging.
He should have been annoyed. He should have told you to stay in your lane, to keep your hands off his things, to remember that you were here because he allowed it and he could un-allow it just as easily. The last person who had touched his things without asking had lost a finger. Not by his hand, but the principle still stood.
Instead, he dropped into his chair and looked around. The room felt different. Definitely calmer now. He hated that he noticed. He cracked his neck and rolled his shoulder, still sore from the takeover, and tried to focus on something else.
"Where's the Glock?" he asked.
"Bottom drawer. Left side. The safety is on."
"How do you know how to check a safety?"
"I told you I don't know how to use a gun. I didn't say I didn't know anything about them." You closed the filing cabinet and turned to face him. "I grew up in Gotham. Everyone knows how to check a safety."
Jason leaned back in his chair and studied you. You’d stopped flinching when he walked into the room sometime in the last few days. He wasn't sure when. You also stopped measuring your words, stopped being careful, stopped treating him like something that might bite.
He was still unsure whether this was a blessing or a curse. Being liked certainly had its perks, but being feared? That was even more powerful. With his reputation on the line, your efforts weren’t exactly helping him.
He picked up his phone, looked at it, put it back down. No messages. He already knew there were no messages.
"You're not going to stay here forever," he said.
"I know."
"You understand that."
"I understand that you keep telling me that." He watched you cross your arms over your chest. "You also keep not telling me when I can leave."
Jason opened his mouth and closed it.
You had a point. A good one, at that.
"You're not a prisoner," he said.
"I'm not free either."
"Everyone in Gotham is a prisoner of something. At least here you have food and a couch and a lock on the door."
You tilted your head, studying him like he was problem you were trying to solve. He didn't like that look. It made him feel like you could see things he didn’t want to show you.
"You don't have to keep me here," you said.
"I know."
"Then why do you?"
Jason didn't answer. He thought about saying something honest. He thought about telling you the real reason, the stupid reason, the reason that made him feel like a kid again.
Then he thought better of it.
"Because you're useful," he said, and the word tasted like a lie even as he said it.
You didn't look like you fully believed him either. But you also knew better than to push. You just went back to the filing cabinet.
Jason tapped his fingers against the armrest of his chair. Once. Twice. Three times. Then he picked himself off the chair and walked out, leaving you with one notice.
“Don’t go through my stuff.”
𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒
That whole name thing happened around the third week.
Jason was in the middle of reviewing a list of Cobblepot's outstanding debts when you walked into the office with two cups of coffee. You set one on his desk and kept the other for yourself, curling up on the couch with a folder full of bank statements. You’d been doing that more often lately. Just existing in the room with him. Reading or organizing or working on tasks he assigned you while he handled his.
It should’ve been distracting, but day by day he’d gotten used to it.
"Red Hood," you said, flipping open the folder. “It says here that—”
"Don't call me that."
"Well… what should I call you?"
"Boss works."
"That's weird."
"You're weird."
"I'm the one who organized your filing system and found three shell companies in a frozen yogurt franchise. You're not allowed to insult me."
Jason looked up from his papers. You were smiling in a way he hadn’t seen before. Not a nervous smile or a polite smile, but a genuine one that suited you.
"Jason," he said.
You blinked. "What?"
"My name. It's Jason."
He hadn't meant to tell you. He hadn't told anyone in Gotham his real name since the takeover, not even the Sisters Su. There was power in a name, and he wasn't in the habit of giving power away. Bruce taught him that much. Secrets were currency. Names were weapons—sometimes.
But you’d been here for three weeks now. You hadn't tried to run. You hadn't betrayed him. You hadn't looked at him like he was a monster, even when he came back to the office with blood on his collar and the occasional fresh bruise somewhere on his face or neck or elsewhere.
You just made him coffee and organized his files and treated him like he was a person instead of a symbol.
"Jason," you repeated, testing the shape of it. Your mouth curved around the syllables like you were trying to figure out if they fit.
“Yeah.”
"Okay," you said, and went back to whatever was on your screen.
Just like that.
Jason stared at you for a long moment. You didn't look up. You didn't even acknowledge the weight of what he had just given you. You just sipped your coffee and flipped a page and existed in his space like it wasn’t a big deal.
He tried not to think too much about it. So instead he went back to his paperwork and tried even harder not to think about it. He cracked his knuckles one by one, a nervous habit he had never been able to shake.
𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒
Jason comes back from a job later than usual. His knuckles are split open and his shoulder aches where someone got a lucky hit in with a goddamn pipe. The cut on his ribs isn't deep, but it's bleeding through his shirt and that's definitely going to stain the fabric. He's tired in a way that goes beyond the physical, the kind of tired that comes from fighting the same fights over and over and watching the city swallow his efforts whole.
He walks into the office and finds you still awake.
You're sitting on the couch with your laptop open, reviewing the accounts from the frozen yogurt franchise that turned out to be a money laundering front. You look up when he comes in, and your eyes go straight to the blood on his shirt.
"You're hurt," you say, voice tinged with concern.
"I'm fine."
"You're bleeding."
"It's not mine."
You give him a look that says you don't believe him for one second.
"Most of it," he amends.
You close your laptop and stand up. "Sit down."
"I don't need—"
"Sit down, Jason."
The use of his name stops him. Not because he's scared of you, but because you say it like you have every right to tell him what to do. Like you've already decided that he's going to sit down and let you patch him up, and his opinion doesn’t matter in the slightest.
He sits down and wonders when he became so… compliant.
You disappear into the bathroom attached to the office and come back with a first aid kit. It's his kit, which means it's military grade and contains enough supplies to treat a gunshot wound. You open it on the coffee table and start pulling out bandages and antiseptic wipes.
"Take off your shirt," you say.
Jason raises an eyebrow. "Bold."
"Don't be annoying."
"I'm never annoying."
You don't dignify that with a response. You just wait, your arms crossed over your chest, until he sighs and pulls his shirt off over his head. The movement pulls at the cut on his ribs, and he grits his teeth against the sting.
You kneel in front of him and start cleaning the wound on his ribs first. Your hands are steady. Like you’ve done this before. You work in silence for a while, dabbing at the cut with an antiseptic wipe, and Jason finds himself watching your face.
You're focused. Concentrated. Like this is just another task you decided you had to do, no different from organizing his desk or reviewing a spreadsheet.
"You're not bad at this," he says.
"My mother was a nurse," you reply without looking up. "I learned a few things."
"Where is she now?"
"She died. Six years ago. Cancer."
Jason doesn't say he's sorry. He learned a while ago that sorry doesn't mean anything to people who have lost someone. It's just a word people say to fill the silence.
"She the reason you stayed in Gotham?" he asks instead.
You pause for a moment, then go back to work. "Part of it. The other part is that I didn't have anywhere else to go."
"That's why most people stay."
"That why you stayed?"
Jason thinks about it. He thinks about leaving Gotham a hundred times, a thousand times. He thinks about the places he's been and the people he's met and the ways he's tried to build something for himself outside of this city's shadow.
He thinks about Crime Alley. About the kid he was, stealing tires off the Batmobile because he didn't have anything else. About the way Bruce looked at him the first time, not with pity, but with something that felt like recognition.
"Someone's got to clean up this mess," he says. "Might as well be me."
You look up at him then, and your expression is unreadable. "That's very noble."
"It's not noble. It's stupid. There's a difference."
You almost smile. He sees it in the way the corner of your mouth twitches upwards just a little .
You finish cleaning the cut on his ribs and start on his knuckles. The split skin is raw and angry, and you work carefully, dabbing at the blood with the same steady hands. The silence stretches between you, unfamiliar but not uncomfortable.
"Cobblepot treated me like furniture," you say quietly. Unexpectedly.
Jason looks at you.
"I was there to do a job. I did it well. But I wasn't a person to them. I was a thing that balanced the books and poured their drinks and stayed out of the way."
You press a bandage across his knuckles, smoothing the edges down with your thumb.
"His men talked about me like I couldn't hear them. Made comments. Jokes. Nothing I could report, nothing that crossed a line they thought mattered." Your voice is flat, controlled. "I learned to ignore it. To be small. To be useful enough that they didn't notice me and not useful enough that they wanted more from me."
Jason watches your face as you speak. There's no self pity in your voice. No anger, even. He wonders why you’re not mad.
"The ones who were worse, the ones who actually tried something. They didn't last long. Cobblepot didn't like competition for his attention. He would get rid of them. Not because he cared about me. Because they were touching something that belonged to him."
You reach for another bandage.
"I hated him. Every single day. I hated the way he looked at me and the way he talked to me and the way he made me feel like I should be grateful for the privilege of being treated like garbage." You finally look up at him. "And then you showed up. And you killed the ones who deserved it. And you locked him in a room somewhere in this building."
"He's on the third floor," Jason says.
"I hope he’s suffering."
You say it with so much conviction that Jason feels something shift in his chest. He looks away, rolls his shoulders, cracks his neck. He doesn't know what to do with the thing shifting in his chest, so he ignores it.
"You're not grateful," he says.
"I'm not," you agree. "I'm relieved.”
You finish wrapping his knuckles and sit back on your heels. The first aid kit lies open between you, supplies scattered across the coffee table. The office is quiet except for the hum of the city outside the windows.
"You could’ve killed me," you say. "That night in the basement. You could’ve killed me and no one would’ve asked questions. I was nobody. I worked for Cobblepot. That would’ve been enough reason for most people."
"Civilians aren't on my list," he says again. "They never have been."
"You killed some of his men."
"His men weren't civilians. They made choices. They carried weapons. They knew what they signed up for."
You look at him for a long moment. "And me?"
Jason holds your gaze. "You hid behind a wine rack and shook so hard I could hear your teeth chattering from across the room. You weren't a threat to anyone."
You nod slowly, like you're filing that information away for later. Then you stand up and close the first aid kit.
"You should eat something," you say. "There's leftover soup in the kitchen. I'll heat it up."
"I don't need—"
"You're bleeding, you're tired, and you haven't eaten since yesterday. I've been here for almost a month. I know your schedule." You pick up the first aid kit and carry it back to the bathroom. "Sit there and don't move."
Jason opens his mouth to argue.
"Jason."
He closes his mouth. He’s too tired to.
You disappear into the bathroom, and he hears you putting the kit back in its place. The water runs for a moment. You wash your hands. Then you walk past him toward the door that leads to the kitchen.
"I'll be back in five minutes," you note. "Don't do anything stupid."
"When have I ever done anything stupid?"
You pause in the doorway and look back at him. Your expression is dry, unimpressed, and something else that he can't quite put his finger on.
"Do you want the list alphabetically or chronologically?"
Before he can respond with something equally dry in humor, you're gone.
Jason sits on the couch with his bandaged hands and his stitched ribs and listens to you move around in the kitchen. The sound of a pot being placed on the stove. The click of a burner lighting. The quiet hum of your voice as you talk to yourself, though he can't make out the words.
He picks up his phone from the coffee table. No messages. He already knows there are no messages. He puts it back down. Then he picks it up again, checks the time, and puts it back down again. He's being an idiot.
You aren't afraid of him. You haven't been afraid of him for weeks now. That should bother him. It doesn't. He's not going to think about why.
He thinks about what you said. About being treated like furniture. About learning to be small. About hating Cobblepot and being relieved that someone finally did something about it. He pushes the thought away before it can settle. He doesn't have time for that. He has plans. Big plans. Ones that don’t include you getting in the way of.
The soup will be ready in a few minutes. You'll come back with two bowls and sit across from him and you'll eat in silence or maybe you'll talk. He doesn't know which one he wants more.
He doesn't know what this is. He doesn't have a name for it.
For once, the Prince of Gotham doesn't have a plan. And for once? He didn’t absolutely hate the feeling.
waking up to find jason asleep on top of you. part of you feels bad cause he’s tired. but mostly he just wants to keep you in bed, with whatever necessary method.
it’s past noon when you wake up to jason laying with his head on your chest. his face literally buried between your breasts like it’s a pillow or something. snoring softly as though completely content.
you probably wouldn’t have woke up if it hadn’t been for the blinds being open because his weight over you just felt like a blanket. warm and inviting. his suit still on him like he just collapsed here somehow and his huge arms resting beside your head. watching the rise and fall of his back since his chest was to your stomach and the soft ruffle of his hair, you smile to yourself.
when you finally try to get up, he’s not budging even a smidge. if anything, he seems to get heavier, and he doesn’t make a sound still completely asleep. but you know he sleeps at odd hours and lord knows when he got home and collapsed on your sleep-ridden form.
fine, you think to yourself, i’ll give him another ten minutes.
though ten turns into twenty and now it’s 1pm. you shake him a little harder and groan out his name.
“jason, get up. you’re crushing me.”
he mumbles something against your chest and rubs his face there before turns it to the side. hands spanning around your waist to keep you from squirming further.
you groan a little louder and laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. “half the day is gone and you’re here suffocating me.”
that’s when he lifts his head to look at you. sleep heavy on his eyelids and a soft pink to his cheeks from pressing his face to the fabric of your clothes. the soft imprint of your ribbed shirt against his skin.
“you aren’t suffocating if you can talk ma.”
squinting down at his stupidly attractive face, you shake your head, “don’t be a smartass.” suddenly able to see the drool he left on your shirt you grimace with no malice. “ugh you got spit all over me you gremlin.”
he laughs aloud and pinches your side to make you jolt. “what this? it’s just drool.”
“same shit as spit.”
then he smiles, “no, spit is when i’m intentionally doing it. drool is mindless. see, i just love your tits even in my sleep.”
he leans over and bites you through your shirt. since you don’t wear a bra to sleep, you feel the press of his teeth completely and it makes you jolt and gasp again. you shove at his head and he just catches your wrists, still smiling at you.
the domesticated annoyance melts into something even more tender as his eyes seem to sparkle up at you. like he’s drinking in the sight of you like this but not consciously doing it. as though he could burn this memory into his soul and not flinch when his flesh form remembers.
you feel yourself fall into him when he raises your shirt over his head and ducks underneath.
“what’re you doing?” giggling as he presses wet kisses onto your abdomen. taking small bites enough to leave a little indent but not to break skin.
“shh it’s sunday baby.” he coos, “this is worship time.”
you’re still laughing and he’s making it up the valley of your breasts, bringing a hand under your shirt too. he gropes one of your breasts while the other takes familiarity in his mouth. suckling and moaning as though this was the best thing to ever happen to him. a laugh turns into a moan before you can stop it.
“shit— jay, i gotta study, come on.” you sigh but you really didn’t want him to move.
luckily he doesn’t because you don’t seem to stop him. he pulls your shirt up higher as higher until it comes off from over your head. unable to help it, your hands go into his hair and hold him there, humming as he groans against your skin. your back arches off the mattress and he decidedly perches you up a little higher with his hand slithering up your spine, stopping between your shoulders blades. bringing your chest closer to his mouth by pressing you right into him. he moans egregiously and sucks in pulses, making the most delicious pressure. he takes the opportunity to bite the flesh again. leaving teeth marks on your breast beside the reddish purple marks that were already forming.
he was purposefully giving you hickeys.
breathing through your teeth as you feel the graze of teeth a little harder, biting down and tonguing at you at the same time. when you tug at his hair, that’s enough for him to moan at the feeling and he looks up at you again, gauging your reaction.
when you finally get a look at your chest, it looked like you’d been punched by a bunch of little fists. shades of the galaxy—purple and blues with hints of red surfacing. you scoff and look at him. jason looks entirely sorry, his bottom lip sideways and his brows pressed low.
“oopsies baby i just meant to put a couple on there—”
you cut him off, “just a couple? i look like i’ve been beat up. oh my god, someone is gonna think i got jumped.”
he blinks and his expression falls, “who else sees your boobs?”
“no one?” you shove him but he just falls back ontop of you as if his bottom half wasn’t already slotted between your legs. regardless of what you’d just said, he’s still nuzzling into your skin like none of it mattered.
“good then. it’s my canvas.” he hums as he settles on the plush part in contentment. “five more minutes.”
you sigh, “three.”
“ten. and i’ll make you pancakes.”
pretending to think as your hands find their way into the hair at the nape of his neck again, he makes a small sound of approval. you use it to coax him more.
“eight and you have to make coffee too.”
he lifts his head so he’s face to face with you and squints before he pecks your lips. “i was gonna do that anyways.”
just as quickly as he got up, he settled back into the position he’s kept you in. though sleep tugged at you as the lazy sunday took full effect on more than just jason. and even though you debated him on how long you’d stay pliant under him, you both knew you could stay there forever.
contents :: fluff, just fluff. established relationship. wc. ~1.3k
The apartment was warm when Jason got back home. Real warm, home warm.
Goldish lamp light spilled across the living room, the dishwasher hummed softly from the kitchen, the line of shoes by the front door was crooked – it always was, no matter how hard you tried to keep it neat – a mug half filled with cold, forgotten tea was left on the coffee table.
It was home.
Jason stood by the front door a little longer than necessary, his helmet tucked in his arm, between his side and the crook of his elbow, and he just listened.
Until he heard it, the sound of running water from the bathroom. His entire face changed in a second. It should have been embarrassing how immediate it was. How one moment he looks like Red Hood, all tough edges, bruised knuckles, spit and anger and Gotham grime to last for days, and the very next he’s just … a boy.
A very happy one.
“Oh, thank fuck,” He whispered to himself, dropping his helmet on the couch as he passed. He was grinning before he even turned into the hall.
He appeared in the bathroom mirror behind you moments later, when you were half bent over the sink, toothbrush still in your mouth.
There he was. Hair messed up from his helmet, eyes exhausted, leather jacket half unzipped. You could tell it had been a rough night, and somewhere under his clothes bruises were already blooming. But he was looking at you like he had just walked through Heaven’s gates instead of into your slightly cluttered, too small, too expensive apartment at 1am.
“There’s my girl”
It comes out of him soft, and delighted, and terribly fond.
You barely have time to spit the toothpaste and rinse your mouth before he’s on you. Jason does not enter spaces normally when he’s this happy. He arrives in them entirely, every piece of him committing to it at once.
“Hi, baby” You laughed as his arms came around you from behind, picking you up and bringing you to the bedroom. He practically dropped you onto the bed, before plopping himself down on top of you. Heavy, warm, large. All dramatic deadweight, burying his face into your shoulder with a deep groan.
“There she is,” He mumbled, “I missed you”
“You were gone not even five hours” You replied, trying to shift yourself into a position more comfortable. But it was no use.
“It was five hours. And fourty-six minutes. And it was the worst five hours and fourty-six minutes of my life”
“You know you say that every patrol is the worst time of your life ?” You asked him
“Yeah. I do. And I mean it every time.”
He shifted, pulling his weight off you and wrapping his arms tighter around you as he spoke, like he all of a sudden developed a deep fear of somebody prying you off of him if he let go even for a second. He smelled like the city. Like smoke, and chilly air, rain damp leather, gunpowder, sweat and the faintest trace of blood.
But underneath it all, he still smelled like Jason. Jason who was home, and safe.
He pressed a kiss to the side of your jaw, then another, and another right after because he’s decided that taking a break was optional for him tonight.
You laughed, trying to push at his shoulder. He didn’t budge. “Jay”
“Nope”
“Jay.”
“Nope,” he repeated, grinning against your skin as he kissed you again, pressing a new one on every inch of skin he could reach. “Can’t hear you. I’m busy”
“Busy doing what exactly ?” You asked
“Kissin’ my girl.” He answered, as if it was obviously the most important thing in the world for him to be doing right now. The sheer amount of joy put into a single phrase made something ache sweet in your chest. Because he means it every single time he says it. My girl. Not in the sharp possessive type of way. He said it with reverence, in a Look-What-I-Get-To-Have-Way.
He pulled back just enough to look at you properly, hands coming up to cup your face, making sure your eyes stayed on him and nothing else. And there it was, that smile of his. The real one, the one where his eyes crinkled and his nose scrunched up. The smile that was too big to hide, and too bright to try and play cool. But Jason had never been able to even think about acting normal when it came to loving you.
“You stayed up for me,” He said proudly
“I always stay up for you”
“I know” His grin somehow got even brighter “That’s the best part”
It was immediately followed by: “Do we have any snacks”
You laughed so hard you snorted. “You are unbelievable”
“Hey. I deserve them. I got stabbed a little”
“You did not” You gave a playful smack to his arm. You would have known the second he walked through the door if he got stabbed.
“Emotionally. Because I had to be away from you”
“That does not count as being stabbed, Jason”
“It should” He grumbled, flopping sideways again until nearly his entire body was draped over yours. Clingy in that absurd post-patrol way he allows himself to have when he makes it home. He propped himself half up on his elbow, and just stared at you. You stared back.
He started laughing first, warm, loud laughter. The kind that shook his shoulder and made him duck his head into your neck when he was catching his breath afterwards, still grinning helplessly because he had lost all control over it.
He couldn’t contain it. Not here, not with you. Outside of this apartment he could keep himself locked up so tight sometimes he feels like he might crack under all of it. But here ? With you curled up under him, the sheets freshly washed, the lights dimmed and warm, everything overflows. Affection, relief, want, joy so pure and earnest it becomes boyish.
He steals kisses between sentences, and smiles for no reason, and touches you over and over, every place he can reach.
When you brush his hair back from his forehead he melts. Eyes closing, face going soft, leaning into your hand with a little sigh that makes you laugh again.
“There he is,” You teased, softer this time “Big scary crime lord.”
“Don’t ruin my reputation” He teased back. But his reputation was clearly not as important as having his face pressed into the palm of your hand.
“You are laying across me like a large dog”
“Yes. A guard dog.”
“A lap dog” You corrected
Jason let out a dramatic gasp, head popping up from your hand before he grabbed your face and kissed you three times in rapid succession.
“That is defamation,” "A kiss “Slander,” another kiss “Character assassination” A third kiss.
You were breathless, still laughing, when he finally settled again, heavy with contentment, head tucked against your chest to listen to the sound of your heart beating.
Neither of you said anything for a while, instead Jason just listened. Breathing slowly, rubbing his thumb in slow circles against your side, still smiling.
He never really thought he’d get to this part of things. He got the dramatic parts of life, the life-or-death parts, the yearning so deep it ached.
But he didn’t think he’d get this. The coming home part. The being loved openly and dearly part. The getting to collapses into the arms of the girl he loves and hearing her laugh while the city spins outside and he is untouched and unbothered for a few hours.
His head tilted up again suddenly, eyes bright.
“You know what ?” He asked
“What ?”
“I think that I am devastatingly in love with you”
You smiled at him, fingers brushing through the white streak of hair above the center of his forehead.
c/w ᝰ.ᐟ coach’s daughter!reader, secret relationship, possessive!garrett, praise, risk of getting caught; in the hockey house kitchen, fingering, handjob, briefff oral (m.) language, teasing, edging, pet names (baby, pretty thing, my girl, gorgeous + no y/n), oh && he refers to himself as a good boy + refuses to leave ☺︎ ⋆✴︎˚｡⋆
You’re barefoot in the kitchen, hair still damp from your shower as you measure out some sugar with the little spoon. A to-go cup for Garrett. And a mug for you.
You stir without really thinking, watching the little sugar crystals disappear into the swirl as you hum some song from the bar last night, lingering in the back of your mind. Ding!
The toast pops out of the toaster. You walk over to the fridge to pull out some jam. You bend at the hips, reaching for the little glass jar tucked behind the mess.
A whistle cuts through the kitchen. You already know who’s standing behind you.
You glance back and sure enough, there he is, caught mid-stare, duffle slung over his shoulder, dressed head to toe in Briar U Hockey workout gear. His dark curls are sticking out from beneath his hat, still messy from sleep, and the gold chain around his neck catches the kitchen light when he shifts.
He looks at you like you’re something he’s not supposed to touch, always seconds away from getting walked in, but that's half the fun at this point. He takes his time looking you over, his hand lifting to turn his hat from the front to the back with a lazy flick.
He’s on you in a second, big hands sliding around your hips as you straighten up; his body pressing into yours.
“Holy shit,” he murmurs against your skin, his voice rough with sleep—the kind that always gives him away when he’s stayed up too late the night before and woken up too damn early. “What are you doin’ down here, huh?”
“I made your coffee,” you murmur and he groans.
“Saw your text,” he hums, grazing his mouth over your cheek. “You’re too good to me.” His chain brushes your collarbone when he leans in, cool against your skin.
Garrett lets you go, reluctantly, and you start to walk toward the counter. His eyes trail up the length of you.
“It’s just coffee and toast, baby,” you smile, tilting your head slightly.
“Considering everything you did for me last night… I should be the one making breakfast—you don't owe me anything.”
Your cheeks burn, suddenly shy under all this attention as he walks closer. His hands rest on the counter on either side of your hips just as you lean over the counter, reaching for the butter, your ass arching back, right onto his lap. On purpose. You don’t even try to pretend it wasn’t.
“Oh, shit,” he breathes, his voice low and amused as he plays along with the accidental contact, his bag falling heavy to the floor, looking over his shoulder for his roommates. “Real sorry, baby.”
You let out a bubbly laugh as he grabs your body and turns you toward him, lifting you up to set you down on the cool counter.
“What if the boys see you down here, huh?”
His smile’s smug; the man stepping between your thighs as his hands slide up the back of his jersey. His rough thumbs slip under the band of your panties, gripping your hips in his big hands.
Garrett reaches up a little higher, squeezing your breasts before his thumbs brush softly against you. “And what if they did?”
“See you?” His grin widens. “Coach’s daughter wearin’ forty-four and not much else.”
“Yeah,” you sigh, arching into him a little more.
“Well, damn,” he murmurs, looking at you like he’s just remembered he has somewhere to be. “I’d be fucked—I mean, it's pretty risky. I could stop,” he grins against your skin.
“No, you couldn't,” you dismiss it with a teasing laugh.
“No shit. Wearin’ my jersey. No bra… Panties. Textin’ me telling me you made me coffee and breakfast. You honestly think I wasn't gonna thank you a little. Thank you, baby,” he breathes as he leans in, pulling the fabric up, his mouth finding your breast.
He circles it once with his tongue, then again before sucking down, rough enough that your breath hitches and your fingers thread through his dark hair, his curls tangling between your fingers as you hold him there.
“Wish we lived alone,” he grumbles, turning his face further into your chest as his curls tickle your skin.
“Yeah?” You ask breathily as your thighs widen on the counter.
“Whole house to ourselves?” He says, letting the words vibrate against your skin.
He tilts back in, greedy mouth following the curve of your neck as his hands clutch your thighs, holding you open as he leans in close.
“I’d lift up the back—bend you over the counter.” His fingers shift around your body, tracing down your spine, landing on your ass, kneading your flesh.
He smiles against your lips, snapping the waistband of your panties against your skin. “Couldn’t have put on some shorts, or somethin’?”
“More comfortable like this,” you whisper, turning his words back on him when you say, “I mean, it's pretty risky. I could run upstairs and put some on.”
“No, you wouldn't,” he hums. “You did this for me and I fuckin’ love it. Just walkin’ around here like you own the place. What if Tuck and Logan see you, huh? Dean?”
“Oh, Dean?” You ask, because suddenly this conversation makes a lot more sense.
“Don’t start,” he scoffs. “You know he likes you.”
“None of you are subtle,” you answer and he lets out a laugh.
“Yeah, well you got no idea how many conversations I’ve sat through, baby.”
Then his hand slips forward, grazing over the thin material between your legs, pressing soft little circles onto your clit until your hips twitch at his touch.
“They think they know what it’d be like to be with you—they got no fucking clue,” his voice breaks a little when he softens it. “How perfect you are—how much you do for me. To me.”
You hook a hand around the back of his neck, thinking about how easy it would be to have him press himself in and lay you out across the counter, but the both of you would never recover from being caught like that.
You pull him closer and his lips suck down on your neck, rough enough to leave a mark.
“Kept my mouth shut. Haven't said shit. It kills me…” He breathes over your collarbone right where the collar of the jersey meets your skin. “I've been such a good boy for you.”
“So good,” you whisper. “And yet, you stopped telling what we would do if this house was ours,” you breathe, nails tracing over the thick bulge in his shorts.
He laughs, liking the sound of that. “Got you bent over this counter. One hand on your hip, the other gripping this jersey in my fist while you cry out that name on your back.”
His fingers trail even lower, dipping just barely between your folds, right above your entrance, the barrier of fabric only adding to the ache between your thighs. So much for all that teasing he accused you of. He’s worse.
“Too bad you have a workout.” Your fingers card through his dark hair. “We could stay back.”
He grins as he chuckles warmly against the column of your neck, dragging your panties to the side. “Fuck, you wanna get me in trouble, huh? Won’t be able to play tonight if I don’t show—you know that. After the game, though. Boys’ll go to the bar,” he breathes as his fingers mimic the tempo of his words.
His breath catches in his broad chest as your finger slips under the band of his shorts, pulling him closer before you slide your hand inside.
“Christ,” he grits through a smile as your fingers wrap around his cock, finding him hard and heavy. You stroke and he hums deep against your lips about all the things he wants to do to you when you're alone.
“Trying to get me all worked up just to send me off,” he whispers. “That’s fucked, pretty.”
He works you with his long thick fingers, slow enough to tease. “How fast do you think I could get you off, huh?” He chuckles, his laugh buzzing against your lips. “Pretty close right now, huh?”
Garrett breathes those words against your jaw. Your hand slaps over your mouth, muffling the sound of his name.
Your pussy squeezes around his fingers and you lose the rhythm of your strokes, but he doesn't, leaning into the counter a little more. The wet sounds of his hand darting in and out suddenly, too loud but it's replaced by the pounding of your heart in your head.
“Come on, baby… Cum on my hand,” he mutters, teeth scraping your neck and your body releases, fluttering around his fingers.
Your thighs squeeze together as he keeps going, whining against your hand, before he slows his pace.
He brings his fingers to his mouth, cleaning them with his heavy gaze locked on yours, the watch on his wrist glinting.
“Fuckin’ perfect,” he mumbles as you slip off the counter and into his arms. “I love you—”
“I love you too,” you whisper as your lips find his again, hands sliding down his chest. Your hands slip lower. His shorts are already halfway down his hips, cock trapped beneath the waistband.
“What are you up to, huh?” He asks like he doesn’t already know as you back him into the counter. “Yeah?” He laughs softly. “Bet you won’t.” That challenge barely leaves his mouth before he kisses you again, eyes flicking toward the stairwell mid-kiss before dropping back to you as you sink to your knees.
“In my jersey,” he mumbles as he tilts back, hands resting on top.
He sucks in a sharp breath when the air hits him, shivering when your tongue glides up the side of his cock, tossing back his head as he bites down on his lip, holding back a moan—BANG!
“Fuck me,” he hisses, hanging his head between his shoulders when a bag drops in Logan’s room above you.
Your tongue swipes against his tip and he blows out a sharp breath through his nose, his sticky wet precum catching on it.
“Just—Just a little more,” he mutters, holding your head, following you as you take him in your mouth. You bob back and forth and his grip tightens, eyes fluttering shut—THUMP!
You draw away when you hear some more motion upstairs. He shakes his head, laughing under his breath, watching as you kiss the tip.
“That’s how we’re playin’ this, huh?” Looking back at you in playful frustration, he tugs you up fast, muttering bitterly under his breath as you tug his shorts in place.
“Sorry, baby,” you smile.
“Teasin’ me, baby. Just wait until later,” he warns with a smile, grabbing his workout bag, walking with you back up to his room.
His fingers find yours automatically as the two of you step into the hallway.
Garrett walks a half-step behind you, his thumb rubbing back and forth across your knuckles. You glance over your shoulder and catch him already looking. He drags a hand across his mouth, trying and failing to hide his smile.
You step up one stair, and by the third he already knows he’s in trouble. His number stretched across your back. His last name stamped over your shoulders. The curve of your ass peeking out each time you take a step higher.
The intrusive thoughts win without effort. His other hand reaches out for you, pulling you back and into his strong arms. “Garrett Graham!” You whisper-scream and his deep laugh echoes through the stairwell.
“You are drivin’ me fuckin’ crazy,” he mumbles like he's pissed—smiling like he's in love. “I’m just a man, alright? What do you want from me?” Your arms curve loosely around his neck, your legs wrapping around his waist as he holds you, carrying you the rest of the way. “Plus you were walkin’ up the stairs too slow, you needed my help.”
“My hero.”
“Good thing I'm riding by myself. I need some time alone with my thoughts.”
“You’re dramatic,” you cut in, but that only encourages him.
“You know one hand on the wheel, the other doin’ what you started and didn't finish… you're lucky you're gorgeous.”
“So are you,” you smile and he scowls.
By the time he sets you down inside his room, he’s smiling so hard his cheeks hurt, shutting the door before anyone can see. “I mean…” Garrett shifts his bag higher on his shoulder. “Maybe I could stay.”
You give him a look. A long look. And his shoulders slump.
“I know,” he mutters. “Goddamn, baby. You run a tight program.”
“Workout,” you whisper.
“Yeah.”
“Hockey,” you remind him.
“Mmm… Mhmm,” he hums, so dreamily you laugh. “Fuck, I love when you boss me around—”
“We’ll have all night—”
“How am I supposed to focus now? All I can think about is how pretty you looked trying not to make a sound.” His finger hooks under your chin, lifting your lips to his. “But you... you gotta be careful, baby. These boys are gonna hear you one of these days. They could have caught us down there.”
You look up at him through your lashes ever so slightly and he melts.
“Fuck,” he mumbles, blowing out a tired breath. “You own me—don’t even know why I try.”
He reaches out, grabbing the jersey on your body, pulling you closer. His nose brushes against yours—his lips doing the same, drawing back and leaving you chasing them just enough to notice before he kisses you.
“You don't have class until ten, yeah?” He murmurs between kisses.
“Yeah,” you breathe. “Wishin’ you were me right now, huh?”
“Wishin’ a lot of things honestly.”
Garrett groans, dropping his forehead to yours, his voice dripping honey-sweet as he takes a different approach. “Shit, baby… what about your coffee? I should probably go get that for you, hmm?”
“Seriously—”
“Then, I don’t know…” He continues when that doesn’t work. “Maybe not get my ass beat at the gym. Sweat here instead. Do something better with my time.”
“You’re gonna be late—”
“And, I wonder why,” he cuts in. “Running out of excuses.”
“What are you gonna tell him, Captain?”
He thinks about it for a moment, stalling still. “Pretty thing. Wears my number. Torments me. Tells me I have to stay or else—”
“Or else, huh?” You giggle, and his eyes fall to your lips. “She sounds like a bitch, baby.”
“—Don’t talk about her like that. That’s my girl.”
“Such a charmer, Garrett Graham,” you hum, twirling one of his curls with your finger. “Leave—” Smack! His hand claps against your ass, the mesh barrier, just another reminder that he can't have you how he'd like.
He batts his hand against the door handle, still unwilling to let you go for another moment.
“Send me a picture or somethin’,” he mumbles against your lips. “You know, for the car ride there.”
“I don’t know, baby. You look extra pretty when you suffer,” you whisper, and he chuckles deeply, the sound going straight through you.
“Gonna ruin you later.”
“M’counting on it…” You smile and his groan breathes against your lips when he pushes open the door.
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the girls keep trying to set you up on vacation. that is, until they find the senior attending in your bed and realize why you keep shutting them down
𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ interested in how the pitt crew got approved for a week in greece? the original invitation is still posted
PAIRING: jack abbot x reader
WARNINGS: fem!reader, sunshine reader, reader has breasts, reader and jack are naked in bed together!, kissing, light possessiveness, secret relationship, very soft jack abbot
PROMPT: here!
WC: 1.1k
Jack Abbot has the nicest lips you’ve ever kissed.
And yes, maybe that would sound more profound if you had a wider frame of reference.
What you do have to compare him to amounts to a few teenage makeouts under splintered bleachers, some smattering of questionable judgment calls at frat parties, and then essentially nothing once medical school dragged your life into an alley and shot it dead.
Still. Even a limited sample can yield a clear, uncontestable result, and the result is Jack.
Jack, whose kisses arrive so confidently, like he has never once doubted where his mouth belongs, golden and fizzing, like champagne left to bloom in the heat of summer while your whole body hitches in open-mouthed amazement just to feel it.
Even now, even when the cool air whispers in through the balcony door and skims over your legs beneath tangled sheets, raising goosebumps in delicate lines along your thighs.
Jack notices instantly, the faintest smile warning against your lips as he shifts closer, chasing off the chill and dimming everything else until he is all you know.
When he kisses you again, it’s slower, lush and lazy, every nerve in you waking and stretching toward him, and when he pulls back, it’s only far enough that his lips barely graze the corner of your mouth.
Waiting, poised, always right there if you need more.
And you always seem to need more.
“C’mon,” he urges, his voice raspy from sleep, infused with a smugness you’d like to resent — because he knows he’s won this round. “Tell me again how much better I am than everyone else.”
You laugh before he can kiss it back out of you, a warm burst of affection filling in the little space between you.
“Such an ego trip,” you mutter softly. “But, unfortunately for literally every other man on earth, you are kind of ruining the curve here, Dr. Abbot.”
“That’s what I thought.”
You roll your eyes, but you’re smiling anyway. “See, that confidence really shouldn’t be as attractive as it is —especially since you spent all last night watching Victoria and Samira scout alternatives for me.”
His fingers tense slightly against your waist, pulling you that much closer as his brows lift with genuine offense. “Should I have been worried?”
“Maybe a little,” you tease, unable to help yourself. “They were getting ambitious by the end there.”
He exhales, voice husky and low. “Let them get ambitious. They’ll just have to get used to being disappointed.”
You cant your head to the side and let your lips skim the sharp, firm line of his jaw, feeling the small catch in his breath as it happens.
That tiny lovely moment that reminds you all that swagger is something wonderfully human, something you can touch and affect and undo a little.
“They just don’t know the position’s already been monopolized.”
“And it’s a position I’m extremely attached to, baby.” His lips twitch as his thumb keeps tracing small circles into your skin. “Although,” he murmurs, “there are a few other positions I’m equally invested in exploring with you.”
“Cheeky.”
The accusation loses most of its force when you can feel the tips of your ears burning.
You don’t wait for him to answer. That would only give him room to keep going, and he is very good at that, good at pressing exactly where you are weakest until you dissolve on contact.
So you put a hand to him instead and guide him back, trading positions until his shoulders are against the mattress and he is looking up from the pillows.
He lets you do it without a fight (the only way you could manage it), only smiling as he runs his hands along your naked sides in long idle strokes until his palms settle against the valet of your chest.
After that you have to look away. Or rather, down. It’s easier to fold yourself against him than to hold his gaze when it gets like that, open and intent and almost too knowing.
Better to focus on the terrain of him. The freckles and beauty marks and scattered dark points across his skin that your fingers can follow and reorder into something legible. A constellation, naturally. Andromeda before they put her back up in the night sky where everyone could stare and nobody could touch.
A sudden knock at the door jolts both of you apart, but you barely make it half an inch away from Jack before the door swings open anyway, accompanied by a voice you would recognize in any state of consciousness.
“Babe, please tell me you’re awake, because we’ve all been dying to hear if you liked that guy from last night. Also, we found his Instagram and —” Victoria’s voice dies on the spot.
You make a tiny, strangled sound of pure horror.
Thankfully, Jack reacts for you, rolling you back into the mattress and yanking the sheet up over your head like that is somehow going to undo the last ten seconds instead of simply turning you into a very obvious person-shaped lump.
Which also doesn’t solve the larger issue, namely that there is a very naked senior attending what is meant to be your bed, in your room.
So much for plausible deniability.
“Oh,” Victoria says. Then, apparently finding that insufficiently expansive: “oh my god.” Beneath the sheet your face goes so hot it feels chemical. “Wow. This is —” She breaks off. You can practically hear the competing impulses at work: decorum on one side, unrestrained glee on the other. “I mean, congratulations, but also wow.”
Jack does not even have the decency to sound flustered. “Thanks.”
You sigh. At this point you’re not sure there’s really anything left to do but surrender gracefully to the smoking ruin of your secret.
“Would you believe he’s just here for a really, really thorough rounds update?” you ask, peeking out from the sheets with what you feel is a very convincing amount of innocence.
“On vacation?” she asks flatly. “Wow. Healthcare workers are getting more and more dedicated.”
Jack settles further back against the pillows. “Patient care never stops.”
Victoria presses her lips together tightly. It’s obvious she is fighting for her life not to laugh, and maybe not even fighting that hard.
“Right. Message received. I’m gonna give you two your privacy. Samira owes me forty bucks, so I need to go collect on that anyway.”
She slams the door shut behind her.
You drop the sheet at last and look up at the ceiling, momentarily unable to imagine a more useful direction in which to direct your face.
“So,” you say, sitting up and giving Jack what you mean to be a stern glare, “I think the secret aspect of this relationship may be over.”
He glances at you. “Did we even have a secret, really?”
“Maybe for like, a week.”
He kisses you again. The thesis remains intact. Jack Abbot has the nicest lips you’ve ever kissed, and now, apparently, that is no longer private research.
this fic was part of my 2 year celebration: maria's summer in santorini
𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ to learn more, click here!
Summary: reader doesn’t work in the medical field and always felt a certain level of insecurity because they feel as if Jack thinks they are dumb. Then one outing with Jack’s team and some comments from Jack and his coworkers all but confirms their insecurities.
Dating Jack Abbot is as fun and delicious as you would expect. He’s funny, handsome, means what he says, and the sex is out of this world. Almost everything about him is perfect. The only thing is his relationship with Robby. Robby has made it abundantly clear he does not like you and quite frankly thinks you're dumb. Jack has made zero attempts to stop him from his comments, which turns sprouts an deep insecurity inside you that Jack thinks the same thing.
When you ask Jack about his day at work, he always just tells you it was okay or it was long, but he doesn’t want to bite you with the details and that’s it. End of conversation. When you try pressing for more information or ask him questions, he would wave you off and say something along the lines of you don’t want to know the boring medical things. And you can’t ever help but feel the small stab of insecurity from his dismissal.
Sure you weren’t in the medical field, you worked in Human Resources. But you met Trinity in college and remained friends all throughout her medical schooling and you were thrilled when she moved to Pittsburgh and got a job here. For fucks sake you helped her study for all her exams, you know enough to carry on a basic conversation of “how was work honey?”. But apparently Jack never thought so.
And when Jack would ask about your day and you would tell him, he would act like he already knew the stories and the information you were telling him. Like your job was so easy to figure out and understand. And honestly it only got worse when you were around his coworkers, most notably Robby. He just viewed you as just a stupid little girl who plays dress up for 8 hours a day Monday through Friday.
“I wish I could have a job where I’m home by 5 and off every weekend. But at last, some of us have real jobs to do” Robby said to you one outing. And Jack didn’t do anything other than give a fake stern “Robby”, but there was still a slight laugh in his tone.
It was Trinity who wanted to say something, but you reminded her that even though she is outside of work, that Robby is still her attending and based on what you have heard about him, he can really make her life a hell. So against her better judgment, she bit her tongue.
……………………………………………………………………..
Jack was hosting a barbecue Saturday and the team was going to be there. He of course invited you, but you declined stating that you never fit in the team. Jack argued saying they all loved you, but he respected your decision and that he’ll miss you. And that was the end of the conversation until Saturday morning when Trinity called you.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come?” She asked
“Trin, I don’t fit in with them. I’m always the outlier” you reminded her and she sighed
“But Jack’s your boyfriend. You're basically living at his house, just because Robby is an ass don’t let that stop you” she said and she is technically right. You are at Jack’s more often than not. Hell, your cat has his own cat tower and kitty litter area set up there when you stay for extended periods of time. Jack even asked you to move in with him earlier this week and you said yes and actually was using today to pack.
“You know what, Trin you’re right. I shouldn’t let them stop me from hanging out. I mean, I’m friends with most of you anyways outside of Jack, so fuck Robby!” You say
“Here here!” Trinity said and you hung up with her and decided to call Jack who answered after the second ring.
“Hey baby!” He answered cheerfully
“Hey Jackie! Is the invitation still open for me to come today?” You asked
“Of course it is! But I thought you didn’t want to?” He asked
“I didn’t, but I spoke to Trinity and she talked me into it. And besides I am friends with most of them outside of you, so I can just hang with them and not cramp your style” you joke. Only slightly kidding and Jack laughed
“You could never cramp my style. Besides, you're always welcomed here. If you want to come a little early, I can help calm your nerves” Jack said suggestively and you giggle
“You got yourself a deal Dr. Abbot” you say
……………………………………………………………………..
It took you about 20 minutes to get ready and drive over to Jack’s. When you pull into Jack’s driveway you see a stupid ass motorcycle and know Robby is already there. Sighing you get out of the car and make your way into Jack’s house. Since you are moving in, you don’t even bother knocking and you follow the voices to the kitchen when Jack is cutting up some fruit and Robby is sitting at the island.
“Hey” you greeted catching both of their attention
“Hey baby” Jack smiled and you moved to give him a side hug as he pressed a kiss to your head.
“I see you just let yourself in now” Robby say
“Robby” Jack warned with a small smile
“What? All I’m saying is it must be getting serious” he says taking a swig of his beer
“It is. She’s moving in” Jack said as he resumes cutting up the watermelon and Robby chokes on his beer
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” He ask Jack as if your not standing right there
“Jesus Robby-“ Jack gets cut off by you walking away and you hear him say something else, but you are too far away to hear what. Or you’re too angry, you’re not sure what.
You make it to Jack’s room where you begin pacing and trying to calm down. You’re not even in the house for five fucking minutes and you are already being belittled and treated like you are nothing but scum and once again, your boyfriend isn’t doing anything about it.
“Y/n?” his soft voice enters the room as he shuts the door behind him and you stop pacing and turn to look at Jack who is leaning his back against the now closed door.
“Can you please not do this today?” He asked and you look at him in confusion
“Do what?” You asked
“Pick fights with Robby” he said plainly. And you’re trying to wrack your brain for what the fuck he is referring to
“Me pick fights?” You asked and he nods
“I never do. It’s always Robby who starts them. I barely speak to the guy and yet he finds ways to get his digs in at me” you tell Jack and he sighs
“This is a perfect example, you walked away from him when he was talking to you”
“To you” you cut him off. “He was talking to you. He was talking to you as if I wasn’t even there. He does that often Jack”
“He doesn’t-“
“Yes he does! He always fucking does it he talks down to me like I’m fucking stupid or worthless because I’m not a goddamn doctor. And you let him every fucking time!” You yell
“Keep your voice down. He’ll hear you” Jack remains oh so calm
“Oh no, poor Robby will hear me talk bad about him? Well I probably should just go out there get on my knees and kiss his feet and beg for his forgiveness” you fake pout
“Can you be mature? I just wanted a nice get together with friends and you-“ he stops himself
“I’m what? Finish it Jack.” He goes to say something but the doorbell being rung and voices filling the house stop him.
“This conversation isn’t over. Just please have fun, and don’t start anything with Robby” he says as he opens the door and you watch him leave.
……………………………………………………………………..
Throughout the party, Jack acted as the perfect host. He laughed, cooked, and made sure everyone was happy- well almost everyone. Once again, you were pushed off to the side while the important people mingled. You were only saved when Trinity, Dennis, Samiria, and Victoria showed up.
When they did, they all made sure to pull you into their conversations and for once you felt welcomed. You didn’t feel that nasty insecurity bug crawling around inside you. When they talked about work, they didn’t feel the need to dumb anything down and if you felt inclined to, you would ask questions. You couldn’t help but think why it couldn’t be this way with Jack. Speaking of which, out of the corner of your eye, you see him walk over.
“Glad you guys could make it”- he says smiling to the group- “though proper etiquette is to say hi to the host” he says clearly a little tipsy from the beers he's been drinking.
“Poor y/n here looked lonely when we showed up, so we kept her company” Trinity said while she threw an arm around your shoulder and you blush a little. You briefly spoke to Trin about your fight with Jack.
“Well I’m glad you were. Can’t have my girl sad during a party” Jack said and smiled at you
“Someone has to” Trinity mumbled and it was clear Jack heard based on the way his face fell.
“Well I hope you guys enjoy the party. Let me know if you need anything” - he smiled to the group and turned to you- “come find me later baby” he says as he pat your ass gently and you give him a smile and a “of course”.
When Jack left, you glared at Trinity who simply held up her hands in surrender.
……………………………………………………………………..
The night continues on and you actually start enjoying yourself. You and Samira have chatted most of the night as Trinity ditched you guys to flirt with Garcia.
“So what happened with that manager you were telling me about the other day?” Samira asked you
“Oh! Yes- well he was fired. After the initial racism complaint, we had several other employees come forth with similar experiences and complaints. We had enough for termination based on his contract and our company policies” you tell her
“That’s amazing!” Samira said and you smiled, it’s always validating to hear someone to get excited to hear stories from your job.
“What are you two chatting about?” Jack cuts in as he takes a seat next to you and Robby takes one across from you in the little circle of chairs your group had set up earlier. You look around the yard and realize it is only you four left.
“Oh y/n was just telling me about the manager she had to fire” Samira said
“Oh shit you had to do it?” Jack asked
“Yeah- yesterday” you tell
“Why didn’t you say anything?” He ask and you shrugged
“You worked yesterday and I didn’t think it was that important” you told him and he frowned
“You’re not wrong”- Robby snorts into his beer- “I mean having to tell someone they’re fired? A child could do that” he laughs and your frown deepens
“It is important. Y/n spent hours reviewing the complaints and federal laws on this case. She put a lot of work in this” Jack said
“Whatever. It’s not like she’s doing life saving work like we do. Honestly Jack the imbalance is crazy. How is she ever going to understand what you do?” Robby asked and Jack sighed but didn’t say anything and your glare turned to him.
“Are you not going to say anything?” You asked him and he looked at you mouth opening and closing, like he’s trying to figure out what to say.
“No, of course you’re not. I don’t know why I’m surprised. You never say anything to defend me against Robby’s hurtful comments towards me. Hell, half the time you laugh and egg him on!” -You shout and stand up now. Jack tries to ask you to sit down and lower your voice, but you cut him off and turn towards Robby.
“And you- you are a hurtful, spiteful, sexist asshole. You have done nothing but cut me down since I met you. I thought at first, I just had to get to know you, but now it only gets worse every time I’m around you. You are the sole reason I don’t come to many of Jack’s team outings. You alone make me feel like the outsider, like I’m a fucking idiot because I’m not a doctor. I may not be saving lives like you Robby, but I’m also not making my coworkers live a living hell. Yes I hear all the stories and if I worked in that damn hospital, I would do everything in my power to make you pay for the way you treat your female inferiors.” -you take a small step towards him- “you are fifty fucking years old and act like a child. I don't know if this hatred you have for me is because you think I’m taking Jack away from you, but you don’t have to worry about that anymore because I’m done. You need to grow the fuck up Robby” you end your spiel to him and turned back to Jack who is now standing
“I’m not moving in with you. I’m done”
“Y/n-“ Jack starts
“No. I’m tired of not being enough for you Jack. I’m tired of you thinking I’m not smart enough to tell me about your day. You can talk to me Jack, I may not know the complicated medical terms, but you can fucking tell me how you damn day was. And I’m so tired of you never defending me against Robby. I’m done with obviously not being the right woman for you” you say as you turn and walk out.
You walk out of Jack’s yard, out of his house, and out of his life. You don’t look back and you don’t think about what you did until you’re laying in bed crying yourself to sleep that night.
Jack loves his little family. Loves the domesticity and peace that comes with it. Ever since he met you, he doesn't chase the high of dangerous adrenaline. The only thing he chases are you kisses, your affections, basically just any attention you are willing to give him.
And right now, it feels like his heart might burst as he sees you with your perfect babygirl. Your daughter is in a baby wrap against your chest as you bounce her softly from side to side.
You are making him breakfast after his shift, but one look at you and he completely forgets any hunger for food.
"Hi," he whispers, walking towards you.
"Hi, handsome. You early today." You hum in content as you see him. He's still dressed in his black scrubs and he looks just as fucking attractive as always.
"Couldn't wait to go home and be with my girls." He confesses, giving you a kiss on the mouth and a quick kiss on babygirl's head.
"We missed you too. "You say, raising on your tiptoes to get another kiss from him. You love the attention just as much as Jack does.
"Was she good?" Jack asks in between the greedy kisses he leaves all over your face. God, there's not a day that he doesn't fall even more in love with you.
"She was perfect, barely any fussing." You state, heart-eyes on your baby. "Are you hungry?"
"A little, but let me just soak you two up a little." Jack's muscled arms sneak around you, clutching you to his chest.
"So needy." You tease, giggling as he pokes your side for that comment.
"Can you blame me?"
"No. I'm so happy you have two days off again." Jack's new schedule has him working two days and leaves him free for two and so on. It's a new arrangement, one that he was adamant about ever since you got pregnant.
"Me too, angel." He says, before he unwraps himself from you and softly tugs you after him towards the bed. Jack's only intend is to cuddle you and his babygirl, until all of you are asleep.
He'll be happy if only you fall asleep because you've been taking care of babygirl like a champ while he's been at work. You deserve to rest even more than him after his shift.
pairing – garrett graham x reader
summary – four times garrett’s chain causes problems, and one very smug hockey captain pretends he isn’t loving every second of it.
warnings – suggestive content, making out/grinding, mild sexual references, implied oral sex, drinking, party setting, garrett being smug and whipped.
notes from me – as part of my 1k celebrations, here's the top requested fic!! enjoy 🫶🏼
word count – 5k
navigation – masterlist | taglist
The first time Garrett realises his chain is a problem, they're in his room with the door locked, the bass from downstairs moving through the floorboards in lazy, uneven pulses and the old house doing what the old house always does around a party, which is pretend it’s not seen worse.
There are voices below them, Logan’s laugh cutting through once in a bright, drunken bark, Dean yelling something that sounds like an accusation and Tucker answering with the sort of dry, patient tone that means someone is absolutely about to be called an idiot.
But up here, everything has gone smaller. Warmer. The room narrowed down to Garrett’s weight between her thighs, the soft give of his mattress under her back, the skirt shoved high enough on her hips that there's no point pretending it’s even a skirt anymore, and his mouth dragging over hers like he has all night and no better use for it.
He kisses like an athlete too, which is deeply annoying information to have about him because it makes too much sense. Confident, paced, unfairly good at changing pressure right when she starts thinking she’s adjusted to him.
One hand is braced beside her head, the other curled around her thigh, thumb pressing absent little circles into skin like he doesn't know it’s making her thoughts get weird and slippery around the edges. He’s still wearing his t-shirt, which feels rude considering she’s in a bra and skirt and whatever dignity survived the trip up the stairs is now lying somewhere dead near his laundry basket.
His chain has slipped out from under his collar while he kisses her, warm gold catching against the side of her throat every time he grinds down into her and makes her breath come out embarrassingly thin.
“Garrett,” she gets out, though it doesn't have much purpose beyond giving her mouth something to do when his is suddenly leaving it.
He hums like he’s heard her and decided to take it under advisement at a later date. His mouth drifts to her jaw, then lower, slow and pleased and entirely too smug about the way her body moves before she can stop it.
He kisses down her throat, over the spot where her pulse is doing something humiliating, then lower still, along the top edge of her bra, and she should probably let him. She should probably enjoy the fact that Garrett Graham, Briar hockey captain, walking campus hazard, has decided her chest deserves sustained attention.
But the second his mouth leaves hers properly, some spoiled little part of her lights up in objection.
“No,” she whines, which is not her proudest moment, and is made worse by the fact that Garrett pauses against her skin like he’s trying not to laugh. She reaches down and gets her fingers in his hair, gentle but insistent, tugging him back up until his face appears over hers again, curls mussed, mouth shiny, eyes bright with the kind of amusement that makes her want to either kiss him harder or shove him off the bed. “Come back.”
His grin spreads slowly. “Bossy.”
“You stopped kissing me.”
“I was kissing you somewhere else.”
She pouts. “Wrong somewhere.”
He gives one of those little laughs that starts in his chest before it reaches his mouth, warm and low and stupidly pleased, and then he comes back happily, because that’s the worst part of Garrett.
He has all this cocky-boy resistance in theory, all this mouth and attitude and captain-of-every-room energy, and then she asks for him directly and his body gives him away before his ego can file an appeal. He kisses her again, deep enough that the complaint evaporates under her tongue, and for a few seconds she forgets about the chain entirely.
Then he pulls back to sit up on his knees, one thigh planted on either side of her hips, and reaches behind his neck for his shirt.
“Oh,” she says before she can stop herself.
Garrett pauses with the hem already half up his stomach, eyebrows lifting. “Oh?”
“Shut up.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
His teeth catch at his bottom lip. “I was about to ask if you needed a minute to process.”
She narrows her eyes at him, which would probably have more force if she were not lying under him with her skirt bunched around her waist and her hands already drifting up his exposed stomach. “You’re so annoying.”
“Yeah, but you’re still looking.”
And she is. Tragically. Openly. With no legal defence. The shirt comes off the rest of the way and lands somewhere near the chair, and Garrett is there above her in the soft lamplight, shoulders broad from hockey, stomach tight under her palms, chain resting against his chest like it’s been placed there for the express purpose of ruining her life.
It's not even that fancy. That’s the insulting part. Just a gold chain. Simple. Warm from his skin. Sitting right at the base of his throat.
Her hands slide up his stomach, over the hard shift of muscle when he breathes, and she catches her bottom lip between her teeth without meaning to.
Garrett’s grin softens into something more dangerous because he knows. Because Garrett is many things, but oblivious is not one of them, especially not when a girl is looking at his chest like she’s discovered a new academic field.
“Baby,” he says, amused.
She doesn't answer. She hooks two fingers under the chain and pulls. Garrett comes down with it, one hand shooting to the mattress beside her head, the other catching her waist as he laughs into the space above her mouth. “Jesus. Okay.”
She smiles, breath already uneven again. “Come here.”
“I was here.”
“Closer.”
His mouth hovers over hers, his chain trapped between her fingers, the metal a little warm, a little slick where it’s been resting against his skin. “You always this demanding?”
She tugs again, smaller this time, mostly because she likes the way his eyes drop to her mouth when she does it. “Only when you’re slow.”
Garrett stares at her for one beat, and then the smile goes all bright and helpless at the edges, like she’s pleased him against his will.
“Yeah,” he murmurs, bending until the chain brushes her collarbone and his mouth is almost on hers again. “That’s gonna be a problem.”
The second time is quieter, though quiet in the hockey house is a relative concept and mostly means no one is actively breaking furniture within their line of sight. They're downstairs on the couch after dinner, the living room dim except for the television throwing blue-white light over everyone’s faces and the standing lamp Tucker keeps insisting gives the room ambience, which Dean keeps calling divorced dad lighting.
A movie’s on, something Logan picked with the confidence of a man who would be asleep within twenty minutes, and sure enough he’s already slumped in the armchair with his head tipped back and one socked foot on the coffee table, snoring faintly through the loudest action sequence anyone has ever failed to respect.
Garrett’s stretched out behind her on the couch, one arm tucked under her head like a pillow, the other lying heavy over her waist. She’s settled half on top of him, half against him, legs tangled beneath the old throw blanket that smells faintly like fabric softener and Garrett’s laundry detergent and whatever popcorn crime Dean committed earlier.
The whole room has that late-night, lived-in warmth to it. Empty bowls on the coffee table, Tucker leaning on the other end of the couch with his phone in one hand and his attention somehow still half on the movie, Dean sprawled on the floor with his back against Allie’s legs while she runs her fingers lazily through his hair like she’s rewarding a large, badly behaved dog.
Garrett’s chain has worked its way out again. She doesn't mean to start fiddling with it. Her hand is just there, resting against his chest, and the chain is right under her fingertips, cool at first and then quickly warming up.
Her thumb catches the tiny curve of one link. Then another. Then she’s sliding it back and forth lightly against his skin, not really thinking, only listening to the movie and the steady sound of his breathing under her cheek and the occasional thud of Dean kicking the coffee table because he refuses to understand where his legs end.
Garrett lets it happen for a while. Long enough that she forgets she’s doing it. Long enough for the metal to move in a tiny, repetitive drag under her fingers, a private little rhythm tucked beneath explosions and the muffled rain starting against the windows.
His chest rises under her palm. His hand at her waist flexes once, absent, and she shifts closer without lifting her head. Then his fingers close around her wrist. Warm and sure, stopping the motion.
She glances up. “What?”
Garrett looks down at her with the deeply patient expression of a man being tortured in a way he’s not allowed to enjoy too obviously. “You’ve been doing that for ten minutes.”
“Doing what?”
His eyes flick to the chain. Then back to her. “That.”
“Oh.” She looks down at her hand, caught in his like evidence. “Was I annoying you?”
“No.”
“You stopped me.”
“Because,” he says, lowering his voice as Dean makes a disgusted noise at the movie and Allie tells him to stop talking before she smothers him with a cushion, “you keep touching my neck, and I’m trying to be a decent citizen in a communal living space.”
Her mouth twitches. “Your neck?”
“My chain is on my neck.”
She bites back a smile. “That’s very scientific of you.”
“I go to college.”
“For hockey.”
He sucks at his teeth, a grin spreading across his face. “For hockey and the pursuit of knowledge.”
She laughs into his chest, and he immediately looks pleased with himself in that quiet Garrett way, like making her laugh while half the room is asleep counts as a personal win.
His hand slides from her wrist to her fingers, lifting them to his mouth. He kisses her knuckles once, soft and warm, then again, slower, like he can get away with it because nobody’s looking directly at them. The contact sends a stupid little wave through her, low and gentle, a sudden looseness in her ribs and the sense that her body has settled another inch into his.
“Stop playing with it,” he murmurs against her hand.
“I didn’t know it was an activity with rules.”
“It is now.”
“Sounds controlling.”
“Sounds like you’re too hot for your own good and I’m a responsible man.”
She lifts her head just enough to look at him properly. “You’re so full of shit.”
Garrett smiles like that’s his favourite thing she’s said all day. “A little, yeah.”
Then he threads his fingers through hers and brings their joined hands down to rest against his stomach, trapping her there with him. Garrett’s hand stays wrapped around hers. Firm. Warm. His thumb moves once over the side of her finger, slow enough that it feels accidental and deliberate at the same time.
The third time, she should know something’s wrong with the whole arrangement because Garrett offers it too easily. It's the morning of her exam, a big one, the kind that has lived in the back of her head for three weeks like an unpaid bill and ruined several perfectly good evenings by existing near them.
She’s already eaten half a banana, stared at her notes until the words lost meaning, changed shirts twice, and accused Garrett of breathing too loudly while he sat on her bed watching her spiral with the sort of affectionate calm that made her want to throw a highlighter at him.
“You studied,” he says, for maybe the fourth time, lying on his side with one elbow propped under him and his curls still damp from the shower. “Like, a disgusting amount. I know because you made me quiz you last night and I learned things against my will.”
She stands in front of the mirror, smoothing her top down and then immediately undoing the smoothing because now it looks too deliberate. “That doesn’t mean I know it.”
“That’s actually exactly what studying means.”
“No, studying means I knew it at midnight in your bed while you were half asleep and kept pronouncing things wrong on purpose.”
“I was keeping morale up.”
She turns to glare at him, and he grins at her from the bed, annoyingly gorgeous and unhelpfully relaxed, his chain sitting against his bare collarbone because he hasn’t put a shirt on yet. Which is also rude. Honestly, the whole morning has been a campaign of emotional terrorism.
“I’m serious,” she says, and the words come out thinner than she wants.
His face changes then. The grin doesn't disappear entirely, because Garrett without some amount of grin would be genuinely concerning, but it settles. He sits up properly, feet hitting the floor, and reaches for her when she comes close enough. His hands land at her hips, warm through the fabric, thumbs pressing once like he’s reminding her she has a body and it's standing here, not drowning somewhere in the imagined future of a badly answered essay question.
“I know you are,” he says. “I also know you’re gonna kill it.”
“Don’t say that.”
“What, kill it?”
“Yes.”
“Fine. You’re gonna… respectfully and academically dominate.”
“Garrett.”
He laughs under his breath and tugs her closer until she’s standing between his knees. Then, with the sudden seriousness of someone remembering an ancient ritual and not a bit he came up with seven seconds ago, he reaches behind his neck and unclasps the chain.
She looks down at it. “What are you doing?”
“Good luck.”
Her eyes lift to his. “What?”
He holds it up between them, gold catching the morning light from her window. “It’s lucky.”
She stares at him. “Your chain is lucky?”
“Extremely.”
“You’ve never said that.”
He looks almost offended. “I don’t tell everyone my deeply personal athletic superstitions.”
“You told Dean you had to wear the same socks for playoffs.”
“That was different. He touched them.”
“That feels like a public health issue more than a superstition.”
Garrett ignores this, and gestures for her to turn around. She does, suspicious but too nervous to fight him properly. He stands behind her, and for a second the mirror catches both of them: her in exam clothes and stress, him shirtless and too calm, chain hanging from his fingers.
He lifts it around her neck, his knuckles grazing the sides of her throat as he brings the clasp together. The metal lands cool against her skin, heavier than she expects, and something in her chest gives one stupid little pull.
“There,” he says, hands settling briefly on her shoulders. “Guaranteed.”
She touches the chain with two fingers. “Guaranteed?”
“Yeah.”
“If I fail, I’m blaming your jewellery.”
“If you fail, I’ll fake my death and start over somewhere chainless.”
She laughs then, finally, and it comes out shaky but real. Garrett’s eyes meet hers in the mirror, his mouth tipped in a way that’s half smug and half proud of having pulled the sound out of her.
He bends and kisses the side of her head, quick, easy, like he doesn't know the chain suddenly feels like some ridiculous little anchor against her collarbone.
“Go,” he says. “Ace it. Then come back and be unbearable about it.”
She does ace it.
She walks out of the exam hall two hours later with the weird, floating, slightly manic clarity of someone who knows the questions landed exactly where she needed them to, who wrote until her hand cramped, who remembered the thing from the bottom of page seven that she had absolutely expected to die with no audience.
She calls Garrett from the sidewalk and says, “I think I nailed it,” and he shouts so loudly through the phone that a girl walking past looks over in alarm.
“Tell the chain I said thank you,” she says later that night, when she’s in his room again, sitting cross-legged on his bed with takeout containers open between them and his hoodie swallowed over her exam clothes because the adrenaline crash has finally arrived and brought a mild existential fog with it.
Garrett looks up from stealing one of her fries. “What?”
“The chain.” She taps it where it still sits at her throat. “Your ancient family luck charm.”
There's a pause. It's tiny. Almost nothing. But Garrett Graham has many gifts, and hiding guilt from his girlfriend while his mouth is full of stolen fries is not one of them.
Her eyes narrow. “Garrett.”
He chews slowly.
“Garrett Graham.”
He swallows. “Okay, before you get mad–”
“Oh my God.” She sits up straighter. “It’s not lucky?”
“It’s, uh, lucky adjacent.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I’ve worn it to some good games.”
“You told me it was extremely lucky.”
“I was trying to get you out of your head.”
“You lied!”
“I motivated.” He points at her with a fry. “And you crushed your exam, so actually, where’s my thank you?”
She stares at him for one second. Then another. The chain’s warm now from her skin, and the fact that he made it up should be annoying. It is annoying.
It's also so Garrett that something in her gives up and goes soft around the edges despite herself, because he saw her standing in front of the mirror two seconds from vibrating through the floorboards and decided the solution was to hand her something of his and make it sound official enough for her nervous system to believe him.
“You’re unbelievable,” she says.
His grin comes back immediately, bright with relief and bad ideas. “But effective.”
“You’re never getting this back.”
“Baby, I look really good in that chain.”
“I look better.”
He studies her for a second, eyes dropping to where the gold sits against the oversized neckline of his hoodie, and his mouth does something slower.
“Yeah,” he says, voice rougher. “You do.”
Her fingers move to the chain. His eyes track the motion. The takeout goes forgotten between them, steam thinning in the cartons, the lamp laying warm light over his bed and the stupid little lucky-not-lucky object at her throat.
She crawls toward him, slow enough to make his brows lift.
“What?” he asks, though his hands are already moving to her waist when she pushes the cartons aside with the care of someone who doesn't want to get sauce on his sheets but absolutely does want to ruin his evening in other ways.
“You want a thank you?”
Garrett’s mouth opens, then closes. He tilts his head, trying for casual and missing by a heroic distance. “I mean, I’m not gonna say no to gratitude.”
“Good,” she says, and leans in to kiss him once, soft enough that he follows when she pulls away.
His hands tighten on her hips. “Good?”
“Mhm.”
Then she slides off the bed onto her knees between his legs, and Garrett goes very, very still. For once in his life, he doesn't have a comeback ready.
She looks up at him, the chain hanging forward from her neck, gold swinging slightly in the space between them, and his eyes drop to it like he’s experiencing several personal revelations at once.
“Still think it’s lucky?” she asks.
Garrett exhales through his nose, a smile breaking helplessly at one corner of his mouth as his hand comes up to brush her hair back, careful and warm and already a little wrecked.
“Baby,” he says, voice low with absolute reverence and zero shame, “I’m about to start fucking worshipping it.”
The fourth time is after a home game, which means the hockey house is operating at a volume level that could probably be reported to local authorities if local authorities hadn't long ago made peace with the fact that Briar hockey players were simply going to make too much noise.
The living room is packed in that loose, post-win sprawl of bodies and beer and boys shouting over one another from distances that don’t require shouting at all. Someone has put the game highlights on the television and every single person in the room is pretending they're not watching themselves while absolutely watching themselves.
Logan is arguing with a guy from the second line about whether his assist should have been cleaner, Tucker is sitting on the arm of the couch with a beer in hand and the calm expression of a man who played very well and doesn't need to scream about it, and Dean is stretched in the middle of the room like a Renaissance painting sponsored by bad decisions, loudly explaining to Allie that his defensive effort has layers.
Garrett’s on the couch below her, sitting with his legs spread, one arm hooked along the back cushions, hair still damp from the post-game shower and curling messily. He looks good in the obnoxious, lived-in way he always does after a win. Tired under the eyes, mouth lazy with satisfaction, hoodie pushed up at the forearms, chain glinting at his throat every time he turns his head to answer someone.
There's a faint bruise starting near one cheekbone and stiffness in the way he holds his shoulders that he’s pretending doesn't exist because men who willingly block shots with their bodies have a complicated relationship with the concept of pain.
She’s standing behind the couch with her arms looped around his shoulders, her cheek resting against the side of his head, close enough that when he laughs she feels it before she hears it. The room smells like beer and aftershave and pizza grease and wet pavement dragged in from outside.
Her chin is tucked near his temple, and his hand comes up every so often to touch her wrist where it crosses his chest, as if checking she’s still there even though she’s been draped over him for fifteen minutes like an affectionate scarf.
“You’re tense,” she murmurs near his ear.
Garrett tilts his head slightly toward her. “I got checked into the boards by a guy built like a refrigerator.”
“I saw.”
“You also yelled ‘get up’ at me.”
“You did get up.”
He huffs. “Supportive.”
“I’m very motivational.”
He smiles, eyes still on Logan across the room. “Yeah, Coach, you’re a real asset.”
She presses her thumb into the muscle at the top of his shoulder before he can get too smug, and his mouth shuts in the middle of whatever he was about to say. There’s a small drop in his posture, a breath leaving through his nose, his head tipping forward half an inch because the pressure hits somewhere useful.
“Oh,” she says softly, pleased. “There he is.”
“Don’t sound so happy about my suffering.”
“I’m happy about being right.”
He hums quietly. “You usually are.”
She starts working at his shoulders properly, thumbs pressing slow circles into the hard knots there, fingers sliding under the edge of his hoodie collar. Garrett tries to keep participating in the conversation around him, because Garrett Graham could be dying and still find time to chirp a teammate, but she feels him lose focus by degrees.
His answers get shorter. His hand drops from his beer to rest loosely on his thigh. When she presses into the muscle beside his neck, he makes a low sound under his breath that is almost nothing and somehow still deeply satisfying.
Dean notices, of course. Dean would notice a private moment through drywall.
“Oh, that’s cute,” he says from the floor, voice carrying with surgical precision. “Captain’s getting a little spa treatment.”
Garrett doesn't open his eyes. “You jealous, Di Laurentis?”
“Of a shoulder rub? No. Of your girlfriend looking at you like you just returned from war? Little bit.”
Allie leans around him. “He did get slammed pretty hard.”
Dean points at her. “See? This is why I date women. Compassion.”
Tucker takes a sip of beer. “You date Allie because she tolerates you.”
“That too.”
She ignores them, and keeps working her thumbs into Garrett’s shoulders. The only problem is the chain. It keeps getting in the way, slipping under her fingers every time she moves toward the base of his neck, catching lightly against her knuckle, dragging sideways over his skin. She shifts it once. Twice. The third time, Garrett reaches up without looking, catches her wrist, and then lifts his other hand to the clasp.
“Here,” he says.
She pauses. “What?”
He takes the chain off in one smooth motion, turning his head enough to glance up at her with that soft, amused look that always feels worse when other people are around because it's not performative. It's just his face, open for one second before he remembers to make a joke. “Here, baby. Wear it before you strangle me with it.”
The room hears baby. Naturally. The room reacts with the dignity of wolves spotting an injured deer. Logan’s head snaps over. “Oh, wow.”
Dean sits up so fast Allie has to move her knees. “Did he just give her the chain?”
Tucker’s mouth twitches. “Big night.”
Garrett points vaguely at all of them without turning around. “Everybody shut up.”
No one shuts up. That would go against the entire founding philosophy of the house.
She bends down anyway, smiling despite herself, hair falling forward over one shoulder. Garrett lifts the chain around her neck from where he sits, reaching back and up, his fingers careful as they brush the sides of her throat. It's an awkward angle, and he fumbles once with the clasp.
Dean gasps. “He’s putting jewellery on her. In public. Garrett Graham has fallen.”
“I will throw this beer at you,” Garrett says.
“No, you won’t. Your girl’s wearing your chain and touching your shoulders. You’re domesticated now.”
Logan lifts his cup. “RIP to a slut.”
Garrett finally opens his eyes and looks over. “I’m still alive, asshole.”
She laughs into Garrett’s hair before she can stop herself, and his hands settle briefly at her collarbone once the clasp is done, thumbs brushing over the chain where it sits against her skin.
The touch is quick. Almost hidden. But his eyes stay there for a second too long, and the whole loud room blurs slightly at the edges in that private way it sometimes does around him, even when Dean is three feet away preparing to be the worst person alive.
The chain is warm from Garrett’s skin when it lands against her throat. Something about that should not matter as much as it does.
Garrett’s head tips back until he can look up at her. “Good?”
She nods, fingers touching the chain. “Good.”
“Can I have my massage now, or are we hosting a ceremony?”
“Ceremony,” Dean says immediately. “I have a speech.”
“No one wants that,” Tucker says.
“I do,” Logan contributes, raising a hand.
Garrett groans and drops his head forward again, but she can see the grin at the corner of his mouth, tucked away where the boys cannot fully get to it.
She goes back to his shoulders, the chain now resting against her instead of him, rising and falling gently with her breathing as she works the tension out from under his hoodie.
The boys keep going, because of course they do.
“Whipped,” Dean says.
“Tragically,” Logan adds.
“Clinically,” Tucker says, which makes Allie laugh so hard she almost spills her drink.
Garrett lifts one hand just enough to flip them off without opening his eyes. “Keep talking. I’m cutting all of you from the power play.”
“You can’t cut me from the power play,” Dean says. “I am the power play.”
She leans closer, thumbs pressing into Garrett’s neck, and murmurs, “They’re not wrong, you know.”
His eyes open slightly. “Careful.”
“What?” she says, voice innocent near his ear. “You gave me your chain in front of everyone.”
“You were choking me with it.”
“I was massaging your shoulders.”
“Poorly.”
She pinches him lightly.
He laughs, catching her wrist and bringing her hand down just long enough to kiss the inside of it, quick and warm and entirely too natural for a room full of men actively trying to ruin his reputation. Then he lets her go and sinks back against the couch, shoulders finally loosening under her hands.
Across the room, Logan makes a wounded noise. “Oh my God. He kissed her hand. We lost him.”
Dean presses his beer to his heart. “He was so young.”
Tucker, dry as dust, says, “He died doing what he loved. Pretending he wasn’t in love.”
Garrett’s jaw ticks once, but the smile wins. She feels it more than sees it, the small shift under her cheek when she bends down again and rests against him for a second, her arms around his shoulders, his chain warm at her throat, the whole loud, stupid house moving around them.
“Love is a strong word,” Garrett says, which is exactly the sort of thing Garrett says when everyone is looking and the truth has wandered too close to the middle of the room.
She smiles against his cheek. “Mm.”
His hand comes up and covers her forearm, fingers curling there, thumb sweeping once over her skin in a slow little pass that says more than his mouth is willing to risk with Dean waiting to pounce.
Around them, the boys keep chirping, the television keeps replaying Garrett’s goal from the second period, someone in the kitchen shouts about beer pong, and the chain rests against her collarbone like a tiny, ridiculous victory.
Garrett turns his head just enough that his mouth brushes near her temple, hidden from most of the room by the angle of her body.
“You look good in it,” he says quietly.
Her hands pause on his shoulders for half a second.
Then Dean yells, “I can see you whispering sweet nothings, Graham,” and Garrett closes his eyes like he’s begging a very unhelpful God for patience, and she laughs so hard into his hair that the chain jumps lightly at her throat.
jason shows up at your apartment looking like he stepped out of one of those cliché dark romance novels he pretends not to read, leather jacket slung over one shoulder, hair messy, scars peeking from the collar of his shirt. you’ve been seeing each other for weeks now—stolen kisses turning heated, hands wandering but never quite there.
tonight you finally drag him to your bed, convinced jason’s done this dance before. he talks a big game, after all.
“been thinking about this,” he mutters against your mouth as you pull him down on top of you, voice already rough. “fuck, you have no idea.”
clothes come off fast. he’s hard and thick and trembling just a little when you guide him between your legs. you wrap your hand around him, stroking a few times, and he hisses through his teeth, eyes squeezed shut like he’s concentrating hard—probably thinking of whatever isn’t how his tip’s right up against your cunt. “easy, princess. don’t—shit.”
you think it’s just the heat of the moment. you line him up and he pushes in slow, groaning low and broken as your walls squeeze around him. he wasn’t lying about being big, his size stretching you just right, and for a second it feels perfect. then his hips jerk once, twice, and he buries himself deep with a wrecked sound, coming hard before you even get a chance to adjust.
the silence hits for a moment. you feel the warm rush inside you and blink up at him. “jason… did you just—”
“shut up,” he grunts, face burning red under the scars, but he doesn’t pull out right away. he’s still half-hard, breathing like he ran across rooftops. “it’s been a minute, alright? don’t make it a thing.”
you start laughing, soft and playful, hooking your legs around his waist to keep him close. “a minute? jay, be honest. was that your first time? you lied to me, you cocky bastard.”
he tries to play it off, smirking even as embarrassment floods his cheeks. “what? no. i’ve done this. plenty. you’re just… really fucking tight, okay? caught me off guard.” his voice cracks a little on the last word and it only makes you grin wider.
“plenty, huh?” you tease, rolling your hips experimentally and feeling him twitch inside you. “could’ve fooled me with that two-pump chump performance. my big tough red hood, coming the second he gets it in. that’s adorable.”
jason groans, burying his face in your neck, but you feel him starting to harden again already. interesting. you press further, voice sweet and mean all at once. “aw, poor virgin boy. all that talk about ‘handling’ me and you blow your load before i even moan your name. how embarrassing.”
“fuck you,” he mutters, but there’s no heat in it. he lifts his head, green eyes dark and a little glassy, hips shifting like he just can’t fucking help it. “i’m not—okay, fine. maybe i haven’t. happy now? still gonna bust my balls about it or are you gonna let me make it up to you?”
you laugh again and squeeze around him on purpose. “oh i’m definitely busting your balls. look at you, getting hard again and all i’m doing is making fun of you. does the big bad vigilante have a little humiliation kink? that’s pathetic, todd. my virgin big mean boyfriend coming untouched basically.”
his breath hitches hard. fuck, your bullying’s getting him all riled up. he doesn’t know if he loves it or hates it. both. definitely both. “goddamn it, princess,” he rasps, voice gravel and shame and heat all mixed together. he rolls his hips experimentally, slower this time, hoping he won’t humiliate himself for a second time tonight. “keep running your mouth like that and i won’t last a second time either. you gonna keep bullying me or help me fix this?”
“both,” you say sweetly, dragging your nails down his back. “because it’s cute watching you try to act cocky while your dick’s betraying you. came so fast for me, baby. first time and you couldn’t even hold it together. how many times did you jerk off thinking about this and still fold instantly, hmm?”
jason curses under his breath, thrusting shallow and careful now, face flushed but eyes locked on yours with that stubborn defiance. “keep talking shit and i’ll make sure the second round actually lasts long enough to shut you up. virgin or not, i learn fast. and you,” he leans in, biting your shoulder lightly, “love having the big scary red hood embarrassed and leaking for you. don’t you?”
you do. and the way he’s getting harder with every teasing word tells you he loves it even more.
the grip he has on your hips seconds later tells you he’s about to redeem himself as best as he could. because he’s right, virgin or not, the guy learns fast.
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Robby doesn't mean to keep looking at you. That's what he tells himself. But you're in one of those tiny, pink dresses that Jack probably regrets letting you wear around company. Not that---no. Not allow. That's kinda fucked up.
But it's...clinging to your frame, and you're all bare thighs and easy smiles like you have no idea what you can do to a room. Robby keeps catching the curve of your hips when you walk, and the way you pull on the strap of your bra that doesn't seem to fit right.
But, like, it's not that he's noticing that. But it's easy to catch the way Jack's eyes follow you. Robby's sure he's an inch close to dragging somewhere where it's just the two of you.
And that's...okay. He's your husband. He's your obsessive as all hell husband. You and he have made Robby a semi-unwilling witness to his...consumption of you.
Yeah. That's Robby's excuse. It's not that he wants you.
Jack just makes it impossible not to imagine you that way.
"Robby, any reason my wife dancing with my kid in her arms so fascinating to you?"
Jack's already crowding you, broadly posessive. He might as well be licking his lips like you're a steak or something in reference to juicy food. You like it. You know exactly what you're doing. And that's fine! It's just that Robby has seen enough of Jack's whatever for you to almost have a name for it.
And now? Well, he still feels bad that his brain keeps filling in the relationship blanks no decent friend should be filling.
Like, he's...he's pretty sure Jack's bunched up that dress you're wearing to see the panties you're not.
You're not wearing, he means. Probably. There'd be an outline or something, right?
See? That's very gross, Robby feels sick, but Jack makes it too easy to imagine.
oh to be sleepily riding jack abbot, tummy to tummy, chest to chest. your soft arms thrown over his strong shoulders, chin hooked over the freckled skin. your head tilts against his, your rich hair rubbing against his silver strands as your ears kiss.
he’s got you in a bear hug— actually stops your movements just to hug you. to feel you in his arms and cuddle for a second because, at the end of the day, jack loves you. tells you every single day… he even tells you now.
left arm wrapped around your torso while his right crosses over to press a hand to the back of your sweaty hair. holding you to his shoulder, you mouth at jack’s skin, sucking and kissing and rubbing your cheek against him as he pulses inside of you. a slow grind, your favorite, causes you to whine out against him.
“i love you, honey. love you so much, my comfy girl. can’ya keep takin me? hm? keep takin’ jackie’s cock? love you so much.”
his eyes are screwed shut as he lifts his hips into you, still holding your head to rest against him. “‘m always gonna take care a’you. never have to worry about anything. know why? daddy loves you, sweet, pretty girl. gimme kiss”
you whine against his mouth, a pathetic, weeping sound, and he loses it more. moving both arms back to your torso, he’s got you in the tightest bear hug, arms squeezing for a second in affection. he rests his cheek on your back, mirroring you, surrendering to all of his intrinsic need.
“say it.” “d-” “say it baby, c’mon. tell daddy.” “love you!” “yeah? you love me?” “yes daddy,” you cry out, slobbering down his back without a care as he fucks up into you. your nails scratch down his back as you hiccup, your tummy sticking together from the heat of the room, you can feel his happy trail rubbing against your lower belly. “i love you so much jack” “i love you- oh my god- i love you more. come on baby, cum for daddy, that’s it… fuck, that’s it.”
afterwards you stay seated in his lap, falling asleep as he lightly rocks you both back and forth. gently, he whispers into the moonlit room, “hey.. lemme see you.. lemme see that pretty face.” and when you pull back to look at him, swaying a bit in exhaustion, his green eyes glitter. a fondness etched into the very fabric of what it means to be a man like jack who loves a woman crosses over his face.
warm eyes, a little smirk as he holds your cheeks with both hands. “you feel how much i love you?” “yeah” you agree, blushing and keening under his attention. he smiles, laughing in the enchanting way only an older man can. “good. can i hold you a little longer? love you so much, kid, can’t get enough of you.”
despite the definite headache and backache waiting to come, you both doze off just like that. with jack’s love leaking out of you as you cuddle into his chest, his arms wrapped securely around you <3
synopsis jack really wants to take care of you, you're really not used to that feeling, but when an accident has you in harms way and rattles jack more than you, you have little choice but to accept how he feels about you. (I want to take care of you- it's rotten work- not to me, not if its you) type.
warnings, fluff and angst but with a happy ending. guns. insecure reader. reader is described with hair long enough to braid. insecure reader. angst with happy ending . younger reader though not a massive plot point. miscommunication/misunderstanding
authorsnote uncle pee-paw i'm growing very fond of you. sometimes i get so in my head about how things preform on tumblr and i completely forget that fanfic is so self indulgent so as long as i'm happy with it but i'm so happy with the love these pitt fics are getting they really do mean a lot
Pitt masterlist. Jack Abbot fic!
“ You need a ride? ”
When you'd called Jack to tell him you were going to be late into your night shift because the buses you relied so heavily on to get you to and from work weren't running due to some strikes or something, you really were only calling to let him know you'd be late. Not to subtly ask for him to give you a ride.
“No- no. I just didn't want you to think I was not turning up, I'll be there.”
“ What's your address again? ”
“It doesn't matter, I'm walking- running- running in,” you said breathless down your phone, busy stuffing your bag with whatever you'd need, none of which was food for the shift. You'd recently ran out of the energy bars Jack had recommended.
Everyday you said you'd prepare something nice, some risotto or something and take it in. Every morning you collapsed from exhaustion and ran out of time to make anything that resembled a 'meal'.
“ I've got it here, I'll be around in ten, ” Jack said.
Your bag slid down your shoulder as you paused. “Got it? Got what?”
“ Your address. ”
“How do you have my address?”
He chuckled down the line. “ Remember I ubered food to yours, two weeks ago? You've probably still got leftovers in your fridge. ”
Ah. You remembered. One of those times you let slip your terrible routine and he sort to fix it, sending you over prepped meals that- he was right- were still littered around your fridge.
“Right, yes. You should delete that.”
“ Comes in handy, sometimes. In emergencies, ” he said. “ I'll pick you up in ten, bye. ”
There was no time to argue as the call ended promptly after that.
Jack Abbot was a caring man. Something you were learning the hard way. You knew he'd given Ellis his spare room when she was evicted from her apartment, he'd even let her re-decorate, got her fresh blankets and sheets. You knew that Shen's favourites snacks were always stocked up in the lounge. You always knew that he was first to spot Lena getting tired and was always there with a coffee.
It was just like you knew he knew all those little things about you too.
He knew when your bus got in across from PCMT, always there to escort you over the road and back again at the end of the shift. No matter how long or gruelling it had been he would wait with you, rain or sun. He knew you had a bad sleeping habit so he told you herbal remedies in teas and even brought some for you. Annoyingly they worked and every time you had one you were forced to think of Jack.
You knew that if he said he was picking you up- he was.
There was nothing wrong with his affection.
You just didn't know what to do with it.
The night shift was still new to you. You'd only joined since their nights had gotten wilder, even too wild for the 'weirdest and wildest' to handle so you'd made the swap six months ago to help out. You were used to Robby's ways of doing things: of his careful watch over his residents with happy thumbs up or disapproving shakes of his head.
Jack trusted in his residents to take care of patients, but didn't when it came to themselves.
You rushed around, finding your pens and stethoscope and phone that you'd just put down for a second. Soon enough Jack had texted saying he was coming up (he somehow already had the code to your apartment complex).
His knuckles rattled softly and you rushed to grab the last of your things, including a book marked with 'Abbot, J' that you had yet to get round to reading.
“Hi,” you greeted.
You'd expected he'd come up just to be a gentleman, figuring the two of you would just head back down.
Jack squeezed by your attempt at baring him from your place and walked into your small and cramped apartment. “Hey.”
You tried not to be surprised, shutting the door behind him. “I've got everything, we- we can go.”
“I jussss wanna check-” the kitchen was just to the right and he opened your fridge door, grinning. “I was right. Still got the leftovers.”
There were many containers stacked, some full, others emptying. All marked in his handwriting from his meal prep he shared with you.
“Yeah, I haven't got round to sorting it,” you said. “Sorry, I didn't get around to eating everything. It's really good though.”
Jack smiled, reaching into your fridge like it was his own. “Hey, I made you a lot, didn't expect you to eat everything. Just wanted to make sure you had a choice. Did you like the Linguini? I tried a new recipe.”
Jack moved around your kitchen like he'd been living in your space forever. He was confident as he re-arranged your food, throwing what had gone out of date away and washing his hands in your sink, taking a towel hanging up by a cupboard like he knew it was there and drying.
“Er, yeah, it was nice, we can go, you know,” you said.
“You started reading it?” Jack asked, gesturing down to the book in your hands. “What do you think of it?”
“Oh, er, no. I haven't had the chance to start it. I was gonna give it back to you,” you said.
Jack shrugged. “It's yours, keep it.”
It was not yours. It was his. It was one of his favourites if the several dog-eared pages and annotations were anything to go by. It was a title he'd recommended to you and handed you a month ago but you'd only managed to flick through and get a vague understanding of the characters names only.
“But I mean- I don't know when I'll get round to reading it,” you said, loitering outside your kitchen.
“It's okay, I've read it a thousand times, keep it till you do.”
Wasn't he worried you may never get round to reading it and he might not ever get it back?, if your forgetful memory was anything to go by.
Jack finally abandoned your kitchen, passing by you. “Shall we?”
“Thanks for the lift. You really didn't have to,” you said as you left your apartment building, the sky already darkening and where others came in from their long days of work, yours was only just beginning.
“It's on my way,” he shrugged.
“It's out of your way,” you pointed out, knowing Jack was a complete different way to PCMT then you.
You saw his eyes roll as he opened the passenger door for you, nodding for you to get in.
“Just take the lift.”
“Thank you.”
“Word is you and Abbot arrived together,” said Dana.
You groaned.
There was a lot to like about the night shifts. It felt more of a team work than day did sometimes, you loved working with everyone just as much as you did day and you liked how still it got in the night sometimes. But you missed Dana who watched out for you like a mama bear. Still, she made time to always check in with you before she headed out.
Her jean jacket was thrown over her shoulders, her hair pinned back neater and keys in hand but she still greeted you like it was the start of the day.
“He gave me a lift, the buses are on strike.”
She smirked. “Nice of him.”
“I've told him not to do it again.”
“Oh yeah, how'd he take that?”
He'd shook his head and laughed, constantly brushing off every thanks you made and offer of any aid you could give. He seemed wholly un-bothered by the inconvenience you'd caused.
“Jack's a good guy,” said Dana.
“That he is.”
“You deserve someone like him.”
You weren't sure where Dana got that idea. You also didn't know why you couldn't believe her. Why every time Jack turned up when things were going bad, or why every time he showed he cared you felt scared.
And you'd never really had the time to un-pack that.
You looked up to Dana, folding your arms over on the counter. “And what about what he wants?”
“Well for that you'll have to ask him,” she said with the all knowing look in her eyes. Her hand was gentle on your shoulder as she squeezed. “I'll see you in the morning.”
“Night.”
You thought you'd have a chance to view the patient charts that were swapped over to night shift but Jack was next, standing in Dana's space.
“What did mamma bear have to say?” he asked.
“Oh you know, the usual,” you said. “Trying to give me life advice that I won't follow.”
He huffed a chuckle. “I could've told her that, saved her the time.”
“I listen to your advice-”
He levelled his gaze onto yours.
“- I try to.”
His brows rose up. “You brought anything in for food tonight?”
You were about to answer, ready to prove him wrong, finally.
Jack interrupted you. “Anything other than that caramel coffee you like?”
He could read you like a book. You don't know how he found the time to know so much about you, to observe such things you wouldn't even notice unless he pointed them out.
Your silence was an answer.
“I brought extra, we'll have it later.”
He said it so confidently, leaving little space for any arguing on your end.
“Will we?”
“Yeah,” he said, stretching out on the counter. “I'm thinking a midnight picnic, trauma two? Might even get lucky with a GSW as company.”
You laughed and when you looked at Jack he was smiling. It was a soft kind, the sort that smoothed his face and made him seem younger and lighter. The kind that you took home with you and re-played as you fell asleep slowly.
You would never admit how long Jack spends in your mind. Somehow it felt like he already knew.
“You, um, you didn't braid your hair today,” said Jack, straightening up and drumming his knuckles on the counter. His gaze only faltered on yours for a second.
This was something you knew you did, carefully creating a routine for washing your hair that meant you didn't have to do it every day after work. Enough baby powder or dry shampoo meant you could get away with two washes at best.
“No, I guess I didn't.”
“It's gonna annoy you, being in your face all day.”
“I'm sure I'll manage.”
Jack didn't listen. He picked up your wrist- the one you kept a hair tie around- and slid it onto his own before going behind you.
“Jack, what are you doing?” you asked.
“Helping you.”
“You don't have to, I'll shove it up.”
Jack grumbled. “Let me work.”
His fingers grazed your neck as he brushed back your hair, the callouses on his hands rough against you, eliciting some sort of warmth in your body. Thankfully he was behind you and couldn't see the blush absolutely coming to your cheeks.
Jack took care of those around him, but he'd never touched anyone else's hair, never stood in the middle of the nurses station where all could see to braid someone's hair.
You felt him work, the weight of his gaze on the back of your head and his fingers moving through your hair like a cool summer evening breeze.
Across the way, Lena peered over her glasses at you with a smile.
“Lena's staring,” you said, unable to focus on any work till Jack's fingers were out of your hair.
Jack hummed. You knew that concentration from the amount of times you've seen him focused. “Lena always stares.”
You noticed Crus and Matteo passing by, both watching and pointing. You were sure Crus made some obscene make-out gesture and only hoped Jack didn't see. You were sure, if anyone else had asked he'd have done the same.
Though you hadn't technically asked.
“I'm sure you have far more important things to do than braid my hair, Abbot.” The lights in the Pitt seemed brighter, burning down on you like spotlights.
“Nothing more important right now.”
Your neck stretched as Jack pulled at your hair lightly to get it all in place. Curiosity ate at you, wondering where he'd done this before but the idea of knowing- like you had any right to- shut you up before you could speak.
Eventually he finished and his hands fell on your shoulders.
“There. Ready to be a hero?” he asked, spinning you around to him.
Your feet scuffed along the floor. “What? Am I the Robin to your batman?”
His lips quirked up and he moved his head side to side like weighing up his options. “More like the Lois to my Super-man.”
You sadly weren't versed enough in comic to know if that was a good or bad thing.
Jack was attending to a young girl when you walked in. Honestly it was starting to get comical how you turned up around him or he you. Some would call it magnets and as you met Jacks gaze as you stepped in you knew the ‘people’ meant Jack.
He looked at you, taking a quick note of the fact you still had your braid in even hours into the night. Jack smiled.
“Miss mermaid this is who I was telling you about,” said Jack.
The young girl- maybe five, maybe six- looked up at you as Jack slowly pulled at the thread bringing the skin of her knee together.
The chart had told you she'd taken a nasty fall on the playground and her teacher had brought her in, still trying to get in contact with the parents while Jack kept her company, cleaning her scraped knees and the gash just below.
“Hello,” the little girl waved. There wasn't even any tear marks on her cheeks but there was a small mark of blood at her little lip and her hair was falling out around her face.
“Hello miss mermaid,” you greeted, realising quickly the name came from her little mermaid top she wore.
“We were just talking about you,” said Jack, glancing quickly at you.
You blushed, wondering what Jack had to say about you to a small child. “Oh?”
“You and Crus played mermaids that time at the beach, remember?”
The girl giggled and Jack smiled over her shoulder at you.
“It wasn't- it wasn't mermades,” you excused.
That day was one of sweltering heat and lingering gazes. The night shift had took a trip to the beach on one of the hottest days of the year, enjoying the day for the day-shifters that couldn't. You'd gotten a lift with Matteo who'd brough Victoria Javadi along as she had the day off anyhow.
There was sand in places you didn't know sand could get, beach balls that somehow were pierced before you could even blow them up and gazes shared with Jack.
Maybe it was the bikini you wore that was so different from the scrubs. Maybe it was the fact Jack was un-characteristically insecure about his prosthetic leg being exposed to all and you'd told him nobody cared, that everybody cared more that he couldn't enjoy himself. Something had changed that day, settling in you like a pebble at the bottom of a lake thrown from a great height.
Since then, you and Jack had never looked at each other the same way.
But you and Crus hadn't been playing mermaids.... exactly. You swam around a lot and sort to collect more sea shells than the other. You just didn't call it mermaids.
“Will I be able to play mermaids again?” asked the little girl brushing hair out of her face with clumsy hands.
“Absolutely,” said Jack with great enthusiasm.
“And run faster than all the boys in my class?”
Jack chuckled, so did you. “Of course, but you'll have to rest up first.”
“Give the boys a chance to catch up, huh?” you suggested, plucking a leaf out of her hair.
“I like running fast,” she said.
Jack worked on the stitching, back to concentrating.
You sat down on the other side of the bed, gently reaching over to pluck bits of leaf and dirt from her hair. “So do I but sometimes we got to take things slow to not get hurt.”
You hadn't realised the meanings of the words until Jack halted his movements, glancing at you.
So you supposed there was a double meaning.
Jack's gaze was heavy.
“Tell you what, miss mermaid, Doctor Abbot here is better at braiding hair than he is stitches,” you said after a clear of your throat.
“Rude,” Jack mumbled.
It took a little convincing but you managed to swap places with Jack, gloving up and taking the tread he'd started at. He took your space on the bed and gently worked the child's hair into something neat while you carried on her stitches, close enough to being finished.
The both of you worked in silence as you each concentrated on your separate endeavours. All the while the young girl sat in between you hummed to herself, some Disney song.
“That's my favourite,” said Jack half way through when he must have realised what song she was humming.
You were still trying to understand it when part way through they changed to 'Under the sea'. You had to all but hold her leg from swinging as she sang loudly, causing you to laugh.
“Why not singing?” asked the girl.
“Yeah, why not singing?” Jack asked
You shook your head. “I don't know the song.”
Jack made a 'pfft' sound like he didn't believe you and 'little miss mermaid' did the same, blowing a raspberry.
Eventually you finished up the stitching, coincidently the same time Jack finished with his braiding.
A nurse- Bridget- walked in with the young girls teacher, eying the two of you between her. “You braiding Matteo's hair next?” she teased with a glint of wicked amusement in her eyes.
Jack moved up from the bed just as you also stood, discarding of the tools you'd used. “Only if he asks nicely.”
“Her parents have been informed they're on their way,” said the girls teacher.
“Perfect,” said Jack, holding either end of his stethoscope slung around his neck. “We are going to leave you in the very capable hands of Bridget who knows many more Disney songs than we do. Don't go without giving me another song.”
The girl laughed, her new braid slung over her shoulder. “I won't.”
Jack smiled and held the door open for you as you left with a small wave and him trailing behind you.
Lena was at the nurses station, answering calls and dishing out work while others walked around the two of you, busy with their own nights that existed by itself in the Pitt.
You hadn't realised you and Jack were heading for the break room till his arm stretched out and he pushed the door open over you.
“Are you really telling me you didn't know the song she was singing?” he asked.
“Of course I knew the song. I wasn't going to sing and embarrass myself,” you said, pulling out the mug you always used and Jack's favourite, finding the coffee pot newly brewed.
“Like I'm any Phil Collins,” scoffed Jack as he pulled out two containers from the fridge.
You frowned, sitting at the table. “Who?”
Jack looked at you, swinging the door shut. His brows rose high, crinkling his forehead. “Phil Collins? Turn it out again.... In the air tonight... The music on Tarzan?”
“Is he the dad of Lily Collins?”
Jack slid into the seat across from you. “Who?” He passed you over a full container of some sort of quinoa. It wasn't just left overs, it was a carefully calculated portion to match his.
You stared down at it like you were trying to decide if it was poisoned while Jack had already had a spoonful of his own.
It felt strange, to be sitting in a secluded room of the chaos and eating with him. Though at work, it felt oddly domestic. It felt- annoyingly- like the right thing to do. You wanted to eat from his container and wash it, hand it back to him. You wanted to know where he kept all his Tupperware, the kind that fell from cupboards at every open of the door.
“You cooking for me now?”
Jack shrugged, not meeting your gaze. “It's quinoa. Hardly cooking.”
You took a careful spoon.
Like he'd been discreetly watching as soon as you swallowed he spoke.
“You like it?”
“It tastes... kind of...”
“Healthy?”
You looked at him, feigned aghast.
Jack smirked, jaw working as he ate his food. “Come on, if it weren't for me you'd still be living on pizza's and take aways. At least this way you save a couple bucks and eat good. For a doctor you should know how important that is.”
“What are you so worried about what I eat for?” you mumbled, more wondering to yourself.
“I like to take care of you.”
He admitted it softly, a slight shrug to his shoulders like it was nothing. Like looking after you, a simple colleague- maybe a friend if you were lucky enough- was a simple feat. As if you didn't struggle to take care of yourself. Jack worked the same shifts, even more as an attending and cooked for himself, did yoga in mornings and even went out as a SWAT team member.
“Why?” You pushed the grains around in the tub.
“Why what?” he asked.
Daring to glance at him, you found Jack looking at you, arms rested on the table, his freckled biceps pulling at his scrub top.
You shook your head, taking another spoon of the food.
Any other time some emergency would be called to save you. Nothing as such when you really needed it. Of course you were glad nobody was being rushed in hurt... but still.
“Why do I like looking after you?” Jack repeated. “Because it's you.”
At that, you smiled. Not through happiness, more sympathy. “Because I can't look after myself?”
You knew you slept a lot, didn't take as good care of yourself as you could have. There were healthy and easy meal ideas sat in a folder in your phone, gathering dust. There was always laundry in a pile, dirty and clean, to go to their respective homes. There were friends waiting to make arrangements you never got around to making. You weren't easy but you didn't think you were so bad someone else had to come in and save you.
Jack paused, his face falling. “That's not what I meant.”
“Sure it is, you can admit it,” you shrugged, the food he's kindly shared turned to ash in your mouth. “I know I might seem like a mess to you, to someone so put together and... older, but I really do have my life managed. You don't have to add me to your to do list.”
“Woah, woah, woah, I never said that. That's not what I meant at all.”
You laughed. It felt better than feeling so embarrassed. “It's okay-”
“- no, no, that's not what's supposed to be going on, I... ”
Jack cared for people, you knew that. It was just apart of himself.
So you were almost distraught inside when you realised he didn't like you anymore than Shen or Ellis. He just looked out for you cause it was something he had to do.
“I'm not actually very hungry right now,” you said, pushing the lid back on and leaving it for him.
Jack was just as quick as you were to his feet. “No, no, wait- wait, hey-”
His pushed the door closed as you only just opened it an inch.
You looked at him. Your stomach was tight, uncomfortably so.
“Let me- let me try again, okay? I didn't think this through.”
“There's nothing to think through, just wait-”
Shen appeared at the door, trying to get in but Jack was surprisingly strong in keeping the door barred. “I need my coffee.”
“Give us a minute, Shen,” said Jack with all his attending commanding voice.
“But-”
“- a minute!”
You caught sight of Shen looking to you for help before walking away, head down and probably with his bottom lip jutted out like a kicked puppy. “Shen won't get far without his coffee.”
“Shen can wait till we're done now listen,” he said and leant against the door, watching you close. “I like taking care of you, I do, I really do. Not because I think you're not capable of looking after yourself, you are, I know you are it's... I just...”
You waited.
There was nothing.
Jack looked at you with all wide eyes and tension held in his arms. It's like he wanted to say something but ... couldn't.
One more minute and Shen would tear the place apart for coffee.
“You're a nice guy, Jack, you just don't have to be that nice.”
Jack let his arm fall from the door and you evacuated.
The sun had started to rise and you were so close to getting out the door, so close to running from the day's problems. Day shift had turned up, somewhat bright eyed and bushy tailed to take the days stresses though you weren't sure they could take Jack's insistence to talk to you away.
You were inches away from leaving when Jack called for you.
There wasn't the desperation to talk to you, it was the sort he used in traumas, only.
“I need you, GSW to the chest!”
The both of you ran in, gowns pulling on and gloves next as you pushed through the doors.
It was all the usual to you: too many doctors in one room, so much talking and orders it fell on your ears like music you knew all the words to.
“Woman in her twenties, multiple GSW's,” Robby called out. “Pulse ox eighty!”
The doors shut behind and the team of you all took your roles like a practised routine.
“Three... two... one- move!”
All together you lifted her over.
There was blood blooming on her shirt, a tear in her jeans. There was a black eye and what looked like a broken nose if the cut over the bridge and the slant of it was anything to go by.
You'd seen enough of these to know when they were accidents and when they weren't.
Her back hit the bed and the sharp beep of life being lost echoed.
“We've lost her pulse!” shouted Robby.
Without being told you climbed up, hands coming together and hammering down on her chest. For a split second you felt the ghost of Jack's hands, helping you up before they were gone like a summers breeze.
Looming over her you could see the injuries better. And worse.
“GSW, right-sided, she needs a central line,” you announced.
Jack moved around you and the patient, already preparing himself for the central line before you'd called for one.
“BP's dropping out! Pulse Ox is eighty-five!” Robby called.
“She's got tension pneumo,” said Jack without shouting and everyone heard. Somewhere in the back of your mind you recognised that authority he demanded with the simple sound of his voice.
“Crash cart,” said Robby. “Charge to one hundred.”
You waited till you heard the buzz of the cart and felt the heat of the panels before moving.
“Clear!”
The sound of her pulse was quiet and the rhythm was odd but it was there, slight bumps in a green line.
You climbed down, landing next to Jack as he readied with a fourteen needle.
“BP's seventy Ox,” said Jesse.
“Day shifters trying to cramp our style,” said Jack as he slid in.
Robby tutted. “Trying to make sure you don't get all the fun.”
Jack straightened next to you. “Ok, I'm setting up the chest tube, you're gonna set me up with a thirty-two French. Get a mig of atropine and a need a unit of O-neg.”
Two units were hooked up.
“We need to get the chest tube in and stop the bleeding.”
It was all a flurry of hands and tools as the chest tube was in, as the chest was packed with gauze at the right flank where the bullet had tore through her chest. It was a close one, but the sort you could save with nimble hands and careful concentration.
“Okay,” Jack uttered as the both of you loomed over her. “I know we're fighting and I don't like that-”
“We're not fighting and now's not the time,” you said.
Robby was on the other side of the bed, giving the two of you a look. “I agree.”
Jack waved him off, focusing on you. “I'll strike you a deal, we save this woman's life. You get breakfast with me.”
You glanced up, wondering if anyone had heard, though you were sure by now Jack's attempts at asking you on a date was one of the worst kept secrets.
Robby was watching from the other side, arms over his chest and his brows raised.
“You strike a hard bargain there, Abbot,” you mumbled.
“May as well say yes, either way you're saving lives.”
“Why cause you'll die if I say no?”
Jack looked at you. As usual there was nothing giving away if he was joking or not. “Yeah.”
It would have been a pretty poor time to joke.
Five minutes later she was stable.
Blood bags hung slowly draining, rags and gauze of blood littered the ground and torn off gowns were thrown haphazardly around. The patients pulse was steady and beating with the promise of years of life ahead. There'd be challenges, you don't get shot and not have to face even more hardship.
But there was life.
And that was the most rewarding part of the job.
“Good job,” said Robby, peeling of his gloves. “I'm gonna get some air.”
“Then go home, right?” asked Jack as everyone slowly moved away.
Robby only made a rude gesture as the doors closed and left you and Abbott to peel away the blood stained gowns and gloves.
Jack turned to you, un-fazed at the life he'd saved. “You want to go from here or do you want me to drop you off at yours and let you change first?”
You stared at him.
It was almost unfair, his charisma in spite of it all. You didn't stand a chance. When Jack said he was going to save a life, he was going to do just that. It was an added bonus to take you on a date.
Your head was shaking but your lips were curling up.
Jack backed out of the room, leaving you with a thumbs up.
You didn't know why you lingered with the body. You were a resident who had one patient on the go, you should've picked up another. You should've left the trauma room for the surgical consultation.
Yet you wanted to start a chart, wanted to find a name for the girl.
As you walked over, checking her BP which sat safe at one hundred over sixty, her eyes fluttered open, dry lips parting and murmurs exiting.
“Hey,” you dropped your voice gently. “You're safe now, you're at the hospital. Can you hear me?”
You held her head steady as her eyes fluttered but didn't open wide enough to meet yours.
“Can you tell me your name?”
You listened close but got nothing from the grunts.
The doors to the trauma room pushed open.
A small girl stood there, early twenties or even late into her teens. She wore a hoody, blood soaking up the sleeves. She didn't introduce herself, instead, she stared.
“Is she alive?” she asked.
Beyond the broken nose you could see the resemblance in the unconscious on the bed and the one that stood ahead of you.
“Do you know her?” you asked.
“She's my sister.”
“Well your sister was shot in the chest, she's lost a lot of blood but she should make it-”
You heard the gunshots before you saw the gun.
Jack had stripped off the gown stained with blood and pulled off his gloves next, trashing them in a bin.
“That was some way to ask a girl out,” chuckled Robby as he followed his movements in yanking anything with blood on him off.
Jack shrugged. So far nothing that he'd planned the day had gone to plan, asides from saving lives yet that was his plan every day. When you'd called he was already at the hospital but you'd said about the buses and he put his keys back in at once. He thought finally. He'd been waiting for a sign to try to take you on a date, seeing's as the food and books and recommendations and days out weren't enough.
Now, he'd saved a life and got a date.
“So what's next?” asked Robby. “You perform a resuscitative thoracotomy and ask her to marry you?”
“If you have one let me know and I'll see.”
Robby chuckled, patting him on the back when three gunshots rang out.
Everyone ducked.
People screamed.
Where suddenly dozens of people stood everyone was down in lumps, covering heads and ducking for patients.
Jack hovered, not quite down but ready to move. Gun shots were nothing, enough to lull him to sleep. These shots were like any other but they echoed in his ears and richoeted in his heart.
They came from behind him.
From the room he'd just left.
“Where'd that come from?” he asked. He knew.
Robby's hand pushed at his chest, already moving past him. “Trauma two!”
You.
“No!”
The two of them took off toward the room.
A lady exited. It wasn't you. It wasn't the patient. It was a third un-familiar party.
She turned at the sound of heavy footsteps and rose her gun at the two.
“Gun!” someone screamed.
Robby was still holding onto Jack as the two of them skid to a stop in front of her. Somewhere someone was crashing and Jack couldn't see you or hear you.
There were three shots.
He knew three shots were enough to kill.
Jack raised his hands, showing he was harmless and helpless. “Please,” he begged. “Is she alive?”
The girls eyes were hard and full of hatred. The gun was steady in her hands. She was calm, completely but there was no doubt the gun shots were hers. “Not anymore.”
“Oh god-”
“Woah-Woah-” Robby caught Jack with one strong arm as his knees gave out.
You were dead? Some girl- hardly an adult- shot you? Why? To tear out his own heart?
It was already gone.
“Jack? Jack, brother, listen to me,” Robby was trying to talk to him but nothing was going through to him, like a signal lost.
The girl turned and left quickly, making sure everyone knew she had a gone when they all knew she wasn't afraid to use it. The shots must have rung out through the entire hospital.
Robby helped Jack up and as soon as the doors leaving the Pitt closed they rushed in.
The harsh sound of beeping was bouncing off the trauma walls where blood was splattered and a pool of that same blood dripped down into a puddle under the patient.
“Oh my god.” Jack found you at once, using the walls as a crutch as you stumbled your way through the room. He was at your side at once, arms around your trembling body and holding you- moving with you even as you tried to walk.
There was blood all over you and you'd paled dramatically.
Jack coaxed you into staying still, grabbing your cheeks to get your attention. He ignored the pain in his leg that had come from the run, the giving out and now as he crouched to get a look at you. “Hey, hey, hey, look at me- let me look at you. Are you hurt? Did she hurt you?”
Robby had already rushed to the patients side, what doctors and nurses that had gained control over themselves joining him in trying to save her life again. “Ah shit, looks like PEA! Amp of antropine, amp of Epi!”
Your eyes darted over to where the chaos ensued, even as Jack tried to get you to look at him.
“You won't ... won't get her back!” your voice was shaky and hoarse from a scream he hadn't heard. “Blew her god damn brains out.”
“Come here, okay, let's-let's-” Jack's arm was around your shoulder and he was moving you out, trying to help pulling off your bloody gloves while keeping an arm on you.
There was blood and something else on your gloves. Blew her brains out. And you'd tried to scoop them back in.
When the bright lights of the hospital met you your body grew still in his arm.
Jack was familiar with trembles, with blood and PTSD. He wasn't used to any of it in you. In everything he'd learnt about you, he hadn't learnt the subtle art of comfort. “Let's get you some air, let's get you cleaned up-”
You pushed out of Jack's arms, pulling and tugging at your scrub top soaked in blood and all but ran into the women's bathroom.
He heard retching as the door closed.
Jack shook his head, ready to follow you when Dana appeared in front of him, hand on his chest.
“Take it easy, take it easy, I'll check in on her.”
He could still hear you throwing up when Dana slipped in.
The sun was high in the sky, casting the roof of PCMT in an orange glow. The sky burnt in its colour but all you saw was red.
One moment the girl had been crashing, the monitor still beeped in your head. Her body had jerked up to the sky before you got a rhythm back and then- just as you did with any patient- you got hopeful. It seemed in the clear to do so, you'd helped patients come back from worse and you always had hope.
Nobody that worked in the ED could live without it.
Then- it had took three bangs for you to drop to the ground but not before being smeared in blood. You didn't even know what was happening as the ringing ran out in your ears. You'd met the ground with a hard thump to your head. When your vision cleared you saw the shoes rush out of the room.
Your guiding as a med student was doing no harm, saving lives and you'd dropped and put your life ahead of your patients.
What kind of doctor did that?
The cowardly type- you.
“You're in my spot,” said a voice coming closer.
Jack.
His voice soothed the nerves in your body that had been on edge since the accident. Everything made you jump, but him.
“It's a nice spot,” you said as loud as you could, knowing your voice still wasn't back. Or loud enough.
“Yeah,” he said, getting closer. “But usually I like to be on the other side of the rail. And on my feet.”
You were sat on the edge of the roof, not on the edge close enough for anyone to worry but apparently that didn't stop Jack.
He huffed, behind you now. “Please, I'm an older guy, my heart can't take it. Can you come over?”
If your feet weren't like weights pulling you down maybe you could have but you were struggling to feel any part of you.
You admitted as much, quietly. “I can't move.”
You'd moved quick when faced with the gun, dropping to save your own skin. Since then moving had been difficult, like you'd used every muscle in your body to push yourself and now you were locked.
Jack moved in a blur as he ducked under the rail and slowly set down next to you. He was silent, only his breathing calming you. “Did you get checked over with Robby?”
You nodded. “The ringing'll go away in a day or two.”
“Yeah.... it always does.”
You looked at him and Jack was looking at you. The grey stubble of his beard never looked greyer and his eyes were dull, small half moon bruises of sleep marked there. His hair was ruffled and he smelled dully of hospital.
This was a man that had saved more lives than you could count and severed in tours ... and he was taking time to check on you.
“I'm sorry,” you didn't know you had cried till Jack's arm was around your shoulder, bringing you in.
“Hey, hey,” he cooed, his arm tight on you. “What are you sorry for, huh?”
“I didn't save her, I-I should've tried. Should be reasoned with the shooter and I just-I just dropped down and you-” your breathing was ragged, the cries frequenting. “-you've done so much, lost your leg for damn sakes and I just dropped.”
“Hey,” he snapped. It wasn't un-kind. It was stern in ways he had to be in the as a night attending. “You did everthing you could.”
You looked at him. He really meant that though. “I dropped down!”
“You saved your life,” he reminded you. Jack's arm was still tight on your shoulders but his other hand held your cheek, making you focus on him. “You acted on instinct. If you hadn't your patient still would've shot and you-” Jack's breath caught. His eyes were glossed over. You'd missed the redness around his eyes. “- you'd have been shot and I couldn't live with that. I-I couldn't.”
Jack wiped away his tears, wiping yours next. He chuckled dryly at the both of your tears.
“I lost my leg in a tour,” said Jack. “Where guns and shooting is part of the job. It's not in a hospital. You did what you could.”
It still didn't feel right. It still felt like the cowards way of doing things.
“Look at me, look at me-” he nudged your gaze to his. His eyes were wide and implored you to look at him. Really look. “You did what you could and I know a patient died and I know-I know it's hard but...”
He sniffed.
“But what?” you mumbled. How could there be a but in any of this?
He held your cheeks tighter, smudging your cheeks just that little more. Jack let out a shaky exhale. “But I am so happy you're okay. I am so fucking glad.”
His dimples were hardly there as he gave you a sorry smile.
Your head fell into his chest and he brought his arms around you, holding you, shushing you as you cried. Cried for your patient, for the shooter, for the way you dropped. None of which maybe could be forgiven but all of which were valid.
Somewhere in the crying Jack held you tighter and moved the both of you back away from the ledge. You let him, even helped in scuffing your feet and pushing away till the railing hit both your backs.
“You're okay, I got you, I got you.”
I got you. He'd always had you, if he hadn't had you today what would you have done? Nothing crazy but you might have stayed up on the roof all day, be dead on your feet by the night. Jack had always had you and when he did you'd all but told him not to.
“I'm sorry.”
His hand ran over your hair. It had come lose but still remained in the braiding. “You don't have to be sorry, you don't.”
“No about earlier, in the lounge,” you said, holding onto him. “You were being nice, you've always been nice and I... I was horrible-”
“- you weren't horrible, no-”
“- you've been so kind to me and I don't even say thanks-”
“- you have actually, quite a few times- ”
“- I don't know why you put up with me-”
“- well, it helps that I love you-”
If there was one way to shut your rambling up, it was that.
You still had a vice on his scrub top but you looked up to him. For the first time- you think ever- Jack had to look away from you.
“What?” you asked.
Jack's jaw ticked and he clocked his head. “I didn't mean to say that.”
Disappointment chocked you. Of course it would just slip out, heck Jack was comforting you, he'd say anything.
“Oh.”
“I do love you,” he said and you looked at him with something akin to hope as you moved your head away. “That's why I've been looking after you, that's what you do when your- when your in love. My... my wife taught me that. I was just scared you know cause.... I haven't been in love since she died.”
It wasn't often Jack talked about his wife but when he did he talked. He'd talk anyone's ears off about her and once or twice you'd been that person.
“I'm sorry.” This time you weren't sure what you were apologising for, you just were.
Jack looked at you with a mocked frustration.
You cringed. “Sorry, I should- I should stop saying that.”
He hummed and nodded along with you, a tiny smile on his lips, the chapped parts cracking from the salt of his last tears. “I never meant to make you feel incapable, I know you can look after yourself. But I want to.”
You laughed at yourself, wiping at your cheeks and snot. “Why? I'm a mess.”
Jack took your cheek in the palm of his hand. “No, you're not. Not to me.”
Jack kissed you so slow and sweet on the edge of the roof with the sun praising upon the both of you. He didn't push his feelings into you, he let you feel them in the gentle press of his lips and the hold of his hands.
pairing – garrett graham x reader
summary – garrett's girlfriend is drunk, freezing, and extremely loyal. so loyal, in fact, that she refuses his water, his jacket, and his flirting because she’s waiting for… garrett graham.
warnings – fluff, drunk antics, alcohol, post-game party, protective boyfriend garrett, reader doesn't recognise him for most of the fic
notes from me – part of my 1k celebrations!! & based on this request!! thank u anon, such a cute idea 🥹
word count – 4.4k
navigation – masterlist | taglist
There was two versions of Garrett Graham. The version people got in the rink, all sharp focus and captain voice and that very specific game-day intensity that made even strangers in the stands start sitting a little straighter when he skated past.
Then there was the version people got after he’d won, showered, changed, and been handed exactly two beers at a party by Logan, who had called it recovery hydration with the confidence of a man who had never once been trusted by medical professionals.
That Garrett was looser. Warmer. Still tired in the shoulders, still carrying the ache of a hard check somewhere along his ribs, but smiling more easily now, head tipped back while Tucker said something dry beside him and Dean yelled over the music from the kitchen like volume could make a story better.
His hair was still damp at the edges from his post-game shower, curling slightly where he’d shoved his hand through it too many times, and the dark blue Briar letterman jacket had stayed on for maybe twelve minutes before the house got too hot and he dumped it over the back of a chair.
He was, by every reasonable standard, doing great. His girlfriend was not. His girlfriend had arrived at the party with Allie and a plan that had included one drink, maybe two, and absolutely no consideration for the fact that girls pouring vodka cranberries in hockey houses tended to treat measurements as a loose concept.
Garrett had been across the living room when she’d taken the first one. He’d been in the kitchen with Tucker when she’d finished the second. By the time he saw her again, she was standing near the bottom of the stairs with one hand wrapped around a red cup, smiling at something Allie said with the bright, floaty concentration of a girl whose whole body had started operating on a two-second delay.
He could notice a winger drifting out of formation from half a rink away with two guys trying to take his head off. He could absolutely notice his girlfriend blinking too slowly under the hallway light, her cheeks warm from alcohol and the heat of too many bodies packed into the house, her mouth glossy and parted slightly like she kept forgetting whether she was meant to be talking or laughing.
She looked happy, which helped. Loose and giggly and pleased. But she also kept shifting her weight like the floor had become more wobbly than usual, and Garrett had not fought for his life against Harvard’s second line that afternoon just to let his girlfriend get taken out by hardwood.
So he left Logan mid-sentence. Logan didn’t even pretend to be offended. He just followed Garrett’s line of sight, saw her trying to drink from the cup and missing her mouth by half an inch, and winced. “Oh, buddy.”
Garrett pointed at him without looking back. “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was gonna say she looks graceful.”
“Die.”
Garrett crossed the room with the easy confidence of someone everyone automatically moved for, red cup of water in hand because Tucker, thank God, had seen the situation unfolding and passed it over like a medic on a battlefield.
She didn’t see Garrett coming. She was too busy nodding very seriously at Allie, who was holding both her hands and saying something that involved the words no, babe, I’m so serious and eyebrow blindness.
Garrett stepped into her space, close enough that his knee brushed hers. “Hey, baby.”
She turned toward him. For one beautiful second, her face went blank. Then her entire expression rearranged itself into scandalised horror.
“Excuse you,” she said, pulling herself up to her full height, which was less effective than usual because she swayed slightly at the top and had to catch Allie’s wrist. “I have a boyfriend.”
Garrett blinked.
Allie made a noise like she’d swallowed a firework. Garrett looked at his girlfriend. His girlfriend looked back at him with genuine, drunken offence, like he’d approached her in a bar wearing a leather bracelet and too much confidence.
“Uh huh,” he said slowly, because there were moments in life that required leadership and moments that required not laughing directly in the face of the girl you loved while she was doing her best. “That’s great.”
“It is great,” she said, lifting her chin. “He’s very tall.”
Garrett’s mouth twitched. “Good for him.”
“And he plays hockey.”
“No shit?”
“And he’s, like, really good at it.”
Allie had turned away now, one hand clamped over her mouth, shoulders shaking. Garrett refused to look at her because if he did, he was going to lose it, and that felt like the sort of thing his girlfriend would interpret as disrespect from a strange man at a party, which apparently he was now.
He held out the cup. “Can you drink some water for me?”
Her eyes narrowed. Suspicious. Wobbly. Deeply loyal to the absent boyfriend currently standing less than a foot in front of her. “Why?”
“Because you’re drunk.”
“I’m not drunk.”
“Baby.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Don’t call me baby.”
“Right. Sorry.” He pressed his tongue to the inside of his cheek, nodding with a level of solemnity he absolutely did not feel. “My bad.”
“My boyfriend calls me baby.”
“Does he?”
“Yes.”
“Sounds annoying.”
“He’s not annoying.” She frowned at him with such force that it seemed to briefly take all her balance with it. Garrett’s free hand shot out to her waist before she could tip sideways into Allie. She looked down at it, then back up at him, appalled. “Don’t touch my waist.”
Garrett removed his hand at once, palms lifting. “Alright.”
Allie, still dying, leaned in and said, “Babe, maybe just drink the water.”
She looked betrayed. “You’re taking his side?”
“I’m taking hydration’s side.”
Garrett offered the cup again. “Just a couple sips.”
She stared at him for another second, clearly weighing the moral implications of accepting water from a man who looked suspiciously like her boyfriend but who she had, for reasons unclear to everyone except the vodka, decided was not.
Finally, she took the cup with great caution, like he might use the transfer to propose something criminal, and drank.
Garrett watched her swallow three obedient little sips, then nodded. “Good girl.”
The look she gave him could have killed a weaker man. “Nope.”
“Right. Yep. Forgot.”
“My boyfriend says that.”
“Bet he does,” Garrett muttered.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
She handed the cup back, pleased with herself and still indignant, and then immediately turned toward Allie like the conversation had been handled.
Garrett stood there for half a second, holding the water, staring at the side of her face.
Dean appeared beside him like he had been summoned by humiliation itself. “Hey, man.”
Garrett didn’t look over. “Do not.”
Dean’s grin was audible. “She knows you’re her boyfriend, right?”
“She’s drunk.”
“She just told you she has a boyfriend.”
“Yeah, Dean, I was here.”
Dean leaned around him to look at her, delighted. “This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
Garrett finally turned his head and gave him a flat look. “That’s sad.”
“No, what’s sad is getting rejected by your own girlfriend.” Dean clapped him once on the shoulder and immediately stepped out of reach. “Tough shift, captain.”
Garrett pointed at him. “I will put you through a wall.”
“Wow.” Dean called over his shoulder, already retreating. “Her boyfriend would never.”
Garrett took a slow breath through his nose and looked back at her. She was laughing at something Allie said now, one hand pressed to her own chest, head tipping forward so her hair fell around her face.
She looked ridiculous. Beautiful and unsteady and way too warm in the cheeks, standing under the hallway light like the world had gone pleasantly fuzzy and she trusted it not to hurt her because she hadn’t yet noticed Garrett had been replaced by some guy bothering her with cups.
His annoyance softened before it could become anything real. Fine. He could work with this.
For the next twenty minutes, Garrett kept orbiting. That was the only word for it. He didn’t hover, because hovering would get him accused of being controlling by Dean, and probably by her if she remembered how to form an argument.
He orbited. Close enough to keep an eye on her, far enough that she didn’t look up and accuse him of trying to steal girlfriend privileges from Garrett Graham, who was both beloved and missing.
She danced with Allie in the living room, mostly from the waist up because her coordination had started giving its two weeks’ notice.
She complimented Tucker’s shirt with extreme sincerity even though Tucker was wearing the same plain black t-shirt he wore to every party.
She told Logan he looked so tall tonight, which made Logan look down at himself like height might have happened recently and without his permission.
Garrett found her again near the back door, rubbing both hands over her bare arms.
The house was hot, but the door kept swinging open whenever someone stepped out to smoke or yell into the yard, letting in cold spring air that slipped over her skin and made her shoulders inch up toward her ears.
Garrett saw the little shiver move through her before she did. He grabbed his letterman jacket off the chair and came up behind her, careful this time, no hands first. Just the jacket, warm from the room and heavy with him, settled over her shoulders.
“There,” he said, low near her ear. “You’re cold.”
She froze.
Garrett closed his eyes for one second. “Please don’t.”
She shrugged the jacket off so fast it nearly hit the floor. Garrett caught it by the collar.
“Nope,” she said.
“Baby.”
Her head snapped around. “I said no.”
Garrett looked at the ceiling. The ceiling offered no help. “You’re shivering.”
“I only wear my boyfriend’s jacket.”
“This is your boyfriend’s jacket.”
“No, it’s not.”
“It literally has my name on it.”
She squinted at the embroidered Graham on the chest like letters were a personal challenge. “Lots of people are named Graham.”
“Not on this team.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do, actually. I’m the captain.”
Her face twisted with immediate doubt, like that was exactly the sort of lie a jacket predator would tell at a party. “You’re the captain?”
Garrett stared at her. “Oh my God.”
From the couch, Logan made a strangled sound into his beer.
She pointed at Garrett’s chest, very serious now. “My boyfriend is the captain.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard great things.”
“He’s very hot.”
“Is he?”
“So hot,” she said, and then sighed, soft and dramatic and so genuinely fond that Garrett’s irritation had nowhere to land. “Like, stupid hot. It’s actually kind of annoying.”
Garrett’s face moved before he could stop it, warmth pulling at his mouth. “Yeah?”
She nodded. “And he has really nice hands.”
Logan choked.
Garrett didn’t look away from her. “Good hands are important.”
“They are,” she agreed solemnly. “And he’s not some random guy trying to give girls jackets.”
“Right.” He held up the jacket between them, helpless now. “Can I just–”
“No thank you.”
“You’re gonna freeze.”
“I’ll wait for Garrett.”
“You do that,” he said, because love was standing in a hockey house holding your own jacket while your drunk girlfriend faithfully rejected you on your own behalf. “Sounds like a plan.”
She smiled at him then, bright and polite. “Thank you for understanding.”
Garrett looked at her for a long moment, then at the jacket, then back at her. “Anytime.”
He walked away to the sound of Logan losing the fight against laughter so badly he had to bend over his own knees.
“You’re not helping,” Garrett said.
Logan wiped under one eye. “I’m sorry, man, but she’s loyal as hell.”
“She thinks I’m a stranger.”
“She thinks you’re a stranger with bad intentions. There’s a difference.”
“Great. That makes it better.”
Tucker came up beside them, looking far too amused for somebody usually committed to being the reasonable one. “You know, technically, this is a very good sign for your relationship.”
Garrett gave him a look. “Don’t start.”
“She’s hammered and still refusing men for you.”
“She refused me.”
“Exactly. Nobody is safe.”
Dean reappeared then, because joy, unfortunately, had a way of finding him. “I just heard she wouldn’t wear your jacket.”
Garrett’s jaw tightened. “You heard wrong.”
Dean grinned. “Did I?”
“I’m gonna kill you before playoffs.”
“No, you’re not. You’re too busy getting friend-zoned by your girlfriend.”
Garrett shoved him in the chest. Dean laughed all the way into the kitchen.
By the time Garrett found her again, she had somehow migrated to the old armchair near the stairs, sitting sideways with her knees tucked up and Dean perched on the arm like some kind of terrible emotional support animal.
Her bare arms were folded tight over her chest now, because she was still cold and still deeply committed to jacket monogamy. Her face had changed too. Gone softer around the edges, bottom lip pushed out, all the earlier moral outrage curdled into something wounded and grumpy.
Garrett stopped a few feet away. Dean saw him first and his grin turned wicked. “Oh, thank God.”
She frowned up at Dean. “What?”
“Nothing.” Dean patted the top of the chair. “Your night’s about to improve.”
She slumped deeper into the cushion, still looking at Dean. “I haven’t seen Garrett all night.”
Garrett blinked.
Dean pressed his lips together so hard his whole face went strange.
She kept going, mournful now, eyes glossy from alcohol and the kind of drama that only really existed after midnight in a crowded house. “He’s, like, disappeared.”
Garrett slowly looked at Dean.
“He had a game,” she said, to no one in particular, or maybe to Dean’s knee. “And I wanted to tell him he played really good.”
“He knows,” Dean said, voice suspiciously tight.
“No, but I wanted to tell him.” She rubbed at one eye with the heel of her hand, then stopped halfway as if remembering makeup existed. “And there’s this guy who keeps talking to me.”
Garrett’s eyebrows went up.
Dean made direct eye contact with him and looked like he might actually pass away.
“He keeps calling me baby,” she muttered. “And trying to make me drink water.”
Garrett bit the inside of his cheek.
“Sounds awful,” Dean managed.
“So annoying,” she said. “Like, okay, hydration police. I have a boyfriend.”
Garrett stepped closer then, because there were only so many times a man could be called the hydration police by the love of his life before he had to intervene. “Hey, baby.”
Her head lifted. The transformation was immediate and almost violent. Her whole face opened, bright and relieved and suddenly so happy to see him that it genuinely knocked the joke sideways in his chest. “Garrett!”
He froze. “Hi?”
“Baby!” She reached both arms out toward him from the chair, nearly tipping herself forward in the process. Garrett crossed the last step fast and caught her by the hands before she could slide off the cushion. “Hi.”
“Hi,” he said again, slower this time, looking down at her. “You recognise me now?”
She frowned like he’d said something deeply strange. “What are you talking about?”
Dean made a sound that might have been a cough if he had not immediately turned away with his shoulders shaking.
Garrett stared at her. “Nothing.”
She squeezed his face, delighted and fully unaware of the damage she’d caused him tonight. “I missed you.”
His mouth softened despite himself. “Yeah?”
“Yes.” She tugged at him, needy and uncoordinated, until he stepped properly between her legs where she’d moved to sit properly in the chair. Her knees bracketed his thighs, her fingers curling in the front of his shirt like now that she had found him, she intended to physically prevent further abandonment. “You were gone for so long.”
Garrett looked at her for one second, then over her head at Dean, who was wiping tears out of the corner of his eye. “I was around.”
She shook her head, very firm. “No.”
“No?”
“No. There was just this guy.”
Garrett nodded, face serious. “Right. The water guy.”
She gasped softly, looking up at him with genuine alarm. “You saw him?”
Dean slid off the arm of the chair. “I need to go tell Logan something immediately.”
Garrett didn’t even try to stop him. His hands had settled at her waist now, thumbs pressing lightly over the fabric of her top because she was still swaying in tiny increments even while sitting down. “Yeah, baby, I saw him.”
“You should talk to him.”
“Oh, I should?”
“Yes.” Her voice dropped into a whisper that wasn’t remotely quiet. “He was flirting with me.”
Garrett’s eyes flicked over her face. “Was he?”
“He kept calling me baby.”
“That’s crazy.”
“And he tried to give me his jacket.”
“What a dick.”
She nodded, relieved that he understood the severity. “I know.”
Garrett’s grin finally broke free, slow and helpless. He stepped closer until her forehead could tip against his stomach, and when it did, she sighed like the entire night had been restored to its proper axis by the smell of his shirt.
He looked down at the crown of her head, at the way her hands had found the hem of his t-shirt and held on loosely, and brushed his fingers once over the back of her hair.
She had rejected him all night. She had accused him of being a stranger, declined his water on principle, refused his jacket with the ferocity of a woman defending a sacred oath, and still somehow the inside of him went soft at the way she leaned into him now, trusting and warm and gone enough to be ridiculous but not gone enough to forget where she wanted to end up.
“Baby,” he murmured.
“Mhm?”
“You wanna get outta here?”
Her head lifted at once. “Yes, please.”
“Yeah?” He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, watching the way her eyes followed his face now with no suspicion at all. “You done?”
“So done.” She nodded, then winced faintly at the motion like her brain had moved one direction and her skull another. “Can we go home?”
“Yeah, we can go home.”
“And maybe get McDonald’s?”
Garrett laughed under his breath, and the sound made her smile like she’d won something. “Sure, baby.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. But you gotta stand up first.”
She looked down at her own legs with sudden doubt. “Okay.”
“Confident.”
“I can do it.”
“I know you can.” He took both her hands and backed up half a step, giving her room. “Come on. Up we go.”
She stood with the intense focus of someone attempting a field sobriety test on a ship. Garrett’s hands went to her waist at once, steadying her as her knees straightened and her body tipped forward into his.
He didn’t make a show of it. Didn’t laugh when she grabbed his forearms and blinked hard at the room. He only held her until she found the floor again, fingers spread warm and firm at her sides.
“There we go,” he said softly. “You good?”
She nodded, then thought about it. “Mostly.”
“Mostly works.” He leaned around her just enough to grab his letterman jacket from the back of the chair “Can I put this on you now, or are we still being loyal to your boyfriend?”
She looked at the jacket. Then up at him. Then back at the jacket.
“That’s yours,” she said, like he was the one struggling to keep up.
Garrett pressed his lips together. “Yeah.”
She smiled, sweet and pleased. “Okay.”
He slid it over her shoulders. This time she pushed her arms into the sleeves with immediate enthusiasm, even though they swallowed her hands completely.
Garrett zipped it halfway because she was too busy smelling the collar with a happy little hum that did absolutely nothing for his ability to remain normal.
“You smell good,” she told him.
“Thanks.”
“Like Garrett.”
“Crazy coincidence.”
She nodded, accepting that, and slipped her hand into his when he offered it. Her fingers were warm and clumsy between his, squeezing twice like she was checking he was real. He squeezed back once and started guiding her through the house.
The party kept moving around them. Someone called his name from the kitchen and Garrett lifted his free hand without stopping. Logan appeared near the doorway, took one look at them, and grinned.
“She found you,” he said.
Garrett pointed at him. “Not a word.”
She turned toward Logan, solemn and slightly off-balance. “There was a guy bothering me all night.”
Logan’s mouth opened. Closed. He looked at Garrett, then back at her. “No way.”
She nodded. “Way.”
Garrett kept walking. “Let’s go.”
Behind them, Logan said, “Hope your boyfriend handles that.”
She turned around while still moving, which forced Garrett to catch her by the waist and redirect her like a shopping cart with a bad wheel. “He will!”
“I’m sure he will,” Logan called, voice cracking around laughter.
Outside, the cold hit her properly. She shrank into the jacket at once, shoulders rising, Garrett’s hand still wrapped around hers while they moved down the front steps and along the path toward his car.
The night was damp and dark around the edges, grass glittering faintly under the porch light, the music dulling behind the shut door until it became a pulse more than a song. She walked close to him, not quite straight, occasionally bumping into his side and then apologising to his arm.
“Baby,” she said halfway down the walk.
“Yeah?”
“That guy was so annoying.”
Garrett glanced down at her. “Still thinkin’ about him?”
“He was talking to me all night.”
“Sounds like a loser.”
“He was kind of hot, though.”
Garrett stopped walking.
She stopped too, delayed, then looked back at him with wide innocent eyes. “What?”
He stared at her. “Hot?”
She nodded, very serious. “But not as hot as you.”
“Uh huh.”
“And he had your jacket.”
“My jacket?”
“Yeah.” Her brows pulled together. “Actually, that was weird.”
Garrett looked up at the sky for patience. “So weird.”
“You should talk to him, baby. I’m serious.”
“Oh, I will.”
“Good.” She nodded once, satisfied, and started walking again. “Don’t fight him though. You had a game.”
His mouth twitched. “Right. Wouldn’t wanna overdo it.”
“And you already won.”
“I did.”
“You were really good,” she said, and the words came out softer now, slipping under the joke with no warning at all. Her fingers tightened around his. “I forgot to tell you.”
Garrett’s steps slowed by a fraction. He looked down at her, at her messy hair and flushed cheeks and his too-big jacket hanging off her shoulders, at the careful way she was watching the pavement. “Yeah?”
“Mhm. You did that thing.” She lifted their joined hands vaguely, as if the thing might be available in the air somewhere. “Where you went really fast and then the other guy was stupid.”
Garrett laughed, warm and surprised. “That was my favourite play.”
“It was good. I’m real proud of you.”
“Thanks, baby.”
She leaned into his arm, pleased. “You’re welcome.”
At the car, he opened the passenger door and turned her gently by the hips before she could attempt entry at a dangerous angle. “Alright. Watch your head.”
“I always watch my head.”
“You don’t.”
“I have one.”
“Having one and watching it are different.”
She ducked into the car with exaggerated care, one hand on the roof, one hand still gripping his. Garrett waited until she was seated, then crouched slightly and drew the seatbelt across her.
She looked down at him while he clicked it into place, her expression suddenly soft and sleepy. “Baby.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m so glad I found you.”
His hand paused on the belt for half a second.
She sighed, sinking back into the seat, eyes half-lidded now that the car’s quiet had started wrapping around her. “I missed you tonight.”
Garrett looked at her in the blue dashboard glow, and something in his chest pulled tight and fond and a little ridiculous. “Missed you too.”
“There was this guy–”
“I heard.”
“–and he kept trying to give me water.”
“So rude.”
“Exactly.” Her head tipped against the seat, eyes closing for one beat before opening again. “Can you get me nuggets?”
Garrett smiled and brushed his thumb over her knee before standing. “Yeah, babe. I’ll get you nuggets.”
“And fries.”
“Obviously.”
“And a Sprite.”
“You need water.”
She made a face. “The guy said that too.”
Garrett leaned one arm on the open door and looked down at her, trying very hard not to smile too much because she would see it and accuse him of something. “The guy sounds smart.”
She frowned. “Don’t compliment him.”
“My bad.”
“You’re my boyfriend.”
“I am.”
“And I love you.”
The words came out simple and softened by vodka and sleepiness and the warm cocoon of his jacket around her, but real enough that Garrett felt them land under his ribs.
He bent and kissed her forehead. “I love you too.”
She smiled, eyes closed now. “Good.”
“Good,” he murmured, brushing her hair back from her face before shutting the door.
He walked around the front of the car with a grin he couldn’t quite get rid of, hearing the muffled thump of the party behind him and the faint sound of her shifting around in the passenger seat like she was trying to get comfortable in sleeves three sizes too big.
When he got in, she was already curled toward his side, cheek against the seat, looking at him with heavy eyes and total, trusting recognition.
Garrett started the car. She reached blindly for his hand. He gave it to her.
For a minute they sat there in the dim quiet before he pulled away from the curb, her fingers woven through his, his thumb moving once over her knuckles. Then she inhaled like she had remembered something important.
“Babe?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re gonna talk to that guy, right?”
Garrett smiled at the road, the house falling behind them, McDonald’s glowing somewhere ahead like a drunken little lighthouse.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’ll give him a stern talking-to.”
“Good,” she mumbled, already drifting. “Tell him I have a boyfriend.”
His grin widened.
“Trust me, baby,” Garrett said, squeezing her hand once as he turned out onto the street. “He knows.”
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"All because my head is full of poison
And my heart is full of doubt
I got toxins in my bloodstream
You tried so hard to suck out
—the cure, Olivia Rodrigo
summary: you’re the ray of sunshine and overly dependable smiling intern the night shift crew has been needing. But a certain attending begins noticing you might need more help than you let on.
wc: 11.7k (a short one sorry guys)
warnings: crippling perfectionism, high-key people pleasing, reader is bright and bubbly to compensate for how awful she feels day to day, one vomiting scene, service dom jack, santos is on nightshift bc i love her and i wanted her in this fic. trinity and dennis and reader r basically siblings, jack’s characterization in this is DEF andrew pope cody-esque panic attacks, mental health struggles, reader is an intern again but i swear it’s just cause i watch a lot of greys and interns r the only stage of medical career i know enough about to write semi-well T-T
acknowledgments: once again a round of applause for @wesandresons for the lovely gif, and @uzmacchiato and @cursed-carmine for the dividers!
a/n: i’m not rlly sure i like how this turned out but oh well @leeknowpegger i hope this keeps you company
masterlist
When you first get to the PTMC, Jack can’t decide what he thinks about you.
He vaguely remembers you— you’d done a rotation here, some time ago. One of the unfortunate ones who’d drawn the short stick and been stuck on the night shift. He has a hazy recollection of your face during an MVC, your jaw hard set and a permanent smile to your face. He vaguely remembers, at the time, the only thing he’d really though was:
Jesus, this kid needs to dial it back.
The sentiment, of course, remains the same when it’s handoff time, and Robby is telling him all about what an awful fucking day it’s been, and of course now he says “Oh, remember that med student you got stuck with awhile back? Smiley-face? You must’ve done something right, because she matched into the ED for her residency. She starts today.”
Not exactly the news an attending wants to hear right after the horror show the day has been so far. Especially when intern/baby resident in question is… charismatic.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Ellis says, her eyes trained on you as you soothe a crying teenager who just got wheeled in. “If you ask me, we could use someone who actually smiles. Bit too dark and dreary in here for my taste.”
“You like dark and dreary.”
She gives him an unimpressed raised eyebrow. “So? We can’t all be doing it. Like, we’ve got Shen, but his is more iced-coffee induced than actual smiling charm.”
“I can be charming when I want to be.”
“No, you can be flirty or suggestive. There’s a difference.”
Jack does not justify her response with one of his own, instead choosing to look down at his tablet and pretend to chart while he listens to how you’re interacting with the patient. The teenager seems to be calmed down, and the parents don't sound frantic or worried.
Maybe Ellis is right. Unfortunately, this tends to be the case fairly often.
He sighs and focuses on the chart he’s supposed to be doing and attempts to wipe his mind of bright smiles and glittering eyes.
—
The PTMC and Emergency Medicine in general was not, actually, your first choice. It wasn’t even your second, or your third.
First was surgical. Everybody wants to be surgical. You wanted surgical. It’s flashy, it pays well, and it’s cool as fuck. Plus, unlike some of your classmates, you actually have the stomach for it (one of the many things that eventually translated well to emergency medicine.)
Second was Ortho. Because bones are cool. Ortho surgeries are fun too, when they’re not arthroscopy after arthroscopy.
Third was any kind of unit like Burn or ICU. A high stress program that wouldn’t let you think, let you run on adrenaline all day.
But then you did your rotation in general surgery and absolutely fucking hated it.
Surgeons are assholes. Surgeons are uptight nerds who like to subject anyone they consider beneath them to cruel and unusual punishment.
Even in during the short duration of your rotation through surgery, it almost killed you. You could practically feel the light in your soul dimming at every pointed comment, every sharp correction, every barked insult and something or other cruel word.
And then there was the PTMC. The stupid ED that wasn’t supposed to fun, was supposed to be grueling and exhausting (especially since you’d gotten assigned to the night shift.) But instead of awful you got amazing, which sucked.
Seems counterintuitive, but it’s true.
You wanted to like surgery enough to power though. But not a single rotation after the ED even came close to measuring up. The speed, the action, the gore, and the kind but firm guiding direction from the attending’s and residents.
Matching into the PTMC was an event actually worth celebrating. As in, you decided to un-tense minutely and splurge on actual champagne that you drank in your apartment while dancing to your favorite music.
And now, you’re here. Determined to not fuck this up. To keep moving, keep going, and be a fucking excellent ED doctor.
Except your attending, Dr. Jack Abbot, one of the reasons you joined the ED in the first place, keeps giving you funny looks when he thinks you’re not looking.
You’re not sure if he’s aware that you know that he’s staring at you. You do have a wider than normal field of peripheral vision, so maybe he doesn’t know that you can still see him out of the corner of your eye?
Regardless of if he knows or not, it’s unnerving. Because he’s your boss. And you know he’s capable of being an incredible doctor and mentor, because you see it every single day.
Just not directed at you.
He’s not really mean, or standoffish, or anything like that, he’s just… not necessarily kind. Not in the way that you see him with the other residents on his service or even with you, during your rotation as a med student.
Hell, he’s nicer to Santos than he is to you.
“Did I like, say something to offend him and I don’t know?”
Trinity makes a face at you from over the edge of the monitor. “Isn’t that more my area of expertise?”
“No. You offend people on purpose.”
“True.”
You prop your head on your hands, resting your elbows on the counter above her. Your keycard, attached to your breast pocket via a red, heart-shaped badge reel is lovingly adorned with pink rhinestones and cute stickers. The pocket itself is filled with several glitter gel pens (and regular pens, just in case.)
“I just don’t get it. I’m nice, right?”
“Disturbingly so.”
“Exactly. The only thing I can think of is that I’ve messed up or something, but it’s Dr. Abbot. He’d tell me if I did. He doesn’t exactly hold back.”
“Do you really need me for this conversation?”
You level her with a look, but she just groans.
“Why do you even care? So what, one guy doesn’t like you, boohoo.”
“He’s not just some guy. He’s my attending. And you might’ve secured your spot here, but i’m all shiny and new. I can’t exactly earn people’s respect if our boss doesn’t like me.”
Trinity doesn’t immediately respond with a scathing remark, which usually means that you’ve made a valid point.
“Should I talk to him?”
She sighs. “I think you’re overreacting. You’ve only been here for like, two weeks? Three? He’ll probably calm down the more you work together.”
“Did he stare at you all weirdly when you first started?”
“Well, no, but that’s because I don’t suck at my job.”
Now it’s your turn to glare.
“Sorry. I guess you’re not completely hopeless.”
You roll your eyes. “Thanks, Trin.”
She scrunches her nose up at the nickname like you knew she would, because she hates it, which makes it one of the only weapons you have against her.
Trinity wasn’t as helpful as you’d hoped, and night shift means no Dana to ask for advice. There’s Dr. Ellis, but she’s pretty close to Dr. Abbot, which means there’s a high chance that whatever you ask her will make it back to him. You aren’t really close enough to Dr. Shen to ask him “Hey, how come Dr. Abbot stares at me when he thinks I’m not looking and isn’t as nice to me as he is to you guys?”
The question is stupid and kind of pathetic, so really, you shouldn’t be asking anybody, but you’ve always been crippled by an intense need to be well-liked. It feels like winning, and it feels good and safe. Safe is good. Safe is great.
Wanting the guy who's essentially your boss to like you is completely rational, right?
You just wish he’d tell you what you’re doing wrong, so you can fix it.
Also, it’s just driving you crazy.
Even if he just legitimately didn’t like you, and made that apparent, it’d be something. You could work with that. You could figure out what it was he didn't like via intense pattern recognitin and fix it. Problem solved!
But he isn't obvious about it. He behaves indifferent and detatched- like you could die tomorrow and he wouldn't care.
It’s the not knowing. If you could just ask him, if he could just give you an answer, then you’d know where you stood, and everything could be fine.
What changed? You want to beg, What happened after my med student rotation? Do you even remember that? What did I do? Where did I go wrong?
It eats away at you over the course of the week. It has been since you noticed, which was pretty much on day one. You don’t show this outwardly of course, because you’re pretty sure you can get through to him and level out the wrong-footedness you feel around him through stubborn determination. Surely, at some point your unwavering nature will win out and he’ll finally see there isn’t anything he needs to hate about you. This is an incredibly healthy mindset to move through life with.
The week closes with an MCI around 5pm, which is just everyone’s favorite thing in the world. The night shift gets called in, minus Trinity, who was already there working a double, and everyone sets in for the long haul. You do your best to focus on the patients and do not at all think about the ease and camaraderie between Mohan and Abbot, because that would be a very fucked up progression of priorities.
Eventually it’s all over— patients are stabilized, some aren’t. Overtime ends with phantom blood on your hands and being strong-armed into drinks in the park afterwards.
You feel awkward, because you don’t work with the day shift people that often, so you’re not really sure how best to be yourself and not come across as weird. Neither of your “safe” people (Trinity and Dennis) are present, so there’s no way in hell you’re going to be capable of relaxing.
You take the beer that’s tossed to you, even though you think beer is gross (why does it taste like that? Why do people enjoy it?) and sip on it excruciatingly slowly, trying to hide a grimace and occasionally chiming in with mentally rehearsed and carefully crafted jokes and comments.
It’s exhausting, and not at all how you wanted to spend your night after an MCI. In a dream world, you don’t have the social backbone of a wet paper bag, and you say no, and you go home to your house and shower, then watch one, maybe two episodes of a tv show, scroll through Pinterest, and then go the fuck to bed.
But for the low low price of much needed rest, you get to drink one of the most disgusting alcoholic beverages known to man and worry if everyone thinks you’re being weird! Yay!
Also. Side note. Minor comment. Little issue.
Jack Abbot is sitting next to you. Like, right next to you on the bench. Because he came late and it was the last spot open. So he’s just right there. Posture loose and open and not at all like he didn’t just help you try to save a girl your age who had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Like two hours ago your elbows weren’t brushing, elbow deep in a man’s organs, saving his life.
Jack, unlike you, looks comfortable to be at the park with everyone. He doesn’t look like he’s analyzing conversation to determine the best thing to say next.
Jack isn’t looking at everyone. He’s not looking at anyone. He’s looking at you.
You turn, give him a little smile.
Again.
Maybe he doesn’t know you can still see him out of the corner of your eye. (No, he’s a vet, he’d definitely also have wide peripheral vision. But maybe he thinks that you don’t have it, because you’re not a vet.)
(You’re probably thinking too much about the peripheral vision.)
Jack doesn’t stop staring at you. Instead, he reaches over to where your barely-drunk beer is in your hands, and says:
“Here, give me that.”
And then he just. Takes your beer. Straight out of your hands.
Jesus fucking fuck he so hates you.
—
“He took your beer?”
“Yes,” You groan from the kitchen island in Trinity’s apartment, “He said ‘here, give me that’ and then just took it. He didn’t say anything else to me for the rest of the night.”
She lets out a low whistle. “Maybe he doesn’t like you. What could you have possibly done to make him not like you?”
“I don’t know!”
“Well, you better fix it. Having your attending hate your guts will like, majorly suck.”
“I don’t know how to fix it. That’s what i’m over here for. To brainstorm.”
“I thought you were here to steal the cookies Huckleberry made?”
Dennis peeks his head up from the couch. “Wait, what?”
You wave a hand. “Semantics. Focus.”
“Okay,” Trinity taps a pencil on a notepad, “Have you tried sleeping with him?”
“He’s like, probably over twenty years older than me.”
“So? I know your type.”
You roll your eyes. “As if he’d go after me, Trin. He doesn’t like me.”
“Hate sex is a thing.”
“Name one time hate sex solved the hate part.”
She purses her lips. “Touché. What about like, baking him shit, like Huckleberry does for—“
“Shut up Trinity!”
You both snicker.
“No dice,” You sigh, “I can’t bake for shit. Recipes never have enough context. They’re never specific enough.”
“Two tablespoons of sugar isn’t specific enough for you?”
“You’re not helping.”
Trinity holds up her hands in mock surrender. “To be fair, I never agreed to help. I just said we’d both be here if you wanted to come over.”
“I think you should just ask him.” Dennis pipes up.
He shuffles off the couch and slides into the second chair at the kitchen island adjacent to you. “Dr. Abbot is a straightforward guy. He appreciates honesty. Doesn’t beat around the bush. I can’t imagine him being truly upset that you tried to fix a problem.”
“I want to, but that’s like. Too straightforward. What if—“
“Oh my god,” Trinity moans, “Just ask him. Or fuck him. Do something so I don’t have to hear about it anymore.”
You frown, opening your mouth to object, then close it with a sigh.
She’s right.
You have to just move on. Either deal with it or deal with it by… not dealing with it. Talk to him or don’t.
Easier said than done.
—
It takes two more shifts of unrequited awkwardness for you to finally reach your limit. At a certain point, probably when you almost snapped at him for hovering (doing his job) while you were trying to intubate a patient, you realize that you cannot, actually, just get through to him via stubborn determination.
Damn.
So when you have a second, you corner him in one of the quieter hallways. The conversation has the potential to be horrifically embarrassing and mortifying, so it’s best if there’s no audience.
“Do you have a minute, Dr. Abbot?”
He glances down at his watch, then crosses his arms and leans against the opposite wall.
He doesn’t talk (unnerving, annoying) and his sharp, ever analyzing gaze makes your skin prickle as you cross your hands behind your back and mirror his position, leaning against the wall.
He’s so irritating. He won’t even give you a fucking inch. There’s nothing to go on.
“Did I do something wrong?”
For the first time since you became a resident in the ED, he makes an expression: surprise.
“Why do you think you did something wrong?”
“Because you won’t fucking talk to me!” You hiss, absolutely fed up with Dr. Jack Abbot, “Half the time you only look at me when you think I won’t notice. You don’t talk to me unless it’s required for teaching, and even then, it’s short and stilted. I’ve seen how you interact with literally every other person who works here. I know you can be nice. You’re just not nice to me, and I’d like to know why.”
You pause. “And you took my beer!”
There’s a moment of silence, and then there’s a breathy, almost wheezing sound that takes you a minute to place.
He’s laughing.
Jack fucking Abbot starts laughing.
You honest to God want to kill him.
“Sorry,” He says, eyes sparkling with mirth and shoulders loose, “I can see how all of that can be taken negatively—“
“How else was I supposed to take that.”
Jack levels you with a look, and you shut your mouth. “But it was not my intention.”
He just stops speaking there, like that’s a perfectly adequate explanation and not at all vague and almost more disconcerting.
“So…,” You drawl, “What was your intention?”
Something interesting, a little more heated than just analytical sparks in his gaze, and he tilts his head, eyes flicking up and down your body.
Under the silence and scrutiny, you resist the urge to squirm in place, hands squeezing themselves in an effort to subdue the itch.
“You hate confrontation.”
Your chest feels like a cinder block just slammed onto it. “What?”
“You,” He levels a finger at your chest, “Hate confrontation. You hate it so much that you lie about yourself to people instead of saying things they might not like.”
You laugh nervously, voice high and reedy. “A lot of people do that. I don’t think that’s a crime.”
“It’s not. But it doesn’t exactly make me want to trust you with my residents. With my team.”
“You’re worried I’ll what? Get somebody in trouble? Do something shitty?”
“I’m worried that something is going to happen to you, and you won’t tell anyone about it.”
The hallway grows silent. In this distance there’s beeping, someone shouting orders, a child crying. But not in the five feet of space you, Jack, and the conversion currently occupies.
“Why do all of this?” You gesture vaguely to the space between you two, unwilling to be more specific. He does not deserve the itemized list you assembled in your head.
“I wanted to see if you’d confront me about it or not. Confirm my suspicions.”
“That’s—“ You wrinkle your nose, “Actually kind of shitty of you.”
Jack just hums.
“So what now? Did I prove myself to you?” Your tone is mocking.
He scoffs, “God, you really hate confrontation, don’t you?”
Your skin prickles again. “No.”
“Lying again.”
“Shut up.”
He knows how uncomfortable he’s making you. He’s doing it on purpose. And right then and there, you decide you don’t care what Jack Abbot thinks, because if Jack Abbot is going to be a self-assured asshole, Jack Abbot can go fuck himself.
Your pager going off saves you from verbalizing any of this, and with one last glare, you’re gone.
—
If Jack was an obnoxious lurker before, it doesn’t hold a damn candle to how he behaves now.
He’s just. Everywhere. Around every corner. Driving you crazy.
When you bring this up to Trinity, she looks at you like you’ve finally lost it.
Which. Okay. You probably have. But that’s beside the point! The point is…
…The point is that Jack Abbot is getting on your last nerve and you really don’t have any to spare. Life has been stomping all over the other ones, so the singular nerve Jack is stabbing with his annoying pointed looks and almost lingering touches and stupid little questions (“Hey, that was a rough one, are you alright?”) is just worn out. It doesn’t have anything left to give. You don’t have anything left to give.
But, like you were brought up to do, you keep right on giving. And working. And smiling.
Because it goes a little something like this: There’s no one to pick you up if you fall. You pick yourself up when you fall, and you’ve gotten pretty fucking good at it. All of your friends (read: Trinity and Dennis and maybe Mel) are doctors, which means you all have shitty work/life balance and no one would even be available if you called and said “Hey, every morning I lie awake and stare at the ceiling and convince myself to get up while listening to Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley, after which I will inevitably cry on the bus to work. Would you mind helping me with my laundry?”
Okay. Well. Trinity would probably show up if you asked because once she decides that you’re her friend she’s really intense about it (she’s a bit like a Doberman or some other dog like that, not that you would ever tell her) and Dennis probably would too, but only because he never says no when someone asks for help so it kind of just feels like you’re taking advantage of him. Mel is far too busy juggling being an ED doctor and caring for Becca for you to even think about asking her without feeling intense, soul crushing guilt.
So yeah. You don’t really have a best friend, unless one would count the singular romance book you’ve read so much the spine is completely fucked and the pages are yellow from years of travel and rereading. Counting any book as a best friend is probably very pathetic. But hey, don’t fix what isn’t broken.
So you have a system and a method and crying before and after work every single day is totally, completely normal, healthy, and sustainable. Probably even more so in the medical field, and especially since you’re a PGY1. Interns gotta suffer and all that jazz.
Jack Abbot does not need to make the suffering worse by existing near you constantly. Things are really honestly bad enough.
“Hey,” Trinity grabs your arm as you’re going by during a mellow shift, grip not tight enough to hurt but enough to be a bit past uncomfortable, especially for a girl not used to physical contact, “You good?”
‘No,’ You want to shout, collapsing on the floor in a heap of bones and tears, ‘I haven’t done laundry in so long that I’ve started wearing my cleanest dirty socks instead of washing more. I don’t have the energy to spend my days off doing anything productive, but every time I sleep instead of doing chores the anxiety eats me alive. I can’t sleep at night because the guilt makes me so nervous sometimes I throw up. Sometimes I don’t wash myself in the shower and I just stand in the water until it gets cold. Every day I wake up with the same headache, and then I take medicine for it, but by the time it’s gone I’m going to bed and then I wake up with it all over again. I think my liver is shot from over-the-counter medication usage. Everything hurts. I’m so tired.’
Trinity needs you to be okay. Trinity is too busy and under too much stress to worry about you. She needs you to be okay. Everyone needs you be okay.
“Mhm!” You nod, lips spread wide, “Pretty good day actually, all things considered.”
It’s not a total lie. The headache relief you’ve been taking religiously is kicking in faster than it usually does today.
Trinity scans your face, looking for signs of a lie, and she must find something (not shocking, it’s very hard to pretend that everything isn’t awful when Everything Is Really Awful) because her grip tightens minutely and she does that pursed lip thing she does when she’s worried and about to express it through anger or bitchiness.
“Don’t fuck with me. I don’t want to find out you’re like, doing drugs or something stupid like that. If you’re having a hard time—“
“Trin,” You interrupt, skin prickling uncomfortably as she implies that you’re not capable of handling things on your own, “If I need help, I know I can ask for it. And look,”
You tap your unbroken collection of glitter gel pens still intact in the front pocket of your scrubs. “It’s gotta be a good day. I still got my glitter.”
She wrinkles her nose, but drops your arm. “I don’t even know why you keep those. You can’t use them on like, anything. It’s against hospital policy.”
You shrug. “Glitter is a great motivator and mood elevator. Plus, kids love ‘em.”
You manage to feign something important coming up and duck out of the conversation and then, when the coast is clear, dart into one of the lesser used bathrooms and tuck yourself in the darkest stall.
Even in a hospital, toilet seats are disgusting, but you can’t quite summon any actual disgust as you plop down on the white porcelain, only lightly cracked, and cradle your exhausted head in your hands.
You have to keep going. There is no alternative. There is no other option.
Your chest feels tight and loose at the same time, and your skin feels clammy and wrong. Everything feels wrong. The lights are too bright and the material of your scrubs is scratchy and awful, and the longer you sit in the stall the more you want to throw up.
Someone knocks on the door before you get the chance to move down to your knees and start worshipping the porcelain altar. Assuming it to be Mel, who sometimes has a habit of showing up at the wrong time, you open the stall door to reveal none other than Jack Fucking Abbot.
You stare at him blankly for a few beats, too bewildered to feel sick. “You’re not allowed to be in here.”
“In the men’s bathroom?”
“This isn’t the men’s bathroom.”
“The sign on the door would say otherwise.”
Embarrassment brings the nausea back tenfold. You hold the stall door in a white knuckle grip to keep yourself upright and from hurling onto your boss.
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I swear I didn’t do this on purpose—“
Jack raises an eyebrow, his hands folded behind his back. Military man, right.
“Clearly.”
You stumble forward. “I need to go—“
“Woah, down girl. I didn’t knock because I cared which toilet you use. You work here. Use whatever toilet you want. Preferably not the one in the attending’s lounge.”
“There’s an attending’s lounge?”
“No.” He grins, a devilish upturn to just the corner of his lips.
“Oh,” You pause, then catch up to the rest of what he said, “Then why’d you knock?”
“Cause it kind of sounded like you were dying in there, and I’d rather if you didn’t.”
“Why not?”
“The paperwork, for one. Two, Santos would probably shank me.”
“Ah.”
“Also,” He shrugs, “I’d miss you.”
You scoff. “No you wouldn’t.”
“I would.”
“You don’t like me. You don’t even trust me.”
Jack gets this pinched look on his face; his lips pull down, his brows furrow and he narrows his eyes, just a bit.
He opens his mouth to respond when the door bangs open.
Jack doesn’t even look up before he’s barking:
“Find another bathroom.”
“But I have to—“
“Find another bathroom or I’ll cut your dick off.”
The guy grumbles away, but Jack never takes his eyes off you. It’s unnerving— to be the sole focus of his attention.
You’re the first to break the now tense silence of the bathroom.
“That seemed a bit extreme.”
“I’m not a man who does things by halves.”
“No,” You sigh, “I suppose you’re not.”
Jack cocks his head to side, almost predatory. More methodical than anything. He looks at you— really looks at you. Shamelessly drags his eyes up your body, likely cataloguing every mystery bruise, frown line, eye bag, freckle, and all the million lines of exhaustion that seem etched on your very being, right down through the bones and marrow.
He sighs, crossing his arms before leaning back on the opposite wall of the bathroom.
“What am I going to do with you?”
His words instantly have you on edge, bristling at all the unsaid things behind his tone.
“I’m not something to be dealt with. I’m a person, not some fucking—“
“You’re like a stray cat,” He interrupts, “Always hissing. Do I need to win you over with treats? Should I start bringing canned tuna?”
“You’re an asshole.”
“And you’re drowning.”
Just like that, all the humor gets sucked from the room, replaced with the cold, sharp grip of reality. Suddenly exhausted by the weight of it all, you drop back down onto the toilet seat.
Jack gives you a few moments to respond, get angry, or defend yourself, but you don’t. He’s too good at reading you, it seems. What is there to say?
When you don’t speak, he does.
“Did you think no one would notice?”
“No one has.”
“Am I no one?”
You lean back, closing your eyes and awkwardly resting the back of your head against the wall and the back of the toilet.
“You’re nosy.”
If this were any other moment, any other scenario with any other person, you would never ever act so contrary. But you’re tired and Jack seems to bring out the worst in you.
He makes an amused huffing noise. “You’re good at what you do, I’ll give you that.”
“What, exactly, am I doing?”
“Pretending.”
You scoff. “Fuck off.”
“Come on, sweetheart. How much longer are you going to do this to yourself?”
You lift your head off the back of the toilet. “You act like I’m killing myself:”
“You are,” His inclined his head, “Just really slowly.”
You scrub a hand down your face.
“Look. I understand why you think you have to care, but you don’t. I’m just going through a rough patch. I’ll get through them like I always do. I’m not gonna crash and burn or endanger myself or do whatever it is you’re worried I’m going to do, okay? So you can leave me alone. I’m fine.”
Jack doesn’t get to respond, because the second the words are out of your mouth the nausea that’s been churning in your stomach since you made it to the bathroom rises all at once, and you barely have time to slide off the toilet and turn before you’re throwing up hard enough to almost choke.
The worst part is that you forgot to eat lunch so your stomach is woefully, painfully empty. You’re throwing up nothing but bile, throat burning and tears streaming down your face.
“Alright, come on,” A warm hand rubs soothing circles on your back, and if you weren’t busy hurling your guts out, you’d marvel at the feeling and juxtaposition between the Jack you know, who’s all cold indifference, and the Jack currently holding your hair out of your face while you vomit.
“Let it out,” He soothes, hand still rubbing, “Don’t fight it. It’ll be over soon.”
“I hate throwing up.” You choke, coughing and gasping.
“No one does. But you’ll feel better when it’s over.”
Over feels like it’s never going to come. But eventually your stomach stops clenching, you manage to stop heaving, and you’re slumped over the toilet, sucking down gulps of air, sweat beading on your forehead and the back of your neck.
“This,” You mumble in between gasps, “Means nothing.”
You can’t see Jack’s expression, but his response is so quiet you almost miss it.
“Okay.”
You can’t see his face, but you know this isn’t over.
—
Jack sends you home once you’re capable of standing on your own two feet without shaking like a newborn fawn.
(“You can’t send me home.”
“Yes I can. You’re not allowed to come back to work after throwing up in the bathroom.”
“We both know I’m not the only person to do it.”
“Yeah, but I haven’t caught the other people in the wrong bathroom and held their hair back while they vomited.”
“…”
“You only have two hours left anyway. Go home.”)
The problem lies in the fact that the buses aren’t running yet, which means that you can’t, actually, get home. Your house is an hour away on foot. An hour you’d normally be capable of walking, but your phone is almost dead, you’re exhausted, and you still feel a little weak because of the vomiting.
So after retrieving your things from your locker, you find yourself sitting on the little bench outside the PTMC, waiting for the minutes to tick by. If you didn’t bring at least one book with you everywhere you go in case of emergencies (like this one) you probably would have just walked into oncoming traffic.
It’s cold out and your jacket is cheap so you have to burrow into it, hood up to retain any semblance of warmth. It would be almost cozy —huddled in your jacket, watching the city go by, tucked into your favorite romance book— if the shift hadn’t gone the way it had and if a grueling bus ride and half mile walk didn’t await you once the buses finally start running. Waiting for you beyond that is just chores and an empty apartment.
Your fingers tighten on the edges of your book.
“Why the fuck are you still here?”
You jolt in place, cracking your neck over to the side and blinking blearily.
Jack. Again.
He makes an expectant face at you as if to say ‘Well?’ when you don’t answer immediately.
Your eyes dart back and forth nervously, even though you know you haven’t done anything wrong. “The buses aren’t running yet. It’s an hour walk to my house.”
Jack scrubs a hand down his face and curses under his breath.
“How long until your bus gets here?”
You check your phone. Shit. Only four percent left.
“And hour and a half. Maybe a little longer if it’s running behind more than usual.”
He seems put out by your answer, as if the bus’s heavily fluctuating schedule is of personal consequence and offense to him.
“Um,” You start, both uncomfortable at having been caught reading a romance book in public and at the general air of frustration Jack seems to be venting at the moment, “I’m fine. I have my book. I don’t mind waiting.”
Jack just sighs.
“Do you really think I’m just going to leave you out here, in the cold, after you threw up in the bathroom, to wait for the bus, for nearly two more hours?”
You wince. “Well, it doesn’t sound great when you put it like that.”
He works his jaw. “Have you eaten?”
“No…?”
He shakes his head.
“Come on. You’re coming with me.”
—
“I have to admit, this isn’t where I thought we were going.
Thirty minutes later finds you seated on the cracked vinyl seat of a booth in a cheap diner, staring at a menu and rationalizing spending your last $15 on what will probably be mediocre pancakes.
Jack is seated across from you, already two mugs of coffee —black, but oddly enough, decaf— and not even bothering to pretend to look at his menu. He either comes here often or doesn’t care to act like he isn’t staring at you.
Probably both.
“Where did you think we were going?”
Steam curls out of your own untouched mug of coffee —ordered for you by Jack, also unfortunately decaf— and you debate just getting up and running out of here.
Too bad you’re too exhausted to run anywhere. Jack’s probably banking on that.
“I don’t know,” You shrug, setting the menu down, “Maybe to Gloria’s office to write me up or something.”
“What would I even be writing you up for?”
“Disobeying direction? I’m sure you could come up with something.”
The waitress chooses that moment to appear, notepad in hand. “Are we ready to order?”
Jack rattles off his order, and then two sets of eyes turn to you expectantly. Before you can order the single fruit bowl you were planning on getting (the cheapest thing on the menu) Jack pipes up:
“Order whatever you actually want. Not whatever you think is cheapest or easiest.”
The waitress, a middle aged woman who has probably seen much worse than whatever the two of you have going on, just chuckles lightly under her breath.
You hesitantly list the item you’d been eyeing and thank the waitress.
It isn’t until after the menus have been taken and Jack’s coffee re-upped for the third time that you manage to courage to speak.
“You didn’t have to do this, you know.”
“I know.”
“No, I mean,” your fingers curl on the edge of the table, desperate for something to hold onto, “I can’t— It’ll be awhile until I can pay you back. I barely made rent this month.”
“Do you think I would take you to breakfast and then make you pay?”
“Yes…?”
“You’re not touching the bill, kid. I’m a gentleman.”
“Oh,” You didn’t really see that coming, “Okay.”
Jack gets a funny expression on his face, then resumes his drinking coffee and glancing out the window routine.
“So,” You say after a beat, “Was there something you wanted to talk about…?”
The silence just feels so awkward. It’s killing you.
He raises a brow. “Do you want to talk?”
“I’m asking you.”
“And I’m asking you what you want to do. What do you usually do when you come out to eat?”
“I don’t? Eating out is expensive, so. But when I do it’s usually by myself, so I end up just reading.”
Jack gestures to your bag beside you. “Don’t let me stop you.”
“What?”
“Read your book.”
“But that’s— isn’t that boring for you?”
He sets his mug down. “I didn’t bring you here because I wanted something from you. I brought you here because you had a shitty day and it seemed like you could use some cheering up. If reading makes you feel better, then do it.”
You have to look out the window to avoid his gaze. You don’t understand how your perfectly crafted facade just crumbles into fucking dust around him. How he manages to see right through you at every turn, how he manages to uncover every lie and every half truth.
“How did you even know I like diner food?”
“Because I pay attention to you.”
You finally look back over at him, arms folded across your chest; not really defensively, more like you’re trying to hold your entire body together by sheer force of will.
Jack’s lips twitch. Not really a smile, but almost. “You bring it up every time Santos wants to get food after a shift. She always says no, because she hates it, but it never stops you from suggesting it.”
It’s just one detail. One tiny, inconsequential detail that he’s apparently memorized and held onto because to him, it’s important. For some impossible to understand reason, he seems to care.
"Also," He shrugs, "I'd miss you."
You scoff. "No you wouldn't."
"I would."
“Do you hate me?”
Jack looks back at you, seemingly startled by the abrupt question.
“No.”
You take a deep, shuddering breath.
“Okay.”
—
“You did what?”
You wince from your spot lying face-down on Trinity’s couch.
“Not so loud, Trin. I have a headache.”
She ignores you, seated on the floor almost directly in front of you. “So you’ve gone from hating each other to going on a date?”
“It wasn’t a date,” You groan, “We spent almost the entire time in silence. I read my book and he stared out the window and did… whatever it is men like him do when they stare out the window.”
“Brooding,” Trinity says, “He paid. That means it’s a date.”
“No it doesn’t!”
It doesn't. It totally doesn't. Just because Jack said he doesn't hate you doesn't mean he likes you either. There are a lot of emotions in between hate and love. Like toleration, for example. Mild amusement. Exasperation. An appropriate amount of annoyance.
Trinity pokes you on the back of your head, having none of it.
"He likes you. Why else would he willingly hang out with one of us after work?"
"He goes out for drinks in the park sometimes." You mumble.
"Yeah, after an MCI."
What Trinity doesn't know is the events leading up to breakfast at the diner, because that would involve telling her about the whole throwing up from anxiety in the men's bathroom directly after a mini-panic attack because she confronted you about your unhealthy lifestyle (which all just sounds a lot worse than it is), so there isn't really a way to give her the kind of context necessary to get her off your back and dissuade her from her (insanely insane) belief that Jack likes you. Romantically.
"Trust me Trin, he was just being nice. Nothing romantic about it."
It was kind of romantic. Just eating surprisingly good food in the company of someone you don't need to pretend around, enjoying being in the company of another human being without worry or expectation.
Not that she needs to know that.
"Jack doesn't do nice. Have you seen him? What happened to the hating?"
You shrug. "You'll just have to ask him, because I don't know."
You do know. He told you. Explained it.
It doesn't make sense.
Trinity throws her hands in the air dramatically.
"Whatever. You two are impossible."
She finally withdraws, leaving you to wallow in your headache-induced misery by yourself on her couch.
Your phone vibrates on the floor next to you, and you groan, rolling further over to hide yourself in the crack of the couch, shunning the light like the reclusive vampire you are.
Your phone vibrates again.
“Dennis,” your voice is muffled by the couch cushion so it ends up sounding more like ‘denim’, “Can you please see who’s texting me and tell them to fuck off?”
Dennis, who was eating cereal at the tiny table near the kitchen when you first showed up fifteen minutes ago and has pointedly stayed silent throughout the entire exchange between you and Trinity, finally speaks.
“Your phone is two inches away from your hand.”
“I have a headache I don’t wanna look at the screen.”
You feel rather than actually see him roll his eyes, but then there’s the clink of a spoon against a bowl and the faint sound of socked —you’ve genuinely never seen him ever be barefoot under any circumstances, no matter what, he’s always wearing socks— feet as they make their way over to your temporary pit (couch) of despair.
There’s a quiet rustle as he picks up your phone off the floor.
“Oh.”
You whine, dramatic and upset. “What?”
“Um,” He grabs your shoulder, slowly rolling you over and away from the back of the couch, “It’s Jack?”
“What!?” You screech.
You throw yourself up, wincing as you immediately regret it when the pain in your head doubles, take a steadying breath to ignore it, and then grab the phone from Dennis’s outstretched hand.
You turn on the phone and— yep. Sure enough. A text from Jack, complete with the stupid picture of a dinosaur you made his profile picture. Because he’s old.
(It was funnier at the time.)
Somewhere behind you there’s a crash, and then the thump thump thump that can only mean a person running towards you at dangerous speeds for sock covered feet on cheap linoleum.
“Incoming,” Dennis mutters.
“Did I just hear that right?” Trinity gasps, nearly giving herself blunt force trauma via the back of the couch, “Did Jack just text you?”
“I don’t know!” You cry.
“How do you not know! Your phone is right in your fucking hands!”
“I’m tired! Stop yelling at me!”
“Guys!” Dennis shouts, holding up his hands, “I refuse to spend my day off listening to you two argue over the validity of romance with our attending. Give me the phone.”
He snatches the phone without waiting for a response, quickly typing in your password (if there was ever a moment you regret telling him in case of emergency…) and opening the text.
He makes an incredulous face at the phone before saying:
“He asked what you’re doing today.”
Trinity claps once. “Fucking called it!”
“Trinity!” Dennis snaps, before sighing and tapping at your keyboard, “I’m telling him that you have a headache and you’re at our place and to please not text again—“
“No!” You squeal, launching yourself off the couch, arms outstretched, but your legs tangle over each other and you fall and slam, gloriously and beautifully, face first into the coffee table.
“Oo!” Trinity winces, covering her mouth.
“Oh my god!” Dennis balks, “Are you okay?”
“Just give me the fucking phone.”
Peeling your face off, you grab the phone, squinting at the screen and ignoring the black spots in the corner of your vision.
hi, you type, I’m at Trinity and Dennis’s. Did you need something?
You hit send before you can talk yourself out of it.
“We,” You haul yourself to your feet and stagger over to the kitchen table, “Will never speak of this.”
“I definitely am. When I’m the maid of honor at your guys wedding, I’m gonna give a speech and be all ‘you guys, she gave herself a concussion the first time he texted—‘“
“There will be no wedding!”
“That’s just what you think.”
Your phone vibrates again, signaling a response.
Just wondering how you were doing. Surprised to hear you’re not holed up in your apartment reading something.
Ah, sexy old men and their correct grammar and punctuation when texting. Shouldn’t be endearing.
“What’s he saying?”
“Go away!”
You tap out a quick response.
Not today unfortunately lol I have a headache so no reading for me
Isn’t this the sixth day in a row you’ve had a headache? Should I give neuro a call?
You stomach flips.
nooo I’m fine i get them all the time
That’s not exactly reassuring.
I went to the doctor for them awhile ago apparently they’re normal
Who?
if I tell you, are you going to call him and make him send over my chart?
Yes.
Your heart is starting to pound a fluttering beat in your chest, and you hunch over your phone.
then i’m not telling you. it’s fine, really
they usually go away when i take over the counter stuff
So your plan is just to destroy your liver?
pretty much
We need to work on your planning skills.
we?
I’m not doing all the work.
Now stop looking at your phone. Drink some Gatorade and take a nap.
this is a resident apartment there’s no gatorade here just redbulls
Have either of them buy you one. I’ll pay whichever one it is later. Go to sleep. You need it.
You turn off your phone, shuffling back over to the couch and flopping down onto it.
“I’m taking a nap. Jack wants one of you to go buy me a Gatorade. He said he’d pay you back later.”
“He said what?”
—
You end up sleeping the entire day away, which should have screwed up your sleep schedule, but thankfully you live in a state of perpetual exhaustion and are fully capable of falling asleep anytime, anywhere, no matter how much you last sleep. It’s a gift.
Shockingly, the shift you work the next day is actually much easier to survive and your smiles aren’t nearly as forced. Go figure. Who knew that getting an appropriate amount of sleep would be so helpful?
“Somebody’s in a better mood today.” Jack mutters as you sidle up next to him under the board.
“I’m pretty sure I slept for like, fourteen straight hours. Thanks for the Gatorade, by the way. I woke up around hour three, chugged it, and then went back to sleep. No headache when I woke up!”
“Wonderful,” He drawls, “It’s almost like taking care of yourself is actually beneficial.”
“I take care of myself plenty.”
He casts you a sidelong glance, expression pinched.
“When was the last time you drank water without being prompted?”
“That’s different.”
“Okay,” He dips his head, “When was the last time you ever felt truly relaxed?”
You give him a beaming smile, so wide it hurts. “We’re not going to talk about this right now!”
“You started this conversation. I’m trying to do my job.”
You snort. “You’re waiting to see if someone else is going to take the sunburn guy.”
“Are you accusing an attending of cherry picking?”
“Of course not. Just observing, sir.”
Jack’s turned to look at you now, head tilted up, hands folded behind his back.
When you say sir, his eyes flick down to your lips, and then his jaw tightens.
The air suddenly becomes charged, the space between you two filled with something too electric to be air.
It smells like aftershave, hospital antiseptic, wanting, and something that’s distinctly masculine.
You look away first, swallowing hard past the sudden dryness of your mouth.
“You know,” You say, crossing your arms and looking up at the board, “Trinity thinks you like me. Romantically.”
“Mm.”
“I told her that was dumb,” You babble, “Obviously it’s not true, but. She won’t let it go, so if she says something, just ignore her. Or not. Whatever you want.”
“Why wouldn’t it be true?”
You whip your head around so fast you’re pretty sure something cracks. “What?”
“I mean,” Jack’s voice is gruff as he shrugs once, “Is that really so unrealistic?”
“Of course it is,” You sputter, “You don’t like me.”
“I’ve actually never said that. That was a conclusion you came to on your own. I distinctly recall telling you that I don’t hate you.”
“Just because you don’t hate me doesn’t mean that you like me, let alone— like that.”
Jack tilts his head, almost predatory, and all that sharp tension rushes straight back in.
“Like what?”
Something hot and dangerous is starting to unfurl in your chest, untethering from where it was previously lodged deep behind your ribs, out of sight, out of feeling.
“Code Blue en route, ETA two minutes.”
Jack jerks his head in the direction of the ambulance bay. “You gonna go get that?”
“Uh,” You’re pretty sure you’re stroking out, having a seizure, or something, because the only thing you’re capable of comprehending is the fact that Jack just not-so-subtly implied to actually liking you. Romantically.
“Get going then.”
You scurry away, hot all over and absolutely done with emotions in their entirety.
—
The rest of the week is hell on Earth. Perks of being in your twenties.
Things could be worse though!
Kind of.
It’s just that it’s been several days since Jack basically confirmed Trinity’s suspicions on romance and you can’t stop thinking about it. Obsessively.
It’s bad.
Bad enough that when Mel asked if there was any way you could cover her shift, you said yes.
“Okay,” Dennis stage-whispers as you’re downing your third coffee of the day, miserably charting at the nurses station, “I feel the need to ask how bad things can possibly be if you’re covering a day shift.”
“Mel asked.”
Dennis blinks incredulously. “You love Mel, but not enough to work a day shift voluntarily.”
“What exactly are you asking me here?”
“Did you and Jack hit a rough patch or something?”
“Keep your voice down!” You hiss, ducking your head as if you can hide from Princess and Perlah, “And for your information, no. We didn’t. I just wanted to do something nice for Mel.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t need you to believe me.”
Day-shift crawls on in a whirlwind of chaos and a level of dumb-fuckery that can only be achieved from the hours of 8 a.m to 8 p.m. As usual, the place is understaffed, overcrowded, and filled with a lingering sense of impending doom.
By the time night-shift starts filtering in, you’re ready to completely give up and start a new life a sheep rancher in New Zealand. It’s always been the plan if being a doctor didn’t work out.
Jack finds you in the locker room once the handoff is over, sitting on the little bench in the same position Dennis found you in earlier. Face in your hands, heels in your eyes, methodically counting breaths and wondering if that fluttering feeling in your chest is from caffeine consumption or sleep deprivation.
It’s fine. Your fine. Everything is fine.
“You don’t look too good.”
“I’m—“
“Don’t say you’re fine.”
“But I am,” You grit, “I just need a minute.”
“Okay.”
There’s the distinct sound of Jack’s slightly uneven footsteps, and then there’s a warm weight pressed against your side.
You take another shuddering breath that feels less like breathing and more like placing a single brick in a wobbly foundation.
“Shouldn’t you be out on the floor?”
“I don’t work tonight.”
You raise your head just enough to look at him. “You don’t? I thought I saw you on the schedule. Why are you here if you don’t work?”
Now that you’re looking at him and not starburst patterns on the back of your eyelids, you can see that he’s wearing casual clothes, not scrubs, and he doesn’t have his usual army-issue backpack with him.
“I got Shen to cover me. I came here for you.”
Your next breath in almost gets stuck in your chest, air struggling to move past that alive and wriggling thing that keeps moving every time Jack is around.
“What’d you do that for?”
The barest hints of a smile tugs at the corner of his lips. “Dennis called me. He said you’d need picking up after your shift.”
Shame, guilt, and embarrassment flood your veins, turning your blood into sickly-sweet poison that makes your stomach roll and twist.
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I have no idea why he did that. You really didn’t have to drive all the way over here, I swear I didn’t tell him to call you or something like that—“
“I know you didn’t,” Jack soothes, voice a rumbly, smooth timber that washes over your permanently-frazzled nerves like a balm, “Which is why I came.”
“I don’t understand.”
Jack stands, pulling your bag and change of clothes out of your locker.
“I’m going to ask you a question, and I need you to be honest with me, so you don’t have to answer it again. Can you do that for me?”
You nod once.
“Words.”
“Uh— yeah. Yes.”
“Good.”
Thank god the locker room is empty— everyone’s either on the floor or already left for their homes.
He closes your locker down, shoulders your bag, and hands you your clothes.
“Is it easier for you to accept help when you don’t have to ask and don’t get the chance to say no?”
It sounds so pathetic, hearing it laid out like that. The ugly guts of you; cut open, laid bare, and marked for research. Exhibit A, the inside of the girl no one ever needed to worry about.
You don’t want to agree. You want to laugh it off, maybe run away from it. Sit up straight, wipe your face, take the bag from Jack and explain that this is all a big misunderstanding and you’re perfectly fine and he can stop worrying about you now.
“Yes.”
Jack doesn’t verbally acknowledge your response besides a single dip of his head, like he knows that if he does anything more it’ll turn your response into a confession and that’s just too vulnerable for the hospital locker room.
“I’ll drive you home.”
“I don’t mean to be this way, you know.”
The passenger seat of Jack’s car isn’t somewhere you’d ever imagined yourself being. Not even late at night or on the bus when you’re pretending to be someone else who’s better at chasing what they want.
“It stopped being intentional a long time ago,” your hands are fisted into the material of your sweatpants, nails digging into the fabric, “It was just the natural progression of things. I like being liked.”
What you don’t say, what becomes an unspoken truth that lingers in the air despite not being verbalized, is the survival aspect of it. Why and how a person fuses this kind of thing to their personality; to their life. The circumstances that makes the natural progression of things end it being better for everyone if you just don’t have needs.
“I know.”
“I know you know, I just… needed to tell you. Myself.”
It’s odd seeing Jack illuminated by streetlights instead of fluorescent overheads. It’s odd being able to watch his hand flex on the steering wheel, watching his forearm tense as he shifts gears in his old stick-shift.
“You like being told what to do.”
Your face heats, but you’re determined not to lose face now. Especially after managing to survive being emotionally flayed open, willingly, by him.
“It feels safe. If I know what yo— someone wants, then I can’t mess it up, and I can relax.”
You can practically see the gears turning in Jack’s mind.
“Makes sense.”
The rest of the drive is quiet, the silence only filled by the sounds of Pittsburgh around you and the gentle crackle of something from the radio turned down too low to hear.
And for the first time in longer than you can remember, you begin feeling something that approaches calm.
Jack doesn’t have any expectations. There isn’t any one particular way he wants you to act or expects you to behave like. There’s nothing he wants you to do.
So you do what you want to do.
You relax.
—
In the weeks following Jack driving you home, there is a quantifiable shift in behavior between the two of you.
He starts pulling back.
It strikes you as odd first, and your natural inclination is to pull back too— to guard the soft, vulnerable bits you’ve showed him in case he throws them back at you.
But then you realize what he’s doing.
Instead of telling you how to proceed on a case when you come to him for advice, he asks you questions and steers you to the answer. He holds back when he’s evaluating a case with you, patiently following your lead and only interjecting when necessary.
He’s making space for you try new things and learn without fear of rejection. Building your confidence bit by bit.
It feels more intimate than sex.
After much deliberation, screaming into your pillow, and Reddit forum searching for HR violations, you decide to get him a card. Because he’s actually been really kind and helpful and he makes you feel like you can actually survive residency.
“What’s this?”
“A thank you card.”
You’re staring at your shoes, eyes flicking up and down between Jack’s face and the floor.
“What for?”
“It says it in the card.”
You scurry away, attaching yourself to the closest patient to avoid seeing Jack’s face when he does finally open it.
But when you look back, he’s just staring at it, a small smile on his face.
—
It’s the card that does him in.
Jack hasn’t made his feelings for you a secret, despite your unwillingness to see him as anything other than standoffish in the beginning.
He came on too strong at first— that was his fault. He didn’t yet understand how imbedded your need ran and how long it’d been since anyone bothered to look deeper.
He’d hoped, at least, that you were letting Whitaker and Santos help, and though you let them closer than most, it was clear you still seemed intent on holding up yourself and everyone around you on your own.
But it wasn’t just that. It was the way you oozed kindness— like it was a byproduct of your existence. He watched you get so wrapped up in being the perfect resident, perfect friend, perfect person, that no one ever stopped to let you know how good you were just by being.
He hadn’t planned on developing feelings or anything of the sort. At first, you’d just been one of his residents. Smart and capable but lacking confidence in yourself to fully commit. Then there was that MCI, and drinks in the park afterwards where he’d painfully watched you sip a beer you clearly hated, and everything just clicked right into place.
He never intends to flirt with you. It just happens. He can’t help himself. He’s a weak fucking man when it comes to you.
And then you bring him a card. A fucking card. To thank him for doing his job as an attending, a job he should’ve been doing better from the start. It has an illustration of bananas on it and says “Thanks a bunch!”.
He knows he’s completely gone, then. He was capable of being in denial before, could delude himself into thinking that what he felt was casual, but the sight of you before him, hands nervously wringing, your glitter gel pens sparkling as they caught the light was just the final nail in the coffin.
He allows himself a modicum of flirting on a day to day basis, mostly because if he couldn’t tease that real smile out of you at least once per day, he’d lose his mind.
Sometimes he takes you back to the diner, especially on longer days where none of your smiles reach your eyes and you start obsessively uncapping and capping your gel pens.
Even though you think it “looks dumb” you’ve also taken to sitting shoulder to shoulder with him in the booth, and he pretends he can’t see you sneaking fries off his plate because he knows how much effort it takes you to ask him if you can sit with him instead of on the opposite side.
Then he starts driving you home during a string of bad weather after you start sneezing from walking in the rain everyday, but even after the storm passes and the weather clears up he still finds you at the lockers, every day, car keys in hand. No matter how many times he does it, you always look so happily surprised that he’s still offering.
As if he’s not wrapped around your finger.
One day, after things have been mellow for awhile, Whitaker calls him and says that neither he nor Trinity have seen you in three days and you called out of work.
So naturally, as a calm and collected man, he showed up to your house.
You’d answered the door after the third time he knocked (which was great, because he was gearing up to force the door open) and you just looked miserable. Your hair was a mess, you head blanket wrinkles imprinted onto your face, and your eyes were puffy.
“Jack?” You’d mumbled, squinting your eyes against the not very bright light in the hallway, “Why are you at my apartment?”
“No one’s heard from you in three days.”
You wince. “I swear I meant to text Trinity. I just have a bad headache.”
His fingers twitch towards a penlight he doesn’t have. “How bad?”
“I don’t know. Like a seven on the pain scale?”
“Jesus— I’m coming in.”
“Nooo,” You cry, but shuffle back from the door and put up very little fight as he ushers you to the couch.
Your apartment is….. exactly as messy as he’d imagined a resident who lives alone would be. For someone who doesn’t drink enough water, there are an incredible amount of beverage bottles and cans littered about.
“Do you have headache relief?”
You gesture to the kitchen. “Cabinet furthest to the left.”
While rifling through your very disorganized medicine cabinet, he spies an orange prescription bottle with your name on it, dated for the previous year.
“Why do you have a prescription for a high level antihistamine?”
“Stop snooping. It’s for my migraines.”
“You’ve had a prescription this entire time and you’ve been taking all that over the counter shit?”
“Stop being mad,” You mumble into the couch cushion, “My migraine meds put me to sleep, so I can’t take them when I’m working. Plus I don’t have any refills left so I save them for when it’s really bad.”
“You called out of work and haven’t left your apartment in three days and you don’t consider this bad?”
“Could be worse. Could be throwing up.”
He sighs. Sets the bottle on the counter, breathes in once, then lets it out slowly. Imagines all the ways he could murder whoever made you think suffering alone for three days is preferable to asking for help.
“I’m going to help you back to bed,” He starts, voice low as he rounds the couch, “And then you’re going to drink some electrolytes, have a snack, and take your meds. Okay?”
The migraine has clearly taken it out of you, because you put up zero fight as he manhandles you to your feet and helps you drag yourself back to your bed.
“M’ sorry my apartment is a mess. I was supposed to clean it.”
“I’m not judging, sweetheart,” He says, tucking the blankets up around you, lips twitching as you make grabby hands for a giant triceratops plushie that looks to be the size of your upper body. “I’m gonna make you a snack, so try to stay awake until I come back. Can you do that?”
“Mhm. I’ll try.”
“Good girl.”
He manages to find a cucumber in your fridge, cuts it into slices and then adds a few pieces of lunch meat for protein. Last but not least, he snags a bottle of blue Gatorade from your pantry.
(He only knows they were there because he bought them for you a few weeks ago.)
He doesn’t make you sit up to eat, but instead scoots you a little ways away from the edge of your bed so there’s space for the plate.
You slowly nibble your way through, taking little sips of Gatorade when he nudges the bottle into your hands.
You finish the cucumbers, eat most of the lunch meat, and drink half the Gatorade before burrowing back into the blankets and declaring yourself done.
“Can I have my sleep mask please? I think it’s on the floor under my nightstand?”
“Of course you can.”
After your face mask is on and the curtains closed, he gives you the correct dose of your meds and gently shuts the door to your bedroom.
He fires off a quick text to Whitaker (he doesn’t have Santos’s number) that says you’re fine, stuck in bed with a migraine, and that he’s handling it.
And then he gets to work.
Two hours later your apartment is clean, your laundry is started, and Jack’s relaxing on your couch, aimlessly watching the news.
He hears the door creak open but knows you hate feeling on the spot, so he keeps his gaze trained on the tv even as he hears the sound of you shuffling over to the couch.
And then you pause.
“Jack.”
“Yes?”
“Did you clean my apartment?”
He finally looks over to you, and when his gaze reaches your face his stomach drops.
You’re crying.
He hauls himself off the couch (he’s thankful that he put his leg back on a few minutes prior) and stops in front of you, arms twitching at his sides with the need to fix, help, to stop whatever it is that’s making you cry.
“What’s wrong? Did I overstep?”
“No,” You warble, voice wet, “I just haven’t had the time or energy to clean in here for so long, and it’s been stressing me out so bad I avoid staying here during my off days. It’s just really, really nice of you.”
You look at him, eyebrows pinched and eyes wide with worry, “I— I’m not sure how to repay you for all of this. I know you said going to the diner was fine, but this is— a lot.”
“Sweetheart,” He starts, bracing one hand on the side of your face, thumb deftly sweeping across your cheek and wiping away the quickly drying tears, “I’m not doing any of this because I expect you to repay me. I’m doing it because I care about you and I want to see you happy.”
You sniff hard. “This is a lot of work, though.”
“I like doing it. I like taking care of you.”
Another sniff. “It doesn’t seem very fun.”
“I told you. You’re like a cat. Had to coax you over and now look at you,” he thumb rubs circles over your cheekbone, “Practically purring.”
You wrinkle your nose. “I don’t know if I like this metaphor.”
“Get used to it.”
You sigh, dramatic and long.
“I suppose I’ll allow it.”
“Oh, you’ll allow it, huh.”
You fold your hands behind your back, rocking back and forth on your heels. “Yes. I’ll allow it.”
“Well, aren’t I lucky.”
Later, when you’re lying on the couch, two movies into what Jack thinks is an unofficial early 2000s rom-com marathon (your favorite genre) you turn to look up at him from your spot tucked into his side.
“This is romantic, right?”
He presses a lazy kiss to your forehead, because he knows how much you like physical affirmations as well as verbal ones.
“Yes.”
“You’re serious about this?”
“You need confirmation?”
“I’d rather have it in writing, but this will do for now.”
He huffs a breathy laugh, tucks you closer to his chest.
“I’ll put it in writing for you later.”
You hum, pleased, and snuggle back into him, letting out a content sigh.
SUMMARY: The ER is not a pleasant place to work when you’re six months pregnant. The constant check-ins from your coworkers and patients is one thing, but the attention from Jack Abbot? That’s another thing entirely, and it thrills and terrifies you all at once.
NOTES: Pregnancy, single mother reader, mentions of absent co-parent, canon-typical workplace stress + scenarios, mentions of Jack’s wife, vulnerability, Jack is so sappy and sweet in this.
REQUESTED BY: Anonymous.
NAVIGATION | PITT MASTERLIST | KO-FI
You hated being treated differently. The frustrating thing was that everyone seemed to think they were being kind.
Ever since the pregnancy had become impossible to hide, people had started looking at you differently. Patients asked if you should really be working. Nurses tried to take things out of your hands. Residents hovered whenever you lifted anything heavier than a clipboard. Every conversation seemed to begin or end with somebody asking if you were alright.
You knew they meant well, and that somehow made it worse. You were twenty-six weeks pregnant, not made of glass.
Most days you could ignore it. Most days you smiled politely, accepted the concern for what it was, and carried on. You had chosen to keep working. You loved your job. The emergency department was exhausting and chaotic and occasionally heartbreaking, but it was yours. It gave structure to days that might otherwise have been swallowed whole by anxiety.
The anxiety was harder to admit, but nobody seemed concerned about that part. Nobody saw the moments you sat alone in your apartment after a shift with one hand resting over your stomach, wondering if you were making the right choices. Nobody saw the nights when you woke up terrified by the sheer scale of what was coming.
You were going to be somebody’s mother. The thought still knocked the breath out of you. You were going to do it alone, and that part was worse.
The baby’s father had left months ago, long before anyone at work knew about the pregnancy. There had been no screaming argument. No dramatic betrayal. Just a gradual retreat until one day you realised you were the only person still fighting for something that no longer existed.
You had survived it. You would continue surviving it. You didn’t have any other choice. Which was why you absolutely refused to become somebody else’s responsibility, especially Jack Abbot’s.
“Why have I got room fourteen?”
The question escaped before you could stop yourself. Dana looked up from the desk.
“What about room fourteen?”
You stared at the assignment sheet in your hand. Room fourteen contained the sweetest little old lady currently waiting for discharge paperwork. Room twelve contained a man with a minor fracture. Room nine needed routine medication.
That was it. No aggressive intoxication. No psychiatric hold. No combative family members. No complicated trauma patients. Nothing.
It was practically a holiday.
You narrowed your eyes. Across the department, Jack was discussing scans with one of the residents, words thorough and professional despite the toll the rare day shift was taking on him.
Your gaze lingered. Unfortunately, Jack’s eyes lifted almost immediately. Straight to you. The man possessed some supernatural ability to know when you were looking at him.
Your stomach performed an irritating little flip. That was becoming a problem. Actually, no. The crush was the problem. The stomach flipping was merely a symptom.
Jack’s expression remained perfectly neutral. You pointed at your assignment sheet. He looked away immediately, seemingly guilty.
You knew it.
Ten minutes later you cornered him near the medication room. “Stop it.”
His eyebrows rose. “Good afternoon to you too.”
“You’re doing it again.”
“I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You keep changing my assignments.”
“I don’t make assignments.”
“Jack.”
His mouth twitched. That tiny almost-smile somehow made him more infuriating.
“You have no proof.”
“I don’t need proof.”
“Yes, honey, you do.”
“Don’t ‘honey’ me, Jack. You keep giving me easier patients.”
Jack folded his arms. The movement pulled at the sleeves of his scrub top. Your traitorous brain noticed entirely too much about him these days. The broad shoulders. The wedding ring he still wore. The permanent exhaustion around his eyes.
The gentleness he tried so hard to hide beneath sarcasm. “You think I have nothing better to do than secretly manipulate patient assignments?”
“Yes.”
That earned an actual laugh. A short one. Rare enough that it briefly distracted you. Jack shook his head.
“I think that’s insane. You’re being a bit… God, what did Javadi call it? Delulu?”
“Never say that again. I’m serious.”
“God forbid a guy try something new.”
You stared at each other. The familiar tension settled into place almost immediately. Neither of you ever acknowledged it. Nobody else seemed to notice it either, which felt impossible.
You noticed everything when it came to him. The way his voice softened around frightened patients. The way he instinctively positioned himself between vulnerable people and whatever was upsetting them. The way he always appeared beside you whenever a shift became overwhelming.
That last one was definitely intentional.
The problem was that Jack never did anything obvious enough to challenge. Every act of care was disguised as practicality.
A patient would need transferring and somebody else would mysteriously volunteer before you could. You would arrive at the break room to find tea already waiting. A difficult relative would somehow end up redirected towards an attending physician instead of a pregnant nurse nearing the end of a twelve-hour shift.
None of it was dramatic. None of it could be called out without sounding ridiculous. Still, you knew.
“You don’t need to look after me.”
The words came out quieter than intended. Something changed in his expression. Not much. Just enough.
For a moment, neither of you spoke. The noise of the department seemed strangely distant.
“You know,” Jack said eventually, “it’s possible for people to help each other without it meaning something.”
The statement should have reassured you. Instead it hurt. You weren’t entirely sure why. Perhaps because you wanted it to mean something. That was the truth you kept trying not to examine too closely. You wanted his attention. You looked for him at the start of every shift. You noticed when he wasn’t there. You noticed when he looked tired. You noticed everything.
The feelings had arrived slowly and then all at once. Now they sat heavily in your chest, impossible to ignore.
You forced a smile. “Fine.”
“Fine.”
“You still need to stop.”
His eyes held yours. For a second you thought he might argue. Instead he sighed.
“You are the most stubborn person I’ve ever met.”
You laughed despite yourself. “That’s rich coming from you.”
A trauma alert sounded overhead. The moment vanished instantly. Jack pushed away from the wall. Professional mask sliding neatly back into place.
You hated how easily he could do that.
As though he could simply lock parts of himself away whenever necessary. You wondered what it would be like to be that controlled. To not feel everything so intensely all the time.
“Come on,” he said. “Work calls.”
You fell into step beside him. Close enough to hear his breathing, and to smell hospital soap and coffee. Close enough that the ache in your chest returned before you’d even reached the trauma bay.
You wished it would stop. You wished it would get worse. Neither option seemed particularly safe.
Especially not when Jack glanced at you as the doors opened and asked, quietly enough that nobody else could hear,
“You feeling alright today?”
The concern in his voice was genuine. Simple. Uncomplicated. Somehow that made it harder to answer than any question you’d faced all week.
The trauma ended up being far less dramatic than the alert had suggested. A motor vehicle collision. Two patients, both conscious. One broken wrist, one nasty laceration that looked significantly worse than it actually was. Nobody needed a miracle.
For once, the emergency department managed to survive a trauma call without the world ending. You should have felt relieved. Instead, the restlessness that had settled beneath your skin earlier refused to leave.
Jack’s question kept replaying in your head. ‘You feeling alright today?’. Such an ordinary thing to ask. People asked it all the time. The difference was that most people weren’t really asking. Most people wanted reassurance. A quick smile and a simple yes.
Jack always seemed to want the truth. That was what made him dangerous. He paid attention. It would have been easier if he didn’t. Easier if he were merely an attractive older guy with freckles and muscles and curls. A crush based on appearances would eventually burn itself out.
Unfortunately, every shift seemed determined to reveal another reason to fall for him. You hated that. Mostly because there was absolutely nothing sensible about it.
Jack was older than you. Widowed. Emotionally complicated in ways you suspected only a therapist fully understood.
You were carrying another man’s baby.
The timing couldn’t have been worse if someone had deliberately arranged it.
Yet every time he looked at you, some foolish part of your heart seemed convinced there was still something worth hoping for.
By three, your lower back felt like it had been replaced with concrete. The baby had apparently decided sleep was for cowards and had spent the last hour enthusiastically rearranging your internal organs.
You were updating notes at the nurses’ station when a sharp kick landed beneath your ribs. The involuntary wince escaped before you could stop it.
Unfortunately, somebody noticed. Of course somebody noticed. “Everything alright?”
You looked up. Jack. Again. The man appeared with the consistency of a haunting. You straightened immediately.
“Fine.”
“You know I was literally standing here when that happened, sweetheart.”
“I’m still fine.”
“You made a face.”
“I make faces all the time.”
“You looked like somebody stabbed you.”
“That’s slightly dramatic.”
His expression remained unconvinced. The irritating thing was that he wasn’t hovering. Not really. He wasn’t fussing or ordering you to sit down. He was simply standing there looking concerned. Which somehow made it impossible to dismiss.
The baby kicked again. Your hand moved automatically towards your stomach. A subconscious gesture. One you’d barely realised you’d started doing.
Something softened in Jack’s face. The sight of it nearly undid you. There was no pity there. No awkwardness. No discomfort. Just warmth.
Your pulse stumbled. Dangerous. Very dangerous.
“You should take ten.”
“No.”
“Five.”
“No.”
“Two and a half?”
A laugh escaped despite yourself.
“You negotiate with trauma surgeons like this?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“They aren’t as terrifying as you.”
You rolled your eyes. Jack looked suspiciously pleased with himself. The sight made something warm spread through your chest. You hated how often that happened around him. The feeling had become increasingly difficult to ignore. Particularly during the quieter moments.
Those moments were always the worst. Those were the moments when you remembered how easy it felt to talk to him. You couldn’t pinpoint when it had started. At some point he’d stopped feeling like an attending physician and started feeling like Jack. The distinction mattered more than it should have.
“You know,” he said eventually, leaning against the counter beside you, “it’s alright to admit that you’re tired.”
You stared at the computer screen. The blinking cursor suddenly seemed fascinating.
“Who says I’m tired?”
“You’ve had three cups of coffee in ninety minutes.”
“Maybe I like coffee.”
“You hate coffee.”
Your head dropped backwards. “Oh, come on.”
His smile widened. “You told me.”
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
You looked at him. Actually looked. The man remembered entirely too much. The realisation struck with uncomfortable force.
Six months ago.
You couldn’t remember half the conversations you’d had yesterday. Jack remembered an offhand comment from six months ago.
Your chest tightened. The feeling wasn’t entirely pleasant. Part of you wanted to bask in it. The rest wanted to run. Nobody had paid attention to you like this in a very long time. Not before the pregnancy. Certainly not after.
The baby’s father had forgotten things constantly. Appointments. Plans. Conversations. You had spent months shrinking your expectations just to avoid disappointment.
Now here was Jack remembering your coffee preferences. The comparison felt unfair. Your emotions didn’t seem particularly concerned with fairness.
His gaze lingered. Not challenging. Not pushing. Just waiting. You wondered whether he knew how difficult that made things. Most people demanded explanations.
Jack simply offered space. The urge to step into it was becoming overwhelming.
A sudden rush of emotion caught you completely off guard. Exhaustion. Fear. Hormones. Loneliness.
Whatever combination was responsible, it hit hard enough to sting behind your eyes. You looked away immediately. Embarrassing. The last thing you needed was to start crying at the nurses’ station.
Jack didn’t comment. Another kindness. He simply moved slightly closer. Close enough that you could feel the steady presence of him. Not touching. Never assuming. Just there. Ready if needed. The gesture nearly hurt.
“You’re allowed to lean on people sometimes.”
The words were quiet. Careful. As though he wasn’t entirely sure he should be saying them.
You laughed softly. A humourless sound. “That’s easy for you to say.”
His expression shifted. Something sad flickering briefly across his face. “You’d be surprised.”
The answer lodged somewhere deep. You knew enough about Jack to understand what wasn’t being said. The grief he carried everywhere despite pretending otherwise. Perhaps that was why being around him felt so different.
He never treated pain like weakness. He understood it too well.
A call light sounded down the corridor. The interruption should have felt annoying. Instead it came as a relief. The conversation had wandered dangerously close to honesty. Neither of you seemed entirely prepared for that.
You pushed away from the desk. Professional instincts taking over. Work was easier. Work always had been. People made sense when they were patients. Charts and medications and treatment plans were infinitely simpler than feelings.
Jack watched you stand. Something unreadable lingered in his eyes. Then it disappeared, locked away behind professionalism once again.
You found yourself wishing, not for the first time, that he would let you see what lived underneath it. The frightening thing was that you suspected he wished exactly the same thing about you.
The shift should have ended an hour ago. That was the thought repeating itself through your head as you stared at a computer screen that no longer seemed capable of forming coherent words.
Every part of you ached. Your feet hurt. Your back hurt. Your shoulders felt impossibly tight. Even the baby seemed exhausted, the constant movement from earlier reduced to occasional sleepy stretches beneath your ribs.
The emergency department had entered that strange period between night and morning. The chaos was winding down. Exhaustion was settling over everyone like a heavy blanket.
Those were always the dangerous hours. The hours when emotions started slipping through cracks you’d spent all shift holding together.
You rubbed a hand across your face and tried to focus on the discharge paperwork in front of you. The words blurred. For a moment you simply sat there staring at them.
Then, completely without warning, your eyes filled.
“Oh, for God’s sake.” You muttered it to yourself.
Nobody else heard. At least, that was what you thought. You blinked rapidly and forced yourself to take a breath. You were not going to cry.
Not here. Not now.
The ridiculous thing was that nothing had actually happened. It was just exhaustion. Pure, relentless exhaustion. The kind that seemed to hollow you out from the inside.
You loved your baby already. Loved them with a fierceness that still startled you.
That didn’t mean you weren’t frightened.
Every day seemed to bring a new thing to worry about. The nursery. Money. Childcare. Labour. The future. The endless responsibility waiting just around the corner.
Most of the time you managed to carry it.
Tonight it suddenly felt very heavy.
“You missed a spot.”
You jumped.
Jack was standing beside the desk, a takeaway cup rested in one hand.
You stared. Then frowned. “What?”
“The discharge summary.” He pointed towards the screen. “There.”
Sure enough, you’d missed an entire section. Your shoulders slumped. “Oh.”
Jack studied you for a second. Long enough that you knew he’d noticed. The tears. The exhaustion. All of it.
You looked away first. Humiliation immediately flooding your chest.
“You should go home.”
You laughed quietly. “I was planning to.”
“No.” His voice softened. “I mean now.”
The concern in it almost made things worse.
You swallowed hard. “I’m nearly finished.”
“You look exhausted.”
“I am exhausted.”
“Then go home, sweetheart.”
Something inside you cracked. Not dramatically. Not all at once. Just enough that holding everything together suddenly became impossible.
You looked down at your hands, at the hospital ID badge hanging from your neck, at anything except him.
The words came out before you could stop them. “I don’t get to stop.”
Silence.
Your throat tightened. You hated this. Hated feeling exposed. Hated feeling weak. Most of all, hated how desperately you wanted somebody to understand.
“I don’t get to fall apart,” you continued quietly. “Everybody keeps telling me to rest and take breaks and ask for help, but at the end of the day it’s still just me.”
The confession hung between you. Entirely honest. You hadn’t meant to say any of it. Months of fear seemed to have slipped free without permission.
“I go home and it’s just me.”
Your voice wavered. You pressed your lips together immediately.
For a long moment neither of you spoke. The department carried on around you, life continuing exactly as normal. Meanwhile your entire chest felt like it had been turned inside out.
Then Jack set the coffee cup down. Carefully. As though sudden movements might break something. And, maybe they would.
His gaze never left yours. “You know what’s been driving me insane for the last few months?”
The question caught you completely off guard. You frowned. “What?”
“You.” Jack huffed out a short laugh. Not amused. Nervous. The sound alone was shocking. You weren’t sure you’d ever seen him nervous before. “You refuse help from everybody.”
Your mouth opened.
He continued before you could interrupt. “You carry everything yourself. Every shift. Every appointment. Every problem.”
“Jack—”
“You never let anybody look after you.”
The words landed harder than they should have. Emotion immediately tightened your throat again. You looked away. He wasn’t finished. You could tell. The realisation sent your pulse racing.
“I keep telling myself to stop.” His voice had gone quieter now. Rougher. “I keep telling myself you’re perfectly capable and none of this is my business.”
You slowly looked back at him. Neither of you seemed capable of looking away anymore. The space between you felt impossibly small, despite the fact neither of you had moved.
“I know you don’t need me.” The confession sat heavily between you. “I know that.”
His jaw tightened briefly, the way it always did when he was forcing himself to continue.
“But every time you walk into a shift looking exhausted, I want to help.”
Your heart stumbled, then stopped entirely.
“I want to take the difficult patients.” His eyes never left yours. “I want to make things easier.”
Another breath. Another heartbeat.
“I want to be the person who carries some of it when it gets too heavy.”
The world seemed strangely quiet. Every sound fading into the background. Your eyes burned again. This time you didn’t care. You’d spent months convincing yourself you were imagining it. Misreading kindness. Projecting your own feelings onto harmless gestures.
Now Jack was standing in front of you looking like he’d rather face another mass casualty event than this conversation.
The sight nearly broke your heart.
“You know why that’s a problem?” he asked softly.
You shook your head. The answer came anyway.
“Because somewhere along the way I stopped doing it just because I care about my staff.”
The breath left your lungs. “Oh.”
Brilliant response. Truly. Jack laughed quietly, a little helplessly. The sound made your chest ache.
“Oh,” he echoed.
For one terrifying second neither of you spoke. Then something shifted. Perhaps it was exhaustion, or relief, or simply the fact you’d both spent too long pretending.
Whatever it was, it finally pushed you forward.
“You make me feel safe.”
The words escaped before you could second-guess them. Jack froze. You continued anyway.
“If that’s a horrible thing to admit, then fine.”
A shaky laugh slipped out. Your eyes filled again.
“You make me feel looked after. I keep trying not to need that.”
Jack’s expression softened completely. “You don’t have to earn being cared for.”
The sentence hit harder than everything else combined. Nobody had ever said that to you before. Not like that. Not as though they genuinely believed it. A tear escaped, and then another, but you couldn’t even bring yourself to care.
Jack stepped closer. Slowly. Giving you every opportunity to stop him. You didn’t. His hand settled against your arm. The simple contact nearly undid you.
For months you’d been carrying everything alone.
Not because you wanted to, but because you thought you had to. The difference suddenly felt enormous.
Neither of you said anything for a while.
There wasn’t much left to say. The truth was already sitting between you. Visible at last. Jack’s thumb brushed lightly against your sleeve. A tiny movement so careful that it made your chest ache.
The man looked at you as though you were something precious. The realisation was terrifying. It was also wonderful.
For the first time in a very long while, the future didn’t seem quite so frightening.
Nothing had magically been fixed. You were still pregnant. Still scared. Still facing a thousand uncertainties.
Jack was still carrying grief of his own. Life remained complicated. Messy. Difficult.
Yet standing there beneath fluorescent hospital lights, with exhaustion pulling at both of you and dawn beginning to creep through distant windows, something fundamental had changed.
The loneliness wasn’t quite so sharp anymore.
For months you’d been trying to convince yourself that strength meant carrying everything alone. Looking at Jack now, you finally understood how wrong you’d been. Sometimes strength looked a lot more like letting somebody stay.
